July 20, 1888.] 



SCIENTIFIC NEWS. 



55 



General &oU$. 



Professor Chevreul. — The health of the veteran 

 savant is beginning to occasion some anxiety to his 

 friends. He still eats and sleeps well, but he is rather 

 feeble, and has difficulty in ascending stairs. 



Subsidence in Worcestershire. — Owing, it is said, to 

 the insufficiency of props in the underground workings 

 of a colliery some 600 feet below the surface, a subsi- 

 dence has taken place in the neighbourhood of Cradley. 

 The area affected is about one hundred yards square, 

 and unfortunately it is covered with houses. 



United States Coast and Geodetic Survey. — The fol- 

 lowing publications have recently issued from the offices 

 the Coast and Geodetic Survey, Washington : — "Tide 

 Tables for the Atlantic Coast of the United States for the 

 Year 1889," " Catalogue of Charts and other Publications 

 during 1887," and " The Atlantic Local Coast Pilot, Sub- 

 division 21." 



House-Boats on the Thames. — The house-boats on 

 the Thames have increased to such an extent that the 

 excrementitious matter and other refuse discharged from 

 them into the river has become a serious item of pol- 

 lution. The evil is the more serious because the 

 " putrescent and putrescible matters " thus emitted can 

 undergo no kind of purification. The attention of the 

 Thames Conservancy Board has been at last attracted to 

 the nuisance, and measures are being taken for its re- 

 pression. 



The Mound-Builders' Units of Measure. — Accord- 

 ing to Mr. R. P. Gregg, quoted in the Popular Science 

 Monthly, the ancient Peruvians, the Aztecs, Toltecs, and 

 Central Americans employed a foot equal to n| inches 

 English. This foot was divided into twelve equal parts. 

 The mound-builders of Ohio, according to Dr. Abbott, 

 used a foot equal to 10 English inches, also divided 

 into twelve equal parts. Seven of the Ohio inches 

 were thus equal to six Peruvian inches. 



Refrigerating Mixtures with Solid Carbonic 

 Acid. — According to MM. Cailletet and Colardean, floccu- 

 lent carbonic acid is capable of cooling bodies down to 

 -6o° Centigrade at the ordinary pressure of the atmo- 

 sphere, and down to -76 in a vacuum. If the solid 

 carbonic acid is mixed with ether the temperatures are 

 -77 and -103 . If chloride of methyl is used instead, 

 of ether there is obtained a temperature of -82° at the 

 pressure of the atmosphere, and of -106 C. in a vacuum 

 which is equal to 190S below freezing or 158° below 

 zero on Fahrenheit's scale. 



Absorption of GAses by Carbon. — From analogy we 

 should expect that chemical action withiji carbon filaments 

 is very possible, since, however carefully they have been 

 prepared, a greal volume of gases must be condensed in 

 their texture. Smith and Reichardt report that the gas 

 which these carbons give off is carbonic acid, the more 

 abundant the moister is the air. Baker has since estab- 

 lished that in perfectly dry air carbonic oxide only is 

 evolved. In any case a combination of carbon and 

 oxygen takes place, which accounts for the gradual de- 

 terioration of the filaments in incandescence lamps. 



Detection of Gas-Leakage. — The use of matches or 

 other lights to detect an escape of gas is not free from 

 danger. A test-paper for detecting such leakage has been 

 devised by Dr. Bunte, improved by Herr Schauffers, and 

 is published in Invention. The paper is steeped in 

 alcohol, containing to every three parts chloride of 

 palladium one part chloride of gold. One pint costs 9s., 

 and will steep filter paper enough for 10,000 tests. The 

 observer may be misled if there is present tobacco smoke, 

 a smoky chimney, fusel oil, the smell of onions, 

 sulphuretted hydrogen, or the vapour of mercury. 



Exploration in Morocco. — The following message 

 sent to the coast by special courier, by Messrs. Joseph 

 Thomson and Harold Crichton-Browne, and forwarded 

 from Tangier by the Eastern Telegraph Company's cable, 

 has been transmitted by Sir James Anderson to the Royal 

 Geographical Society : — " Left Demnat June 5th, followed 

 the glen of the Wad Gadat to the Tilnet, which we crossed 

 at a height of 8,000 ft. Reached the house of the 

 Governor of Ghaoria on the 8th ; magnificent reception ; 

 all goes well ; prospects good ; remain here for a few 

 days. 



Flies as Communicators of Disease. — Dr. Hoffmann, 

 of Dresden, confirms the statement that the common 

 house-fly distributes the bacillus of tubercle. In a ward 

 occupied by phthisical patients, four out of six flies 

 caught were found to contain the bacillus in their 

 intestines. The insects collect the microbia from the 

 expectorated matter, and discharge them again unhurt. 

 The Medical Press appends to this paragraph the follow- 

 ing curious moral : " Abstain from eating flies or their 

 excreta, and bottle up all phthisical sputa." Would it not 

 be better to say treat all such sputa with corrosive sub- 

 limate or strong sulphuric acid ? 



Hypnotism as an Amusement. — By way of emphasizing 

 the caution which we gave (vol. i., p. 621), we quote 

 from the Monthly Magazine of Pharmacy the following 

 paragraph : — " A well-connected young man, who lives 

 with his mother in a fashionable part of Paris, recently 

 attended what is called a soiree d hypnolisiue at a friend's 

 house. He went to sleep, and a stuffed mannikin was 

 placed by his side, which he was told was a man, whom 

 he must murder. The youth did as he was told, and 

 when a knife was put into his hand he ripped the dummy 

 figure open with the exultation of a man who was wreak- 

 ing a long-cherished revenge on an enemy. After that 

 he awoke, but ever since he has been labouring under 

 the delusion that he murdered his mother. He ran away 

 from his home, and sat weeping on a bench in the 

 Champs Elysees, when two policemen, whose curiosity 

 had been excited, came up to him. On seeing the agents 

 of the law the poor fellow took to his heels, and was, of 

 course, pursued and arrested. It was only when he 

 was brought face to face with his mother that he regained 

 his senses." 



Purchased Research.—" We regret," says the Ameri- 

 can Naturalist, " to read in our esteemed contemporary, 

 the American Geologist, an editorial apology for a 

 practice which scientific men condemn. We refer to the 

 purchase of the scientific work of a man, and the pub- 

 lication of it by the purchaser as though it was his own 



