NATURAL rniLOsornY. 181 



and is represented in the alphabet as 153, or in tones by CGE. To 

 give a more extended example, we take the word " alphabet," 

 which is easily readable by sounds as follows : 



ALPHABET 



5 35 133 18 5 138 1 3 



or G EG CEE CC^ G CEC C E 



Mr. Boyd's system could be readily and profitably used as a 

 code of signals, either land or marine ; and is equally adapted for 

 church-bells, steam or air whistles, or for a key-bugle, or cornet- 

 s-piston, or any other far-sounding diatonic instrument. 



SUMMARY OF NEW FACTS IN NATURAL PHILOSOPHY. 



Observing the Bessemer Converter Flame. — At the Atlas Steel 

 Works, Glasgow, a very neat contrivance has for some time been 

 used for enabling the observer to determine the point when the 

 combustion of the carbon is completed. A square, thin frame con- 

 tains a combination of colored glasses ; for instance, one dark yel- 

 low and two blue, or any other colors giving together a very dark 

 neutral tint. Looking at the flame through these glasses affords 

 the double advantage of preserving the eye from unpleasant ef- 

 fects of the intense light, and of making all smoke and other dis- 

 turbing changes invisible. The flame, when thus viewed, looks 

 white so long as the intense brilliancy due to the burning up of 

 the carbon continues, but changes to a deep red at the moment all 

 the latter has been consumed. 



ITie Spectrum Reconstructed. — Prof. Listing, of Gottingen, con- 

 siders the solar spectrum as made up of nine colors, in the follow- 

 ing order: brown, red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet, 

 and lavender. He has also calculated the number of vibrations 

 of each, and has found that their numbers constitute an arithmeti- 

 cal progression ; the interval between one color and the next 

 always being 48,524 billions of vibrations per second. The num- 

 ber of vibrations constituting the two extreme colors are repre- 

 sented by 364 trillions for the brown, and 801 trillions for the 

 lavender. 



Shadows from Transparent Bodies. — By means of the electric 

 light a piece of glass can be made to throw a perfectly black 

 shadow. This will be the result, provided the two surfaces through 

 which the ray passes are not perfectly parallel, the deepness of the 

 shadow depending upon the variation. 



Influence of Colored Light on the Decomposition of Carbonic Anhy- 

 dride by Plants. — According to Cailletet, the red and yellow rays 

 of light are the most favorable for this decomposition. Light 

 which has passed through a solution of iodine in carbonic disul- 

 phide prevents decomposition altogether. Under the influence of 

 green light not only does no decomposition take place, but new 

 quantities of carbonic anhydride are formed. A fresli leaf exposed 

 to sunlight, under a bell of green glass, exhales nearly as much 

 carbonic anhydride as it wouhl in the dark. — Com])tes Rendus. 



16 



