CJje popular Science i^ttus 



AND 



BOSTON JOURNAL OF CHEMISTRY. 



Volume XXII. 



BOSTON, FEBRUARY, 1888. 



Number 2. 



CONTENTS. 



Familiar Science. — Simple Scientific BzperimenU 17 



Botany as a Recreation 17 



Paris Letter 18 



The Law of Ereetitude 19 



A Bitof Coai 20 



Scientific Brevities 20 



Practical Chemistry and the Arts. — Simple and Cheap 



Chemical Apparatus 21 



A New Form of Vt-ntilator 21 



Starch-Sugar an<l Glucose 21 



A H.irmless Red Color for Confectioners and Others 22 



Magic Photographs 22 



Industrial Memoranda 22 



Laboratory Notes 23 



Home, Farm, and Garden. — The Orange 23 



.V Pheasant Farm 24 



Parisian Egg Chocolate 24 



Gleanings 24 



Editorial. —.Tames Robinson Nichols 25 



The Bacon. Shakespeare Lunacy ^ 26 



The Senses of Animals 27 



Meteorology for December, 1887, with Review of the 



Year 28 



Astronomical I'henoroena lor February, 1888 28 



Do Horses have Sense?. 29 



Whole Wheat us an .Vrticle of Diet 29 



Do Worms fall during .Showers? 29 



Questions and Answers 29 



Literary Notes 30 



Medicine and Phar.macy. — The .Antagonisms of Cocaine. 30 



Sanitary Science and Domestic Architecture 30 



How to Trent the Eye with a Cinder in it 31 



Monthly Summary of Medical Progress 31 



Medical Memoranda 31 



P0BLI8HERB' COLUMH 32 



JTamiliac S>ctente. 



SIMPLE SCIENTIFIC EXPERIMENTS. 

 Place the hands over the ears, and pass a 

 piece of string around the head, as shown in 

 the engraving. Then let another peraon press 

 the string between his fingers, and gradually 

 draw them over it. The vibrations of the 

 string will be transmitted through the hands to 



the vibrations that actually affect the ear, even 

 in the case of the loudest noises. 



Take a wooden pen-holder with a metal top, 

 and paste a piece of paper upon it so that it 

 covers a part of both the wood and metal. 

 Heat the paper over a spirit-lamp ; or an or- 

 dinary lamp or gas-flame will answer, if it be 

 held far enough awaj- to avoid smoking the 

 paper. By heating carefullj-, that part of the 

 paper attached to the wood will become 

 charred, while that against the metal will re- 

 main white. The metal, being a good con- 

 ductor, carries the heat away from the paper ; 

 while the wood, being a poor conductor, allows 

 it to remain, and the paper becomes charred. 



That sound is due to vibrations, and that a 

 sounding bod\- is a vibrating body, can be 

 proved b3- a very simple experiment. Take a 

 goblet of thin glass, ancl attach to the handle 

 a boot-button suspended b^- a string so that 



die opposite this space, and, preserving the 

 same distance as before between your mouth 

 and the candle, blow strongly against the flame. 

 Not only will the latter not be extinguished. 



XV 



^H 



"■ 5- 



Fio 



the ears, and produce a load noise resembling 

 thunder. By drawing the nails over the string 

 the sharp claps of thunder are imitated, and by 

 varying the motion the different sorts of rum- 

 bling and roaring can be reproduced. The 

 intensity of the sound produced by this simple 

 means is astonishing, and shows how weak are 



Fia. 2. 



the button will rest against the rim. If the 

 goblet is then struck so as to produce a musi- 

 cal sound, the button will be thrown away from 

 its surface, showing that the glass is actually 

 vibrating. 



The cuts illustrating the above experiments 

 are reprotluced from La Nature. 



We find in another exchange the following 

 interesting experiment : — 



Put a lighted candle behind a bottle, pickle- 

 jar, stove-pipe, or any other object having a 

 polished surface, then station yourself at about 

 twelve inches from the object, so that it hides 

 the flame of the candle from j"ou, and blow 

 with your breath. The candle will be very 

 easily extinguished, in consequence of the 

 currents of air that you have created around 

 the object meeting near the flame. With a 

 board or a sheet of cardboard of the width of 

 the bottle, extinction would be impossible. 



This experiment can be varied by taking 

 two bottles instead of one, and placing them 

 alongside of each other, so as to leave a space 

 of half an inch between them. Place the can- 





I'll-.. 3. 



but it will incline slightly toward you, as if 

 through the effect of suction. This phenom- 

 enon, which is analogous to the preceding, is 

 due to the fact, that, as a portion of the air 

 cannot pass between the bottles, it flows around 

 their exterior, and returns to the operator. 



[Original in Popular Science News.] 

 BOTANY AS A RECREATION. 



BY FREDERICK LEROY SARGENT. 



For cultivated plants and our commoner and 

 more easily studied wild ones, we should recom- 

 mend Gray's Field, Forest, and Garden Bottiny. 

 Gray's Manual includes all the wild flowering plants 

 of North-eastern United States, and is the standard 

 for the region it covers. For the Southern States 

 we have Chapman's Flora, and for the Rocky- 

 Mountain region Coulter's Manual; while for the 

 country beyond there is Rattan's Popular Flora of 

 California. The highest authority on the phseno- 

 gams of North America is Gray's Synoptical Flora; 

 but this has not yet been completed, and what 

 there is can be used satisfactorily only after con- 

 siderable previous study.' 



In using any of these books, the first thing is, to 

 learn the method of arrangement, and the princi- 

 ples on which the keys are constructed. Sufficient 

 information on this point may be found in the 

 Lessons before referred to, and we have only to 

 add a few practical suggestions. In the first place, 

 we would advise that the student begin with plants 



1 As a preparation for this higher work, the student wilt De«d 

 to ose Gray's Structural Botany. 



