568 S CIENTIFI C MIS CELL AN Y. 



tibout equally divided in favor of establishing it in the centre of Madison 

 Square, between Twenty-third and Twenty-fifth streets, on Fifth Avenue, 

 or in the park into which it is proposed the site of the present distributing 

 reservoir on Forty-second street and the same avenue shall be converted, 

 after demolition of the now unnecessaiy reservoir. 



la view of the distribution of Egyptian obelisks over the surface of the 

 earth, one being in Rome, another in Paris, another in London, and now 

 another in JSTew York, it has been humorously suggested that the archaeolo- 

 gist of a dozen centuries honce will be vastly puzzled to account for the 

 Avonderfully wide contemporaneous dispersion of the Egyptian race, which 

 will be indicated by the localities of its monuments. — Scientific American. 



Pl:re Water. — The Board of Water Commissioners — Messrs. Brown, 

 Walsh and Sweeny — met Wednesday afternoon at the Waterworks, for the 

 purpose of testing the efficacy of a new filtering apparatus designed for the 

 })uritication of water used by cities. A model of the arrangement was 

 brought to St, Louis, on Tuesday last, under the charge of Mr. F. M. Ma- 

 han, of St. Joseph, one of the owners of the patent, and President of the 

 Novelty ]\lanufacturing Works, of that city. 



The process used is an exceedingly simple one, and as Mr. Mahan re- 

 marked, it is a wonder that somebody had not thought of it before. It con- 

 sists of sinking a bottomless box or float into the river, the high sides of 

 the float quieting the disturbed waters inclosed, and, being quieted, the sed- 

 iment of course settles to the bottom of the river. Within this quieting 

 chamber is another sort of bottomless apartment, into which the water 

 rises, and from here the water percolates through tubes filled with sand and 

 covered at each end with perforated tin, into the receiving chamber. In a 

 word, the water is by this process first settled and then purified b}' its pas- 

 sage through the tubes of sand, flowing into the tubes in its endeavor to 

 find its own level. 



The model used j-esterday wus made of tin, about half as long as a com- 

 mon^ skift', though much higher. The trial was made oft' a raft lying on the 

 river near the works, at a place where the water was unusually muddy. 

 The float was put overboard at 3:80, and in seventeen minutes the five-gal- 

 lon receiving chamber was full of water, perfectly clear from sediment or 

 suspicion of color. The members of the Board tasted it, comjDared it with 

 the element which now and then overflowed the raft on which they were 

 standing, and seemed well satisfied that the apparatus could filter even the 

 tawny Missouri. 



The amount of water used daily by the city is 28,000,000 of gallons, and 

 this is settled after a fashion in the wells made for that purpose. Mr. Ma- 

 han claims that one of his floats three hundred by one hundred feet, fitted 

 up with lines of sand tubes, "^vill be able to filter 30,000,000 gallons daily, 

 from which supply water clear as crj^stal can be forced all over the city. — 

 Glohe-Bemocraf. 



