302 



SCIENCE, 



[Vol. VII., No. 165 



a foot and a half high, which is pulled up and 

 burned, and the ashes leached with boiling water. 

 On this an abundant scum arises, which is re- 

 moved and dried. This is the salt which, white 

 at first, afterward becomes grayish. It is a little 

 bitter, but replaces ordinary salt for all purposes. 

 It is curious that such uncivilized people should 

 have discovered such a process. 



The newly discovered affluent of the Kongo. — 

 The river traversed by Lieutenant Wissmann, to 

 which reference was made in a late number of 

 Science (vii., 160), proves, as we suspected, to be 

 one long indicated on the charts, partly under the 

 name of Ikelemba. It is called by Wissmann the 

 Kassai, and at different points is named the Zaire, 

 the Maneme, and the Kwa. It receives near its 

 mouth the waters of the Kwango and the drainage 

 of Lake Leopold II. It has a navigable length of 

 about four hundred miles through a rich region 

 with many probably navigable branches. Hip- 

 popotami were very abundant, in some places 

 obstructing canoe navigation ; eighty-two were 

 counted in one herd. The mouth of the Kassai 

 does not indicate the importance of the stream, 

 which is probably the reason why it has not 

 sooner been explored. According to Lieutenant 

 Wissmann. the commercial future of the whole 

 Kongo state depends upon the construction of a 

 railway from Vivi to the upper Kongo valley. 



PARIS LETTER. 



SINCE my preceding letter, some very interesting 

 facts have been made known in different sittings 

 of the Academy of sciences or other learned soci- 

 eties. But I must begin by repairing an omission 

 in my last letter, and mention Professor Verneuil's 

 paper concerning phthisis. As it is generally con- 

 ceded at present that phthisis is a parasitical 

 disease, M. Verneuil prcposes that a fund be 

 especially raised for the purpose of studying the 

 Bacillus tuberculosis, to try and find out some 

 scientific and methodical way of fighting this 

 microbe. M. Verneuil's letter has been published 

 in the Gazette hebdomad aire and in many other 

 papers ; but I do not think that much money has 

 been yet raised. M. Verneuil is no micrographer, 

 and has never studied any bacillus or bacterium. 

 His idea is a very good one, but he is not the man, 

 nor does his name carry the weight necessary to 

 make the idea work a long way in the world. 



At the last meeting of the Societe de psycho- 

 logie physiologique, I listened to an interesting note 

 by MM. Richet, Ferrari, and Hericourt, concern- 

 ing the way in which the handwriting varies 

 according to the suggested mental states of hyp- 

 notized persons. For instance, if such a person is 



told that he is Napoleon, and asked to write a let- 

 ter, he writes one, in a handwriting entirely differ- 

 ent from his own, in which a graphologist easily 

 recognizes the signs of a certain mental state which 

 is generally supposed to have been that of Napo- 

 leon ; when told that he is a miser, he writes in a 

 close, short, economical handwriting, in the way 

 misers write, according to graphologists ; as a peas- 

 ant, he writes in a drawling, ugly hand. The con- 

 clusion drawn by these gentlemen is, that graphol- 

 ogy is a real science, and that its main features 

 are correct, generally speaking. After all, there 

 is nothing wonderful in the fact that handwriting 

 can be and is influenced by the mental state, as is 

 the case in physiognomy, attitude, and movements. 

 The papers of MM. Richet, Ferrari, and Hericourt, 

 will be published in the Revue philosophique, and 

 their experiments are being continued. 



A fortnight ago, the Societe geologique began 

 a series of conferences, to be held now and then at 

 the ordinary meetings of the society. The open- 

 ing address was made by M. A. de Lapparent, the 

 well-known author of a very good book on geology, 

 a text-book for French students. The subject was 

 ' The form of the earth,' and M. de Lapparent 

 communicated very interesting facts on the ques- 

 tion. The most important, which is also the one 

 that contributes the most to give to the earth a 

 very irregular form, is the attraction which conti- 

 nents and even islands exert on water, as they do on 

 the pendulum, resulting, as has been proved and 

 measured, in an accumulation of sea- waters around 

 continents. Thus the continents are all situated at 

 the tops of hills of water ; and to go from Europe 

 to America, the ship has first to go down hill, 

 then to cross a valley, and finally to climb another 

 hill. Of course, this is an exaggerated figure ; 

 but, if the world were flat instead of round, the 

 case would be exactly such as I have just said, for 

 it has been calculated by some that between two 

 continents the sea-level, in the middle, may be a 

 thousand metres below the level the sea ought to 

 have, and would have if there were no continents 

 to attract it. As a curious and interesting confir- 

 mation of this attraction of seas by continents, it 

 has been noticed that when Vesuvius is in eruption, 

 and consequently when the mountain itself is 

 denser on account of ascending and issuing lavas, 

 the sea-level of Naples rises in a sufficiently well- 

 marked manner. 



M. de Lapparent, who does not think that there 

 is any great motion in continents, and does not 

 much believe in the sinking of some and the 

 emersion of others, tries to explain the fact fre- 

 quently met with, of sea-level and sea-beaches 

 standing many hundreds of feet above the actual 

 sea-level, in the following manner. Suppose a 



