NOTES. 



287 



of low clouds by the difference in relative 

 velocity between observations at the base 

 and summit of Blue Hill, but the difference 

 in height (one hundred and twenty-six me- 

 tres) was found too short for this purpose. 

 The four different methods mentioned to a 

 large extent supplement one another. 



.. NOTES. 



THE rare instance of the coming of age 

 of a whole trio of triplets was celebrated re- 

 cently at Whitenast, near Leamington, Eng- 

 land. Generally, in case of triplets, the chil- 

 dren die soon after birth, but occasionally 

 they survive and reach maturity. One case 

 is on record of quadruplets, all of whom 

 were reared. 



ATTENTION has been called to the cheap- 

 ness of life in Italy by the light sentence 

 of a few years' imprisonment recently im- 

 posed upon a native who, in a fit of jealousy, 

 murdered a physician innocent of all offense. 

 Jealousy is practically accepted by Italian 

 juries as a part expiation of crime, and their 

 misled verdicts are styled verdicts of the 

 heart. Consequently, Italy heads the list of 

 European countries for homicides, and the 

 vendetta flourishes there unchecked. A story 

 is told of a Neapolitan who, wishing to kill 

 his wife, would not venture upon the act at 

 home, where he might be guillotined, but re- 

 moved to Florence, where the penalty was 

 imprisonment for life. Since then imprison- 

 ment has been made the penalty throughout 

 the country. 



NOVEL uses said to have been found for 

 aluminum are for a folding pocket scale, 

 one metre long ; a necktie made of metal, 

 frosted or otherwise ornamented, in various 

 shapes imitating the ordinary silk or satin 

 article, which is recommended for summer 

 wear ; and military helmets. 



A LARGE trade, according to Mr. John 

 Wallace, is done in the shipment from Wash- 

 ington ports of salmon frozen solid and packed 

 tightly in refrigerator cars in sawdust, with- 

 out ice. The cars are first reduced in tem- 

 perature as low as possible, and the floors 

 are covered with chilled sawdust. The boxes 

 of fish are next placed therein, any spaces 

 between them being filled with the cold saw- 

 dust. The car is then closed and sealed, and 

 in reasonably warm weather its contents may 

 be relied upon to arrive at their destination 

 in the most perfect condition after a passage 

 of eighteen days or thereabouts. 



THE mean cloud velocities at Blue Hill, 

 Mass., indicate that the entire atmosphere, 

 from the lowest to the highest cloud level, 

 moves almost twice as fast in winter as in 

 summer. The mean velocity of the highest 



clouds in winter is more than fifty metres 

 per second, or a hundred miles an hour ; and 

 the highest velocity, a hundred and three 

 metres per second, or two hundred and thirty 

 miles per hour, show that the upper currents 

 sometimes move with enormous rapidity. 



THERE was a discussion once in The Popu- 

 lar Science Monthly regarding the position, 

 assumed by flamingoes in incubating some 

 authors affirming that they straddled their 

 raised nests, their legs dangling down on 

 either side, and others that they disposed 

 of their legs in some other way. The ques- 

 tion seems now to be settled by Abel Chap- 

 man, in his book, Wild Spain, who observed 

 them in their nesting grounds on a low mud 

 island of the Andalusian marisma, " most 

 distinctly " from a distance of about seventy 

 yards " the long red legs doubled under 

 their bodies, the knees projecting as far as 

 or beyond the tail, and their graceful necks 

 neatly curled away among their back feath- 

 ers, with their heads resting on their breasts 

 all these points were unmistakable." 



THE Dutch, desiring to utilize their wind- 

 mills and at the same time place them in line 

 with the latest improvements in the appli ca- 

 tions of power, have offered, through the 

 Haarlem Society for the Encouragement of 

 Industry, a prize of $150 to the author of 

 the best essay on the production of electricity 

 through their agency. 



A SUBSTITUTION of camels as working 

 animals for horses and oxen has been going 

 on for a few years past in several provinces 

 of Russia, and they are now common on 

 many large estates and on smaller proper- 

 ties. They perform all the work in farming 

 for which horses and oxen are used, as well 

 as being efficient in transportation. A camel 

 market has grown up at Orenburg, and the 

 animals bring sixty or seventy rubles, or 

 about thirty-five dollars, delivered at Kiev. 



THE Baluban tribe of Central Africa are 

 famous for their skill in casting and forging 

 iron. They construct tall cylindrp-conical 

 furnaces of clay with tuyeres of clay and an 

 ingeniously devised wooden bellows. They 

 make arms for hunting and for war, and col- 

 lars and bracelets of iron. The neighboring 

 natives resort to them in great numbers to 

 exchange their own products for the manu- 

 factures of the Balubans. 



MORE than three hundred species of fish 

 hitherto unknown to naturalists are described 

 by M. Leon Vaillant as inhabiting the lakes 

 of Borneo. Many other fish are identical with 

 species living in the waters of the Sunda Is- 

 lands and of Indo-China. As these species 

 never reach the sea, they furnish another 

 argument in favor of the theory of a former 

 connection of these countries. 



PROF. EUGENE SMITH, State Geologist, 

 shows in a paper on the Clays of Alabama, 



