384 



THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY, 



has been and is now continually adding to 

 the vitality of the vegetable and animal 

 kingdom, as far as they are brought under 

 their control. Man has increased his own 

 life also, in so far as he has conformed his 

 self-management to the requirements of the 

 vital law. 



Fossil Edentates.— Prof. 0. C. Marsh, in 

 the current number of the American Jour- 

 nal of Science^ describes some new fossil 

 mammals, being edentates of a stupendous 

 size. They go back very much farther, geo- 

 logically, than any American species pre- 

 viously described. Some of them are from 

 the Upper Eocene of Wyoming Territory. 



NOTES. 



A CONSIDERABLE trade is now carried on 

 between Australia and San Francisco in 

 kangaroo-skins. At the latter place they 

 are much in vogue, and when tanned are 

 said to produce a thin, supple leather, softer 

 than calf-skin and more impervious to water. 



Dr. T. C. Renner writes to the Depart- 

 ment of Agriculture, that several years ago 

 he collected some poke-root {Phytolacca de- 

 candra) for medicinal purposes, and spread 

 it at several places about the house to dry. 

 Soon afterward he observed that there were 

 many cockroaches lying dead, and upon 

 examination found that they had been par- 

 taking freely of the poke-root. Some of 

 the root was placed near their haunts, and 

 the result was that it rid the premises of 

 those insects. Since then he has commu- 

 nicated the remedy to others, who have 

 tested it with satisfactory results. 



The Italian Government having invited 

 Father Secchi, S. J., to remain at his post, 

 he declined to do so unless the pope's rights 

 over the observatory were recognized. The 

 Government has acceded to his request, 

 and is walling off from the rest of the ex- 

 propriated Collegio Romano the portion 

 comprising the observatory, in which Father 

 Secchi and his assistants are to remain un- 

 disturbed. 



The first oil-field around Titusville, Pa., 

 appears to be again becoming productive. 

 Territory long since abandoned and deemed 

 worthless promises to give as abundant a 

 yield of oil as any in the whole oil-region. 

 Several wells recently sunk in the territory 

 yield from 100 to 500 barrels per day. 



Benjamin Thompson, afterward Count 

 Rumford, was born in Wobum, Mass., and 

 not, as might be inferred from a paragraph 

 in the April Monthly, in Concord, N. H. . 



About the year 1300 coal was first dis- 

 covered in England on the banks of the 

 Tyne, and was introduced as fuel into Lon- 

 don about the year 1350. Its use, however, 

 was in 1373 forbidden by proclamation, in 

 consequence of its effluvia being considered 

 injurious to health, by corrupting the atmos- 

 phere, and for many years it remained un- 

 used. At the close of the century, however, 

 the value of coal became recognized, and its 

 application and consumption extended. 



Poggendorff's Annals of Physics and 

 Chemistry, a monthly periodical, has now 

 been in existence fifty years, and has been 

 under the sole editorial direction of Prof. 

 Poggendorff for that long period. Some of 

 the friends of the venerable editor have 

 agreed to assume editorial charge of the 

 work for one volume, thus allowing the vet- 

 eran a four months' vacation. The entire 

 number of papers published in the A7malen, 

 during the fifty years of its existence, is 

 8,850, and among the 2,167 authors who 

 have contributed to its pages are Liebig, 

 Berzelius, Faraday, Brewster, Becquerel. 

 and many others. 



The French Assembly have voted a pen- 

 sion of 12,000 francs to M. Pasteur for his 

 eminent services to science, more particu- 

 larly for his researches into the causes of 

 the diseases of the vine and the silk-worm. 



The American Naturalist calls for a 

 careful geological and zoological survey of 

 Massachusetts. While surveys are going 

 on or have recently been completed in so 

 many other States, it is not particularly 

 to the credit of Massachusetts that a thor- 

 ough survey of its geological and biological 

 riches has been neglected It is now over 

 thirty years since the original incomplete 

 survey of the State was made. Since then 

 physical science has changed so much that 

 the woi'k done then needs to be reviewed 

 and greatly extended. 



Died, in Charleston, S. C, February 28th, 

 Rev. John Bach man, aged eighty-four years. 

 He was associated with Audubon in the prep- 

 aration of his great work on ornithology, and 

 was the principal author of the work on the 

 quadrupeds of North America, illustrated 

 by Audubon and his sons. He was also the 

 author of numerous other works and papers 

 on zoological subjects, all evincing superior 

 powers of observation, and marked by ex- 

 cellence of statement. 



Peter Andreas Hansen, Director of the 

 Observatory of Seeberg, near Gotha, died 

 on the 28th of March last, aged seventy-nine 

 years. He is chiefly famous for his elaborate 

 investigation of the moon's motion, and the 

 tables constructed on the basis of his theo- 

 retical labors. These tables were published 

 in London, in 1857, at the expense of the 

 British Government. 



