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SCIENCE. 



[Vol. XIV. No. 346 



SCIENCE 



A WEEKLY NEWSPAPER OF ALL THE ARTS AND SCIENCES. 



PUBLISHED BY 



N. D. C. HODGES. 



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 )ur correspondents. 



NEW YORK, September 20, iS 



No. 346. 



CONTENTS : 



The Withdrawal of Alcohol from 

 Bond for Scientific Purposes, 

 Free OF Tax-. Edgar Richards 



Electrical News. 



The Telegraphone : 



Electrical Executions : 



Encroachment of Electricity upon 



Gas in House-Lighting 



American Electrical Enterprise in 



Electric Tanning i 



Electric Signalling from Ships..,,, : 

 An Electric Locomotive : 



1 Johns Hopkins Uni- 



The Preparation of 



Lacquer andthe Manufacture 

 of Wakasa Ware 5 



The Production OF Sugar. 1 



Health Matters. 

 Weight of the Body in Typhoid- 

 Health in the French Army : 



New Method of precipitating Sew- 

 age : 



Vaccination in Japan : 



Book-Reviews. 



Benjamin Franklin ; 



Darwinism ; 



The Child and Child-Nature : 



Among the Publishers ; 



Letters to the Editor. 



Methods of Burial X. : 



Monopolies and the People 



C. W. Baker : 

 Queries 



About ten days ago there appeared in the New York Sun 

 a sensational article to the effect that, on account of the deprecia- 

 tion in the value of Baltimore and Ohio stock, and the loss of in- 

 come from dividends on the stock, Johns Hopkjns University was 

 ruined. What the animus of this article was we do not know. It 

 may have been written with the hope that it might further the in- 

 terests of some stock jobbers, or it may have been written by some 

 enemy of Johns Hopkins bent on doing the university what harm 

 he could. A glance at the article in question showed that it con- 

 tained nothing but what was perfectly well known months ago, so 

 far as ill was concerned, and that all reference was omitted to the 

 successful efforts of the university's friends to help it at a time 

 when it was temporarily short of ready cash. We were so impressed 

 at the time with the character of the article, that we made no allu- 

 sion to it last week, supposing it to be evident enough on the sur- 

 face that it was all published to produce a sensation, and not to 

 record a plain statement of fact. We should not now have any 

 thing to say were it not for the frequent allusions published in our 

 exchanges, showing that some read the Sun and accept its fictions 

 as news. All that need be said now is that for years the trustees 

 of Johns Hopkins University knew, as any body of sensible men 

 would know, that, as a good portion of their income-bearing prop- 

 erty was in Baltimore and Ohio stock, it would be wise to save up 

 some of the income to provide against any cessation of dividends. 



This was done. Again, when the dividends stopped some months 

 ago, steps were taken to raise additional funds to cover expenses, 

 and these efforts were rewarded with all the success desired. The 

 result is that the university goes on with ample means to continue 

 as a model to all our American universities, as it has been from 

 the start, with a full faculty on full pay. 



THE PREPARATION OF JAPANESE LACQUER AND 

 THE MANUFACTURE OF WAKASA WARE.i 



Japanese lacquer is the product of a tree {Rhus verntcifera 

 D. C.) which grows throughout the main island of Japan. It at- 

 tains a large size, the trunk sometimes measuring a metre in 

 diameter. It is said the tree will live for forty years, but only com- 

 paratively young trees are valued for the production of lacquer. 

 Having yielded for several years, they are cut down, the lacquer ex- 

 tracted from the branches, and young trees take their places. 



The principal section of the lacquer industry is between the 

 parallels of 37° and 39°, beginning,about one hundred miles north 

 of Tokio. The best lacquer, however, comes from much farther 

 south, from Yoshino, in Yamato. 



The lacquer exudes from horizontal cuts in the bark, in the form 

 of a rather viscid emulsion, and may be collected from April to the 

 end of October. In the spring it is more watery than in the later 

 months. However, the sap never flows so freely that it can be 

 collected in vessels, as has been stated by writers. It exudes 

 slowly, and is collected by means of a pointed, spoon-like instru- 

 ment, and transferred to a wooden receptacle or tube of bamboo. 

 Several cuts are made in each tree, the last as high as a man can 

 reach. Having thus prepared a dozen or more trees in rapid suc- 

 cession, the collector begins to collect the juice from the cuts in 

 regular order, beginning with the one first cut. 



Having finished the collecting, he takes other groups of trees, 

 and after about four days returns to the first, where, after remov- 

 ing the accumulated yield, he cuts again into the same trees, and 

 repeats the same role fifteen or twenty times. Thus the work 

 may go on for eighty to a hundred days. The utmost yield of a 

 single tree is about forty to fifty cubic centimetres of raw lacquer. 



As the sap first exudes, it is a grayish-white thick or viscous 

 fluid, which quickly turns yellow, and afterwards black where it is 

 in contact with the air. 



The sap thus collected is ki-urushi, urushi being the general 

 name for lacquer. An inferior kind is obtained from the branches 

 when the trees are cut down. The branches are soaked in water 

 for several months, then taken up and slightly warmed, when a 

 small quantity of sap exudes. ^ This is seshime urushi. 



The lacquer is strained through cotton cloth to free it from bits 

 of wood and dirt, first being thoroughly stirred to break up lumps 

 and make a uniform mixture. The product thus purified is known 

 as seshime urushi ; but this name, which has already been used to 

 designate the lacquer from the branches, has now a different mean- 

 ing, and is applied to the cheaper kinds of raw lacquer, such as are 

 used for the first coats in lacquering. These lacquers have usually 

 lost some of their water by stirring in shallow receptacles exposed 

 to the sun. They have undergone no further preparation. 



Many varieties of lacquer are prepared for special purposes, 

 ranging in price from one or two to six or seven dollars per kilo- 

 gram. These differ in quality and color. There is a famous black 

 lacquer prepared by the addition of iron, which forms a chemical 

 combination to be mentioned further on ; while red, green, yellow, 

 and other colors are imparted by addition of various pigments, as 

 cinnabar for red, orpiment and indigo together for green, orpiment 

 for yellow, etc. Ultramarine is decomposed by lacquer, giving off 

 sulphuretted hydrogen. Certain lacquers have a small proportion 

 of a drying oil (perilla oil) added to them. The lacquer known as 

 shiu urushi contains from one to ten per cent of this oil. The 

 name "shiu urushi" means "cinnabar lacquer," and is applied to 

 this variety because it is commonly used to mix with cinnabar 

 when a red lacquer is required. 



The emulsion as it comes from the tree consists of an aqueous 



I Abstract of a paper read by Romyn Hitchcock before the Chemical Society of 

 Washington, April 11, 1889. 



