114 
POPULAR SCIEN"OE NEWS. 
[August, 1891. 
by using differeut sizes of dry points aud varying 
the character of tlie marliing point. 
In Fig. 2 some illustrations are given of the 
capabilities of tliis simple but useful instrument, 
wiiicli can easily i)e improvised from the contents 
of an ordinary box of drawing instruments. 
[Original in PoPHLAK SCIENCE NEWS.] 
EPILOBIUM. 
BY S. E. KENNEDY. 
From July to September we find two species of 
Epilobium in bloom, one of which {E. molle) Wood 
puts down as rare. It is a small downy plant, 
with straight round stem, crowded sessil leaves, 
linear oblong and mostly entire, opposite below 
and alternate above. The stem sometimes branches 
at the top, but ofteuer stands quite erect, its 
closely appressed leaves giving it a rather un- 
usual appearance, and the short hairs by which 
the whole plant is covered making it soft and 
velvety to the touch. The pretty rose-colored 
flowers are arranged in a loose panicle. The four 
petals are deeply notched, and are much larger 
than the sepals. ITiere are eight stamens with 
anthers attached near the middle, and the pollen 
connected by cobwebby threads. The style is 
erect, bearing a large club-shaped stigma, nearly 
entire. In common with plants of this order, tlie 
elongated capsule is a conspicuous characteristic, 
each of its many seeds bearing a tuft of long silky 
hairs. We find this plant among the bogs and 
swamp moss in a rocky pasture overrun with 
huckleberry brush and swamp azaleas. 
The other specimen {E. anguntifolium) grows in 
dryer soil, often upon newly cleared land, — some- 
times where it has been lately burned over, and 
for this reason has received the local name of 
"flre-weed." This is a much larger plant, some- 
tunes growing as high as seven feet, but usually 
from three to five. It l)ranches toward the sum- 
mit, has long lanceolate leaves, somewhat scat- 
tered, each with a curious marginal vein. The 
flowers are in long terminal racemes, large and 
showy, of a pinkish purple hue. The petals, are 
unguiculate ; stamens aud style declined ; stigma 
with four long linear lobes turned backward. 
This also has a linear four-cornered capsul?, with 
many comous seeds. 
Moosup Valley, R. I. 
STATE INTEKFERENCE WITH THE INDI- 
VIDUAL. 
The state is the enemy of all volition in the 
individual : hence it is the enemy of all manliness, 
of all force, of all independence, and of all orig- 
inality. The exigencies of the state, from its 
monstrous taxation to its irritating by-laws, are 
in continual antagonism with all those who have 
character unco wed and vision unobscured. Under 
the terrorizing generic term of law, the state 
cunningly, and for its own purposes, confounds 
its own petty regulations and fiscal exactions 
with the genuine solemnity of moral and criminal 
laws. The latter any man who is not a criminal 
will feel bound to respect; the former no man 
who has an opinion and courage of his own will 
care to observe. Trumpery police and municiijal 
regulations are merged by the ingenuity of the 
state into a nominal identity with genuine law; 
aud for all its purposes, whether of social tyranny 
or of fiscal extortion, tJie union is to the state as 
useful as it is fictitious. The state has every- 
where discovered that it is lucrative and imposing 
to worry and fleece the honest citizen ; and every- 
where it shapes its civil code, therefore, merci- 
lessly and cunningly towards this end. Under the 
incessant meddling of government and its off- 
spring, bureaucracy, the man becomes poor of 
spirit and helpless. He is like a child who, never 
being permitted to have its own way, has no 
knowledge of taking care of itself, or of avoiding 
accidents. As, here and there, a child is of rare 
and strong enough stulf to break his leading 
strings, and grows, when recaptured, dogged and 
sullen, so are there men who resist the dogma 
and dictation of the state, and when coerced and 
chastised become rebels to its rules. The petty 
tyrannies of the state gall and fret them at every 
step ; and the citizen wiio is law-abiding, so far 
as the greater moral code is concerned, is stung 
and whipped into continual contumacy by the im- 
pertinent interference of the civil code with his 
daily life. Why should a man fill up a census- 
return, declare his income to a tax gatherer, send 
his children to schools he disapproves, ask per- 
mission of the state to marry, or do perpetually 
what he dislikes or condemns, because the state 
wishes him to do these things? When a man is a 
criminal, the state has a right to lay hands on 
him ; but whilst he is innocent of all crime his 
opinions and his objections should be respected. 
There may be many reasons — harmless or excel- 
lent reasons— why publicity about his life is offen- 
sive or injurious to him : what right has the state 
to pry into his privacy and force him to write its 
details in staring letters for all who run to read I 
The state only teaches him to lie. " You ask me 
things that I have no right to tell you,"' replied 
Jeanne d'Arc to her judges. So may the innocent 
man, tormented by the state, reply to the state, 
w^iich has no business with his private life uutil 
he has made it forfeit by a crime. The moment 
that the state leaves the broad lines of public 
affairs to meddle with the private interests and 
actions of its people, it is compelled to enlist in 
its service spies and informers. Without these it 
cannot make up its long lists of transgressions ; it 
cannot know whom to summon and what to pros- 
ecute. — OuiDA, in North American Review for Axi- 
■ gust. 
♦♦» 
IDENTIFICATION OF MORE ANCIENT 
CITIES OF THE PHARAOHS. 
Dr. Naville, the discoverer of Bubastis and of 
the Treasure City of Pithom, has just given to the 
world the results of his work in identifying other 
cities and districts in Egypt, more especially 
some connected with the exodus of the Israelites : 
and at the end of the month of June he presented 
these results before one of the largest meetings 
ever held by the Victoria (Philosophical) Insti- 
tute, of Adelphi Terrace, London, the great hall 
in which the meeting was held being so crowded 
that many had to be accommodated in the vesti- 
bule. 
Dr. Naville illustrated his remarks by referring 
to an elaborate map of his surveys. He said he 
had found that Succoth was not a city as some 
had supposed, but a district ; from a remarkably 
valuable inscription discovered at Pithom, there 
was no longer any doubt that it was that Greek 
Heroopolis, from whence, as Strabo, Pliny, Agath- 
eraeros, and Artemidorus described, merchant 
ships sailed to the Arabian Gulf. 'I'his fact coin- 
cided with the results of modern scientific surveys, 
which showed that there had been a gradual 
rising of the land, and that the Red Sea once 
extended up to the walls of Pithom; this must 
have been the case about 3,000 years ago, and Sir 
William Dawson and the French engineer Linant 
held that it went even further north. 'ITie next 
place noted by M. Naville, was Baal Zephou, and 
in identifying this, he had been aided through 
some recently discovered papyri, which proved 
that it was not a village or city, but an ancient 
shrine of Baal and a noted place of pilgrimagi;. 
Other places were Migdol and Pi Hahiroth, and 
here again a papyrus had helped him. It seemed 
probable that the Serapeum was the Egyptian 
Maktal or Jligdol, and it was greatly to be re- 
gretted that a bilingual tablet discovered there a 
few years ago had l)een destroyed before being 
deciphered. The bearing of his identifications 
was of no small interest to the student of history, 
both sacred and other. 
INDUSTRIAL MEMORANDA. 
Ikon rusts readily in all locations when alter- 
nately cold and hot, but particularly with a po- 
rous material which prevents the moisture from 
evaporating freelj'. 
One dollar a minute is the charge for using the 
uew telephone line between London and Paris. 
Distance, about 280 miles. Forty cents a minute 
is the price between New York and Washington, 
about 240 miles. 
In Painting Ironwork exposed to wind and 
rain, take red oxide of iron, ground in oil, and 
mix it with equal parts of boiled linseed oil 
and turi)entine; add one ounce of patent dryers 
to the pound. This is said to be a good paint for 
the purpose. 
Preserving Gilding. — The gilding ou frames, 
etc., can, according to the Culorist, be rendered 
much more durable without interfering with its 
luster by giving it a coating with a warm mixture 
of one part of linseed oil and two of turpentine. 
To clean the frames of flj' specks a mixture of one 
part of ammonia to three or four of water is 
recommended. 
A Skin for Stone.— Soft oolitic hmestone, or 
limestone with spherical granules, is now hardened 
into marble by treatment with a certain chemical 
solution, which gives to the stone a thick, strong 
skin about half an inch deep, capable of a fine 
polish. Soft oolite can thus be worked into any 
form aud hardened afterward. The marble be- 
comes hnpervious to damp and atmospheric influ- 
ences. 
Figures show that the consumption of iron in 
general construction — other than raih-oads — in 
this country has grown from a little more than a 
million aud a half of tons in 1879 to more than six 
million tons in 1889. Much of this increase h.is 
gone into iron buildings. By using huge iron 
frames and thin curtain walls for each story sup- 
ported thereon, as is done in' a building going up 
on lower Broadway, New York City, a good deal 
of space cau be saved. 
Alpine Railways. — The bold scheme of Colo- 
nel Lochner with regard to the railway up the 
Jungfrau is now considered perfectly practical by 
experts, and his success in that direction was 
probably his incentive in proposing a railway in a 
vertical shaft — in other words, a huge lift — up to 
the summit of the JIatterhorn. The Matterhorn 
Railway, as proposed, is to consist of three sec- 
tions. Another Alpine railway proposed is the 
Gornergrat Railway, which is also a combination 
of a wire rope line and a rack railway, and is to 
lead from Riflelalp-Rift'elberg to the summit of the 
Gornergrat (10,28() feet). A third Alpine railway 
planned in the canton of Wallis is the Lauter- 
brunnen and Visp IJailway, especially intended 
for tourists. 
Oil-hardened Steel Plates.— Messrs. Brown 
and Messrs. Cammell, the two great Sheftield 
firms, liHvp recently been inaking some experi- 
