P OP ULAR MIS CELL ANY. 



249 



they make an error in determining the prop- 

 er curve. But when the superintendent 

 comes he notices the mistake, pulls down 

 the faulty piece of masonry, and corrects 

 the error. 



When M. Berthelot first saw this ant- 

 city it had already been in existence for some 

 years, and was in the high tide of prosperity. 

 Ten years later it sent out a colony, which 

 settled at the foot of a young oak, distant 

 a few metres from the mother-city. This 

 colony, at first weak and occupying but lit- 

 tle ground, increased year by year. The 

 war of 1870 for a while interrupted the 

 course of M. Berthelot's researches, but 

 on the return of peace there was a new 

 surprise. The mother-city was now in a 

 state of decline, but the colony was thriving 

 wonderfully. In the old home there were 

 but few births and few fruitful unions ; the 

 number of inhabitants had grown less, and 

 the survivors were careless of their dwell- 

 ings. The colony has now become the prin- 

 cipal city, it has sent out a sub-colony which 

 is in a flourishing condition. The old city 

 is compared by M. Berthelot to Babylon, 

 with its thriving neighbor cities of Seleucia 

 and Ctesiphon. 



Persian Hair-Dye. — The practice of dye- 

 ing the hair is very much in use among the 

 Persians, who mostly employ the plant hen- 

 na for this purpose. According to Dr. 

 Tholozan, the private physician of the shah, 

 the powdered leaves of the plant are made 

 into a paste with hot water and then apphed 

 to the head, the hair, and the nails. This 

 is done in a vapor-bath. This first applica- 

 tion lasts an hour and a half to two hours, 

 and then the parts are freely washed in 

 water. The henna gives an orange-red color, 

 very beautiful on a white beard, so that 

 many old men use it. To change the red- 

 dish color of hair into a fine, lustrous black, 

 the parts are coated, at the same sitting, 

 with a paste formed of another powder — 

 that from the leaves of a kind of indigo- 

 tree cultivated in Persia. This is called 

 rcng ; it remains applied about two hours. 

 The henna gives different colors according 

 as it acts on white, fair, or dark hair. It 

 alters very quickly in moisture, and loses 

 its properties in long sea-voyages. Expe- 

 rience seems to have proved that it gives 



suppleness to hair, but it causes it to whiten 

 prematurely. Fair-haired people in Persia 

 always color their hair black, but the black 

 is not so intense as that produced in per- 

 sons of dark complexion. Skin reddened 

 and blackened with the two pastes soon 

 regains its natural color on being washed 

 with soap and rubbed with the fingers, 

 whereas the dye adheres firmly to the hair, 

 which it penetrates. Reng is sometimes 

 used alone, and gives a blue-violet color. 



About Oleomargarioc. — Mr. John Michels 

 points out, in the American Journal of Mi- 

 croscopy, the diSerences between butter and 

 oleomargarine as observed with the micro- 

 scope. Two woodcuts illustrate the paper, 

 the one exhibiting the microscopic appear- 

 ance of oleomargarine, the other that of 

 butter. In the former substance are seen 

 numerous stellate or feathery crystals, to- 

 gether with globules. In butter none of 

 the crystals are seen, the whole field of the 

 microscope being filled by the globules, with 

 perhaps crystals of common salt. Besides 

 these stellate crystals, Mr. Michels found in 

 all the specimens of oleon^rgarine exam- 

 ined by him fragments of tissue and mus- 

 cle, also certain cells of a very suspicious 

 character. What these cells may be the 

 author does not assume to decide, but he 

 appears to suppose that they might possi- 

 bly be the larval forms or eggs of entozoa. 

 Some of Mr. Michels's observations on oleo- 

 margarine and its suitableness for human 

 food having been called in question, in par- 

 ticular his statement that living septic or- 

 ganisms may exist in the artificial butter, 

 he submitted the matter to the Rev. W. H. 

 Dallinger, of Liverpool, a very high author- 

 ity indeed. Mr. Dallinger's reply is given 

 in full by the author. He writes : " A tem- 

 perature of 120° [which is the highest tem- 

 perature employed in the manufacture of 

 oleomargarine] is not by any means serious- 

 ly, and certainly not permanently, injurious 

 to even the adult forms of the putrefactive 

 organisms." Again : " Quite as serious a 

 matter is that of the introduction, through 

 oleomargarine, into the human intestinal 

 tract of eggs of entozoa. I have made 

 enough experiments to say that the eggs, 

 for example, of the nematoda are practical- 

 ly uninjured by 120° Fahr. This," Mr. Dal- 



