loo 



- In August, 1891, a meeting of the Congres International des 

 ' Sciences Geographiques will be held at Berne, Switzerland. So- 

 '^'Cieties, or their members individually, are invited to take part in 

 ; the congress, and to communicate their views on the subjects that 

 should appear in the programme. The. management is in the 

 hands of the Geographical Society of Berne. 



— A thunder-storm is generally believed to be a bad thing for a 

 dairy. An Italian savant, Professor G. Tolomei, has made some 

 experiments od the relation of electricity to the souring of milk. 

 He found, according to The Boston Medical and Surgical Jour- 

 nal, that the passage of an electric current dii-ectly through the 

 milk not only did not hasten, but actually delayed acidulation ; 

 milk so treated not becoming sour until from the sixth to the 

 ninth day, whereas milk not so electrified became markealy acid 

 on the third day. When, however, the surface of a quantity of 

 milk vras brought close under the two balls of a Holt^ machine, 

 the milk soon became sour, and this effect he attributes to the 

 , ozone generated. 



— The Caucasus papers relate an interesting case of globular 

 L lightning which was witnessed by a party of geodesists on the 

 1 summit of the Bohul Mountain, 12,000 feet above the sea. About 

 iS P.M , as related by Nature, dense clouds of a dark-violet color 

 - began to rise from the gorges beneath, At 8 p.m. there was rain, 



which was soon followed by hail and lightning. An extremely 

 bright violet ball, sun-ounded with rays which were, the party 

 says, about two yards long, struck the top of the peak. A second 

 and a third followed, and the whole summit of the peak was soon 

 covered with an electric light, which lasted no less than four hours. 

 The party, with one exception, crawled down the slope of the peak 

 to a better-sheltered place, situated a few yards beneath. The 

 one who remained was M. Tatosoff. He was considered dead, but 

 proved to have been only injured by the first stroke of lightning, 

 which had pierced his sheepskin coat and shirt, and burned the 

 .skin on his chest, sides, and back. At midnight the second camp 

 was struck by. globular lightning of- the same character, and two 

 persons slightly felt its effects. 



— A study of five years' thunder-storms (1883-86) on the Hun- 

 garian plain has been recently made by M.-Hegyfoky, says iVahwe 

 of Sept. 4, 1890. The following points in his paper (communicated 

 to the Hunga.rian Academy) oiay be noted. The days of thunder- 

 storm were those on which thunder wsis observed, and they formed 



"16.4 per cent of all days from April to September. The air press- 

 ure on those days sank about 3 millimetres under thenoimal, 



" morning and evening. The less the pressure, the greater the 

 proViability of tbuuder-stoi'm. The temperature (estimated by tlie 

 maximum thermometer) was higher than that of all days of the 

 .season indicated; and the moisture and cloudiness were similarly 

 in excess. The wind blew about mid-day more softly, and in the 

 evening more strongly than usual. It went round, as a rule, from 

 the south-east by the south to tlie west and north-west. The 

 clouds came oftener than usual from the south-east and south-west 

 quadrants, so that the centre was generally north af the station. 

 Nearly half of the season's rainfall was on days of thunder-storm. 

 Hail fell on 11 days, on one of which there was no thunder-storm. 

 There were most thunder-storms in June (59 out of 199). The June 

 of 1886 had as many as 26. The commencement of a thunder- 

 storm (first thunder) occurred most often from 2 to 5 P.M. To- 

 wards tlie end of the season the thunder-storms tend to come 



] later in the day. AVhen the pressure falls under the mean of the 

 season (753.4 uiillimetres), the thunder-storms last longer than 

 when it is above the" mean. The path was in most cases from 

 south-west or west, and in most cases coincided with that of both 

 lower and upper clouds, but in several cases only with that of the 

 lower or upper. After the first thunder the "meteorological ele- 

 "■ments are usually subject to great ciianges, most marked as the 

 "fetorni nears the zenith; rain falls: wind rises, and alters quickly 

 :m direction: temperature and vapor- pressure tall; relative humid- 

 ' ity, cloud, and pressure hicrease. As the storm withdra"ws there 

 ;'is a rettrrn to the normal. Various other points are considered._ The 

 ' authbr 'accepts 'Sohncke'? theory, that the electricity bf'tHuH'da'- 

 storms is due to friction of wa^et-drops on ice. '"^ " /'"' 



[^'6l. XVIV No. 398 



" ' T^-Dr. G. W. Barr writes, in the Therapeutic Gazette, that iced 

 fed has none of the physiological action of theine if it is kept ice- 

 cold for a short time. He says that he has known a man of ner- 

 vous temperament, \vho is kept awake all night by a single cup 

 of tea, to drink a half-gallon of iced tea during the evening, and 

 sleep soundly at his usual time of retiring. Others, made very 

 nervous by hot tea, have been able to drink large quantities of 

 iced tea with no appreciable effect. If the tea-grounds are allowed 

 to remain in the liquid, the iced tea is usually kept long enough 

 before drinking to dissolve more tannin than is usual in hot tea: 

 hence the tea should be strained as soon as removed from the fire. 



— The process of electric welding invented by Professor Elihu 

 Thomson, which has been so widely' used in its application to 

 numerous manufactures pertaining to the arts of peace, has now 

 been applied to the production of certain munitions of war in a very 

 remarkable manner. The problem in making a shell for armor-pier- 



. cing purposes, says Engineering o( Aug. 39, has been to select a grade 

 of steeLwifch a view to its possessing the hardest point for armor- 



', piercing purposes consistent with a chamber whose walls shall not 



I be so hard as to crumble on strikirig a heavy mass. The metal 

 selected for such purposes has been very naturally the result of a 

 compromise in the endeavor to procure a metal which would give 

 as hard a point as feasible under the circumstances; and yet the 

 limitations of all materials are such that neither object has been 

 perfectly accomplished, and the excessive hardness of the inside 

 of ordinary cast-steel projectiles renders the work of clearing out 

 the interior of the chamber v6ry expensive. This application of 

 the electric welding process to the production of shells has reached 

 very satisfactory results, entirely beyond those achieved by 

 methods of manufacture hitherto carried on. The armor-piercing 

 point of the shell is made of hard steel; shaped in the conical form 

 suited for such a purpose. To this is attached a tube of mild 

 steel, forming the chamber. The plastic state of the metal when 

 the two pieces are pressed togetlier in the act of electric welding 

 forms a slight enlargement without cutting away any of the walls 

 of the chamber. The butt of the projectile is made of a piece of 

 mild steel, which is somewhat harder than the cylindrical walls 

 of the chamber, and is shaped to a cup.form by hydraulic forging. 

 The slight exudation of the metal at the walls on the inside pro- 



idtices an interior ring, which is a material increase in the strength 

 of the projectile. For Shrapnel, the thin metal screen between 

 , the charge and the bullet- case^ is placed in position before the 

 hea,d is welded to the cylindrical chamber of the projectile, and 

 readily joined in place in the act of welding. This new applica- 



-lion of the electric- welding process wasinvented by Lieut. W. M. 

 iWood of the United States Navy, who. has received a year's leave 

 of absence from the government, and is in the mean time asso- 

 -ciated with the Thomson. Electric Welding Company. It is stated 

 that the United States Government is ready to contract for a very 

 large supply of these electric shells as soon as the machinery can 

 be made for their manufacture^ 



— Anew process of bleaching by electricity has been devised 

 for the textUe trades. . By its use the need of bleaching powder is 

 done away with. The process, as described in Engineering, is as 



'follows: the current is taken direct from an engine and dynamo 

 to electrodes placed in a wooden tank containing a solution con- 

 sisting of 64 pounds of calcined magnesia, 357 pounds of hydro- 



' chloric acid, specific gravity 1.16, and i.OO gallons of water, which 

 solution has no bleaching properties; in other words, no chlorine 

 is present. After passing an electro-motive force of six volts, and 



■ a current of 120 amperes, for 100 hours, the solution contains .35 

 of one per cent of fixed chlonne, which bleaches yarn and tow in 



'as many hours as it now tikes days, without impairing the 



"" strength of the mateiial The electrodes used consist of three 

 cathodes of sheet copper, each 27 inches by 18 inches. These are 

 connected to the negative ti'iuiin:il of the dynamo. The anode 

 employed is "litlianoile.'" a pei(i:vide of lead, which is specially 

 adapted for this particular purpose, all.olher metals being attacked 

 by chlorine, which disqualifies them'fOT all purposes of electroly- 

 sis where chlorine is evolved.^ The anode's are 7 inches by 4 



'"'inches, and are seventy-tivo in"niifjilj.?>'i and are connected to the 



''^sitive'fermiiial. These '(^'fefroci'el ar6 ranged along the sides 



