POPULAR MISCELLANY. 



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vided, subdivided, conveyed, and distributed 

 to any number of distant places. If we in- 

 close the main beam in a tube or pipe, and 

 every secondary beam in smaller tubes, 

 branching out from the larger one adjoin- 

 ing it, and we keep the above said reflect- 

 ors at the elbows and intersections, or T- 

 pieces, formed by all these tubes, we obtain 

 a net or system of ' pipes or tubes similar to 

 those used in the distribution of gas and 

 water. 



" Such is our system : in front of every 

 side or face of our chamber of light, we 

 place a box or pipe inclosing the main 

 beams of light ; these pipes are laid along 

 the streets ; at every side street a smaller 

 pipe will branch out from the main one ; at 

 their junction we will place a reflector which 

 will divert into the side street the desired 

 percentage of light. And thus we can pro- 

 vide every street of a city with one or more 

 pipes carrying a known amount of light. 

 Then, from said street-pipes, service-pipes 

 will be run into every lamp-post and every 

 building, and at the intersection of the lat- 

 ter pipes with the street main we will insert 

 proper reflectors, the size of which will de- 

 termine the amount of light supplied by 

 every service pipe. In the same way that 

 at present the gas-burners of all the rooms 

 in a house are in direct successive commu- 

 nication with the gas-meter or service-pipe, 

 for said house, through a net of pipes laid 

 along ceilings and walls ; similarly in our 

 system, a net of properly branched - out 

 pipes will put in communication every room 

 of a building with the above-mentioned ser- 

 vice-pipe ; only that we will place at every 

 junction, occurring in said net of pipes, a 

 proper reflector, which will determine the 

 amount of light carried by the correspond- 

 ing pipe. Thus, the light may come into 

 the rooms through the ceiling or through 

 the walls, every room having as many out- 

 lets of light as desired. But the light will 

 enter in a beam of parallel rays ; therefore, 

 in order to properly shape it for uae, we 

 will place at every outlet of light a diffus- 

 ing lens, called a secondary lens, which will 

 send the light around in any predetermined 

 shape ; thus completing the system of di- 

 vision and distribution of light from a sin- 

 gle station to any or all the rooms in a city, 

 and with any desired intensity." 



Primitive Innocence. In a letter read 

 at a meeting of the Academy of Natural 

 Science, of Philadelphia, Dr. Charles A. 

 Siegfried, U. S. N., writes as follows : " We 

 visited an island called Botel Tobago while 

 surveying a rock, eighty miles east of South 

 Cape, off Formosa. We found a race of 

 aborigines, probably from Malay stock. 

 They knew nothing of money, rum, or to- 

 bacco. They gave us goats and pigs for tin 

 pots and brass buttons, and would hang 

 around us all day in their canoes, waiting 

 for a chance to dive for something thrown 

 overboard. They wore clouts only; ate 

 taro and yams mainly, though they have 

 pigs, goats, chickens, and fish, and cocoa- 

 nuts also. Snakes abound, of the boa va- 

 riety, I judge. Their thatch houses are 

 low, with much overhang of the roof, sur- 

 rounded by stone walls, strongly made of 

 laid stone, to protect them from monsoons. 

 Their paddy-fields contain immense quan- 

 tities of taro Colocasia aroidea, my botany 

 says. They are peaceful and timid, do not 

 mark the body or deform the face or teeth, 

 and seem happy enough in their condition. 

 I found them fairly healthy. They had 

 axes, spears, and knives, but all of common 

 iron, the axe being made by imbedding the 

 handle, instead of the handle piercing the 

 iron, as with us. Their canoes are beauti- 

 ful, made without nails, and are ornamented 

 usually with geometrical lines. The hair is 

 worn naturally, the men partly clipping 

 theirs. I saw no valuable metal. They 

 wore the beards of goats, with small shells, 

 as neck ornaments." 



New and Interesting Fossils. While ex- 

 amining the "Atlantosaurus beds" of the 

 Rocky Mountains, Professor Marsh dis- 

 covered several interesting fossils, among 

 them the lower jaw of a small mammal a 

 diminutive marsupial. This is the second 

 mammal known from the Jurassic in this 

 country. The specimen, which is from the 

 left side, has the larger part of the ramus 

 preserved, with a number of perfect teeth 

 in position. Most of the symphysial por- 

 tion is lost, and the posterior part is miss- 

 ing, or only faintly indicated. The jaw was 

 remarkably long and slender. The hori- 

 zontal portion is of nearly equal depth 

 throughout, and the lower margin nearly 



