SCIENTIFIC MISCELLANEA. 173 



lar an appearance, it was carefully washed and dried, and the contents of the 

 stomach was, by that means, discovered to be feathers collected from its own 

 body. For what purpose could such a quantity have been swallowed? Few 

 of the piscivorous birds disgorge the refuse, like the Falcon family; and such 

 a quantity can scarcely be supposed to have been taken into the stomach in 

 the act of cleaning and dressing its plumage, unless they had been long col- 

 lecting, and were impassable : many indeed were completely comminuted, 

 and fit to pass into the intestines. This singularity has been observed also 

 in the Crested Grebe." Now it would be difficult, nay impossible, to ac- 

 count for the circumstance of so great a number of feathers having been 

 found in the intestines of a bird ; and it appears to me the more likely to be 

 the down of plants, from the fact of Audubon, as well as our own zealous 

 Ornithologist, having discovered the feathery substance in the Crested 

 Grebe. In future, the gizzards of the Grebes, and especially of the Crested 

 species, should be examined with the greatest care. 



In the same volume, speaking of Bewick, the great wood-engraver, Audu- 

 bon says : — " He was a tall stout man, with a large head, and with eyes 

 placed farther apart than those of any man that I have ever seen." — p. 300. 

 I think that, were there no other facts in support of Phrenology, the above 

 would at once settle the doubts of all sceptics, as to the truth of that inval- 

 uable science : for the organ of Form is indicated by the breadth between 

 the eyes, or, which is the same thing, by the breadth of the bridge of the 

 nose ; and it may be imagined that Bewick possessed this faculty in a most 

 wonderful degree. N. W. 



Temperature of Steam — It is generally known that steam under 

 pressure, is considerably higher in temperature than steam under ordinary 

 circumstances ; and that if such steam be allowed to escape into the atmos- 

 phere, its temperature is reduced, by expansion, so much below the boiling 

 point, that it will not scald the hand when introduced into it near the aper- 

 ture from whence it escapes. A portion of this rarified steam, however, 

 instantly condenses, and, by giving up its latent caloric to the remainder, 

 raises the temperature to the boiling point ; so that, at a short distance, it 

 will scald like the most vulgar tea-kettle steam that was ever generated. 

 Paradoxical as it may at first appear, it is nevertheless true, that if high- 

 pressure steam, at 270 or 280, be allowed to expand suddenly, the hand may 

 be borne in it, so much will the temperature be reduced : but afler this 

 steam has traversed a hundred feet of iron pipes and lost a considerable part 

 of the heat which it originally contained, the portion which issues at the ter- 

 mination will be 212**, and will scald severely. B. 



Chloride of Sodium decomposed in the Stomach It has been long 



known that bile contains a considerable quantity of soda, and it has been 

 generally admitted that the source from which it is derived is the muriate of 

 soda taken in the food. It is, therefore, singular that no inquiry was ever 

 instituted, as to the mode in which the muriatic acid was disposed of It is 

 now satisfactorily proved that the stomach secretes this acid in considerable 

 quantities. No cause can be asigned adequate thus to effect the decompo- 

 sition of muriate of soda, excepting the operation of that mysterious agent, 

 which, in living bodies, seems to set at nought all those laws of chemistry 

 and mechanics which operate on inert matter, yet which, could we investi- 

 gate its mode of action, would be found strictly to conform to them. B. 



