NOTES. 



127 



A MASS of native copper, in weight 

 6,000 pounds, and taken from an ancient 

 mine on Isle Royal, Lake Superior, is now 

 on exhibition in St. Louis. The mass had 

 evidently been detached from its bed by 

 the ancient miners. 



From calculations made by Dr. J. T. 

 Luck, of St. Louis, it appears that the death- 

 rate, among officers of the United States 

 Navy is astonishingly high, being last year 

 25.45 per thousand. Assuming the aver- 

 age age of naval officers to be thirty, the 

 death-i-ate is three times as high as that of 

 civilians. 



The growing appreciation of American 

 scientific work in France is evidenced by 

 the action of the Minister of Public Works 

 authorizing an exchange of the Annates des 

 Mines with sundry American journals and 

 publications of scientific bodies. 



To encourage local collectors and ama- 

 teurs of science in the work of determining 

 the ichthyology of Indiana, Prof. D. S. Jor- 

 dan, of the State Geological Survey, has 

 published a preliminary list of the fishes 

 which he has himself found, and adds a list 

 of those likely to occur in Indiana waters. 



At the initial meeting of the Khedival 

 Society of Geography, held June 2d, the 

 Khedive was represented by his second son, 

 Hussein Pasha, and there were present most 

 of the prominent representatives of the for- 

 eign colony in Cairo. The president. Dr. 

 Schweinfurth, addressed the meeting in 

 French. "Science," said he, "which had 

 been carried from Egypt into Greece and 

 Italy, and thence into Central Europe, was 

 now returning to its birthplace. By the 

 munificence of the Khedive, a society had 

 now been established whose object it would 

 be to advance the oldest, the most univer- 

 sal, and the most popular of the sciences. 

 Unlike its sister associations in Europe and 

 America, which have their field of research 

 in distant lands, the Khedival Society had 

 all its work to do at home, so to speak." 



In a lecture at Edinburgh on carnivorous 

 plants, Dr. Balfour stated that voting plants 

 of JJionoea muscipula under bell-glasses do 

 not thrive so well as those left free, and that 

 while a piece of beef wrapped in another 

 leaf becomes putrid, a piece inclosed by the 

 Dionoea remains perfectly inodorous, but 

 soon loses its red color, and is gradually 

 disintegrated more and more till it is re- 

 duced to a pulp. 



Palladium, when coated with palladi- 

 um-black, becomes saturated with hydro- 

 gen much more rapidly than the clean met- 

 al. If, when thus saturated, it be wrapped 

 in gun-cotton, an explosion ensues after a 

 few seconds, and the platinum plate burns 

 for a short time with a feeble flame. 



I Experiments made by Pfaff show ice to 

 be by no means a bad conductor of heat. 

 Taking the conductivity of gold as 1,0U0, 

 platinum is 981, silver 973, iron 374, ice 

 314, and tin 803. Dr. Pfaff suggests that 

 his results will modify our views of the 

 physical condition of the interior of a mass 

 of ice. 



From the observations of Ebermeyer it 

 appears that, in a given species of tree, the 

 size of the leaves differs in proportion to 

 the elevation. With equal strength of soil, 



the leaves decrease with height. 



Agum, 



the entire amount of ash in the leaves de- 

 creases with the height ; and the proportion 

 of phosphoric acid in the ash is much less 

 in high positions than on low ground. 



Statuettes and other artistic forms in 

 plaster are made very closely to resemble 

 silver in appearance by being covered with 

 a thin coat of powdered mica. This pow- 

 der is mixed with collodion and then ap- 

 plied to the objects in plaster with a brush, 

 after the manner of paint. The mica can 

 be easily tinted in various colors. It can 

 be washed in water, and, unlike silver, is 

 not liable to become tarnished by sulphu- 

 retted gases. 



In Great Britain and Ireland, the excise 

 duties on liquors for the year ending March, 

 1875, amounted to 31,917,849, being an 

 increase of 600,000 over the previous finan- 

 cial year. 



" So popular are Mr. Darwin's books," 

 says the English Mechanic, " and so widely 

 read, that a countryman with a basket of 

 round-leaved sundews {Drosera rotundi- 

 folia) has stationed himself near the Royal 

 Exchange in London, and there daily drives 

 a very good trade." 



The excellent Abbe Moigno, editor of 

 Les Mondes, and general manager of the 

 Catholic enterprise for diffusing a knowl- 

 edge of science among the laboring-classes 

 in France, has issued a work entitled " Ex- 

 plosions of Freethinking in August and 

 September, 1874," containing the discourses 

 of Tyndall, Du Bois-Reymond, R. Owen, 

 Huxley, Hooker, and Sir John Lubbock. 

 The abbe appends annotations of his own. 

 This is as it should be : poison and antidote ! 



It is asserted by E. Heckel, as the result 

 of experiments made upon certain rodents 

 and marsupials, that these animals, when 

 fed on the leaves of poisonous solanaceou? 

 plants, are not subject to any injuriouf, 

 effects. 



A committee appointed for the purpose 

 of investigating the working of the govern- 

 ment telegraph system in England reports 

 that the present rate, one shilling per mes- 

 sage, is too low, and recommends that it be 



