284 Journal of Applied Microscopy. 



NEWS AND NOTES. 



An endowment has been made for furnishing laboratories for Tuscukmi Col- 

 lege, Tennessee. 



The "pointer" described by " E. R." in your issue of November (p. •Jn4") 

 can be considerably improved by attaching it to the under surface of a ring of 

 blackened paper or cardboard instead of cementing it directly on the dia- 

 phragm of the eye-piece of the microscope. It can then be removed when required 

 or transfered from one eye-piece to another. . g. h. b. 



The Saturday Night Club of Microscopists, Philadelphia. — At the Feb- 

 ruary 14th meeting, Drs. T. G. Gramm and W. W. Knowlton gave an illustrated 

 lecture on the " Minute Anatomy of the Skin and its Appendages," using the 

 projection microscope to exhibit the microscopical preparations. The specimens 

 shown were especially fine, many of them having been prepared for the occasion, 

 and others brought by Dr. Knowlton from abroad. 



Nathan Smilie, M. D., Sec. 



It is generally desirable to have students do their own staining, so far a.s 

 time will permit. Most good and permanent stains, however, act too slowly to 

 make this possible. I have been using an aqueous 1.5 per cent, solution of gen- 

 tian violet with fair results, on such material as hand microtome sections of rhi- 

 zomes, stems, and roots. The sections are placed in a low grade of alcohol and 

 each student stains his own material. A section is placed on the slide and cov- 

 ered with a drop of the gentian violet, and after staining from two to four minutes, 

 and dehydrating, it is mounted in Canada balsam, and studied immediateh'. In 

 this way students may obtain a fairly satisfactory set of such preparations with 

 little loss of time. j. h. s. 



Botanical Laboratory, Ohio State University. 



Prof. W. W. Alleger, Howard University, Washington, U. C, writes that he has 

 been in the habit of using one of the meat juice extractors, which can be obtained 

 at almost any hardware store, and which is usually sold for household use, in pre- 

 paring culture media for bacteriological laboratories. The instrument is used for 

 extracting juice not only from meat for bouillon, but also from potatoes, grapes, 

 etc., and for the preparation of Ellsner's medium it is of great assistance. Instead 

 of grating the potatoes and allowing them to soak over night, he cuts the pota- 

 toes lengthwise in strips an inch or so in thickness, and runs them through the 

 meat juice extractor. The juice is caught in a beaker, while the pulp comes out 

 as dry as a chip almost. The juice is then filtered or decanted and the requisite 

 amount of water added. By this method the time required for soaking is saved, 

 while the juice is extracted in a small fraction of the time required for grating 

 and with less trouble. 



