Sept. 1, lbb'2.] 



• KNOWLEDGE <► 



223 



^Ct V^ AN ILLiL£XRATED ^ /r> ' 



:>^MAGA,ZlNE0?5qENCE'^ j 

 : PLAINIXWORJED-EXACTLY DESCRIBED | 



LOXDOX: FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 1, 1882. 



Contents of No. 44. 



science and Art Gossip 

 The British Associatic 



Editor 



Was HamescsII. the Pharaoh of the 



Oppression. — VII. By Amelia B. 



Kdwards 22 



Amateur Electrician : Electrical 



Heasurement. — II. {iUuttndedi . 22 

 A Poisonous Lizard. By Dr. Andrew 



Wilson, F.R.S.I!:.,F.L.S 2:5 



Weather Charts for t he Week 23 



P4GB 1 



223 I The PubUc Health 



By the ; How to get Strong 



How 

 24 the Muscles outsi 



[Illuslratfd) : 



Books about Health : 



Correspondence : — Alcohol and In- 

 herited Vices — Bicycles and their 



Defects, Fairy Kings, &o '. 



Answers to Correspondenta '. 



Our Mathematical Column : 



Our Chess Column i 



Science auti 3rt 6o55ip. 



Remahkable mirages are frequently observed in the 

 southern and central parts of Sweden, and a specially note- 

 worthy one was seen recently over the Lake of Orsa. A 

 number of large a)id small steamers were reflected as if 

 plying on the lake, and the smoke could even be seen rising 

 from their funnels. Later on, the scene changed to a land- 

 scape, the vessels now taking the form of islands in the 

 lake, covered with more or less vegetation, and at last the 

 mirage dissolved itself in a haze. The phenomenon, which 

 lasted from four to seven o'clock p.m., is said to have fur- 

 nished a most magnificent spectacle. 



Si i>iE speculative merchants in Bergen have obtained the 

 light of cutting block-ice for export from the enormous 

 glacier, Fon or Svartisen (69° 25' north, 35° 15' east, on 

 the Senjen Island, in Norway, the northernmost of its kind 

 in Europe. The fjuality of the ice is good. The glacier is 

 about 120 square miles in extent, and the distance from 

 its border to the sea is only a couple of miles. A similar 

 attempt to utilise the glacier Folgefonden was made some 

 years ago, but failed, owing to the blocks in their down- 

 ward course breaking through the wooden conductor in 

 which they were slid down to the sea. 



)R CiiKisTiAX exhibited at a recent meeting of 

 the Physical Society of Berlin, a new method of preserva- 

 tion by which organic bodies are coated galvanoplastically. 

 A mulberry-leaf, a cral>, a butterfly, a beetle, the brain of 

 a rabbit, a rosebud, and other objects were plated with 

 silver, gold, or copper, and showed all details of their 

 outer form, down to the finest shadings. The objects to 

 lie preserved are first put into a solution of silver nitrate 

 in alcohol, then dried and treated with sulphuretted and 

 phosphuretted hydrogen, when they form good conductors, 

 which, brought in the usual way into the galvanoplastic 

 bath, can be coated with any desired thickness of a metallic 

 deposit 



One of the hardest woods in existence is that of the 

 desert ironwood tree, which grows in the dry wastes along 

 the line of the Southern Pacific Railroad. Its specific 

 gravity is nearly the same as that of lignum-vita>, and it 



has a black heart so hard, when well seasoned, that it will 

 turn the edge of an axe, and can scarcely be cut by a well- 

 tempered saw. In burning it gives out an intense heat. 



A SULPHUR mine in Sicily was recently set on fire in a 

 very curious manner. A waggon loaded with sulphur was 

 being drawn up an incline, when the rope supporting it 

 broke, and the waggon rushed back into the mine at a 

 frightful speed. The rapid motion developed heat enough 

 to set on fire the highly combustible ore, and the flames 

 spread so quickly through the mine that thirteen workmen 

 were unable to escape, and thirty or forty otliers were 

 seriously injured. 



A remarkable sand-storm, accompanied liy an intensely 

 cold temperature, raged in Iceland for two weeks during 

 the spring. The air was so filled with dry fine sand that 

 it was impossible to see for more than a short distance, 

 and the sun was rarely visible, though the sky was clear of 

 clouds. Nobody ventured out of his house except upon 

 matters of most urgent necessity, and many who were 

 exposed to the storm were frozen. The sand penetrated 

 into the houses through the minutest crevices. It was 

 found mixed with articles of food and drink, and every 

 breath drew it into the lungs. Thousands of sheep and 

 horses died. 



Dr. Schweinfurth has succeeded in freshening and pre 

 serving many of the leaves and flowers from garlands fouml 

 on the breasts of mummies discovered last year at Deir tl 

 Bahari. A small herbarium is thus formed from plants 

 which grew thirty-five centuries ago. A number of the 

 species have been identified with those now found in the 

 East. 



The call for an electrical sheep-shearer made by a New- 

 Zealand correspondent in The Scicntijic American some 

 months ago, has apparently brought forth fruit in an un- 

 expected quarter. It is now announced that the head of 

 the Hudson Bay Fur Company, Sir Curtis Lampson, Las 

 applied electricity to the trimming of sealskins. The skin 

 is " fed " over a knife-edge bar, above which is stretched a 

 fine platinum wire, which, raised to a white heat by an 

 electric current, meets the longer hairs which rise above 

 the under fur, and mows or burns them down. 



At a recent meeting of the Paris Academic a paper was 

 read on a use of electrolysis in dyeing and printing, by 

 !M. Goppelsrteder. For example, he impregnates tissues or 

 paper with an aqueous solution of chlorhydrate of aniline, 

 puts it on a non-attackable metal plate, which he connects 

 with one pole of a battery or small dynamo. On the tissue 

 or paper is placed a second metal plate having a design in 

 relief and joined to the other pole ; on pressure and passage 

 of the current the design is reproduced. A modification of 

 the method gives chemical discharge of colour. The current, 

 again, is used to prepare vats of indigo, aniline black, Ac : 

 the hydrogen which arises at the negative pole beujg 

 utilised. It is also used to prevent oxidation of colours in 

 printing. 



Throu(;u an excess of current accidentally brought 

 about, the w ires for conducting the electricity for illumi- 

 nating the stage of the Paris Opera lately l^ecamo red-hot, 

 burnt their covering of gutta-percha, and caused a fire, 

 which, however, was speedily extinguished with a few 

 buckets of water. Such events as these are of the class 

 that result from w hat must be culpable carelessness. 



