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POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



aluminum on the surface of the metal. The 

 addition to the cadmium iodide of the two 

 chlorides of zinc and ammonium, previously 

 fused together, results in a flux, which read- 

 ily enables tin (or other soldering alloy) to 

 unite perfectly with aluminum. 



NOTES. 



Mr. Vernon Harcourt has retired from 

 the general secretaryship of the British 

 Association, which he has held for fourteen 

 years ; and Prof. Roberts Austen, who has 

 for some time assisted in the work, has been 

 chosen to succeed him. 



M. B. Renault, a French investigator, 

 has long been working at the identification 

 of fossil bacteria. The general results of 

 his observations have recently been pub- 

 lished. He believes them to have been co- 

 eval with the first appearance of organic 

 life on the earth, the spherical form being 

 earlier than the rodlike. He has found indi- 

 cations of their presence in bone, teeth, and 

 scales, and also in vegetable tissues. The 

 species are, as a rule, distinct from those 

 at present in existence. 



Few States, says Mr. John Gifford, in 

 his report on the forestry of that State, 

 " have been more thoroughly deforested than 

 New Jersey. Just how to mitigate this evil 

 without the expenditure of large sums of 

 money and without infringing on private 

 rights, or without adding to the expense of 

 those who are already burdened with un- 

 profitable land, is indeed a difficult problem 

 on which there is great diversity of opinion. 

 After a visit to several of the principal forest 

 regions of Europe . . . the writer believes 

 that great caution is necessary in this work, 

 and that what is gained must come little by 

 little until America has, after much experi- 

 mentation, developed her own systems ap- 

 plicable to her varied climate, species, soils, 

 and demands." The first and most impor- 

 tant steps are the prevention of conflagra- 

 tions and the construction of roads in forest 

 regions. 



The method of the computation of the 

 Chinese calendar is described hy Paul d'Enjoy 

 in the Bulletins de la Societe d' Anthropolo- 

 gic, 1896, p. 52 : "Every year is named by 

 a combination of two words according to a 

 fixed rule, and the special combination is sup- 

 posed to indicate the fortunes of the year. 

 The year 1896 was the period of the external 

 hearth and the monkey ; that is a time of 

 dangers from abroad, which must be met by 

 cunning and dexterity. In 1897 the Chinese 

 enter into calmer times, under the auspices of 

 the internal hearth and the chicken. Next 

 year the combination is waste land and dog." 

 The months, weeks, days, and hours are also 

 described. Each of their hours corresponds 



to two European hours, of which seven be- 

 long to the day and five to the night. The 

 first hour commences at eleven o'clock at 

 night. 



Beets and beet sugar form very impor- 

 tant elements of agriculture and manufacture 

 in Russia. Besides supplying all the wants 

 of the empire, the sugar is exported in con- 

 siderable quantities to other countries. The 

 cost of cultivation averages about eighteen 

 dollars an acre. Russia ranks fourth among 

 European nations in quantity of sugar manu- 

 factured per year. The raw sugar produced 

 by Russian factories is said to differ but little 

 from refined sugar, and to surpass foreign 

 raw products. The cultivation of beets is 

 said to have had a beneficial effect on agri- 

 culture in general throughout the empire by 

 causing the introduction of improved types 

 of machinery and implements. 



In connection with an account of the 

 Kootenays of British Columbia, given in the 

 British Association, Mr. D. A. F. Chamber- 

 lain exhibited an album of drawings made 

 by members of the tribe, which showed a 

 well-developed artistic taste among that peo- 

 ple. The map-drawing was remarkably well 

 done, and showed large tracts of country de- 

 lineated with much topographical skill. The 

 whole series is to be reproduced and pub- 

 lished in the volume of transactions of the 

 association. 



A paper read by Dr. Ami, of the Geologi- 

 cal Survey, Ottawa, at a conference of mem- 

 bers of the British Association, described 

 twenty-six public museums and privale scien- 

 tific collections in the Dominion. 



Dr. Rudolph Heidenhain, Professor of 

 Physiology and Histology in the University 

 of Breslau, who died in October, 1897, was 

 born January 29, 1834, was graduated at 

 Berlin in 1854, and was appointed to the pro- 

 fessorship in Breslau, which he held during 

 the rest of his life, in 1859. He made valuable 

 discoveries in physiology and contributed nu- 

 merous notable papers to its literature. He 

 published a volume of Physiological Studies 

 in 1856, and four volumes of Studies of the 

 Physiological Institute of Breslau between 

 1861 and 1868. His laboratory was the 

 source of voluminous contributions by him- 

 self, his pupils, or his assistants to Pfluger's 

 Archives on a large variety of special topics 

 in the field of his studies. His essay in 

 Hermann's Handbook of Physiology on the 

 Secretion Processes, extending over four 

 hundred pages, is quoted in every text-book 

 on physiology. His later researches on 

 lymph formation and the studies conducted 

 in his laboratory on hemodynamics and fer- 

 ment action were very important. 



Sir Peter Le Page Renouf, an eminent 

 Egyptologist, keeper of Egyptian and Assyr- 

 ian antiquities at the British Museum, died 

 in October, seventy-five years of age. 



