Archceologia. 233 



degree a substitute for it. If introduced into these countries, it 

 might, to some extent, supersede tobacco, and advantageously; but 

 its flavour, though not actually disagreeable, is such that it never 

 can come into very common use. Its consumption is another 

 instance of that extraordinary instinct which has led the different 

 portions of the human race to agree in selecting, without knowing 

 it, some one source or another of a highly nitrogeuized, and, for 

 some reason not yet certainly known, most important compound. 



Incompressibility of Water. — Baron Seguier has discovered 



that if a glass cylinder is plunged vertically into a vessel of water, 

 in such a way that some of it will be in, and some above the water, 

 and a ball of lead is allowed to fall within it, along its axis, the 

 glass will be cut horizontally on a level with the surface of the 

 water, the part above being quite uninjured, and the part below 

 being broken in pieces longitudinally. The effect is due to the 

 incompressibility of the water, of which it is a curious illustration. 

 Similar phenomena, on a large scale, have been well known for some 

 time. A cannon exploded under water produces the most violent 

 effects on subaqueous constructions which are near it ; and rocks 

 are now blasted under water by exploding gunpowder near 



them, instead of within cavities formed in them. New Mode 



of Preparing Grains. — The ordinary method of removing the 

 outer coating of grain is attended with great waste of valuable 

 constituents of the corn. A very favourable official report has 

 been lately made on the means used by M. Poissant for avoiding 

 this evil. His apparatus consists of a hopper, which conduct 

 the grain into a cylinder, where it is subjected for some minutes 

 to a beater, which makes nearly four hundred revolutions a minute. 

 The pellicle is thoroughly separated in this way, and is removed by a 

 current of air, and along with it dust, and matters due to cryptogamic 

 vegetation ; and after which it is ground — only the one thirty-first 

 of the total weight being lost during the process. The bread made 

 from the flour is not, perhaps, so white, but it is more wholesome 



than with grain treated in the ordinary manner. New Break. — 



Every one must have remarked that when a carriage is descending 

 a hill, the front of the pole is thrown up by the efforts of the horses. 

 This fact has been applied to the construction of a very powerful 

 break, which derives its force from this movement of the pole. And, 

 therefore, it is effective, in proportion to the efforts of the horses — 

 that is, to the necessity for it. At the same time it is under perfect 

 control. 



ABCELEOLOGIA. 



At the recent meeting of the British Archaeological Association at 

 Durham, under the presidency of the Duke of Cleveland, the Rev. 

 Prebendary Scarth, of Bathwick, Bath, communicated a discovery 

 he had recently made in Gainford Church, in the county of Durham, 



