Vol. XXV. No. 3.] 
POPULAE SCIENCE KEWS. 
41 
Sf^e J^opukr iBsienee F^ewg. 
BOSTOX, MARCH 1, 1891. 
AUSTIN P. KICHOLS, S.B Editor 
WILLIAM J. EOLFE, LITT. D. . . ASSOCIATE Editok 
The article upon the study of mosses by the 
late Professor Lesquereux is published for the 
first time in the present number of the Popular 
SciEXCK Xews, and, although necessarily some- 
what technical, will be found of unusual interest 
to all interested in botany. Professor Lesquereux 
¥&» one of the highest authorities in his special 
epartment, and we acknowledge with pleasure 
ar indebtedness, both to his family and the Pres- 
dent of the Agassiz Association, for the privilege 
"! presenting his latest work to our readers. 
+♦» 
Mr. S. C. Sdtdam, of Baldwinsville, Xew York, 
ends us an interesting photograph of some natu- 
»1 snow-balls, formed on the frozen surface of a 
Iver through the agency of the wind. The pic- 
Ire sliows the river covered with hundreds of 
lite perfectly formed snow-balls, ranging in size 
om that of a barrel downwards. Although sim- 
ilar occurrences have been observed before, the 
formation of these natural snow-balls is quite un- 
common, as it requires a fall of slightly damp 
snow in connection with a high wind, and the 
exact combination of the necessary meteorologi- 
cal conditions does not often occur. 
-t^* 
A NEW claimant for the earliest discovery of 
the "Periodic liaw" of the chemical elements 
has arisen in the person of M. Ciiancouktois, 
who, it has lately been found, published in the 
Comptes Bendu of April 7, 1862, a paper on the 
classification of the elements under the peculiar 
title of "The Telluric Screw,"' in which he ar- 
ranged the elements in a helix, as was done later 
by Mr. Xewlands, and, in a supplementary paper, 
made the explicit statement, which is the founda- 
tion of the periodic law, that "the properties of 
bodies are properties of numbers." Mr. Newlands, 
who, it will be remembered, disputed the priority 
of his discovery with the chemists Mendeleeff and 
Meyer, first published a list of the elements ar- 
ranged in the order of their atomic weights in 
1864, and did not formulate the periodic law itself 
until 1886. It is remarkable that so impoitant a 
paper as that of C'haucourtois should have re- 
mained unnoticed in a periodical so universally 
read by scientists as the Comptes Bendu, for t wentj'- 
eight years ; but such seems to have been the case, 
and it is a curious instance of the often observed 
fact that many important discoveries have been 
made by two or more independent observers at 
nearly the same time. The discovery of the planet 
Xeptune, and of oxygen gas, are notable instances 
of this, to say nothing of the many claimants for 
inventions of commercial value, in which the ele- 
ment of fraud and deceit may not be wholly ab- 
sent. 
In any case, it is no discredit to either Xew- 
lands, MendeleefiF, or Meyer that the connection 
between the physical properties of the elements 
and their atomic weights was observed a few 
months before they announced the results of their 
own investigations. The only wonder is that 
such an evident fact was not noticed before. 
Chancourtois" theory, although containing a germ 
of truth, was defective and imaginative in every 
way, and would not for a moment bear compari- 
son with the later work of the chemists mentioned 
above, who have developed a theory which is to 
the inorganic world what the theory of evolution 
is to the organic. All the parties concerned are 
entitled to the highest credit, and have ably sup- 
plemented each other in their work. 
A CURIOUS modification of silicon has been dis- 
covered by Mr. H. X. Wauken, which appears to 
be a graphitoidal form of the element, similar to 
the graphite, or plumbago, of carbon, an element 
which silicon closely resembles in many other 
ways. The graphitoidal silicon occurs in perfect 
oblique octahedral crystals, half an inch long, of 
metallic lustre, insoluble in all acids but hydro- 
fluoric, and infusible. The substance was ob- 
tained by intensely heating potassium silicofluo- 
ride in connection with metallic aluminium, al- 
though the actual process was somewhat lengthy 
and complicated. This allotropic form of silicon 
connects it even more closely than before with 
carbon and boron, and tends to strengthen the 
theory held by some chemists that all the diftereut 
elements are but modifications of a single form of 
matter. 
A GOOD example of the wild western imagina- 
tion is found in a story, telegraphed from Omaha 
to the leading newspapers of the country and 
soberly published as a fact, of a patient in St. 
Joseph's Hospital wliose bodily temperature 
reached the astonishing figure of 171°, and, for 
a period of two weeks, remained at 146°. As the 
normal temperature of the body is slightly below 
100°, and a rise of only a few degrees above this 
point has hitherto resulted fatally, it would seem 
that either the patient or the hospital tliermome- 
ter must have possessed some very remarkable 
properties. Inasmuch as albumen coagulates at 
158°, it would also seem that the blood of this 
patient must have been of a very different charac- 
ter from that of common mortals, and free from 
the albuminoid substances which that of less fa- 
vored persons usually contains. 'ITiis alleged sci- 
entific item is of more value as a sample of a most 
artistic lie than as a statement of a fact of medical 
interest. 
The Cincinnati Board of Health has distin- 
guished itself by suppressing an exhibition of 
alleged "hypnotism," on the ground that it was 
prejudicial to the public health. Even allowing 
that the attempted exhibition was one of genuine 
psychical phenomena, and not of mere deceit and 
trickery,— as is the case with ninety-nine hun- 
dredths of these travelling mesmerizers and hyp- 
notizers, — we can see no reason for the inter- 
ference of the Board. If a person chooses to 
place himself under the mysterious influence 
known as hypnotism, he certainly has a right to 
do so, without asking the permission of any polit- 
ical oflicial. We doubt very much if the ofticious 
members of the Cincinnati Board could explain 
what hypnotism really is, or even give an exact 
definition of the term ; and the true reason for the 
suppression of the exhibition was, undoubtedly, a 
desire to imitate the action of certain oflBcials in 
European countries, where exhibitions of hypno- 
tism are forbidden by law. ITie constant inter- 
ference of Boards of Health with private rights is 
a growing evil, and a positive proof that sanitary 
science and practical politics are entirely incom- 
patible. Every individual has certain natural 
rights which even health boards are bound to 
respect, but this fact still remains to be brought 
to the notice of many of them. 
«♦« 
The New York and Connecticut divisions of 
the League of American \Vheelmen"[offer~prize8 
aggregating one hundred dollars for the best col- 
lections of photographs of such subjects as most 
strongly illustrate the unfitness of the present 
public roads to be used as public highways, in- 
cluding photographs showing the common specta- 
cle of the farmer or the merchant with his loaded 
w.igon vainly trying to drive his patient team and 
load out of the inevitable mud-hole, and other pic- 
tures ilbistrating the goodness of good roads and 
the badness of bud roads. Each photograph must 
be accompanied by a full statement of particulars, 
giving date, location, etc., by which the picture 
may be identified. The competition will close on 
the first day of May„1891. 
THE THREE KIXGDOMS OF X.4TURE. 
AccoKDixo to the old school-books, all Xature 
is divided into three kingdoms — the .Animal, Vege- 
table, and Mineral. This is a very convenient 
classification, as no one is likely to mistake a 
mineral for a plant or animal, or — in the higher 
and more familiar forms at least — to confuse a 
vegetable and animal oiganism. A more rational 
and strict classification would be to distinguish 
two kingdoms only — the organic and inorganic, or 
the living and dead forms of matter; for, as was 
shown l)y Professor Stoller in the .January num- 
l)er, the line between animals and plants is by no 
means strongly marked, and among certain lower 
forms of life it is often a puzzling question to 
decide whether they should be considered as vege- 
tables or animals. 
An animal may be I)roadly defined as a vitalized 
aggregation of matter, capable of motion and re- 
production, and endowed with perceptive faculties 
which enal)le it to take cognizance of the outside " 
world, and sustaining the chemical processes of 
life by nutritive material obtained from external 
sources ; while a vegetable is fixed to and grows 
from a certain point, and has no perception of 
outward conditions. These definitions are evi- 
dently very faulty, as certain plants— like the 
ferns and seaweeds — produce microscopic organ- 
isms endowed with the power of motion ; while 
the familiar growth of a potato-sprout towards 
the light, and the motions of the insectivorous 
plants, seem to show that they are sensitive to 
external impressions to a certain degree. 
The most characteristic ditlerence between a 
plant and an animal, and one afibrding perhaps 
the best means of classification, is a chemical one. 
Animals, as a rule, are oxjdizing machines ; they 
take in nutriment prepared for them by vegeta- 
bles,— eitlier directly or after passing through 
some intermediate animal organism,— and, oxidiz- 
ing or burning it in their bodies, throw it off" in 
the form of water and carbonic acid gas. T'he 
vegetables seize upon these waste products of 
animal life, and, by the aid of the sun"s radiant 
energy, remove the oxygen and build them up 
again into nutriment for the animals to oxidize in 
their turn. The plant reduces; the animal oxi- 
dizes ;— and this, while not a perfect distinction, 
is as good as any that we have. The yeast plant 
—if it is a plant— is one of the most familiar 
apparent exceptions, for, feeding as it does upon 
the highly complex molecules of glucose, it breaks 
them up into the simpler and more highly oxidized 
substances alcohol and carbonic dioxide, after the 
habit of a true animal. 
In the mineral or inorganic kingdom, however, 
there is no uncertainty. The presence of vitality 
in matter is unmistakable, as is the presence of 
organs adapted to special purposes of nutrition or 
reproduction. The moment a plant or an animal 
dies, it practically passes ove" to the mhieral king- 
