March 2, 1888.] 



SCIENCE. 



lOI 



to myself, I reasoned, that if at any time during the first compres- 

 sion, the subsequent filing, or the second compression, anywhere 

 throughout the mass, the constituent metals were in contact, at 

 that point there would be a minute globule of the alloy, — a mole- 

 cule of alloy, as it were. If, now, the temperature of the block, 

 either during compression or subsequently, be raised to 70° C, then 

 that molecule of alloy will fuse, and act as a solvent upon the sur- 

 rounding metals till the whole mass is fused. 



If my idea was correct, I concluded that perhaps I could produce 

 the result without pressure, giving more time and an appropriate 

 temperature to the substance. 



The filed metals in the proper proportions were mixed, and 

 packed into the bottom of a ' sealed tube,' such as is used for blow- 

 pipe work, using no greater pressure than could be conveniently 

 exerted with a piece of wire, one-eighth of an inch in diameter, 

 held between the thumb and finger. This tube was hung in the 

 Water-bath of the laboratory over night (eighteen hours), thus 

 maintaining it at a temperature of from 98'-' to 100° C. On ex- 

 amination, the filings had settled down considerably. The tube 

 was then struck upon the table, jarring them down still more, and 

 in an hour or two the whole was a molten globule. The experi- 

 ment was repeated, using larger quantities packed in with a lead- 

 pencil, and occasionally pressing the mass together with the pencil, 

 producing twenty or thirty grains of alloy. Since then, tin and 

 lead have been fused together at 200° C, tin melting only at 

 230° C. ; also sodium and potassium at ordinary temperatures 

 (20" C), the first melting at about 90° C, and the latter at about 

 60° C. Thus I proposed the law, that an alloy can be formed out 

 of the constituents at a temperature above the melting-point of the 

 alloy, althouirh it be far below that of anv constituent, with no 

 {appreciable) pressure. The extended verification of this law, as 

 well as the electrical and thermal phenomena associated therewith, 

 will be the subject of a work which I hope soon to undertake and 

 carry through. 



The Chemistry of Sugar. 



The following is an abstract of some remarks made by Prof. H. 

 W. Wiley, of the Agricultural Department, at the meeting of the 

 Chemical Society, held Feb. 9. Referring to his recent work in 

 Louisiana, he said, " When the cane is subjected to pressure 

 analysis, it is found that the juice differs from that in the ordinary 

 bagasse. There are two kinds of juice in the cane, — one stored 

 in the cells, and the other in the circulation. The juice oozing from 

 the end of the cane, at first, from compression, is like water, and 

 has no sugar, so far as the taste goes." Another subject of in- 

 vestigation had to do with the determination of the total solids in 

 the juices, which is a difficult problem. It was fully demonstrated 

 that the saccharometers in use are not reliable, because they are 

 mostly graduated to pure sugar solutions, while in the cane juices 

 there is a mixture of various solutions. Professor Wiley described 

 the process he used of drying to obtain the total solids, and his 

 method of determining them by the addition of alcohol and the use 

 of paper coils. He also said, in regard to the genesis of sucrose, 

 that it had been proved beyond doubt that it is a direct formation, 

 and not a secondary product. All the facts are against the old 

 theory that starch is formed first, and the sugar from it. The 

 sugar in the circulatory sap is never a starch sugar, and cannot 

 have come from starch. It is found in the leaf, and is formed by 

 the aid of chlorophyl. He also described the polarizing instrument, 

 and said that many improvements have been made in it. Another 

 point developed is that the amount of available sugar in the cane 

 is greater than it has heretofore been supposed to be. In closing, 

 he said that many of these points had been indicated in his previous 

 work, but were emphasized by his recent investigations. 



Rainfall beyond the Mississippi. 

 Gen. A. W. Greely, chief signal officer, gave to the Washington 

 Philosophical Society, at its regular meeting, Feb. 18, the partial 

 results of a study he is now engaged upon of the rainfall in the 

 trans-Mississippi region. He had before him a number of maps 

 upon which had been charted the observations which were the 

 basis of his study, and referred to them constantly as he spoke. 

 He said that the idea that there is any part of the West that is ab- 

 solutely rainless is now a banished myth. During the past ten 



years the number of stations for observation has been doubled, so 

 that there are, in twelve States and Territories, nearly one hundred 

 stations ; and the observations, if reduced to a single one, would 

 cover a period of nearly five thousand years. The result of chart- 

 ing these observations has been to reduce very greatly the areas of 

 small rainfall. The area in which the annual precipitation was 

 supposed to be less than five inches has almost disappeared, and 

 that in which the rainfall was put down at less than fifteen inches 

 has been reduced by a quarter of a million of square miles since 

 the Census map of 1880 was made. 



General Greely discussed the question of what constitutes an 

 arid region, and said that he does not agree with Maj. J. W. Powell, 

 who placed the minimum amount of precipitation necessary for 

 successful agriculture at twenty inches per annum. He said that 

 millions of bushels of wheat are raised every year where the rain- 

 fall is less than twenty inches, and referred to the statistics of 

 Dakota, where more than 2,600,000 bushels were raised in the two 

 counties of Richland and Stutsman in 1885, and 1,500,000 in 1887, 

 with an average rainfall of 13.7 to 15.1 inches. 



General Greely also mentioned the interesting fact, that, while 

 the rainfall increases as the rivers which flow directly into the Gulf 

 of Mexico or into the Pacific Ocean are followed up from their 

 mouths, it increases with the distance from the mouths of such as 

 empty into other bodies of water, like the Colorado. 



General Greely's charts also prove that much of the rainfall in 

 what has been known as the arid region, and where it was formerly 

 supposed that the precipitation was five inches or less, was not re- 

 ported. In some of these places the actual rainfall is as much as 

 sixteen inches, and in one it is thirty-seven. This explains why 

 water is found so abundantly in wells in some parts of southern 

 California, where the annual rainfall has been reported as ten, 

 twelve, and thirteen inches : the actual precipitation is twenty-four 

 inches. 



General Greely said that he had caused to be placed upon the 

 charts the maximum and the minimum rainfall of the various 

 stations, not expecting that they would indicate any thing, but that 

 the curves were almost as regular as those on the annual maps. 

 He explained that the small average amount of rainfall formerly 

 reported was due in part to the fact that so large a number of 

 stations had been situated along the line of the Pacific Railroad, 

 which, seeking low gradients, had been built through a section of 

 country in which the precipitation was small. He spoke also of the 

 prevalent opinion that the rainfall in the West is increasing, and 

 said that he thinks this opinion to be correct, and closed with the 

 remark that it was not fair to treat that country on the basis of 

 seasonable rains, since the larger portion of the precipitation took 

 place during different months in different sections of the region. 



In the brief discussion which followed the address. Prof. G. K. 

 Gilbert said that it was not safe to fix any given amount of rainfall 

 as the minimum necessary for successful agriculture, without quali- 

 fications. Very much depends upon the time when the rain falls, 

 and the rapidity with which evaporation takes place. More rain is 

 required in Arizona than in Dakota, and many unsuccessful agri- 

 cultural experiments have been made in Utah near Camp Douglass, 

 where the annual precipitation is as much as eighteen inches. 



Professor Fernow said that he had compared the amount of rain- 

 fall during the five months of vegetation, in Philadelphia, Buffalo, 

 Dodge City, and North Platte. It ranges from fifteen to seventeen 

 inches, the largest amount of precipitation being at North Platte. 

 There was no lack of rainfall at the eastern stations, but at North 

 Platte it was impossible to raise a crop. He learned also from 

 Utah that the amount of water needed to irrigate land there was 

 less after two or three years than when it was first turned on. 



Prof. C. V. Riley spoke of the frequency and violence of the rain- 

 fall as modifying in an important degree its effect. 



Folk-Lore of Ireland. 



The following is an abstract of a paper read before the Anthro- 

 pological Society of Washington, Feb. 12, by Jeremiah Curtin : — 



For many years I have believed that there was a great stock of 

 myths and folk-lore current among the people in Ireland, as well as 

 an abundance of that class of facts which throw light on the history 

 of the human mind, — facts which would be valuable to the scien- 



