Culture of Cotton— Scientific News. 127 



new process of drawing aluminium into very fine wire. For the details 

 we must await the results of the London Exposition. 



Culture of Cotton.— The planting of cotton in the differnt French and 

 English colonies has made considerable progress ; it would succeed still 

 better in France if the French were accustomed to act for themselves, 

 without the aid of the government. The culture of cotton in Algeria in 

 the vicinity of Mortaganem has received a great impetus from the estab- 

 lishment of an English company in that country so favorable to the 

 growth of cotton. Other experiments have been made in Senegal by 

 both the French and the English. In India already a million kilograms 

 of this textile material have been collected, and the present year the pro- 

 duct will be doubled. At the present time an effort is in progress to 

 take advantage of the favorable climate and soil of French Guyana to 

 introduce the culture of cotton on a grand scale. This plant was culti- 

 vated there a long time since, but the culture having been badly man- 

 aged it was for a time abandoned. 



The question has arisen of reopening the culture in that region. Two 

 reasons principally determine the resumption ; first cotton succeeds there 

 remarkably well and it is of excellent quality, secondly there are found 

 there, what is wanting in other climates, plenty of laborers. Besides the 

 small proprietors who live there, and who ask for nothing more than 

 some lucrative culture, there is the penitentiary occupied by 10,000 or 

 12,000 convicts who are already accustomed to toil, and who have re- 

 cently performed well the work of clearing the land. 



"Jn all sides then there is an effort to provide against the crisis which 

 '^'^re and more menaces the manufacture of textile fabrics. With the 

 C'lttou which Egypt already produces, and which she will be more and 

 ^ore interested to produce, especially in the vicinity of the Isthmus of 

 -j'ez, with that which is obtained in' India and Algeria, with the plant- 

 ations which are made or increased in Senegal, Soudan and Cambodia, 

 jj'w lastly in Guyana, European industry hopes to free itself completely 

 J^rora the tribute which it has hitherto paid to the United States for 



Scientific Mws.—We here place on record certain scientific facts of 

 some importance which have recently transpired. Among these are (1) 

 ^Jie discovery by M. Lame of the existence of a thrid and non-luminous 

 ^y m double refracting media. (2) The production by Berthelot of the 

 Jjdrocarbon C^H, (acetvline) by synthesis, by making a current of hy- 

 ;'?»!? pass over charcoal rendered incandescent by the electric current. 

 IV Ihe transformation of aldehyd into alcohol effected by Wurtz by 

 gleans of amalgam of sodium. (4) The magnificent researches of Hof- 

 ,,^^on upon the derivatives of aniline, those beautiful colors which have 

 \^tt^^ y«ars produced such a sensation in industry which no one has 

 ' , ^'^^^ able to obtain in a state of purity, and which Hoffmann has 

 ^Jduced to two types, rosaline and leucaniline, which bear to each other the 

 cay je'atiou as white indigo and blue indigo. (5) The treatment and 

 ^e of obstinate ulcers by (solid) carbonic acid which is the most powerful 



^^"zing agent known. (6) The construction of a telescope with a silver 

 mirror nf «A _.. .. . , V L ^ , ^^^^^^^ diameter and with a focal length 



