38(3 



KNOWLEDGE ♦ 



[June 29, 1883. 



heating tlie ashfs, containing sodium iodide, with sulphuric 

 aciil and manganese dioxide, wlien the iodine distils over. 

 Chlorine is manufactured largely for bleaching purposes. 

 Its ethcacy in this direction may be readily proved by 

 introducing a piece of moistened red blotting-paper in a 

 jar of the gas : the colour almost immediately disappears, 

 liromine and iodine have not, however, such extended 

 applications, being principally used as medicinal agents. 

 Ptrhaps among the wonderful changes resulting from 

 chemical action there is scarcely one more remarkable 

 than this production of the halogens from sea-salt. Com- 

 mon salt, so necessary as an article of food, is seen to be 

 composed of chlorine — a gas of most poisonous nature — 

 and sodium — which metal would certainly take lire if placed 

 in the mouth ; and yet the two combined form a body so 

 entirely different in all its properties. 



In the ne.vt article of this series it is proposed to com- 

 mence the study of the chemistry of those grains, such as 

 wheat, ikc, used as articles of food, and also the chemical 

 changes invohed in the preparation from them of the 

 numerous class of bodies in general and e\eryday use. 



Brighton School of Science and Art. — One of the 

 leading institutions in Brighton is the School of Science 

 and Art. The building, which is fitted with the most 

 recent appliances, was built at a cost of £12,000. The 

 Science Department is under the control of our contributor, 

 Mr. W. Jago, F.C.S. It contains a good laboratory and a 

 lecture theatre. One of the most important aims of the 

 institution is to provide technical education in chemistry, 

 for intending brewers, engineers, medical men, &c. The 

 laboratory is open daily for students of this description. 



It is reported that a company has been formed in Iowa 

 for the purpose of manufacturing sporting shot from iron. 

 It is stated that recent trials which have been made with 

 the shot have proved it to be fully equal, and in some 

 respects superior, to the lead shot. 



An American contemporary thus describes a piece of 

 tunnel work vrhich baffled the excavators from the same 

 cause as that which gave so much troulile in the St. 

 Gothard :— " The phenomenon of a tunnel so filling itself 

 up as to resist all eflbrts to open it is reported from Vir- 

 ginia, Nevada. In Castle District, at a point about five 

 miles north of that city, is a tunnel that may be called 

 an ex-turuiel. It was run about four years ago into the 

 side of a steep hill, and was originally about 40 ft in 

 length. When in about 1.5 ft., the tunnel cut into a soft, 

 swelling clay, very difficult to manage. After timbering 

 and striving against the queer, spongy material until it 

 had been penetrated some 2.5 ft., the miners gave up the 

 fight, as they found it a losing game. Being left to its 

 own devices, the tunnel proceeded to repair damages. 

 It very plainly showed that it resented the whole 

 business, as its first move was to push out all the 

 timbers and dump them down the hill. It did not 

 stop at that, but projected from the mouth of the tunnel 

 a pith or stopper of clay the full size of the excavation. 

 This came out horizontally some 8 ft., as though to look 

 about and see what had become of the miners, when it 

 broke oil' and rolled down the" slope. In this way it has 

 been going on until there are hundreds of tons of clay at 

 the foot of the hill. At first it required only about a week 

 for a plug to come out and break off, then a month, and so 

 on, till now the masses are ejected liut three or four times 

 a year ; yet the motion continues, and to-day the tunnel 

 has the better of the fight by about 4 ft. 



THE WEATHER FORECASTS OF//rHb: 

 METEOROLOGICAL OFFICE. 



By W. Mattieu Williams. 



1)RESSURE of non-postponable work has prevented me 

 from earlier fulfiUini; my promise (page 72) concern- 

 ing the above, in accordance with the reminder of Mr. J. W. 

 Staniforth (page 1«2). 



My reasons for anticipating that a fair checking of the 

 official forecasts will prove them to be generally reliable as 

 regards wind, but questional^le in reference to rain and sun- 

 shine, are historical as well as theoretical. When I com- 

 menced, in 1854, the three science classes which laid the 

 foundation of the now prosperous Birmingham and Midland 

 Institute, I worked and lodged in the Ijuilding of the old 

 Philosophical Society in Cannon-street. On and in this 

 building was one of Mr. Follet Osier's earliest self-registering 

 anemometers, including a rain-gauge, also self-registering. 

 The sheets on which the curves were drawn by this instru- 

 ment were placed on a horizontal table. When the new- 

 Institute buildings were completed, an improved anemo- 

 meter, with first-class barometer and revolving drum, in- 

 stead of travelling table, was presented V^y Mr. Osier. 



In connection with the working of ,these instruments I 

 had several conferences with Mr. Osier at his house, at 

 which he showed me the results of his researches extending 

 over many years prior to IS. 5 4, and explained his chief 

 object in making these observations and collating them with 

 other observations made at Liverpool and elsewhere. 



He found that certain winds most disastrous to the 

 shipping on our coasts usually travelled in regular courses, 

 and therefore that it was possible, by erecting a weU- 

 arranged set of observatories, easily workable with self- 

 registering anemometers, to supply telegraphic intelligence 

 of the approach of dangerous storms, and thus effect an im- 

 portant saving of life and property on our largely-navigated 

 coasts. He did not assert the possibility of foretelling all 

 the gales and squalls, one very simple reason being that 

 storms reaching us from outside, as, of course, they 

 generally do, must strike one part of our coast without 

 any possible anemometer warning from British stations. 

 (There was no Atlantic cable then). Only the stations in 

 the following track of the storm could possibly receive a 

 warning, and of these stations only such as were far enough 

 distant as to get their telegraphic news before the storm 

 arrived. 



Mr. Osier struggled hard to induce the Government to 

 take the subject in hand us a national business, and to his 

 et?orts we are largely indebted for the establishment of 

 Admiral Fitzroy's storm warnings, and much of the present 

 organisation of the Meteorological Office and its tributary 

 observatories connected by a complex chain of telegrams. 

 For the comfort of certain gentlemen, I may state that Mr. 

 Osier was a very long way beyond the reach of any office- 

 seeking motives in advocating this official scientific work, 

 and that he spent on the demonstration of its desirability a 

 considerable amount of money and of work. The money 

 he could spare well enough, but not the work. 



The prediction of rain was not an element of Mr. Osier's 

 original scheme, and I question the policy of the Meteoro- 

 logical Ofiice in the inclusion of fine, and wet, and cloudy 

 weather in their forecasts. It looks like a bid for popu- 

 larity, and is likely to defeat its own object by the number 

 of failures that must inevitably occur in a country like 

 ours, whore it is possible by means of local observations to 

 contradict any general prediction, however accurate it may 

 be in its generality. The districts included in the forecasts 

 are so large that during certain very common conditions of 



