288 



POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



preparing these arrows, the natives first cover 

 the points with a mucilaginous compound, 

 and then plunge them into the soil of crab 

 burrows in some neighboring swamp. Hence 

 it seems probable that years before our isola- 

 tion of this virulent germ these savages were 

 utilizing its fatal properties in their warfare. 



NOTES. 



Observations have been made by Prof. 

 Lloyd Morgan on instinct in young birds with 

 a view to determine how far the activities 

 involved in swimming, diving, running, fly- 

 ing, feeding, bathing, etc., are instinctive or 

 congenital, and how far the definiteness of 

 this and other activities is a matter of indi- 

 vidual acquisition. Other observations were 

 on congenital and acquired timidity. They 

 indicated that while the performance of the 

 activities in question has a congenital basis, 

 they are perfected by individual acquisition, 

 and that there is no instinctive avoidance of 

 insects with warning colors, this seeming to 

 be entirely the result of individual experi- 

 ence. No material support was afforded to 

 the view that the instinctive activities result 

 from the inheritance of what is individually 

 acquired. 



Under the law of the State of New York 

 the duty of analyzing artificial fertilizers 

 and of prosecuting manufacturers of fraudu- 

 lent goods is committed to the Agricultural 

 Experiment Station at Geneva. Since May, 

 1894, prosecutions have been instituted in 

 the case of eleven brands which fell materi- 

 ally below the guaranteed analyses. More 

 than two thousand samples of commercial 

 fertilizers have been collected and analyzed 

 since July, 1890; and since October, 1890, 

 thirteen fertilizer bulletins have been pub- 

 lished, containing four hundred and twenty 

 pages, of each of which about fifteen thou- 

 sand copies have been distributed among the 

 farmers of the State. The station has the 

 addresses of one hundred and twenty firms 

 doing business in fertilizers in this State, the 

 goods of fifty- three of which are manufac- 

 tured in other States. Its publications are 

 sent free to all farmers in the State who ask 

 for them. 



The knowledge of sugar has been traced 

 back away into the darkness of the past. 

 The Chinese have been acquainted with it, 

 according to the Fortschritte der Industrie, 

 for more than three thousand years. From 

 Asia, where it was extracted from a cane, it 

 was brought into Greece by one of the gen- 

 erals of Alexander the Great, b. c. 325. In 

 a. d. 150 it was prescribed by the doctor 

 Galenus as a remedy for certain diseases. 

 The refining of sugar was practiced in Eng- 

 land about 1659. The story runs that the 

 secret of sugar making was brought to Sicily 



by a Venetian merchant, who bought it from 

 the Arabs for a hundred thousand crowns. 



The number of metals found to be capa- 

 ble of combining with argon at a red heat is 

 gradually increasing, and now includes mag- 

 nesium, lithium, barium, aluminum, zinc, 

 iron, and copper. Metallic barium has been 

 found to absorb nitrogen rapidly, and its use 

 as a cheap means of preparing argon from 

 air has been suggested. Lithium absorbs 

 nitrogen with incandescence at temperatures 

 below a red heat ; and it has been shown by 

 M. Deslandres and M. Guntz that this ab- 

 sorption takes place slowly in the cold. 



Among the scientific works announced 

 for publication by Henry Holt & Co. are a 

 book on Electricity, by Prof. Charles A. 

 Perkins, of the University of Tennessee ; A 

 Problem Book in Elementary Chemistry, by 

 E. Dana Pierce, of the Hotchkiss School, 

 Lakeville, Conn., and the amusing Preisge- 

 kront of Eckstein, edited by Prof. Charles 

 Bundy Wilson, of the University of Iowa, 

 will shortly be added to the series of Ger- 

 man texts published by this house. 



In its issue for May 9th the Scientific 

 American gives the particulars concerning an 

 offer of a prize of two hundred and fifty dol- 

 lars, which it makes for the best essay on 

 The Progress of Invention during the Past 

 Fifty Years received by June 20th. The 

 prize essay will be published in the special 

 fiftieth anniversary number of that journal 

 on July 25th, and regular rates of compensa- 

 tion are offered for the five next best essays. 



The institution of Arbor Day was started 

 in Nebraska, in 1872, by the Hon. J. Sterling 

 Morton, our present Secretary of Agriculture. 

 The first efforts, as its history is told by Mr. 

 B. 0. Northrop, were not assuring; but its 

 progress has been remarkable. The day is 

 now observed in forty States and Territories 

 of the United States, in Canada, and in cer- 

 tain districts of England, Australia, Japan, 

 and South Africa. The Western settler who 

 does not now plant trees is an exception ; 

 and the people of Nebraska, in particular, 

 are proud of what they have achieved in this 

 work. 



The death-rate in the German army, 

 which was 6*9 per thousand in 1870, was in 

 1894 only 2 '4 per thousand. This decrease 

 during the past twenty -five years in the death- 

 rate in standing armies has been very general, 

 and is accounted for by improved hygiene 

 and sanitation. During the Franco- Ger- 

 man War the French lost twenty-three thou- 

 sand four hundred men from smallpox. The 

 Germans, who had been strict vaccinators for 

 thirty years, lost only three hundred men from 

 this disease. The strictness of the vaccination 

 law in the latter army may be gathered from 

 the fact that since 1873 only two soldiers in 

 this immense collection of men have died of 

 smallpox. 



