96 
POPULAR SCIENCE REVIEW. 
stratum of mercury (which had been previously heated to 160° C) ; so that 
whilst change or renewal wa9 prevented the two portions of fluid were ex- 
posed to exactly equal volumes of the same atmospheric air. Yet in this 
case also — where germs had an equal chance of gaining access to the two 
solutions — after eight days, monads, bacteria, and vibrios only were found 
in that of the sealed flask, whilst in that under the bell-jar there were also 
found myriads of cilated- infusoria. 
Brunner s Glands not follicular. — At a late meeting of the Academy of 
Sciences of Vienna, Herr Briicke presented a paper, by Herr A. Schlemmer, 
on the character and position of the intestinal glands known as Brunner's. 
He finds them most abundant in the horse-shoe bend of the duodenum, and 
he states, further, that they are not follicular glands, as has been asserted, 
but are truly tubular structures. 
Physical Disease from Mental Strain. — A most able, graphic, and eloquent 
paper on this important question appears from the pen of Dr. B. W. 
Richardson in the Journal of Mental Science for Oct. We heartily commend 
it to the notice of all readers, both lay and professional. 
Detection of Blood Stains. — The detection of blood in old and often 
minute stains on clothing, wood, metal, &c., can now, according to the 
American Dental Cosmos, be made with absolute certainty. The crystals of 
hfematine which can be separated from the slightest traces of blood can 
always be recognised by means of the microscope —but to decide to what 
species, whether man or lower animal, the blood belongs, is a question 
attended with great difficulty and uncertainty. In view of this fact, Neu- 
mann has recently subjected the question to a rigid and exhaustive exami- 
nation and has published his results in a book. The work contains twenty- 
three superbly executed coloured plates in which nineteen different kinds of 
blood are represented, in which the differences of the microscopic examina- 
tion are displayed in a wonderfully clear manner. Neumann recommends 
to moisten the blood stain with distilled water and to heat to about 60° 
Fahrenheit on the glass side of the microscope. In this way microscopic 
pictures of human and animal blood are obtained of such dissimilarity 
that human blood can readily be distinguished from that of any other 
animal. The author explains in what way this is done, and gives ample 
illustration. 
The Functions of the Ciliary Muscle. — In a recent number of the Monthly 
Microscopical Journal Dr. Lawson, after describing the anatomical relations 
of the ciliary muscle in a pheasant, asks : — u What effect can this muscle 
have on the consistence of the lens, from which it is so distant ? How can 
it advance the lens through any action on choroid, to which its attachment 
is so far behind the lens ? And what can be the effect of the con- 
traction of so important a muscular structure but to bend in the border of 
the cornea, and thus increase the curvature of the object-glass of the eye ? 
Its origin — the sclerotic — is not yielding; its insertion — the cornea — is. 
The liquid of the eye resists the inward pressure of the cornea, and driving 
its central part out, still more increases the curvature. Lastly, in the elastic 
lamina of the cornea do we not see the antagonist of this powerful muscle ? 
Birds must necessarily possess greater power of focal accommodation than 
man, but why should the mechanism by which that accommodation is ob- 
