FRAGMENTS OF SCIENCE. 



283 



for establishing a similar garden on 

 the verdant ridges of the Semnoz. Two 

 local societies in Italy are engaged in 

 a similar work, one of which has estab- 

 lished the garden museum Chamousia 

 on the slopes of the Saint Bernard, 

 where plants from the Pyrenees and the 

 Himalaya are also collected. Switzer- 

 land is not behind either of these coun- 

 tries in this work. 



Tortoise Shell. The following in- 

 teresting account of the tortoise-shell 

 industry is taken from Nature : The tor- 

 toise shell of commerce is obtained from 

 the horny superficial plates overlying the 

 bony case of the great majority of tor- 

 toises and turtles. Turtles differ from 

 tortoises in the heart-shaped form of the 

 upper half of the shell, and the conver- 

 sion of the limbs into paddles adapted 

 for swimming. The upper part of the 

 shell carries a median row of five large 

 superficial horny plates, flanked on ei- 

 ther side by a row of four or five still 

 larger flat plates; these thirteen or fif- 

 teen large plates affording some of the 

 most valuable commercial tortoise shell 

 in the particular species whose shell is in 

 most demand. On the front and hind 

 edges of the upper bony shell and the 

 portion connecting the latter with the 

 plastron, or lower shell, are a series of 

 smaller horny plates, generally twenty- 

 four in number, which are sharply bent 

 in the middle and are known in the 

 trade as " hoof." The under surface of 

 the shell of a turtle carries six pairs of 

 large, more or less flat, horny plates, 

 for which the trade term, derived from 

 their uniform color, is " yellow belly." 

 In value they sometimes exceed all but 

 the very finest of the large upper plates, 

 generally known simply as " shell." Of 

 the host of land and fresh-water tor- 

 toises, most of which are of compara- 

 tively small size, the horny plates 

 (which, by the way, are altogether 

 wanting in the so-called soft tortoises 

 of tropical rivers), on account of their 

 thinness and opacity, are now of no 

 commercial value, at least in England. 

 Moreover, it is by no means all species 

 of marine turtles which yield commer- 

 cial tortoise shell. Of these marine 

 turtles, exclusive of the great leathery 

 turtle, there are three well-marked and 

 perfectly distinct types, severally repre- 

 sented by the green or edible turtle, 



the hawksbill, and the loggerhead. 

 The hawksbill furnishes the most valu- 

 able shell. The largest and best plates, 

 which are in the middle of the back, 

 are about a quarter of an inch thick 

 in the center, and measure about thir- 

 teen by eight inches, their weight being 

 from about half a pound each to as much 

 as one pound. The length of the cara- 

 pace (the upper shell) in the hawks- 

 bill is about forty-two inches. It is 

 found in all tropical and subtropical 

 seas. From a dead turtle the plates 

 of tortoise shell can be readily detached 

 by beating. The highest price realized 

 during 1898 in the London market was 

 about 112s. 6d. (about $28) a pound 

 for the very best selected shell. It is 

 stated that 76,760 pounds of hawks- 

 bill shell were sold in London in 1898. 

 The shell is very readily workable, being 

 made partially plastic by immersion in 

 hot water. 



Poison in "Wild Cherry Leaves. 

 Instances having been brought to the no- 

 tice of the directory of the New Hamp- 

 shire College Agricultural Experiment 

 Station of cattle presumably fatally poi- 

 soned by prussic acid from eating wild 

 cherry leaves, the subject has been in- 

 vestigated by Fred W. Morse and 

 Charles D. Howard. Five species of 

 wild cherry grow in New Hampshire, of 

 which the red cherry and the horse plum 

 are not regarded as dangerous, and the 

 dwarf cherry has not been examined, 

 but is strongly suspected. The wild 

 black cherry is the most noxious species, 

 and the chokecherry is not far behind 

 it. The poisonous principle in these 

 cherries is hydrocyanic or prussic acid, 

 which, however, does not exist in the 

 leaves as such, but is derived from the 

 amygdalin they contain. The popular 

 opinion that only the wilted leaves are 

 specially dangerous is not borne out. 

 The authors found both wilted and fresh 

 leaves poisonous, and the dried leaves 

 worthy to be regarded with suspicion. 

 Vigorous, succulent leaves from young 

 shoots, which are the ones most likely 

 to be eaten by cattle, are far more poi- 

 sonous than the leaves from a mature 

 tree or stunted shrub. The largest 

 amounts of prussic acid were derived 

 from leaves wilted in bright sunlight to 

 about seventy-five per cent their origi- 

 nal weight, or till they began to ap- 



