Mar. i6, iS88.] 



SCIENTIFIC NEWS. 



247 



©General 0oU0. 



Words Addressed to Animals. — Professor H. Carring- 

 ton Bolton is making a collection of the words used in 

 all countries — always excepting the oaths — in calling, 

 driving, and guiding domestic animals. 



Thk Blood in the Brain during Sleep. — According 

 to Spehl (L'Enc^phale), aneemia prevails during sleep in 

 most portions of the brain, whilst certain parts which are 

 active in sleep may be in a state of relative congestion. 



Prehistoric Human Remains. — In a splendid stalac- 

 titic cavern recently discovered (Humboldt) in the Bilstein 

 in Sauerland, Germany, there have been found the skull 

 and the thigh bones of a man, among a quantity of other 

 animal remains. 



The New Guinea Mountains. — The Owen-Stanley 

 range in British New Guinea has been in part explored 

 by Messrs. Hartman and Hunter. It does not appear 

 that they have reached the highest summits, but the 

 flora is described as magnificent in the extreme. 



Origin of Odours. — Professor Leclerc, writing in 

 Cosmos, maintains that odours are due not to the emana- 

 tions, as such, of so-called odoriferous bodies, but to 

 a vibratory movement among such emanations, due to 

 processes of oxidation. Scent, on this theory, is 

 analogous to sound and light. 



On Prolonged Anaesthesia Produced and Continued 

 BY A Mixture of Nitrous Oxide and Oxygen. — M. 

 Claude Martin, in a memoir presented to the French 

 Academy of Sciences, proves that in this state, even if 

 very protracted, no injurious product accumulates in 

 organism, so as to occasion serious results. 



Vowels of Acute Sound. — M. E. Doumer (Conipks 

 Rendus) concludes that the sounds i and ii (French) are 

 pure vowels, a harmonic relation existing between the 

 reinforced sound and the lar3'ngeal sound. The character- 

 istic note of the vowel i is close upon dog or is situate 

 between do^ and re^. The characteristic note of the vowel 

 ti is deeper by two notes, and corresponds to la^ ranging 

 from S0I5 to sis. 



Left-handedness. — La Normandie Medicak has lately 

 summarised the observations of various authors on this 

 subject. The writer does not fully accept the generaliza- 

 tion of M. Galippe that we are right-handed by atavism 

 and left-handed by a morbid heredity. He suggests that 

 asolution of the problem should be sought by ascertain- 

 ing if any similar phenomenon occurs in the lower animals. 

 M. Debierre thinks that our primordial type was that ot 

 ambidexterity. 



Insanity among Negroes. — According to a Govern- 

 ment report quoted in the Medical Press, the proportion 

 of insanity among the negroes in the West Indies has 

 steadily increased since their emancipation. In i860 the 

 insane were as i in 5,799 of the negro and negroid 

 population. In 1870 it was i in 2,695, and in 1880 i in 

 1,096. If this " progress " continues, by 1890 the negroes 

 will exhibit the same liability to mental disease as the 

 Aryan part of the population, i in 500. 



The University of Harvard. — This institution, 

 which dates back as far as 1637, is liberally endowed. 

 In early times it was a strictly religious-organisation, and 

 most of the graduates became clergymen. It has latterly 

 been secularised, so that no denominational religion is 

 insisted on, and not one-twentieth of the graduates enter 

 the churches. There are at present 1,400 students in 

 the various departments of Harvard, and about fifty-five 

 professors. 



The Chinese Wall, — According to the recent measure- 

 ments of an American engineer, given in the Ceniralblatt 

 fiir Bauverwallung, this rampart has a solid content of 

 6,350,000,000 cubic feet, or about seventy times more 

 than the largest of the Egyptian pyramids. Its cost 

 must have been about as great as that of the entire rail- 

 way system of the United States. Yet the work was 

 completed within twenty years, and without borrowing 

 money. 



On the Evolutionary Cycle of the Morphological 

 Variations of Bacterium Laminari^e. — In the study of 

 this species M. A Billet [Comptes Rendus) finds additional 

 proof of the inconstancy and variability of the forms of 

 the bacterian element. He shows that certain species of 

 bacteria may, in one or the same medium, pass through 

 a certain number of those evolutive phases which make 

 of the bacteriacese one of the vegetable groups whose 

 morphology is most complex. 



Weather Prediction. — Uhland's Wochenschrift re- 

 commends for observing the degree of atmospheric 

 moisture an improved hygrometer. A careful deter- 

 mination of this element of the weather is important,, 

 not merely for the meteorologist, the sanitarian, and the 

 farmer. In the drying-rooms employed in the starch 

 manufacture, in calico printing, and in various other in- 

 dustries a proper treatment of the materials in question 

 is not practicable without an accurate knowledge of the 

 degree of atmospheric moisture. 



The Affinities of the Eskimo Tribes. — Professor 

 Flower considers that there exists an affinity between 

 the Eskimos and the Japanese, the Aleutians forming, as 

 it were, the connecting link. He remarks that " every 

 special characteristic which distinguishesa Japanese from 

 the average of mankind is seen in the Eskimo in an 

 exaggerated degree. These special characteristics increase 

 from west to east, and are seen in, their greatest perfec- 

 tion in the inhabitants of Greenland — at least, where no 

 intermingling with the Danes has taken place. 



Low Winter Temperature in Bottoms of Valleys. — 

 J. Hann {Meteorol. Zeitschrift) has collected observations 

 showing that the winter temperature is lower in the 

 bottoms of valleys, or in depressions, than it is on ad- 

 jacent hill-sides. The Central Meteorological Institution, 

 in Neukirchen, in Pinzgau, lies on the left bank of the 

 Salzach, about 162 feet above the river, and at a distance 

 from it of 622 yards. At the Institution the thermo- 

 meter on January 8th, 1887, 11 a.m., marked - 13-3'' 

 centigrade, whilst in the middle of the valley, only 500 

 paces off, it stood at - 20-4^ Cent. 



Wood-Hangings for Walls.— For more than thirty 

 years there has been used in America for hanging, a 

 kind of paper one side of which is wood. Different 



