Maech 25, 1898.] 



SCmNCR 



42S 



great vaccination departments of foreign gov- 

 ernments. This is to be undertaken at once 

 without regard to the vaccination legislation 

 promised in the Queen's Speech, and will be 

 completely independent of such a measure. 

 Some delay has arisen in sending out the new 

 lymph, owing to the want of a special laboratory 

 for the cultivation of the matter, but this will 

 not now be long delayed, as soon as the Local 

 Government Medical Board is granted funds to 

 purchase or secure a laboratory. 



It is stated in Industries and Iron that Herr 

 TVachnitz, a German engineer, has succeeded in 

 plating aluminium with copper by a welding 

 process. It is stated that the plated sheets can 

 easily be soldered, grooved, tinned and 

 nickeled. The plating may be of any thick- 

 ness desired, and even with the thinnest sheets 

 there is no separation when rolled or drawn. 

 Large sample sheets have already been submit- 

 ted to the inspection of the Imperial Xavy De- 

 partment and other large manufacturing con- 

 cerns. The obstacles to a still wider use of 

 aluminium, which could be expected in view of 

 its great lightness, have been its poor ability to 

 solder, its weak power of resistance to numer- 

 ous fluids, and the further fact that paint does 

 not adhere to it very well. All these objections 

 would be removed by this invention. 



Peofessoe IfEENST, of Gottingen, has made 

 an important improvement in the eiJiciency 

 of the incandescent light, the first authentic 

 account of it that we have noticed being con- 

 tributed to the Electrical World by Dr. H. Lux, 

 editor of the Zeitschrift fUr Beleuchtungsuesen. 

 Dr. Lux explains that as long as carbon fila- 

 ments are used in incandescent lights the eflB- 

 ciency of the system will probably not be much 

 increased. Professor ISTernst uses the so-called 

 conductors of second class, such as chalk, mag- 

 nesia and kaolin, materials that, when cold, 

 have an extremely high resistance to the cur- 

 rent, so high indeed that they might be called 

 insulators, the resistance falling greatly at high 

 temperatures. These materials are notable for 

 the large proportion of visible light rays in their 

 radiation. The lime light and the Welsbaeh 

 incandescent gaslight are notable instances of 

 the application of this principle. As Professor 



K'emst says in a letter, these materials have a 

 higher emission of light, as they are not in the 

 sense of Kirchhoflf absolutely ' black substan- 

 ces.' If these materials are raised to a sufii- 

 ciently high temperature, no matter by what 

 means, the efiiciency of production of light is 

 remarkably high. Professor Xernst applies as 

 the means to bring the bodies to a high tem- 

 perature the electric current, conducting it by 

 small staffs of magnesia, chalk or other mate- 

 rials, after ha-\-ing prepared them to conduct the 

 current by warming them. It is necessary to 

 work with alternating currents to avoid elec- 

 trolytic action on the material employed. The 

 importance of this invention, if it can be prac- 

 tically employed — Professor N^ernst, a true sci- 

 entific man, ad\'ises us not to be too hopeful — 

 would be very great, as the cost of incandescent 

 lighting would be reduced to about one-third of 

 the present rate. 



UXIVEBSITT AXD EDUCATIONAL SEWS. 



The bill before the Maryland Legislature for 

 an annual appropriation of $100,000 to the 

 Johns Hopkins University was reported un- 

 favorably on March 16th by the Committee on 

 Ways and Means, and the House, by a vote of 

 50 to 17, refused to substitute the bill for the 

 unfavorable report. The Senate is, however, 

 more favorably disposed to the bill, and it is 

 possible that a compromise may be effected by 

 which at least part of the appropriation may ' 

 be made. 



The eighth annual report of President Low, 

 of Columbia University, presented to the Trus- 

 tees on October 4th, has been published, to- 

 gether with the reports of the Deans of the 

 various schools, of the Librarian and of the 

 Treasurer. President Low takes the removal 

 to the new site as the occasion for comparing 

 the present condition of the University with 

 that of the College when in 1S57 it moved to 

 49th Street, and when in 1SS9-90 he was in- 

 stalled as President. In 1S47 there were 14 

 members of the Faculty ; in 1S90 there were 

 176 ofiBcers of instruction, while there were 2S9 

 in 1897. The receipts of the L'niversity for 

 current expenses were about $775,000 and the 

 excess of disbursements over receipts was about 

 $34,000. The average annual increase in the 



