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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



An Electrical Experiment of the Eigh- 

 teenth Century. The apparatus here rep- 

 resented is composed of a globe of sulphur 

 which a young abbe causes to turn by means 

 of a crank and wheel, while the woman ex- 



cites electrical action by means of the friction 

 of her hand on the ball. A young man 

 suspended horizontally by cords of silk be- 

 comes electrically excited, and causes the 

 spark to fly from the end of his finger by 



AN OLD ELECTRICAL EXPERIMENT. 



putting it near a stick which another ex- 

 perimenter extends toward him. Experi- 

 ments of this kind were much in fashion 

 about the middle of the last century. They 

 assumed many variations, but the one here 

 represented was repeated frequently. The 

 contrast between this simple apparatus and 

 the hundreds of machines from the most 

 delicate to the most powerful, applicable to 

 a wonderful variety of purposes possessed 

 by the electricians of the present day, helps 

 us to realize the amazing rapidity with which 

 improvements are made, and justifies the 

 liveliest hopes for the advancement of elec- 

 tric art in the future. 



Lessons from the Tongue of the Bee. 



Professor A. J. Cook publishes, in the 

 " American Bee Journal," some extremely 

 interesting conclusions, which he has de- 

 rived from the study of the tongue of the 

 honey-bee. The accounts of the entomolo- 

 gists who have written upon the construc- 

 tion of this organ are conflicting and gener- 

 ally inaccurate. They do not agree as to its 



shape ; some say that it is solid, others that 

 it is tubular ; some that the insects lap the 

 liquids in which they feed, others that they 

 take it by suction. By combining the stud- 

 ies that have been made by Mr. V. T. Cham- 

 bers and Mr. J. D. Hyatt on the anatomy 

 of the tongue of the bee with his own in- 

 vestigations, Professor Cook has been con- 

 vinced that those who believe that the liquid 

 is lapped up, that it is sucked through the 

 tongue as a tube, and that it is drawn 

 through a tube which is formed by the ap- 

 proximation of the ligula (or tongue), the 

 palpi, and the maxillae, are all right. The 

 physiology of the tongue and the related 

 organs adapts them to use in either of 

 these methods ; the bee has been detected 

 in gathering nectar by all of them ; and the 

 presence of the fluid in passage has been de- 

 monstrated in the several organs the use of 

 which is required by the different theories. 

 The honey appears to be most abundantly 

 secured by means of the tube formed by the 

 closing up of the ligula, the palpi, and the 

 maxilla. The ligula, or tongue, extends 



