224 SCIENTIFIC NOTES. 



is what is termed the curd. This must be well squeezed, formed into cakes, 

 and left to dry, when it will grow as hard as flint. For use you must scrape 

 some of it off, mix it with quick lime, and moisten it with milk. I think 

 that there is no stronger cement in the world, and it is found to hold, 

 particularly in a hot and damp climate, much better than glue, proving also 

 effectual in mending China ware. 



Paper Neck-Ties and Collars. — Messrs. Smith and Brower, of Xew York, 

 have taken out a patent for paper neck-ties. They are printed in imitation 

 of gingham, silk, &c, and counterfeit the textile fabrics with wonderful 

 exactness. The wholesale price is from Is. to 2s. 2d. per dozen! This 

 firm sold last season of one single style of cloth neck-ties 17,000 dozen. 

 The introduction of paper neck-ties, as a new article of manufacture, goes 

 considerably ahead of paper collars, which have been so extensively sold 

 for the past two or three years, and are sold for about the same price. 

 "Who will go in future without a clean collar and handsome neck-tie of the 

 latest style when he can purchase both for threepence ? — Scientific American. 

 [In India and the colonies, and at sea, where washing is so dear, these 

 paper substitutes may perhaps prove useful.] 



Palo Santo Wood. — A letter from Buenos Ayres says: — "A few days 

 since there arrived at Parana a small vessel built at Oran, which is within 

 about thirty miles of the south central Bolivian frontier, upon the river 

 Yermejo. According to the account of the captain, his vessel (named the 

 Esperanza) is of fifty tons capacity, built of cedar of the best quality, and 

 draws but five and a half feet water when loaded. Her cargo consisted 

 of cedar, ' palo santo,' hides, cheese, and grease — articles abundant in the 

 province of Oran. The wood called ' palo santo ' is very rare, and similar 

 in appearance to the " caoba " of Central America, with which it might be 

 confounded when once worked. It takes a magnificent polish, is of a gi'een 

 colour, very solid and elastic, and moreover has a fine odour, which it 

 never loses. It may be used for furniture, wind instruments, and would 

 make magnificent pianos. One log brought by the Esperanza measured 

 twenty-seven feet in length, with a section of seventeen inches square. 

 The voyage of the Esperanza may be said to open at least 40,000 square 

 miles of new country. The first made, it will be, doubtless, the cause of 

 opening a large trade with almost the centre of South America." 



New source of Truffles. — After the depression occasioned in the minds 

 of the gourmands by the announcement of the failure of the truffle crop in 

 France, it is but just to raise their spirits by the account of the discovery 

 of the luscious production in such large quantities in Africa that several of 

 the great truffle growers of Perigord — armed with their knowledge, which 

 is power, and their experience, which is wealth — have set out to this 

 promised land, and have sent back the most flaming reports, backed by the 

 most splendid proof of the existence of a magnificent species of truffle, pro- 

 duced in great abundance beneath the pine trees and cedars in the brakes 

 of some Algerian forests, more delicate in flavour and more powerful in 

 perfume than those belonging to the oak and hazel bush of Perigord. 



