310 



KNOWLEDGE • 



[Apkil 10, 1885. 



ordinary circumstances the foul air will be confined to 

 chamber C ; but, should the pressure be strong enough 

 to force the trap at F, the sewer-gas will at once 

 escape into the open air through chamber B, by means 

 of the ventilating pipe, as described above. A second 

 and much stronger trap, at G, eflectually excludes all 

 poisonms gases from chamber A, which forms the only 

 avenue to the house. The diaiihragm G is so coustructed 

 that the sewage from the house is discharged directly into 

 the trapped ciiamber C, beyond the point of communication 

 with the open air. By this arrangement the necessary ven- 

 tilation of the trap is effected with a minimum of contami- 

 nation to the surrounding atmosphere. All traps are made 

 with the aperture D. It is not only useful for cleansing, 

 but should always be employed as a fresh air inlet, thus 

 securing a constant current of pure air sweeping through 

 the houKe-drain and soil-pipe, and escaping above the roof 

 of the house. When the house-drain is deep, a drain-pipe 

 should be conducted vertically from the cleansing opening 

 E to about 9 in. below the ground level, then carefully 

 closed with the disc-plate and covered with earth. By 

 means of a long-handled ladle any subsequent obstruction 

 in the trap may be removed without trouble or expense. 



The e.xact description here given of Messrs. Stitf s appa- 

 ratus is the l)est testimonial we can venture to accord to 

 any disconnecting trap. It speaks for itself. 



eii'torial (gossfp. 



The march number of that excellent American astrono- 

 mical serial Tli", S'ukreal Messenger, contains a very inte- 

 i-csting abstract of a paper >'y Professor Seeliger, of 

 Munich, " On the Distribution of the Stars in the Northern 

 Hemisphere." I note this here because Professor Seeliger's 

 researches so entirely corroborate the views consistently 

 maintained by the conductor of this Journil as to the 

 structure of the physical universe, and show that the 

 " cloven disc " theory of the Milky Way is absolutely 

 basele.ss and untenable. It may reasonably be hoped that 

 the too-familiar diagram illustrating this taid "disc" will 

 now disappcAr from popular books on astronomy at once 

 and for ever. 



EvEKYONE who is anxious that England should retain 

 her position of pre-eminence as a manufacturing nation 

 will be gratified to learn from the "Report to the Governors 

 of the City and Guilds of London Institute for the Ad- 

 vancement of Technical Education," of the continued 

 success of the Finsbury Technical College and of the South 

 London Technical School of Art. Whether, though, as 

 much pleasure will be derived by impartial people from 

 learning that the hat is still orbitating for that charming 

 job, " The Central Institution " at Brompton, may reason- 

 ably be a question for discussi in. There is something sad 

 in the reflection that the representatives of the great City 

 Guilds, who have given so lavishly in furtherance of the 

 laudable purpose of educating our artificers, should have 

 lieen so led by the nose by a comparatively few astute 

 people as to erect this '' Central Institution " in what one 

 of the contributors to these columns has elsewhere called 

 " that focus of snobbery and jobbery — South Kensington." 

 In their desire to be genteel, the contributories have wholly 

 lost sight of the fact that their money is being artfully ex- 

 tracted from their pockets to provide situations for the 

 para-iites of the Science and Art Department, I suspect 

 that it will not be long ere the Livery Companies have their 



eyes rudely opened to the mistake they originally made in 

 suH'ering their central establishment itself to be erected in 

 such a locality, and its virtual control to pass out of the 

 hands of these whose sole business is to provide the money. 



I UAVE received a copy of an address delivered at the 

 Manchester Medical Society on the 4th of last February, 

 by the President, Mr. Walter Whitehead, which contains 

 some statistics of so startling a charactfr as to deserve the 

 serious attention, not only of every pathologist and man of 

 science, but of every man and woman in the kingdom. 

 Briefly, if the Reports of the Registrar-General are trust- 

 worthy, it would seem that while, during the year 1849, 

 4,807 persons died from cancer in England and Wales, by 

 1882 the number of such deaths had reached the terrible 

 total of 14,057 ! In point of fact, during the last ten 

 years only the death-rate from cancer has advanced 36 per 

 cent. Mr. Whitehead inclines to the opinion that, as this 

 most terrible disease is endemic in certain localities which 

 he specifies, the physical geography of a place must enter 

 as one factor into its production. The whole subject, how- 

 ever, is, unfortunately, very oVjscure, and is assuredly one 

 demanding the most instant and searching investigation. 



On this day thirty-seven years occurred the famous 

 Chartist fiasco, when Mr. Feargus O'Connor and his mob, 

 who were going to march in their unnumbered thousands 

 through the streets of London, and make a descent upon 

 the House of Commons with their monster petition, found 

 that discretion was the better part of valour, and gracefully 

 retired with their tails between their legs. Now this all 

 happened well within the recollection of very many who 

 will read these lines, and yet how strangely changed in 

 externals are both London and its inhabitants since April 

 10th, 1848 ! New Oxford-street had, it is true, just been 

 cut through the quondam "rookery" of St. Giles's; but 

 the site of Victoria-street, with its stately mansions on each 

 side, was then a huddled group of foul streets in which the 

 vilest characters swarmed. The Law Courts were as yet 

 undreamed of, and Temple Bar impeded the traffic where 

 that artistic abortion, the Griffin, at present offends 

 every cultivated eye. The Thames Embankment now 

 covers what was then the muddy coal-barge hidden fore- 

 shore of the river; and the presuit artistic Blackfriars 

 Bridgeoccu|iie-i the siteof theolder and less ornamental stroc- 

 ture over whicli Feargus <) Connor & Co. did not march. 

 Charing Cross Railway Bridge spreads over much more than 

 the area of Brunei's Himgerford Suspension Bridge, and the 

 Cannon-street one was not yet. Two steep and dangerous 

 hills met where the Holborn Viaduct now runs as a broad and 

 level road, and the present quasi fashionable region of 

 South Kensington was a series of nursery-gardens. Men 

 wore real "stove-pipe" hats, long hair! what were called 

 " Paletots," double-breasted waistcoats, and " Joinville 

 ties," huge flat straps of satin with fiinged ends, round 

 tlieir throats ; while moustache, save among cavalrymen, 

 was utterly unknown. Ladies appeared in curls, and 

 small bonnets of the coal-scuttle order of architecture ; 

 and that very nasty imitation of a repulsive deformity, 

 the "bustle" (I fancy, but am not sure, that it is now 

 known as a "dress-improver"), was just coming in. I 

 should, [)erhaps, in candour admit that I am indebted to 

 Cassell's " Old and New London " for my topography, and 

 to the caricatures of the late John Leech for my fashions. 



The captive balloon introrluced a fortnight since at Suakim 

 ascended to a height of 200 foet. It was made of goldbeater's 

 skin, contained 7,000 cubic feet of gag, was 23 feet in diameter, 

 and weighed 90 lb. It waa charged with gas made at Chatham and 

 taken out in a reservoir in a compressed state. 



