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HARDWICKE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



estuary surrounded by forests. It is, as Mr. Reade 

 remarks, well known that the materials of sedi- 

 mentary rocks have been used up again and again, 

 and that their breaking up is usually preceded by a 

 removal of cementing calcareous matter in solution — 

 limestone being removed nearly wholly in a state of 

 solution in water as carbonate or sulphate of lime. 

 It is insisted upon by those who hold the views 

 which Mr. Reade combats that the mechanical 

 matter is deposited near to land — not in deep oceans. 

 It therefore follows as a corollary, that if the oceans 

 have been fixtures, the carbonate and sulphate of lime 

 have been continuously abstracted from the rocks and 

 deposited in greater or less proportion in the ocean, 

 through incalculable ages, where it must remain to 

 this clay. It also would follow as a further conse- 

 quence that the newer rocks would be less calcareous 

 than the older ones. But the reverse is the case, as 

 the valuable analyses made by Dr. Frankland prove. 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



Glow-Worms. — These insects do not emit 

 heat, and A. B. may safely place them in water 

 without extinguishing their light ; in fact, moisture 

 rather increases their brilliancy, for they shine best on 

 a dewy night, and according to various experiments 

 that have been made, hot water makes them more 

 luminous. The female glow-worm is the one that 

 "lights up," she like "Hero," burns her lamp in 

 order to guide her " Leander home." She is wing- 

 less, so cannot rove very far. Most writers believe 

 that the light is intermittent or continuous at the will 

 of the glow-worm, some asserting that in time of 

 danger the insect extinguishes it entirely. How does 

 A. B. keep his specimens? The change of food of 

 the glow-worm from animal juices in the larva 

 state to tender plants in the perfect condition explains 

 many of the contradictory statements made respecting 

 this insect ; and as the intermittence of light is depen- 

 dent on the different amount of air introduced into 

 the trachea, and the varying activity of respiration 

 and muscular action, regulated as I have before 

 observed by the will of the creature when in its 

 natural state, they may not, if kept in confinement 

 have a sufficient quantity of aerial fuel to light their 

 lamps with for A. B.'s pleasure. — Helen Watney. 



Dwarf Linnets' Eggs. — In your July number of 

 Science-Gossip, you kindly inserted a note for me 

 about dwarf eggs ; I have since had an opportunity of 

 measuring the linnet's eggs I mentioned. The smallest 

 egg is four lines in length by three in breadth. Three 

 more are almost as small, another one is six lines 

 in length by four and a half breadth. The largest is 

 about the size of a long-tailed tit's egg. I give these 

 measurements because they are the smallest dwarf 

 eggs I ever saw or heard of. I have now a linnet's egg 

 before me, which is little short of an inch in length. 

 I have several other dwarf eggs in my collection, 

 amongst which is a pheasant's, in length twelve and 

 a half lines, in breadth ten lines. — G. Dewar, 



Blue Pimpernel. — In 1877, I found one or two 

 plants of the blue pimpernel near St. Leonards-on- 

 Sea ; but it is not common there. — C. B. 



Green Woodpeckers' Eggs. — In your issue of 

 Hardwicke's Science-Gossip for last month, a 

 correspondent states that he has lately taken some 

 green woodpeckers' eggs mottled with brown, and 

 asks if this is unusual. Having made a study of 

 oology for several years now, I am in a position to 

 state that it is very unusual indeed ; in fact I never 

 heard or read of woodpeckers laying any but pure 

 white eggs. Buffon states that the eggs of the green 

 woodpecker are "always white." Gould says, "of 

 a pearly whiteness," and a later authority says, "The 

 eggs are nearly always white," but I have frequently 

 found the latter authority to be in error as to the 

 colouring. I should like to see your correspondent's 

 eggs very much. — J. J. Hammond. 



Hawthorn Bloom. — I have no doubt the absence 

 of the hawthorn blossom has prevailed this year in 

 the whole of the North of England, and whether it 

 has reached to other counties farther south I cannot 

 say. In Northumberland, the condition of the hedges 

 was precisely the same as described by R. W. in 

 the August number of Science-Gossip, viz., an 

 almost entire absence of the blossom of the haw- 

 thorn. In addition to this, there was in Northumber- 

 land an equal scarcity of the blossom of the laburnum. 

 Last year whilst every tree was covered with its 

 golden blossoms, it was a rare sight to witness in 

 the past spring a single flower, and it may be said 

 that they were entirely barren in this respect. The 

 year 1879 was very favourable to the growth of trees, 

 but the absence of heat in the autumn prevented the 

 young shoots becoming sufficiently hardened to bear 

 the severity of the three days' intense frost which 

 prevailed in December, and to this cause I attribute 

 the absence of flowers both on the hawthorn and 

 laburnum. In Northumberland the following trees 

 have either been destroyed or greatly injured by the 

 severe frost just mentioned, which, for intensity, 

 exceeded any other that I ever experienced during 

 the last half-century, viz., the Lombardy poplar, holly, 

 male oak, bay laurel (Z. nobilis), which latter was 

 entirely destroyed above ground, and the walnut. — 

 Dipton Burn. 



How to destroy Mites, &.c. — Would some 

 reader kindly give me some information through the 

 "Notices to Correspondents'" column at an early 

 date regarding the generation, food, and best means 

 of eradicating from household furniture a mite 

 (specimens herewith) which made its appearance a 

 few months ago in myriads in a bedroom and has now 

 spread over the whole house ? The furniture has been 

 exposed to concentrated sulphurous acid fumes, 

 saturated with solution of carbolic acid, corrosive 

 sublimate, turpentine, acetic acid, &c, but, although 

 considerably reduced in numbers, the family is still 

 in a flourishing condition. Any means whereby they 

 could be got rid of would be willingly tried by 

 — " Antimite." 



Longevity of Cats. — (P. 213.) I knew a cat 

 which had been in the possession of a near relative 

 of my own for a period of twenty-two years. It died 

 finally, not of old age, but by violence. In the same 

 house was another cat which was believed to be at 

 least as old — but of this I have no precise information. 

 The old cat just named continued to have kittens 

 until a late age. I have been told of a cat belonging 

 to a public house at Ashford-in-the-Waters, Derby- 

 shire, which was thirty years old at its death, and 

 continued to have a kitten annually up to the last year 

 of its life. The name of the owner of this long- 

 lived cat was Mrs. Martha Hulmes. — Jane Axon. 



