130 



POPULAR SCIET^CE NEWS. 



[September, 1889. 



[Special Correspondence ot The Popular Science I^eios.j 



THE PARIS EXHIBITION. 



On the merits and wonders of the Eiifel Tower, 

 I will not dwell at length. All has been said con- 

 cerning the difficulties of the building, and the easy 

 and quiet manner in which the tower has, neverthe- 

 less, been built, — each piece coming in turn from 

 the foundry, ready to perfection, nothing being 

 required but to put it in its place, every hole having 

 been drilled, and all the work done except the put- 

 ting together of the many millions of iron bars 

 which make the tower. The tower weighs under 

 fifteen million pounds, and, as the cost is about 

 seven millions of francs, ($1,400,000), the tower may 

 be said to have cost about two francs per pound, all 

 ready and in place. Well, when considered under 

 this point of view, the tower is not dear at all. The 

 surface of the inferior parts, which support the 

 whole structure, if supposed to be brought together 

 in a bundle, the section-surface of this bundle would 

 hardly suppass th7-ee square yards. The tower is 

 supported by pieces of iron whose section-surface 

 amounts to only three yards and a quarter. The 

 number of holes drilled 

 in the iron bars is 

 7,000,000- The num- 

 ber of steps to the top 

 is 1,79^- 



Another curious de- 

 tail concerning the 

 weight of the structure 

 is the following : The 

 pressure exerted by M. 

 Eiffel's arm chair, when 

 he is seated in it, is 

 nine pounds per square 

 centimetre (0.31; inch) 

 — and M. Eiffel is a 

 small and spare man. 

 The tower, which is 

 979 feet higher than he 

 is, and whose weight is 

 a hundred thousand 

 times greater, exerts 

 on its foundations a 

 pressure of only four 

 and a half pounds per 

 square centimetre ! In 

 fact, the pressure of 

 the tower is inferior 

 to that of all the ordi- 

 nary dwelling houses. 



The tower easily con- 

 tains 10,000 persons. The view is a very fine 

 one from all parts of it : the whole of Paris and 

 its suburbs appear, with hills and forests in 

 the background. It is a tedious process getting 

 to the top; not that it is tiresome, — since the 

 whole journey is made in lifts, — but because 

 one has to wait a long time at the second 

 story, to get in the unique lift which goes to the 

 summit, on account of the crowd. But the French 

 crowd is very patient, and inoculates some of its 

 patience to foreigners. I have been seven times to 

 the second story, hoping to be able to get to the 

 third one. I went at all times of day and night, 

 with the ugliest weather I could pick up, and never 

 met with an occasion of going up without waiting 

 over an hour at the very least. The average is an 

 hour and a half This delay is unavoidable, as 

 there is place for only one lift from the second to 

 the third story. 



To appreciate well the merits of the tower it must 

 be seen from very near, from underneath, and from 

 a distance, at some miles" from Paris. It is only at 

 a distance that one really realizes how high it is, 

 and how all other monuments are small. From 



underneath it is prodigious and colossal. When 

 seen in the evening, illuminated with fiery bengal 

 lights, the enormous arches which support the 

 whole structure seem, amidst the red flaming and 

 smoke of the bengal lights, like a vision of some 

 infernal and monumental abode of the genius of 

 metals. The sight is not to be forgotten. 



But let us on. The Eiffel Tower is the great 

 attraction, of course, but at night the illuminations 

 and luminous fountains successfully contend with 

 it. These fountains, it is known, are fountains in 

 which the streams are lighted and colored in various 

 colors, alternafively, upon the principle of Colladon. 

 Each stream is cylindrical, and in its base, at its ori- 

 gin, an electric-light ray is imprisoned in it. 

 Colored glasses are made to pass before the electric 

 lamp, and the water is colored accordingly. The 

 whole set of streams are easily worked by a few men, 

 through electricity and clock-work, and every even- 

 ing thousands congregate around the fountains to 

 witness the prettj' sight. The fountains play for 

 the first time at half past nine; at six there is 

 already a crowd sitting in the first row, waiting 



the two branches of the U we have, on one side 

 the art galleries, and on the other the liberal art 

 galleries; and in both branches, between the art 

 and liberal art galleries, and the French industry 

 galleries, are the foreign exhibition galleries. All 

 foreign exhibits are not here ; some countries have 

 detached pavilions (Mexico, Brazil, Venezuela, 

 Bolivia, etc.), but the American, English, Italian, 

 Belgian, Austro-Hungarian, etc., exhibitions are 

 here. 



Concerning the American exhibition, I must say 

 that its different parts are verj' unequal. The indus- 

 trial part is a very good one, and attracts much 

 attention. Edison's phonograph is much visited, 

 and Tainter's graphophone has a great success. 

 Theexhibits of different silversmiths, photographers, 

 jewellers, watchmakers, etc., are very fine, and much 

 praised by the public. But, on the other hand, the 

 educational exliibition is of the very poorest descrip- 

 tion. That of 1S78 was a very good one, and is 

 remembered by all who visited it; the present one 

 is miserable and positively shameful, when one 

 knows what excellent work has been done in the 



States concerning edu- 

 cation. The space al- 

 lotted to the exhibit is 

 very small, very badly 

 located, quite out of the 

 way, where no one can 

 find it unless intently 

 bent upon the purpose. 

 The library exhibit is 

 better, some of the 

 publishing houses hav- 

 ing agreed to exhibit 

 collectively, but it is 

 not what might'be ex- 

 pected, many impor- 

 tant publishers having 

 remained aloof 



H. 

 Paris, July 22, 18S9. 



patiently, and eager of seeing the thing in the best 

 condition, the neai'est possible. I do not consider, 

 however, that there is much pleasure in seeing it 

 from so short a distance ; it is just as well to stand 

 some ten or twenty yards oif. It is very interesting, 

 also, to witness the sight from the first story of the 

 Eiffel Tower, especially on a Sunday evening. The 

 avenues are black with humanity, and the crowd 

 around the fountains is worth seeing. 



The Champ de Mars, as I have already said, con- 

 tains the greatest part of the exposition. Besides 

 the Eiffel Tower and luminous fountains, which are 

 close to it, there is the enormous building, or, 

 rather, set of buildings, which contain the principal 

 interesting features. The form of the buildings is 

 that of a U, in which the curve is transformed into 

 a straight line. In this last part is the exhibit of 

 all French industries, of every description, — iron- 

 work, wood-work, furniture, clocks, watches, porce- 

 lain, glass, tapestry, dresses, hats, paper, stationery, 

 and what not.' Parallel to this series of galleries, 

 which are ten or twelve in number, and parallel 

 with each other, extends the prodigious galerie des 

 machines, 1,200 feet long, and 350 feet wide. In 



The Gulf Stre.vm. 

 —In 18S6 the Prince 

 of Monaco, wishing to 

 studv the course of 

 the Gulf Stream, threw 

 into it some copper 

 flasks from the Hiron- 

 delle. Three of these 

 flasks have come 

 ashore on the south 

 coast of Iceland, two near the O Mountains, in 

 the Rangarvall district, and the third at Floj, in the 

 Arnaes district. 



AN ASSYRIAN LIBRARY, 3,500 YEARS OLD. 



The Victoria Institute of London held its annual 

 meeting at Adelphi Terrace on July ist. An im- 

 mense audience crowded the hall in every part, and 

 Sir George Stokes, president of the Royal Society, 

 took the chair. 



It was announced that family matters, consequent 

 on the death of his father, prevented Professor 

 Sayce's presence, and he had chosen the Rev. Dr. 

 Wright to read the address.. It gave an historical 

 description of what has become known in regard to 

 the conquests of Amenophis III., as shown by the 

 archieves of his palace, which liave only lately been 

 discovered, and which the professor went last winter 

 to investigate on the spot before writing the address 

 for the Victoria Institute. Of the tablets and in- 

 scriptions, he said : "From them we learn that in 

 the fifteenth century before our era,— a century 

 before the Exodus, — active literary intercourse was 

 going on throughout the civilized world of Western 



