FRAGMENTS OF SCIENCE. 



285 



beds and forcing houses the Germans have 

 another substitute glass called Fensterpappe, 

 which is a tough, strong manilla paper 

 which is soaked in boiled linseed oil until it 

 becomes translucent and impervious to water. 

 This paper costs wholesale in Germany 

 about 19s. Qd. per roll one hundred metres 

 in length by one metre in width. It admits 

 sufficient light for growing plants, does not 

 require to be shaded in hot sunshine, is 

 light, durable, and practically secure against 

 breakage, and is said to be a hundred 

 times cheaper than glass. There is a new 

 product recently patented and placed on the 

 German market, called Hornglas. It is very 

 similar to tectorium in appearance and prop- 

 erties, the two advantages claimed for it be- 

 ing greater transparency and less liability of 

 softening under a hot sun. 



Animal Traits. Among the birds in the 

 "Zoo" at the Hague not commonly found 

 in menageries is the " rhinoceros bird," or 

 " buffel pikker," from the Transvaal, which 

 is described by the natural-history writer in 

 the London Spectator as a bird of remark- 

 able habits and unusual plumage. Small 

 flocks of these birds accompany most of the 

 large antelopes, the buffaloes, and the rhi- 

 noceroses in South Africa, and run all over 

 the creatures' bodies, picking off flies and 

 insects. When an enemy approaches, the 

 "buffel pikkers" sit in line with heads 

 raised on the back of the animal they are 

 attending, like sparrows on a roof ridge, and 

 signal the alarm. The plumage is close, uni- 

 form, and compact, giving the bird an ap- 

 pearance of being covered with polished 

 satin rather than with feathers. The mon- 

 keys have an outdoor house, floored with loose 

 sand, exactly suitable for a playground agree- 

 ing with their natural habits, which communi- 

 cates with their cages by holes through the 

 wall. The holes fairly represent the rock 

 crevices in the animals' native hills, and the 

 monkeys slip through them to the sand, which 

 they can turn over in search of insects, as they 

 do at home. When thirsty, they go to the 

 stone water troughs set in the runs and drink, 

 standing on all fours, sucking up the water 

 as a horse does. The elephant in this Zoo 

 has had to sacrifice his dignity and come 

 down to playing tricks. It earns small coins 

 by blowing a mouth organ with its trunk 



and grinding a coffee mill. It plays domi- 

 noes " with laborious care," lifting each piece 

 from the table and depositing it next that 

 placed by the keeper, with a very audible 

 noise. 



Canon Gore on Evolution and the Fall. 



In a lecture recently delivered at Sheffield, 

 England, Canon Gore examines the contra- 

 dictions between the Christian doctrine of 

 the sudden fall and the scientific doctrine of 

 the gradual rise of man. " According to the 

 theory of evolution," he said, "man began 

 his career at the bottom, emerging from pure- 

 ly animal life, and slowly struggled upward 

 to his present level of attainment. Accord- 

 ing to the Christian doctrine, on the contrary, 

 he was created perfect, and then subsequent- 

 ly fell into sin and accompanying misery." 

 Intellectually, however, the Bible does not 

 represent primitive man as perfect. His 

 faculties at the beginning were in a childish 

 state, and his mastery over the arts and sci- 

 ences was a gradual acquirement. But it 

 maintains that man from the first was en- 

 dowed with a perfected moral feeling for 

 right and wrong, and that his one act of dis- 

 obedience not only affected his own life but 

 also tainted with lawlessness his after-com- 

 ers. Canon Gore maintains that according 

 to the third chapter of Genesis man was at 

 first in direct relation to a divine will, and 

 could have followed the path of development 

 pointed out to him. He thereby would have 

 spiritualized not only his own nature, but by 

 the simple law of heredity would have fa- 

 thered a race moving in an altogether higher 

 moral sphere. 



Marsupials and their Skins. The mar- 

 supials (the pouch-bearing animals) of Aus- 

 tralia, the opossums, wombats, kangaroos, and 

 wallabies (smaller kangaroos), are among the 

 fur-bearing animals killed in the largest num- 

 bers. They have been looked upon as pests, 

 and a premium put upon their heads by the 

 Government, so that now they are exter- 

 minated in many parts of the country. Their 

 skins are not at all estimated at their proper 

 value, being mostly made up into cheap rugs, 

 or used for sole leather and japanned boots, 

 or the hair is scraped off and manufactured 

 into felt. Yet they would be a valuable ad- 

 dition to the European fur trade, were the 



