September 20, 1889.] 



SCIENCE. 



199 



sulphuring is given when the shoots are four or five inches long ; 

 then, if lesions appear, the operation is repeated in about a fortnight 

 with a mixture of lime and sulphur, the proportion being one part 

 of sulphur to three of lime. A mixture of plaster and sulphate of 

 iron has also been very successful. The only really efficacious 

 remedy for pourridie is by removing and burning all roots showing 

 traces of the disease. Erinnose may be treated like mildew ; that 

 is, by repeated applications of sulphur. 



— The International Prison Congress will be held in St. Peters- 

 burg in the summer of i8go. A prize of four hundred dollars is 

 offered by the conductors of the Prison Discipline Review, for the 

 best essay on the subject, " What in the most civilized nations has 

 been the historical development of the institutions relating to the 

 correctional education of minors who have been convicted of 

 crimes at common law, or who have been put in custody for idle- 

 ness and vagabondage, or with a view to paternal discipline.'" 

 The essays must be written in Russian or French, and must be 

 sent to the president of the organizing committee of the Fourth 

 International Prison Congress, at St. Petersburg, not later than 

 May 15, 1890. They must be furnished with a motto, and accom- 

 panied by a sealed letter containing the writer's name and address. 



— The Paris correspondent of the Medical Press writes, under 

 date of July 13, 1889, that in the last sixteen years the number of 

 suicides increased in France 55 per cent. Their proportion in re- 

 gard to the population rose during that period from 15 to 21 per 

 100,000 inhabitants. In 1872 the total number of suicides was 

 5,275, while in 18S7 8,202 were registered. Women, as in other 

 countries, are less prone to self-destruction than men, — 1,768 (22 

 per cent) against 6,434 (78 per cent). The frequency of suicides 

 increases with age. Up to the fortieth year the propensity is about 

 the same in both sexes, but after that the men take the lead. 

 There were 2,894 unmarried, 3,706 married, while 1,355 were 

 widows or widowers. As to the social condition, 2,^614 were in 

 agricultural pursuits, 2,276 belonged to varied industries, while the 

 remainder were in business, or were householders, domestics, 

 clerks, etc. The rural population furnished a higher number 

 of suicides than the urban, — 4,279 of the former to 3,807 of 

 the latter. As to the period of the year, summer and spring fur- 

 nish the largest contingent. The means employed vvcre chosen in 

 the following order of frequency : strangling, immersion, fire-arms, 

 asphyxia by charcoal, sharp instruments, poison, precipitation from 

 heights. The presumed causes were, insanity, 2,023 \ physical 

 suffering, 1,407; poverty and reverse of fortune, 1,059; domestic 

 affliction, 1,116; drunkenness, 914 ; disappointed affections, 305 ; 

 etc. In the above list, alcoholism producing cerebral affections 

 takes the first rank. During the last fifty years the consumption 

 of alcohol has increased threefold, and the number of insane per- 

 sons fourfold. The liquor which contributes the most to producing 

 mental derangement is absinthe, of which the French are so fond. 

 When a man gets in the habit of taking that drink, he is sure to 

 commit some crime or destroy himself. 



— Dr. H. W. Wiley, chemist of the United States Department 

 of Agriculture, in a note accompanying a recent report on the 

 manufacture of sugar by the diffusion process, calls attention to 

 the advancement made in the last few years in the sugar-industry 

 of Louisiana, and to the important part taken by the government 

 in developing that industry. In 1884 the Department of Agricul- 

 ture established, in connection with the exposition at New Orleans, 

 a complete sugar-laboratory, and at the same time placed an ex- 

 perimental diffusion battery on exhibition. It also established at 

 Magnolia Plantation, Lawrence, La., a complete chemical control 

 of the sugar-factory. In December of the same year, the attention 

 of sugar-growers was called by Dr. Wiley to the importance of 

 chemical control and new methods. In 1885 the department made 

 an unsuccessful attempt to introduce the process of diffusion into 

 Louisiana on a manufacturing scale, and during the next year one 

 hundred and fifty tons of Louisiana cane were shipped to Kansas 

 and worked by the process of diffusion, securing a yield fully thirty 

 per cent greater than the average milling process would have given. 

 In 18S7 the diffusion process was successfully introduced by the 

 department on Magnolia Plantation. During the coming season 

 the diffusion process will be used on four large plantations in 



Louisiana. Many other planters have also instituted a chemical 

 control of the factory, and a sugar experiment station has been 

 in successful operation at Kenner for four years. The practical 

 result of the work first undertaken in Louisiana by the Depart- 

 ment of Agriculture is seen already in a more scientific agriculture, 

 a better knowledge of the problem of sugar-manufacture, a more 

 scientific method in the sugar-house, and the introduction of re- 

 cent and improved machinery. Before the time first mentioned, 

 the average yield of sugar per ton on the best plantations in the 

 State was scarcely one hundred and forty-five pounds. It is now 

 over two hundred pounds. 



— Cholera is reported as raging in Peking with great violence. 

 All foreigners, with the exception of a few officials, have fled to the 

 mountains. 



— The total length of submarine cables is 209,322 kilometres 

 (130,066 miles). 



— Dr. A. Konig of Berlin has been promoted to the rank of ex- 

 traordinary professor of physics. 



— Professor Lankester proposes, ia Nature, that this new word, 

 " Mithridatism," be admitted to the scientific vocabulary, to signify 

 that immunity from the effects of a poison which is induced by the 

 administration of gradually increased doses. The selection of the 

 word has reference to the fable concerning Mithridates, King of 

 Pontus, that he became so charged with the poisons he experi- 

 mented with, that he obtained an immunity from them all. 



— In a paper on the pathogenic properties of the microbes pres- 

 ent in malignant tumors, by M. Verneuil, read at a recent nneeting 

 of the Paris Academy of Sciences, the author still adheres to the 

 opinion already enunciated in 1883, that these parasites have noth- 

 ing to do with the initial stage of boils, ulcers, cancer, and the 

 like. At the same time he does not regard their presence as a 

 matter of indifference, but admits that in certain cases they may 

 themselves possess special pathogenic properties, in virtue of which 

 they act on the system like septic poisons. 



— At a meeting of the Academy of Sciences at Paris recently, 

 M. Mascart gave a true account of the striking by lightning of the 

 Eiffel Tower, which took place on Aug. 19, and exaggerated re- 

 ports of which appeared in the daily papers. The conductor was 

 struck, with the normal results, showing perfect communication 

 with earth, and consequently complete safety of the structure from 

 any danger on this score. 



— By the will of the late Alonzo . Clark, M.D., LL.D., it was 

 placed in the power of the faculty of the New York College of 

 Physicians and Surgeons to bestow a scholarship, with an income 

 of about nine hundred dollars a year, for the purpose of promoting 

 the discovery of new facts in medical science. This has been be- 

 stowed, for three years from Oct. i, 1887, upon T. Mitchell Prud- 

 den, M.D., of New York City. 



— The Handels Museum states, on consular authority, that the 

 fibres of the banana, or paradise fig-plant, are the most important 

 products of the soil in Africa which have hitherto remained unused. 

 This fibre, which is capable of being divided into threads of a silky 

 fineness, extends the entire length of the plant, which has no 

 branches. In Central America this fibre, without any other prepa- 

 ration than the drying, is used for shoe-strings, and for strings and 

 ropes for various purposes. During the twelve months of its vege- 

 tation the banana-plant produces only a single bunch of fruit, after 

 which it dies, but from its roots four to ten young plants spring up. 

 In its native place, a bunch of fruit of the banana is worth about 

 twenty-five cents, while the plant, which is thrown away, is worth 

 ten times that amount to a soap-factory, paper-mill, or coffee-bag 

 manufacturer. The leaf of the banana, composed, with its stalk, 

 of the toughest and finest threads, has hitherto only served the na- 

 tive women as an umbrella during the rainy season, as a carpet to 

 sit upon, or a bed to, sleep on. " If," says the Handels Museum, 

 " this plant, in the innumerable banana plantations of the entire 

 tropical world, is only properly utilized, the whole human race will 

 obtain such a vast mass of textile material that it is certain to influ- 

 ence the value and cultivation of other kindred plants, such as 

 hemp and flax, cotton, jute, etc., and nobody can predict the conse- 

 quences which the utilization of this hitherto unnoticed material 

 may have." 



