1830.] 



Varieties. 



221 



has not a flourishing appearance. To give 

 an idea of the powerful action of the white 

 lupin as a manure, we shall quote the words 

 of M. Vulffen himself. It is impossible," 

 he says, " to have seen the vast extent of 

 country which the south of France presents, 

 the prosperity of which, and the very popu- 

 lation, rests upon this plant, and to have 

 heard the extraordinary influence it exercises 

 upon the production of corn unanimously 

 extolled, without feeling the necessity of 

 making careful experiments regarding it." 

 The consequence is, that this experienced 

 agriculturist has been making experiments 

 on the white lupin in Northern Germany, 

 of which he has published an account, 

 having fully and satisfactorily proved that 

 the cultivation of this plant is of a nature to 

 surpass the most sanguine hopes. 



Artificial Gems The base of all arti- 

 ficial stones, is a paste composed of silex, 

 potash, borax, oxide of lead, and sometimes 

 arsenic. The best silex is obtained from 

 rock crystal, and the next best from white 

 sand, or flint. The following are two re- 

 ceipts for making a good paste : Rock 

 crystal, 4056 grains, minium (red lead) 6300, 

 pure potash 2 154, borax 276, arsenic 12 or., 

 sand 3600, ceruse (white lead) 8508, 

 potash 1260, borax 360, arsenic 12. Now, 

 it is of borate of lead and silex, that Mr. 

 Faraday has succeeded in making the flint 

 glass, of which such high expectations are 

 formed for scientific purposes. Now, it is 

 known, that more metallic matter was for- 

 merly employed in the manufacture of glass, 

 than at the present day, and the consequence 

 was, as may be observed in many of our 

 very old church windows, that the surface of 

 the glass became oxydised. We hope that 

 the same fate may not attend a return to the 

 same, or similar method of manufacture. 



Improvement of the Cape of Good Hope. 

 The advantages that would result to 

 England from a communication with the 

 interior of Africa are well known ; and it 

 affords us great pleasure to learn that at the 

 Cape of Good H ope much is now doing to 

 effect this desirable object, by the construc- 

 tion of a new road over the Hottentots' Hol- 

 land Mountains, which has been planned by 

 Major C. C. Michell, the surveyor-general 

 of the colony, under instructions from the 

 governor, Sir Lowry Cole. It appears that 

 the old military road of the French block, 

 though reflecting considerable credit on the 

 engineers by whom it was executed, has not 

 answered the expectations formed of it, 

 owing to several natural difficulties ; and 

 the governor, with a zeal for the improve- 

 ment of the colony, which does the highest 

 honour to that distinguished officer, has 

 made a personal journey of inspection, ac- 

 companied by the surveyor-general, to ascer- 

 tain the practicability of improving the pas- 

 sage over the steep and dangerous mountain 

 range. In this plan Major Michell, after a 

 laborious survey of the whole chain of the 

 " Hottentots' Holland Kloof," seems to 



have triumphed over the difficulties inter- 

 posed by nature to the passage of the ma- 

 jestic barrier which divides the western 

 coast and capital of the colony from the in- 

 terior. By the most able and ingenious 

 adaptation of his new line of road to the 

 stupendous features and intricate sinuosities 

 of the ground, he has provided an easy 

 ascent over a mountain chain of which the 

 lowest passes rise to the perpendicular height 

 of eleven hundred feet above the plains at 

 their base. The breadth intended to be 

 given to the road is twenty feet, with the 

 exception of that part near the summit, 

 which requires blasting, less than a quarter 

 of a mile in length, and which, for the pre- 

 sent, will only be made twelve feet broad. 

 Appropriate stop places will not be neg- 

 lected. The road will average in its slope 

 two and a half inches to the yard, which, in 

 a country like this, may almost be regarded as 

 approaching to a dead level, considering that 

 the old kloof averaged nine and a half to ten 

 in the yard. The ultimate utility of this great 

 work to the colony, (and eventually to the 

 mother country) in facilitating the inter- 

 course between the coast and the interior 

 for the transit of foreign merchandise and 

 native produce is incalculable. But we 

 notice the undertaking chiefly for the one 

 more interesting proof which it affords of 

 the advantages which accrue even to the 

 civil service of the state from the cultivated 

 genius and science and the enterprising 

 spirit of military men whenever a fair field 

 is permitted to their abilities and zeal in the 

 arts of peaceful improvement. 



Height of the Patagonians.~-An officer 

 of Captain King's expedition has commu- 

 nicated the following interesting notice. 

 Measurement of the largest Patagonian, in 

 a tribe of about 150 in number. Height, 

 6 feet 2 inches ; circumference of the chest, 

 3 feet 11 inches; ditto of the loins, 3 feet 

 5 inches ; ditto of the pelvis, 3 feet 10 

 inches. The limbs of the men were finely 

 formed, but the muscles were not so strongly 

 marked, and did not exhibit those elevations 

 when thrown into action so much as in 

 stout sailors or other athletic Europeans 

 who have been accustomed to muscular 

 exertion. There was, seemingly, in the 

 whole of them, of both sexes, a thickish 

 layer of adipose substance, under the com. 

 mon integuments, covering the whole of the 

 body, which seemed to fill up the hollows of 

 the muscles seen so distinctly in most hard- 

 working persons. The shortest man in their 

 party was five feet ten inches and a half 

 high : the generality of them appeared to be 

 about six feet, with large bodies. The 

 women, he thought, were larger in propor- 

 tion to the men than is observed in civilized 

 society. 



Wells of Salt and of Fire in China 

 A French Missionary, M. Imbert, has 

 forwarded to Europe a description of cer- 

 tain wells of salt and of fire,atOu-Tong-Kiao 

 Kiatingfou, and at Ise-Lieou-Tsing, in 



