July 13, 1888.] 



SCIENCE. 



23 



pages, of his great work now in press in London, entitled ' Masters 

 of Wood-Engraving.' Ticknor & Co. have lieen chosen to receive 



subscriptions for this great work in this country. William Gitj- 



son, jun., New York, has just issued ' Some Details of Water- Works 

 Construction,' by William R. Billings. The Truth Seeker Com- 

 pany has just published ' The Order of Creation, the Conflict be- 

 tween Genesis and Geology, a Controversy between the Hon. W. 

 E. Gladstone, Prof. Max Miiller, Prof. T. H. Hu,\ley, M. T<(5ville, 

 and Mrs. E. Lynn Linton ; ' ' Rome or Reason, a Memoir of Chris- 

 tian and E.xtra-Christian Experience,' by Nathaniel Ramsay Waters ; 

 ' The Bible of Nature, or. The Principles of Secularism,' by Felix L. 

 Oswald ; ' Try-Square, or, The Church of Practical Religion,' by Re- 

 porter ; and new editions of ' The Secret of the East, or. The Ori- 

 gin of the Christian Religion, and the Significance of its Rise and 

 Decline,' by Oswald, and of Winwood Reade's ' The Martyrdom of 



Man.' Scribncr's Magazine for August will contain another of 



Prof. N. S. Shaler's notable articles on the surface of the earth, en- 

 titled ' Rivers and Valleys,' fully illustrated with views of some of 

 the most picturesque scenery in this country, and dealing in a very 

 practical way with the problems presented by the Mississippi and 

 Ohio River floods. 



— A philosophical society has been formed at the University of 

 Vienna under the leadership of Professor Zimmerniann and Pro- 

 fessor Meynert. Professor Hoffler has been elected president. The 

 object of the society is to bring before specialists of all classes gen- 

 eral scientific problems having a philosophical import. 



— At a recent meeting of the French Physical Society Sir Wil- 

 liam Thomson was present, and stated, that, according to his de- 

 terminations, the rate of diffusion of electricity was a hundred and 

 ten times as rapid as that of heat in the best conductors. 



— The night movements of the Russian troops have recently 

 been rendered difficult by the number of soldiers attacked with 

 hemeralopia (night-blindness). It is well known that this affec- 

 tion is due generally to a lack of proper food. Meissner saw in 

 Podolia an epidemic of this disease produced during a religious ex- 

 citement, when bread was the principal article of diet, which disap- 

 peared when animal food was again taken. 



— The date of meeting of the American Society of Microscopists 

 at Columbus, O., has been changed to Aug. 21 instead of Aug. 14 ; 

 this on account of change of date for the American Association 

 meeting. 



— At the last meeting of the New York Microscopical Society, 

 Mr. George F. Kunz exhibited sand containing monazite, a phos- 

 phate of cerium, lanthanum, and didynium, and from o per cent to 

 17 per cent of thoria, from Brindletown, Burke County, N.C., and 

 monazite sand from Caravalhas, Brazil, stating that the demand 

 for these minerals had greatly increased. of late, owing to the rare 

 earths zirconia, thoria, glucina, etc., which they contain, and which 

 are now used for the mantle or hood of the new incandescent gas- 

 burner invented by Dr. Carl Auer, now ' Von Welsbach.' This in- 

 creased consumption has led to a search by the collectors and 

 dealers in minerals in England, Germany, France, Russia, Norway, 

 and Brazil, and more especially in the United States ; and so 

 thorough has the search been, that the prices of minerals which 

 were considered rare a short time ago, are now quoted at one- 

 tenth to one-hundredth of former figures. The minerals contain- 

 ing these rare earths are lanthanite, sipylite, tysonite, uranothorite, 

 orangite, thorite, clevite, monazite, beryl, yttrotantalite, alvite, erd- 

 mannite, cerite, xenotime, fergusonite, ajschynite, allanite, zircon, 

 eudialyte, euxenite, samarskite, gadolinite, and bodenite. Of these, 

 berj-1, cerite, monazite, allanite, and zircon have been obtained in 

 large quantities. Sipylite, orangite, and thorite are especially 

 sought for. Monazite has been found at the following localities : 

 \"illeneuve, Ottawa County, Canada (a crystal of fourteen pounds 

 and a half) ; Alexander County, N.C.,at Milholland's Mill ; Amelia 

 County, V'a. (in twenty-pound lump) ; Norwich, Conn.; L^ral 

 Mountains ; Mount Sorel (var. turnerite), Tavetch (var. turnerite), 

 and Binnenthal, Switzerland ; River Sanarka, Southern Ural ; Ar- 

 endal, Norway. At these localities the occurrence is of mineralo- 

 gical interest only. At the North Carolina, Georgia, and Brazilian 



localities it can be obtained in quantity for commercial use. In 

 the North Carolina gold gravels of Rutherford, Polk, Burke, Mc- 

 Dowell, and Mecklenburg Counties, monazite is found in consider- 

 able quantities in small brown or greenish or yellowish brown 

 monoclinic crystals associated with chromite, garnet, zircon, ana- 

 tase, corundum, menaccanite, xenotime, fergusonite, epidote, co- 

 lumbite, samarskite, and other minerals. With these associations 

 have been found several of the North Carolina diamonds ; and at the 

 Glade Mine, Georgia, diamonds have been found with the monazite, 

 which exists in some abundance also. These localities will furnish 

 tons of monazite within the next twelve months. The Brazilian 

 monazite is found at Caravalhas, Bahia, where its existence was made 

 known about eight years ago by Dr. Orville A. Derby, geologist of 

 Brazil. It occurs in large quantities as a beach-sand, almost free 

 from other ininerals, as if concentrated. As it occurs on the coast, 

 it can easily be shipped to any point where it is wanted, and a 

 number of tons have been sent to the United States. The best 

 North Carolina zircon locality is on the old Meredith Freeman 

 estate. Green River, Henderson County, N.C.. which was leased 

 for twenty-five years in the hands of Gen. T. L. Clingman of that 

 State, who, as early as 1869, mined one thousand pounds of it, 

 and during that whole period never lost faith in the incandescent 

 properties of zirconia ; but when the time of its adoption actually 

 came, through some legal difficulties the general had forfeited his 

 leases, and hence failed to reap his reward. In Henderson County, 

 N.C., and in Anderson County, S.C., zircon is found in large quan- 

 tities loose in the soil, as the result of the decomposition of a fel- 

 spathic rock. The crystals are generally remarkable for their per- 

 fection, being distinctive of each locality, weighing occasionally 

 several ounces. The recent demand has also brought to light the 

 existence of enormous quantities of zircon in the Ural Mountains 

 and in Norway. Although in Canada, in Renfrew and adjoining 

 counties, enormous crystals have been found up to fifteen pounds 

 each, yet they are so isolated, that it would be impossible to obtain 

 a supply there. The new demand has brought together more than 

 twenty-five tons of zircon, ten tons of monazite, six tons of cerite, 

 thousands of pounds of samarskite, and tons of allanite and other 

 minerals. As a consequence, zircon is now offered at less than ten 

 cents a pound, monazite at twenty-five cents, and samarskite at 

 fifty cents. 



— While Australia is complaining of rabbits, Russia is invaded 

 by the marmots. In certain provinces in Odessa it has been pro- 

 posed to try Pasteur's system of inoculating them with chicken- 

 cholera, but the administrative authorities have not given the 

 scheme their approval. 



LETTERS TO THE EDITOR. 

 Negro Dialect. 



A WRITER in the North American Review for June, 1888, men- 

 tions certain words in use among the negroes of the Southern 

 States, and inquires after their origin. The words are buccra (' white 

 man '), goober (' peanut '), brotius (used in Georgia in requests for 

 small presents, as, ' What are you going to give for brotius? "), and 

 lagniappe (used in New Orleans in somewhat the same sense as 

 broitus). 



With regard to lagniappe, there seems to be no good cause to 

 dispute the derivation from the Spanish given by Mr. George W. 

 Cable. He says, " The pleasant institution of iiapa, the petty gra- 

 tuity added by the retailer to any thing bought, grew the pleasanter, 

 drawn out into the Gallicized lagiiappe " ( The Creoles of Louisi- 

 ana, London, 1S85, p. 114). The derivation of brottus may be 

 similar to that of lagniappe, from the English perhaps, but one 

 cannot speak with certainty. 



The word goober (' peanut ') is, I think, of African origin. In 

 Haussa (a West .African tongue), i"-;//!! is 'ground-nut.' The fol- 

 lowing passage, however, from a rare and interesting work of the 

 beginning of the eighteenth centur)-, goes far, I hope, to settle the 

 matter. 



In the English translation of Bosman's account of Guinea we 

 read, " Here is also another sort called Gobbe-Gobbes, which grow 



