so6 Notes. [February, 
mention that Mr. Schwendler advocates the employment of the 
eleCtric light at Indian railway-stations. 
The German Government lost no time in the practical em- 
ployment of the telephone. . There are now 272 telephonic 
circuits, and communication is satisfactorily carried on over a 
distance of from 30 to 40 miles. 
Mr. Stroh, the well-known mechanician, has observed that if 
a telephone, with the circuit of its coil left open, be held to the 
ear, and a powerful magnet be moved gently up and down along 
the length of the magnet, and at a distance of an inch or two 
from it, a faint breathing sound will be heard ; the recurring 
pulses of sound keeping time with the up and down motion of 
the magnet. The sound may, according to the “ Telegraphic 
Journal,” be aptly compared to the steady breathing of a child, 
and there is a striking resemblance between it and the micro- 
phonic sounds of gases diffusing through a porous septum, as 
heard by Mr. Chandler Roberts, F.R.S. 
Writing on the subject of Gas versus Electricity, to “ Nature,” 
Mr. W. H. Preece observes that we know no more of the eleCtric 
light now than we did in 1862, when as great a display was made 
in our Exhibition of that year as was made in the French Exhi- 
bition of last year. The recent experiments have, he says, shown 
both the strength and weakness of the position of the gas com- 
panies. Their strength consists in their being in possession of 
the ground ; their weakness consists in their producing only a 
poor light — and a very poor light — when compared with electri- 
city. But it would almost seem, from the experiments that have 
been made, that the quantity of light to be produced by gas is 
only a question of the quantity of gas consumed in a given 
space. There are now burning in the Waterloo Road two bril- 
liant gas-lamps, giving alight of 500 candles ; and this is greater, 
in point of faCt, than the intensity of the light developed by any 
one of the eleCtric lights that are now on trial in the thorough- 
fares of London. There is, however, a defeCt in gas light which 
remains to be eradicated, and that is the colour of the light. 
The one great advantage which the eleCtric light has over gas is 
that the eleCtric light, owing to its very high temperature, pro- 
duces rays of every degree of refrangibility, and therefore as an 
illuminating power it is equal to that of the sun. A very marked 
advance towards perfection in this direction in gas-lighting has 
been made in the albo-carbon process, by which the gas burnt is 
enriched with the vapour of naphthalin — a refuse of gas manu- 
facture. By this process the intensity of the light of a gas- 
burner is improved at least five times, and in some experiments 
witnessed by Mr. Preece the improvement was as much as 
twenty times. There are three points which all eleCtric lights 
for general purposes should be required to attain : the first is a 
brilliancy far exceeding that of any known lamp ; the second is 
