856 



THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



march of the temperatures of both conti- 

 Eents is marked by the analogous phenome- 

 na of a shifting of the month of the maxi- 

 mum from July to January in going from 

 north to south on the eastern side, and 

 from January to July in returning from 

 south to north on the western side of the 

 continent. The most rational explanation 

 of the ■ difference presented by the eastern 

 and western coasts is to be sought in the 

 differences in their positions in relation to 

 the seas and to the distribution of storms. 



Tl!e Earthquake of August lOth.— The 



Northern Atlantic section of the United 

 States was disturbed on Sunday afternoon, 

 August 10th, by a very distinct earthquake- 

 shock, which, taking place in the city of 

 New York, at about seven minutes past two 

 o'clock, lasted for some ten or fifteen sec- 

 onds. The shock was felt all along the sea- 

 board from North Carolina to Maine, through 

 a district of country about six hundred miles 

 long and two hundred miles wide, the most 

 distant point from the ocean where it was 

 remarked being at Titusville, Pennsylvania. 

 Its greatest force appears to have been along 

 the Long Island and New Jersey coasts. 

 The statements of the time of the observa- 

 tion of the shock vary some seventy-five 

 seconds as between Boston and New York, 

 so as to show that the general direction of 

 its progress was from north to southwest. 

 It was not accompanied or preceded by any 

 observable peculiarities in atmospheric phe- 

 nomena. No damage appears to have been 

 done by it anywhere, beyond the occasional 

 fall of a brick from a dilapidated chimney 

 or the shaking down of some article that 

 was not securely fastened, although the 

 nervous excitement it occasioned appears to 

 have been fatal to a few persons. At Bos- 

 ton, the signal-officer, taking his ease in the 

 highest building in the city, was shaken off 

 from his lounge. At Seabright, New Jersey, 

 the railway-station was shifted to one side, 

 with a " shaking up of the contents " ; and 

 other trifling incidents of no worse character 

 were remarked in various places. 



A Destroyer in the Spruce-Forests of 

 Maine. — According to accounts of observa- 

 tions published in the third "Bulletin" of 

 the entomological division of the Department 



of Agriculture, the ravages of the spruce- 

 bud worm ( Tortrix fumiferana) have been 

 extensive and destructive in the coast for- 

 ests of Maine west of the Penobscot River. 

 The damage appears to have reached only 

 a few miles inland from the coast, but the 

 belt in which it has prevailed is marked by 

 extensive masses of dead woods. The trees 

 are attacked in the terminal buds, which are 

 eaten away, and, when that is done, the case 

 is hopeless. Tho fatal character of the at- 

 tack is owing to the fact that the spruce 

 puts forth but few buds, and those mostly 

 at the end of the twigs, and, when these are 

 destroyed, it has nothing on which to sus- 

 tain the season's life. The attack is made 

 in June, when the growth is most lively, 

 and just at the time when the check upon it 

 can produce the most serious results. The 

 larches are also attacked by a saw-fly, but 

 with results that are not as necessarily fa- 

 tal as in the case of the spruce. They are 

 more liberally provided with buds, some of 

 which may escape and afford a living pro^ 

 vision of foliage. The larch, moreover, 

 sheds its leaves in the fall, and is in full 

 foliage before its enemies attack it. Hence, 

 while the spruce and fir succumb to the first 

 season's assaults, the larch can endure two 

 years of them. 



The Greely Arctic Expedition.— The ves- 

 sels sent out for the relief of Lieutenant 

 Greely and his Arctic Expedition returned 

 to St. John's, Newfoundland, July l'7th, 

 with the report that they had, on the 22d 

 of June, rescued from their quarters in 

 Camp Clay, Cape Sabine, near the entrance 

 to Smith Sound, seven of the members of 

 the expedition, the other eighteen mem- 

 bers having died during the present year, 

 of starvation and exposure. One of the 

 rescued men. Sergeant Elison, died a fcAv 

 days later, after the amputation of his 

 frozen feet. All the records of the expedi- 

 tion were saved, and are to be published. 

 They show that its work was of the most 

 creditable character, and was fruitful in sci- 

 entific results. Lieutenant Greely's party 

 was sent out by our Government in 1881, 

 as one of a series of International Arctic 

 Expeditions, on the plan suggested by Lieu- 

 tenant Weyprecht, of the Austrian service, 

 for establishing permanent stations as far 



