4i6 



SCIENTIFIC NEWS. 



[May 4, 1888. 



Were nothing but conquerors who planted themselves in 

 the country just as the Germans have done in Alsace 

 Lorraine. Our Iberian ancestors hated the Roman as 

 the Alsatian hates the Prussian." 



Submerged Forests. — Recent high tides on the Breton 

 Coast between St. Malo and St. Lunaire have laid bare 

 the remains of a submerged forest. The bay of Mount 

 St. Michel presents a surface of 250 square kilometres 

 invaded by the sea since the Roman conquest of Gaul. 

 In the eleventh century the country surrounding the 

 abbey was covered with a dense forest, distant about six 

 miles from the sea. The trees lately freed from their 

 covering of sand are in the course of being converted 

 into coal. The Publicateur de St. Briene commends this 

 submarine forest to the careful notice of geologists. 



Submarine Boat. — Mr. Chapman and the Brothers 

 Erin have, it is stated, recently invented a new type of 

 submarine boat, the propulsion of which is effected by 

 the combustion of a mixture of compressed oxygen and 

 petroleum spray, either in a gas engine, or in the 

 furnace of a steam boiler. The oxygen is compressed to 

 80 atmospheres, at which pressure a considerable 

 quantity can be stored in a comparatively small space. 

 The immersion of the vessel is effected by a centrifugal 

 pump which draws in water at the bottom of the boat, 

 and forces it out vertically through two reaction tubes. 

 The depth of immersion is automatically controlled by 

 means of electricity. — Industries. 



The Lake Age in Ohio. — Professor Claypole (Ameri- 

 can Naturalist) concludes that the ice at one time dammed 

 up the Ohio above the site of Cincinnati, forming a sheet 

 of water which he names Lake Ohio. As the banks of 

 the Ohio are 400 to 500 feet high at Cincinnati, the ice 

 must have been thicker than this. If assumed at 500 

 feet, the rim of the ice would be 365 feet above the level 

 of Lake Erie. The entire south of Ohio, a large portion of 

 West Virginia, and parts of Kentucky and Pennsylvania 

 must thus have been under water, forming a lake about 

 400 miles by 200. At one time Lakes Erie and Ontario 

 formed a single vast sheet of water, held by an ice-dam 

 at a level of 700 feet above the sea. 



Names of Minerals. — We borrow from the Ameri- 

 can Naturalist a few notes on the ancient names of 

 minerals, and the accompanying traditions. The name 

 DIAMOND is derived from the Greek a, negative, and 

 £a/iauj, I conquer, meaning unconquerable. The name 

 was originally applied to hard steel and iron, and 

 Hesiod used it in that sense about 750 e.g. Since the 

 days of Theophrastus (about 300 B.C.) it has been 

 applied to the diamond, in Greek aSafia<!. Pliny asserts 

 that if laid upon an anvil and struck with a hammer it 

 remains unhurt, and causes the latter to recoil,; or, 

 indeed, often bursts hammer or anvil. Only by mois- 

 tening it with the blood of a he-goat can it be reduced to 

 such a condition tiiat it may be crushed. 



NiccoLiTE is derived from the neolatin niccolum, the 

 metal nickel. The Gothic nickr or nickl, in Anglo-Saxon 

 nicr or nicor (related to the Icelandic jmickia, to seize 

 or carry off), was a demon who inhabited pools of water. 

 From the above is derived the German Nixe, a female 



water-spirit who was not always cruel, but sometimes 

 gave valuable aid to unhappy lovers. The masculine jVw, of 

 the same family, was a morose, objectionable character. 

 His name serves to this day in Germany to scare children 

 away from the water. From the same source we have ob- 

 tainediV/c,^,commonly used as Old Nick. The old high Ger- 

 man k/cj4'«/ signifies a small vicious horse; also a dwarf. 

 The idea of a dwarf, or stunted animal, was modified into 

 the personification of a malicious spirit. The old Ger- 

 man miners frequently found ores which looked very 

 promising, but which on smelting yielded no silver, but 

 gave off foul odours. The explanation adopted at that 

 time was that wicked spirits infested the ores. 



The Absorption Bands of Oxygen. — M. Janssen 

 (Comptes Rendus) presented a paper on 'the absorption 

 bands of oxygen. According to his researches, oxygen 

 displays two systems of spectral rays : firstly fine lines 

 and then dark and blunted lines. He finds that the 

 distinct appearance of the bands and their breadth are in 

 close relation with the thickness of the layer of oxygen 

 traversed and with the square of the density. The lines 

 depend only on the thickness and the simple density. 

 The law has been verified at pressures varying from 

 six to more than 100 atmospheres. An unforeseen confir- 

 mation has just been produced. M. Olzewski, of Cracow, 

 has seen the bands produced very distinctly in liquified 

 oxygen observed at the thickness of seven millimetres. 

 Now calculation proves that, according to Janssen's law, 

 the bands should commence to be visible at a thickness 

 of 41 millimetres. M. Cailletet, who first succeeded in 

 liquifying oxygen, places his apparatus at the disposal of 

 M. Janssen, who is happy to accept this precious co- 

 operation. It will then be seen if the bands appear at 

 the thickness of 4^ milHmetres. 



Numerical Proportions of Men and Women. — Dr. 

 W. K. Brooks, in the Morphological Notes of the John 

 Hopkins University, remarks that Dussing has discussed 

 the variation in the ratio between male and female 

 animals and plants, and has shown that a favourable 

 environment — in other words, prosperity — tends to pro- 

 duce an excess of females, and unfavourable surround- 

 ings an excess of males. Dr. Brooks finds reasons for 

 believing that the existence of this variation is due to 

 an adjustment which has been gradually brought about 

 in order to secure stability as long as the conditions are 

 favourable, and to increase the probability of change when 

 the conditions are unfavourable. If this be true, a race or 

 species which is approaching extermination, should have 

 an excess of males. Dussing has collected many facts to 

 show that such is actually the case, and the author sup- 

 ports his views by a discussion of the statistics of Vic- 

 toria. The population of Australia consists of a small 

 and decreasing number of aborigines and a prosperous 

 and increasing population of immigrants — chiefly British 

 — and their descendants. As the original population is 

 disappearing, we should expect to find the males among 

 them more numerous, as compared with the females, than 

 among the immigrants. Such is, accordingly, the case. 

 On the average, for all Australia, there are 14372 abori- 

 ginal males to each loo females. Among the immi- 

 grants there are only ii8'64 males to each 100 females. 

 The difference would be yet more striking were it not 

 that the immigrants — those especially of Chinese origin 

 — comprise more men than women. 



