273 



SCIENTIFIC SIDE-LIGHTS 



Freedom 

 Future 



mated at nine atmospheres; during the con- 

 densation the vessel became sensibly warm. 

 After suffering the apparatus to cool down 

 to the temperature of the room, the stop- 

 cock was opened; the air rushed out with 

 great violence, carrying with it a quantity 

 of water, which was instantly converted into 

 snow; after a few seconds the tube became 

 filled with ice, which almost entirely stopped 

 the current of air. The neck of the vessel 

 was then partially unscrewed, so as to al- 

 low the condensed air to rush out around 

 the sides of the screw; in this state the 

 temperature of the whole atmosphere was 

 so much reduced as to freeze the remaining 

 water in the vessel; the stop-cock and tube 

 at the same time became so cold that the 

 fingers adhered to them, in the same manner 

 that they are sometimes found to stick to 

 the latch of a door on an intensely cold 

 morning. This experiment was exhibited to 

 the Institute within six feet of a large 

 stove, and in a room the temperature of 

 which was not less than eighty degrees of 

 Fahrenheit's thermometer. HENRY Proceed- 

 ings of Albany Institute, vol. i, p. 39. 



1331. FREEZING NOT DESTRUCTIVE 

 OF MICRO-ORGANISMS Bacteria in Ice. 

 Ice contains bacteria in varying quantities 

 from 20 per c. c. to 10,000 or more. Nor is 

 variation in number affected alone by the 

 condition of the water, for samples col- 

 lected from one and the same place differ 

 widely. The quality follows in large meas- 

 ure the standard of the water. NEWMAN 

 Bacteria, ch. 6, p. 238. (G. P. P., 1899.) 



1332. FREEZING, SUDDEN, OF 

 NORTHERN RIVER Wild Oxen Frozen in 

 Tibet in Act of Swimming. A herd of 

 mammoths returning from their summer 

 pastures in the north may have been sur- 

 prised, while crossing a stream, by the sud- 

 den congelation of the waters. The mission- 

 ary Hue relates, in his travels in Tibet in 

 1846, that, after many of his party had been 

 frozen to death, they pitched their tents on 

 the banks of the Mouroui-Ousson (which 

 lower down becomes the famous Blue 

 River ) , and saw from their encampment 

 " some black shapeless objects ranged in file 

 across the stream. As they advanced nearer 

 no change either in form or distinctness was 

 apparent; nor was it till they were quite 

 close. that they recognized in them a troop 

 of the wild oxen, called yak by the Tibet- 

 ans. There were more than fifty of them 

 incrusted in the ice. No doubt they had 

 tried to swim across at the moment of con- 

 gelation, and had been unable to disengage 

 themselves. Their beautiful heads, sur- 

 mounted by huge horns, were still above the 

 surface, but their bodies were held fast in 

 the ^ ice, which was so transparent that the 

 position of the imprudent beasts was easily 

 distinguishable; they looked as if still 

 swimming, but the eagles and ravens had 

 pecked out their eyes." LYELL Principles 

 of Geology, bk. i, ch. 6, p. 85. (A., 1854.) 



1333. FRENZY AN OUTCOME OF IN- 

 FIRMITY Indulgence Destroys Self-control 

 Responsibility at Outset. The habit of 

 yielding to a natural infirmity of temper 

 often leads into paroxysms of ungovernable 

 rage, which, in their turn, pass into a state 

 of maniacal excitement. The poor girl who 

 drowns herself after a quarrel with her 

 lover, or the nurse-maid who cuts the throat 

 of a child to whom she is tenderly attached, 

 because her mistress has- rebuked her for 

 wearing too fine a bonnet, may be really 

 laboring under a " temporary insanity " 

 which drives her irresistibly to a great 

 crime; yet, just as the man who commits 

 a murder in a state of drunken frenzy is 

 responsible for his irresponsibility, so is the 

 suicide or the murderess, in so far as she 

 has habitually neglected to control the way- 

 ward feelings whose strong excitement has. 

 impelled her to the commission of her crime. 

 CARPENTER Mental Physiology, ch. 7, p- 

 323. (A., 1900.) 



1334. FUSION OF ROCKS Graniteand 

 Porphyry Cooled under Pressure Subter- 

 ranean Lakes of Melted Lava Now Exist- 

 ing. It may indeed be said that we have 

 as yet no data for estimating the relative 

 volume of matter simultaneously in a state 

 of fusion at two given periods, as if we were 

 to compare the columnar basalt of Staffa 

 and its environs with the lava poured out 

 in Iceland in 1783; but for this very reason 

 it would be rash and unphilosophical to as- 

 sume an excess of ancient as contrasted 

 with modern outpourings of melted matter 

 at particular periods of time. It would be 

 still more presumptuous to take for granted 

 that the more deep-seated effects of subter- 

 ranean heat surpassed at remote eras the 

 corresponding effects of internal heat in 

 our own times. Certain porphyries and 

 granites, and all the rocks commonly called 

 Plutonic, are now generally supposed to 

 have resulted from the slow cooling of ma- 

 terials fused and solidified under great pres- 

 sure; and we cannot doubt that beneath 

 existing volcanoes there are large spaces 

 filled with melted stone, which must for 

 centuries remain in an incandescent state, 

 and then cool and become hard and crystal* 

 line when the subterranean heat shall be 

 exhausted. That lakes of lava are contin- 

 uous for hundreds of miles beneath the Chil- 

 ean Andes seems established by observa- 

 tions made in the year 1835. LYELL Prin- 

 ciples of Geology, bk. i, ch. 11, p. 161. (A., 

 1854.) 



1335. FUTURE MUST BE BASED UP- 

 ON A PAST The Masses a Rising Power. 

 We fail to see any scientific connection 

 between his [Comte's] theoretical explana- 

 tion of the past progress of society and his. 

 proposals for future improvement. The pro- 

 posals are not, as we might expect, recom- 

 mended as that towards which human so- 

 ciety has been tending and working through 

 the whole of history. It is thus that think- 

 ers have usually proceeded who formed the- 



