1829. 
ter be boiled for some time with dilute sulphuric 
acid, we obtain a crystallerable sugar. 
Nitric acid, too, it appears, has the same 
power and privilege of converting rags into 
sugar. Even wood, for instance, well-dried 
elm-dust, may be converted into sugar by 
sulphuric acid. Truly this is a matter to 
be remembered against the seizure of the 
Domestic and Foreign. 
315 
West Indies by the Americans—the Pre- 
sident has lately hinted very broadly that 
they already geographically belong to them. 
Our own rags and saw-pits must then supply 
sugar, and Cobbet has just made the timely 
discovery that the husks of his corn will 
furnish paper in abundance. 
Cae eS 
VARIETIES, SCIENTIFIC AND MISCELLANEOUS. 
Fall of a Hill in India.—The follow- 
ing circumstance is communicated in the 
Asiatic Journal, in an extract of a letter 
dated Colabah, in the Southern Concan, 
August 21, 1828. The hamlet of Cathe- 
nera, consisting of twenty-one dwellings, 
situated at the foot of a hill about two miles 
south of Berrowavva, in the direction of 
Kongoory fort, had, on the evening of the 
20th July, after the inmates had collected 
their cattle, been completely destroyed by 
what may be called an avalanche of earth 
from the adjoining hill. I found the place 
silent: an old man in a cow-hut was all I 
could see; the destruction had been com- 
plete, and left but this cowshed and three 
other huts standing. The hill was neither 
very high nor remarkably steep. The heavy 
and incessant rain on the above day had 
penetrated the side of the hill and worked a 
passage to the rock under the earth, which, 
from appearance, lay from fifteen to sixteen 
feet in depth. The unfortunate beings 
could have had no warning, for at the same 
instant themselves, their cattle, and homes, 
were buried in the same graves: sixty-five 
human beings, eighty-six cows and buffaloes, 
twenty-three goats, and eighteen dwellings, 
are the numbers I collected as swept off by 
this catastrophe. This bank of earth broke 
from the hill in form of a cone, the apex 
having loosened perhaps about sixty feet up 
the hill, and the base about forty yards in 
breadth, no doubt rested almost against the 
houses: in the velocity of its progress part 
of it reached a rivulet eight hundred yards 
down the plain, and scattered fragments of 
rafters and posts over a considerable space of 
batty ground, which it completely destroyed 
for this season. At the village the ava- 
lanche lay deep. I attempted to go across 
the end of it, and got up to my knees the 
first step. I then was yearly overpowered 
by a smell, doubtless similar to such as may 
always be found at those places yclept fields 
of glory, a few days after the carnage. 
Experiments on Friction.—An account 
of a series of experiments on the friction 
and resistance of fluid and solid bodies re- 
tarded by the attrition of their surfaces 
when rubbing against cach other, has been 
communicated by Mr. Rennie to the Royal 
Society. Nearly fifty years have clapsed 
since the labours of mechanicians were di- 
rected to this subject: the progress of know- 
ledge consequently in this department of 
‘Science has been slow and unsatisfactory, 
and a wide field is still left open to experi- 
mental investigation. The following are the 
principal conclusions deduced by Mr. Ren- 
nie. The friction of ice rubbing upon ice 
diminishes with an increase of weight, but 
without observing any regular law of de- 
crease. When dry leather is made to 
move along a plate of cast iron, the re- 
sistance is but little influenced by the extent 
of surface. With fibrous substances, such as 
cloth, the friction diminishes by an increase 
of pressure, but is greatly increased by the 
surfaces remaining for a certain time in con- 
tact; it is greater cederis paribus with fine 
than with coarse cloths: the resistance is 
also much increased by an increase of 
surface. With regard to the friction of 
different woods against each other, great 
diversity and irregularity prevail in the re- 
sults obtained in general, the soft woods 
give more resistance than the hard woods, 
thus yellow deal affords the greatest and red 
teake the least friction ; the friction of differ- 
ent metals alsovaries principally according to 
their respective hardness, the soft metals 
producing greater friction, under similar 4 
cumstances, than those which are har 
Within the limits of abrasion, however, 
the amount of friction is nearly the same in 
all the metals, and may in general be esti- 
mated at one-sixth of the pressure. The 
power which unguents have in diminishing 
friction varies according to the kind, and 
the fluidity of the particular unguent em- 
ployed, and to the pressure applied. 
Natural History.—On the second of 
February, Dr. Ovid Lallemand presented to 
the Academy of Sciences of Paris, a mon- 
ster, which, from particular circumstances, 
he was induced to regard as the issue of a 
dog and an ewe. Upon examination, how- 
ever, it was rather considered as belonging 
to a genus already known, and which M. 
Geoffrey-Saint-Hilaire has pointed out under 
the name of Polyotus, a monstrocity observa- 
ble among several animals and even among 
the human species. 
Experiments on Coal Gas.—The Rev. 
W. Taylor, of York, in performing some 
experiments on the combustion of coal gas, 
has obtained results which promise to be of 
public importance. He has discovered very 
simple means by which the illuminating 
effect of a common argaud gas burner may 
be much increased, while its flame is pro- 
portionally enlarged. The following state- 
ment will show the nature of the experi- 
252 
