May 17, 1889.] 



SCIENCE. 



379 



elementary schools, especially in country districts, where it would 

 appear to be even more important than in towns. A boys' or 

 girls' school can obtain the highest credit in the inspector's report, 

 and the highest possible grant of money, without its scholars hav- 

 ing ever heard of animal or plant, or of those materials of the 

 world, or of those natural forces, wiih which the scholars will have 

 to deal all through their lives; and, what is perhaps still more 

 anomalous, those pupil-teachers who are possibly expected to give 

 object-lessons in their schools are never examined in natural his- 

 tory by the department, and may gain a high place in their exami- 

 nations without the least knowledge of any kind of natural 

 science. 



It seems most desirable that every little child who enters school 

 should be led to observe and inquire ; its curiosity and activity 

 should be encouraged and directed ; only when its senses have 

 been made acquainted with things should it be introduced to the 

 words by which they are called, first orally, then in writing or 

 print. It should proceed from the concrete to the abstract. The 

 works of the Creator are as worthy to be studied as the words of 

 men, and should hold as high a place in any school curriculum. 



The reply of the department to such requests as these will 

 probably be, " We cannot assume that the teachers are capable of 

 teaching, or the inspectors of examining science." No doubt there 

 is that difficulty. But many of them are capable, and they are all 

 presumably intelligent men, who would easily learn what might be 

 required of them. Special teachers of science also exist, and 

 special examiners might be appointed. It may not be possible to 

 insist on all these reforms at once, but at least encouragement 

 should be held out to them, instead of the disappointing uncer- 

 tainties of the code now before Parliament. 



HEALTH MATTERS. 

 Tuberculosis Contagion. 



Dr. Von Duhring reports to the British Medical Journal a 

 case of tuberculosis which was contracted by wearing a pair of 

 earrings. The patient, a girl of fourteen years, removed the ear- 

 rings from the ear of a young girl who died of consumption, and 

 wore them in her own ears. Soon after, an ulcer formed in the left 

 ear, the discharge from which, when examined, was found to con- 

 tain tubercle bacilli, and a gland in the neck also enlarged and 

 ulcerated. The patient developed pulmonary consumption, and at 

 the date of the report was 'sinking rapidly. 



This case is one of great interest as showing another channel by 

 which the bacilli of tuberculosis may enter the system. The in- 

 quiry will naturally suggest itself, whether this patient was not 

 already phthisical at the time she began to wear the earrings, and 

 the development of the disease at that time a mere coincidence. 

 This would seem the more probable from the age of the patient, 

 which was fourteen years. Then, too, the report states that these 

 two girls were intimate friends, so that the seed may have been 

 sown during their lifetime. Some years ago either of these expla- 

 nations would, to most minds, have been sufficient ; but, through 

 the researches of Koch, an additional means of determining the 

 question has been made available. This is the detection of the 

 bacilli themselves. The report states that this was done in the 

 case mentioned ; and, as the methods are simple and decisive, 

 there is no reason to doubt the accuracy of the report. The en- 

 jlargement of the gland in the neck is additional evidence that the 

 earrings were the source of the infection. It would be interesting 

 to know whether the ears of the first patient were ulcerated or 

 not. 



ELECTRICAL NEWS. 



Electrical CotTRSE at Columbia College. — In view of 

 the prodigious strides which electricity is now making, it is but 

 natural that the necessity for the establishment of a means where- 

 by its thorough and systematic study can be undertaken should 

 has'e engaged the attention of educational bodies in this country. 

 Columbia College, which has always occupied a prominent posi- 

 tion in science, has now established a course of electrical engineer- 

 ing. As its professors, it has secured the services of two men of 



excellent repute in electrical and mathematical circles. Mr. Francis 

 B. Crocker, who assumes the instructorship, is no stranger to many 

 of our readers. As one of the inventors of the C. & C. motor, his 

 name has for some time been conspicuously before the public ; and 

 his papers read before the American Institute of Electrical Engi- 

 neers (among which may be specially mentioned that on " Chemi- 

 cal Generators of Electricity," last year) and other scientific bodies 

 have never failed to meet with a welcome. Mr. Crocker is regarded 

 as a rising man in electrical circles ; and in this view it is signifi- 

 cant that he was, a few weeks ago, elected to the presidency of 

 the New York Electrical Society, which is the oldest organization 

 of its kind in the country. Mr. Michael Pupin is the assistant in- 

 structor. From Mr. Pupin's past work and present reputation, 

 great things are expected of him, and he brings to his new sphere 

 of action the additional prestige of having studied under Helmholtz 

 in Berlin. 



NOTES AND NEWS. 



During the past year the director of the Michigan Weather 

 Service has had compiled the average monthly rainfall for each 

 section of that State, and has had the figures published in the 

 monthly report. Believing that the information thus compiled 

 could be better shown by being charted, the director made a chart 

 of the State, showing the average monthly rainfall for each month 

 and for the year. These charts were made up from the observa- 

 tions of thirteen years, and about four thousand reports were ex- 

 amined and proved, to obtain the data. There were also made the 

 charts of the monthly and annual rainfall for the past year which 

 are to accompanv the normal charts. These charts will be of great 

 value to the people of Michigan, as the rainfall can be readily com- 

 pared with the normal, and thus ascertain in each locality whether 

 the rainfall has been the average or not. 



— Professor Rosenthal of Erlangen, at a meeting of the Berlin 

 Physiological Society, March 27, gave an account of calorimetric 

 experiments with which he had been busied for the last few years. 

 He employed in these, says Nature, an air-calorimeter of special 

 construction. It consisted of a copper vessel, of easy ventilation, 

 in which the animal was placed ; this was surrounded by an air- 

 tight envelope, filled with air and constituting the reservoir of an 

 air-thermometer ; external to this was a covering to shield the 

 whole apparatus from any changes in the temperature of the sur- 

 rounding atmosphere. When the animal gives up to the envelope 

 of air, per unit of time, exactly the same amount of heat as the 

 whole apparatus radiates into the surroundings, the temperature of 

 the air in the envelope remains constant, as also its pressure : hence 

 the heat produced and given off by the animal during any known 

 time could be measured by means of a manometer. Notwithstand- 

 ing that the dog used in the experiments was fed in exactly the 

 same way at each meal, the quantities of heat produced varied very 

 largely, and any considerable uniformity is only obtained by taking 

 the mean of a long series of observations. Up to about the third 

 hour after the meal, the heat-production diminishes, then rises rapidly 

 to a maximum ; and from this point, at about the eighth hour, it 

 begins to fall again slowly, and with irregularities, until the next 

 meal. Over the whole twenty-four hours the heat- production is 

 more uniform during the second period of twelve hours than in the 

 first ; about 20 per cent more heat is produced during the first than 

 during the second half of the whole day. When an excess of food 

 was given, the heat produced was always less than that calculated 

 out from the oxidation of the food itself ; but, with a uniformly 

 constant diet, the mean value of the heat produced corresponded to 

 the heat calculated for the oxidation of the food. The amount of 

 carbonic-acid gas given off by the animal was found to correspond 

 to the heat given off during the same period only in cases where 

 prolonged intervals of time were taken into account. When the 

 surrounding temperature varied between 5° and 25" C, all other 

 conditions remaining the same, a minimum production of heat was 

 observed at 15" C: from this point it increased uniformly in both 

 directions, not only when the temperature fell to 5° C, but also 

 when it rose to 25' C. Professor Schweigger demonstrated several 

 pieces of apparatus, which, by the use of small incandescent elec- 

 tric lamps, could take the place of the ophthalmoscope, and even 



