Curiosities of Science. 237 



of winking, and to see into the nature and cause of muscce wli- 

 tantes. 



NATUEE OF THE CANDLE-FLAME. 



M. Volger has subjected this Flame to a new analysis. 



He finds that the so-called flame-bud, a globular blue flaminule, is 

 first produced at the summit of the wick : this is the result of the com- 

 bustion of carbonic oxide, hydrogen, and carbon, and is surrounded by 

 a reddish-violet halo, the veil. The increased heat now gives rise to 

 the actual flame, which shoots forth from the expanding bud, and is 

 then surrounded at its inferior portion only by the latter. The interior 

 consists of a dark gaseous cone, containing the immediate products of 

 the decomposition of the fatty acids, and surrounded by another dark 

 hollow cone, the inner cap. Here we already meet with carbon and 

 hydrogen, which have resulted from the process of decomposition ; and 

 we distinguish this cone from the inner one by its yielding soot. The 

 external cap constitutes the most luminous portion of the flame, in which 

 the hydrogen is consumed and the carbon rendered incandescent. The 

 surrounding portion is but slightly luminous, deposits no soot, and in it 

 the carbon and hydrogen are consumed. Lieliy's Annual Report. 



HOW SOON A COEPSE DECAYS. 



Mr. Lewis, of the General Board of Health, from his exami- 

 nation of the contents of nearly 100 coffins in the vaults and 

 catacombs of London churches, concludes that the complete 

 decomposition of a corpse, and its resolution into its ultimate 

 elements, takes place in a leaden coffin with extreme slowness. 

 In a wooden coffin the remains, with the exception of the bones, 

 vanish in from two to five years. This period depends upon the 

 quality of the wood, 'and the free access of air to the coffins. 

 But in leaden coffins, 50, 60, 80, and even 100 years are re- 

 quired to accomplish this. " I have opened," says Mr. Lewis, 

 " a coffin in which the corpse had been placed for nearly a cen- 

 tury ; and the ammoiiiacal gas formed dense white fumes when 

 Drought in contact with hydrochloric-acid gas, and was so power- 

 ful that the head could not remain in it for more than a few 

 seconds at a time." To render the human body perfectly inert 

 after death, it should be placed in a light wooden coffin, in a 

 pervious soil, from five to eight feet deep. 



MUSKET-BALLS FOUND IN IVOEY. 



The Ceylon sportsman, in shooting elephants, aims at a spot 

 just above the proboscis. If he fires a little too low, the ball 

 passes into the tusk-socket, causing great pain to the animal, 

 but not endangering its life ; and it is immediately surrounded 

 by osteo-dentine. It has often been a matter of wonder how 

 such bodies should become completely imbedded in the sub- 

 stance of the tusk, sometimes without any visible aperture ; or 

 how leaden bullets become lodged in the solid centre of a very 



