630 



NATURE 



\Oct. 10, 1878 



its results, and much disappointed at its failure. On 

 subsequent examination no chickens were found in the 



eggs. 



No. 2. — Christy : Hydro- Incubator. 

 Eggs placed in incubator ... ... ... 50 



Found fertile after testing ., ... 45 

 Unfertile 5 



Broken during competition ... ... o 



Hatched by 12 noon, September 26 ... 34 

 Not hatched II 11 



Percentage of eggs hatched ... ... ... 75*55 



Three more chickens were hatched alive after the com- 

 petition had closed. The other eggs, on being examined, 

 were all found to have living chickens in them. The 

 prize of 25/. was awarded to this incubator. 



No. 3. — Christy : Hydro-Incubator. 

 Eggs placed in incubator 



Found fertile ... ... 45 



Unfertile 5 



50 



Broken during competition 

 Hatched by 12 noon, September 26 

 Not hatched 



I 



20 

 24 



Percentage of eggs hatched 44*44 



Two chickens were hatched alive after the competition 

 was ended. Of the remaining eggs ten were found to 

 have living chickens in them. 



No. 4. — Boyle : Heated by lamp. 



Eggs placed in incubator 48 



Found fertile ... ... ... ... 40 



Unfertile ... ... ... 3 



Broken during competition ... ... 2 



Hatched by noon, September 26 ... 11 

 Not hatched 27 



Percentage of eggs hatched 27*55 



On examining the eggs, Saturday, September 28, four 

 chickens were found ready to break the shell. This 

 incubator worked with great regularity, and deserves 

 much commendation. 



No. 5. — Boyle 

 Eggs placed in incubator 

 Found fertile after testing 

 Unfertile 



Heated by gas. 



52 



42 

 10 



26 

 o 



16 



Broken during competition 



Hatched by 12 o'clock noon, Sept. 26. 



Not hatched 



Percentage of eggs hatched ... o 



The egg rests in this machine are spiral wire springs 

 The egg drawer did not fit well, and is certainly capable 

 of improvement. Full and very clear instructions should 

 always accompany this incubator. Its want of success 

 must not be attributed altogether to the inexperience of 

 the attendant. 



No. 6. — Penman's (worked by lamp) : Exhibited by Messrs. E. 

 T. Brown and Son, Newcastle-on-Tyne. 

 By this no eggs were hatched, but twenty dead chickens 

 were found in the eggs on September 28, having been 

 dead apparently several days. The lamp in this incu- 

 bator worked very irregularly, needing constant attention 

 by day and night. 



No. 7. — Penman's (worked by gas). 

 By this also no eggs were hatched, but on examining the 

 eggs at 6 P.M. on Saturday evening, Sept. 28, thirty-four 

 chickens were found to be alive in them, two having been 

 hatched out on the same morning alive. The source of 

 heat— viz., gas— had been turned off at 8 p.m. on the 



Friday night previous, and the drawer had been opened 

 and shut constantly after the exhibition was opened at 

 noon on Thursday. The irregularity of heat from the 

 gas was doubtless the cause of failure in this instance, 

 the pressure being very unequal. 



The committee subjoin to this report a register of the 

 temperature maintained in the drawer of each incubator, 

 together with that of the water drawn off from the boilers 

 in the case of the hydro-incubators. The chickens 

 hatched are doing well, some under them, some in arti- 

 ficial mothers. 



Such are the facts of this interesting trial, and they 

 seem to us to prove not only that artificial incubation is 

 possible, but that by Mr. Christy's machine, if not with 

 some of the others, it might become a remunerative 

 business, and add materially to the sources of our food 

 supplies. 



NOTES 



By the kindness of Gen. Myer, the distinguished head of the 

 U.S. Army Signal Service, we are enabled this week to give the 

 official description of the weather case, the distribution of which 

 among the 27,000 rural post-offices in the United States has just 

 commenced. It is for use in those parts of the country where 

 the daily weather indications cannot reach in time to facilitate 

 agricultural operations, and its issue has been forced upon the 

 Government because the American farmers are wise enough to 

 see that for them, as well as for sailors, to be forewarned is to 

 be forearmed. In a few centuries we may expect to have 

 something of the same kind here. 



M. BouiLLAUD, the once celebrated medical practitioner, 

 who is a member of the Paris Academy of Sciences, assailed M. 

 du Moncel in the sitting of September 30, and asserted that 

 the phonograph and microphone experiments must be the work 

 of ventriloquists. This fit of incredulity was occasioned by the 

 recital of experiments made with the singing conductors. M. 

 du Moncel asked for a commission of investigation to be ap- 

 pointed, although such accusations are not deserving of any 

 notice, and have, indeed, raised universal ridicule. But the regu- 

 lations of the Academy forbid any commission to be appointed 

 to pronounce on the works or communications of members. 

 Another curious scene took place at the sitting of last Monday. 

 M. du Moncel presented to his colleagues, the ' ' condensateur 

 chantant," which had been exhibited on the previous Saturday. 

 He retired to the room of the Academic Fran^aise, in company 

 with M, Faye, closed the door and sang. His voice was heard 

 coming from a number of sheets of paper, in which six sheets of 

 tinfoil had been inserted, and connected with the wires of an 

 induction coil. M. Bouillaud was obliged to retreat from the 

 position he had taken at the sitting of September 30. He 

 made no allusion to the accusation of ventriloquism, but read a 

 long quotation from Descartes, to show that "even if a speaking 

 machine had been constructed, it could by no means be con- 

 sidered as a thinking machine." He said that speaking was not 

 only a mechanical action, but also an intellectual work, so that 

 neither the phonograph nor the singing condenser could be 

 regarded by any means as really speaking ! The whole assembly, 

 in spite of its usual gravity, burst into roars of laughter. M. 

 Milne-Edwards, who spoke at the previous sititng, said with 

 much propriety, he should not have answered M. Bouillaud if he 

 had understood such was his issue. Unfortunately he had un- 

 derstood, as everybody in the assembly did, that M. Bouillaud 

 questioned the honesty of the experimenter. At the end of the 

 sitting M. du Moncel performed all the principal experiments 

 of the phonograph. 



Some remarkable experiments in Electric Telephony were 

 shown by Prof. Barrett in a lecture at the Midland Institute a 



