POPULAR MISCELLANY. 



565 



merged coastal plain, and its margin as the 

 true boundary between the continent and 

 the ocean basin, or as the submerged con- 

 tinental margin. On the eastern coast the 

 submarine plateau is trenched with subma- 

 rine troughs running out from the mouths 

 of the great rivers to the submerged conti- 

 nental margin and then opening into deep 

 water. The best known of the channels are 

 opposite the mouths of the Hudson and 

 Delaware Rivers, Chesapeake Bay, and the 

 Mississippi. Along the California coast the 

 phenomena are different. The researches of 

 Prof. Davidson have brought to light some 

 twenty or more submarine channels on the 

 coast from Cape Mendocino to San Diego, a 

 distance of about seven hundred miles. But 

 they have no obvious relation to existing 

 rivers. They are not a submarine continua- 

 tion of any system of river valleys on the 

 adjacent land, but run in close to shore and 

 abut against a bold coast, with mountains 

 rising in some cases to three thousand feet 

 within from three to five miles of the shore 

 line, and wholly unbroken by any large river 

 valleys. The channels of the Eastern coast 

 are accounted for by supposing that they 

 were always connected with the rivers oppo- 

 site them, and that they have assumed their 

 present positions by the operation of the 

 changes of level to which the land has been 

 subjected. But the disconnected positions 

 of the Western channels can not be account- 

 ed for except as being the result of orogenic 

 changes which have diverted the lower 

 courses and places of emptying of the rivers 

 since the channels were made. Prof. Le 

 Conte's paper is devoted to the study of the 

 nature and history of these changes. 



Jupiter and the Comets. — Prof. 11. A. 

 Newton showed, at the meeting of the Brit- 

 ish Association, that if a comet or other 

 small body should pass in front of Jupiter, 

 the kinetic energy of the planet would be 

 increased by the gravitational attraction be- 

 tween the two bodies, while that of the 

 comet would be diminished, and might be 

 diminished to such an extent as to cause it 

 to form (though possibly only temporarily) 

 a member of the solar system. On the other 

 hand, if a comet, already a member of the 

 solar system, pass behind Jupiter, the kinetic 

 energy of the planet will be diminished and 



that of the comet will be increased, and 

 may conceivably be increased under favora- 

 ble circumstances to such an extent that the 

 comet may uo longer remain a member of 

 the system. The author had calculated that 

 of one billion comets from space crossing, in 

 all directions, a sphere eqiuil in diameter to 

 that of Jupiter's orbit, about twelve hundred 

 would come near enough to Jupiter to have 

 their period so much diminished as to be less 

 than that of the planet. 



The Baths of the Accnrsed. — Hammam 

 Meskoutine, or the Baths of the Accursed, 

 are a famous bathing-place and health re- 

 sort not far from Constantino in Algeria. 

 They are but a few minutes' walk from the 

 railway station. The first object of interest 

 within a quarter of a mile of the station is a 

 superb hot waterfall, whence the vapors fly 

 away abundantly. " Yet," says a writer who 

 describes it, " it is not all of water. For the 

 most part it is rigid, like a thing of ice. It 

 is, in fact, mainly a petrifaction. The cal- 

 careous deposit in the hot spring above has 

 incrusted the rocks, so that they have the 

 corrugated appearance and something of the 

 color of barley sugar. Here and there, over 

 and between the still masses, there is an 

 ooze or trickle of warm water, adding to the 

 work already done. Grass and flowers grow 

 well by the sides of this nutritious water- 

 fall, though the whitened soil in the neigh- 

 borhood does not seem adapted for vegeta- 

 tion of any kind. You climb to the level of 

 the cascade, and then see, close by, a num- 

 ber of odd-looking cones and columns stand- 

 ing up from the blanched surface of the 

 ground. The soil is hot to the hand, and 

 you tread with an echo." The springs bub- 

 ble up with a temperature of more than 200° 

 Fahr. A litter of egg-shells and fowls' feath- 

 ers by the edge of them tells of the purpose 

 they serve to the residents of Meskoutine. 

 Here the dinner is cooked, and the clothes 

 are washed in one or another of the little 

 basins by which the springs eddy up to the 

 daylight. Though the Arabs give the baths 

 an impolite name, and tell various weird 

 tales about them, they love them well. The 

 cones look like a procession of gigantic 

 phantoms suddenly petrified. Some arc six 

 or seven feet in height, and some are four- 

 teen or fifteen feet. They mark the sites of 



