NATURAL SCIENCE NEWS. 



175 



hundred and thirty to one hundred 

 and fifty cleavers, cutters, polish- 

 ers, etc. 



Mr. Henry D. Morse, of Boston, 

 was the pioneer diamond cutter of 

 the United States. He can justly 

 be called the diamond cutter par 

 excellence, and the best cutters in 

 the United States today received 

 their trainiug under him. But ed- 

 ucating young Americans, both 

 men and women, to his art, was 

 not his greatest work. He showed 

 the world that the art which had 

 so long been a monoply of the 

 Hollanders, was degenerating in 

 their hands into a mere mechani- 

 cal trade. His treatment of the 

 diamond gave great stimulus to 

 the industry both in the United 

 States and abroad. Shops were 

 opened here and in London in 

 consequence of his success. He 

 was one of the few who studied 

 the diamond scientifically and i 

 taught his pupils that mathemati- 

 cal precision in cutting greatly en- 

 hances the value as well as the 

 beauty of the gem. His artistic 

 e3'e, sound judgment and keen per- 

 ception enabled him to carry the 

 art to a perfection seldom, if ever, 

 attained before. In his shop a 

 machine for cutting diamonds was 

 invented which did away, in a 

 great measure, with the tedious- 

 ness and inaccuracy of the old 

 manual process. Thanks to his 

 labors, we now have among us 

 some of the best cutters in the 

 world, men who treat the diamond 

 as it should be treated to develop 

 its greatest beauty. The fact that 

 so many fine stones were recut 

 here after he started his wheel led 

 to a great improvement in cutting 

 abroad, especially in the French 

 Jura and Switzerland, where both 

 men and women are now employ- 

 ed at the trade, and, as a result, the 

 diamonds sold today are decidedly 

 better cut than those of twenty- 

 five years ago, before Mr. Morse 

 turned his attention to the work 

 that showed to all the world that 

 diamond cutting is properly an art, 

 and not an industry. — Atlanta Con- 

 stitution. 



The Mt. Joy Meteorite. 



The Mt. Joy Meteorite is the 

 third largest found in the United 

 States, and the largest east of the 

 Mississippi River. 



It was found in November, 1887, 

 on or about the 16th of the month, 

 by Jacob Snyder, about a foot be- 

 low the surface while digging to 

 plant an apple tree near his house, 

 five miles to the southeast of Get- 

 tysburg, in the township of Mt. 



Joy, Adams Co., Penn. It was 

 supposed by the finder and his 

 friends to indicate the near pres- 

 ence of an iron mine, and consid- 

 erable prospecting was done to lo- 

 cate it. The meteorite was placed 

 on some timbers in the open air 

 where it remained until the sum- 

 mer of 1 891, before it was seen by 

 any one who surmised its true 

 character. 



Professor F. W. Clarke induced 

 Mr. Snyder to send it to the Na- 

 tional Museum for inspection, but 

 was finally unable to secure it, as 

 Mr. Snyder was unwilling to part 

 with it for a price which the Mu- 

 seum felt justified >in paying. I. 

 therefore purchased it from Mr. 

 Snyder on the 15th of August, 

 1891. The three largest dimen- 

 sions of the meteorite are 11, 24 

 and 33^ inches and it weighed on 

 the museum scales 847 lbs. Pro- 

 I fessor Clarke had a few ounces 

 taken off for examination; with 

 this exception and the scaling of 

 decomposed crust, from the out- 

 side, the mass still remains as it 

 was found. 



Professor Clarke has kindly fur- 

 nished me with the following anal- 

 ysis, made by Mr. L. G. Eakins in 

 the laboratory of the United States 

 Geological Survey. 



Professor Clarke did not suc- 

 ceed in developing the Widman- 

 stattian figures satisfactorily, and 

 the small amount of nickel shown 

 by the analysis would indicate a 

 poor etching iron; when larger sur- 

 faces are available, we shall doubt- 

 less obtain better results. 



Fe 93 "8o 



Ni 4-81 



Co 0-51 



Cu 0-005 



P o-ig 



S o-oi 



99-3 2 5 



No idea can be formed of the 

 length of time the meteorite had 

 lain in the ground and very little 

 of the amount of surface decompo- 

 sition, it has undergone; — suffi- 

 cient, however, to remove all the 

 finer pittings, leaving a compara- 

 tively smooth surface. 



Having been much interested in 

 Mr. Davison's examination of the 

 the magnetic properties of the 

 Welland meteorite, and thinking 

 that this line of investigation in 

 other meteorites, might lead to in- 

 teresting results, I requested Mr. 

 Marcus Baker of the U. S. Geo- 

 logical Survey, to make an exam- 

 ination of the meteorite, which he 

 kindly consented to do. 



The result of this examination 

 is to show that the meteorite, as a 



whole, acts as a mass of soft iron, 

 gaining polarity under the induct- 

 ive action of the earth. The low- 

 er portion on the north side be- 

 came a 'north-seeking pole; while 

 the upper part became a south- 

 seeking pole; a pretty distinct 

 neutral line was shown, inclined to 

 the horizon at an angle (2o°-25°) 

 which is approximately the com- 

 plement of the local inclination of 

 the dipping needle. This induced 

 polarity shifted with each change 

 in the position of the whole mass, 

 and in general this shifting or the 

 poles took place promptly though 

 not always at once. Mr. Baker 

 also states that his observations 

 suggested the probable existence 

 of an unequal distribution of per- 

 manent magnetism, but this mat- 

 ter requires further investigation. 

 --E. E. Howell in American Journal 

 of Science. 



How to Examine Objects with 

 the Microscope. 



Many amateurs defeat their own 

 purposes by attempting to exam- 

 ine too much of a substance at one 

 time. Thin sections and small 

 portions of objects to be examined 

 should be placed under the mic- 

 roscope. The microscope, as the 

 name implies, is an instrument for 

 the examination of small things. 

 Generally a very small particle of 

 the substance to be viewed will 

 answer far better than a large 

 amount! A particle as big as a 

 pin's head is usually sufficient. 

 In examing blood such a quantity 

 is a plenty; but a drop as big as 

 indicated is too large until it is 

 spread out. Place the drop to the 

 left of the center of a glass slip; 

 take another slip with a true edge: 

 with the latter press firmly and 

 draw to the right so that but a thin 

 film is left on the first slip of glass, 

 cover immediately with a thin 

 glass and examine with a fifth or 

 quarter objective and the corpus- 

 cles will be nicely displayed. In 

 the case of starch or spicules use 

 but a small drop and examine un- 

 der a cover and much more will 

 be seen and made more beautiful 

 than if a large or thick mass were 

 attempted to be examined. 



So with butter, a drop as above 

 mentioned placed on a slide, cov- 

 ered and pressed with the finger 

 into a film, will under a quarter 

 objective instantly show the natur- 

 al crystals. The rule here stated 

 is a good one to become accustom- 

 ed to and experience will demon- 

 strate that too little will be more 

 satisfactory than too much. — The 

 Microscope. 



