J 94 Muriate of Lime* 



irig it in a bottle covered tightly by a bladder. The pores 

 of the bladder suffer the atoms of water to escape, but not 

 those of the alcohol.— /c/em. 



29. Meteoric Iron. — It was announced by M. de Hum- 

 boldt to the French Academy, in October last, that, agreea- 

 bly to a letter from M. Boussingault dated at Santa Fe de 

 Bogota, this traveller had found, between Tunja and ;he 

 high plain of Bogota, several masses of meteoric iron, very 

 ductile. The weight of one of them is about 3000 lbs. M. 

 Boussingault, conjointly with M. Rivero, has taken levels of 

 the whole mountainous country between Caraccas and Santa 

 Fe Idem, Dec. 1823. 



30. Kain. — The quantity of rain which fell at Paris in the 

 year 1833, as measured in the yard of the Royal Observato- 

 ry, was 20.4 inches. The quantity which fell upon a ter- 

 race at an elevation of about 92 feet above the yard was 

 17.98 inches. The number of days of rain was 175. — Idem. 



31. Muriate of lime. — 'M. Dubuc, an apothecary of Rouen 

 in France has discovered that muriate of lime is a very ac- 

 tive manure or vegetable stimulant. He dissolves about two 

 and a quarter lbs. of the dry salt (chloruret of calcium) in 

 about sixteen gallons of water, and with this solution waters 

 the plants at distant intervals. He sprinkled a light soil 

 with this fluid, and eight or ten days after planted it with 

 maize, and from time to time during the season watered the 

 corn with the same solution. Another portion of corn, at 

 six feet distant, he watered with common wateK. The for- 

 mer yielded double the produce of the latter. A grand va- 

 riety of plants and garden vegetables were tried in the same 

 manner and with similar results. The sun-flower, (helian- 

 thus,) which in that place rises only to six or eight feet, grew 

 \»y this treatment to the height of twelve or fifteen feet, 

 with flowers whose disks were eighteen or twenty inches in 

 diameter, producing seeds which yielded half their weight 

 in oil good to eat, and exuding from its centre a transparent 

 vein of turpentine, very odorous, and drying easily in the 

 air. Potatoes were also tried. They were planted on the^ 

 1st of May, 1822, in two squares six feet asunder ; the one 

 was watered with the solution, and the other with water 

 from the cistern. They were gathered on the 1 0th of N«- 



