The necessary excavations for an immense sewer in course of
construction at Rome, have laid bare some interesting relics of the
ancient city. One of these is a tomb, almost perfect in every respect,
which bears an inscription showing that it was the last resting-place
of Sergius, who was consul in the year 144 B.C. Cicero mentions Sergius
as being a fine orator. The tomb is a handsome one; and it is intended
to remove and rebuild it in some spot where it will again be open to
the light of day. At present, it is at a depth of twenty feet below the
modern level. Other relics, separated from the present by an interval
of twenty centuries, have also been laid bare. Among them is the site
of the College of Medicine, and an inscription bearing the names of
thirty physicians.
Another interesting find has occurred at Ramleh, near Alexandria. This
is the unearthing of an ancient statue of the great Pharaoh, which was
recently discovered by the chief of the coastguardsmen, Middlemas Bey,
while searching for contraband tobacco. The statue has not been fully
examined yet. There is little doubt, however, that it is three thousand
years old. It is covered with hieroglyphics, which will most probably
throw some light upon its history. There is every indication that the
spot where it has been found may form part of the site of a buried city.
The Exhibition opened some weeks ago under the auspices of the
Geographical Society (London), has proved a great success, for it
has been well attended. Its object was to show, by exhibiting the
maps, atlases, textbooks, and appliances devoted to this science by
continental countries, and also by lectures, that the land upon which
the sun never sets is beyond all others the most deficient in the means
of teaching geography. The collection will presently be exhibited at
Manchester, and afterwards at Edinburgh. It is said that the Council
of the Geographical Society will give a favourable hearing to any
application which may be made to them for the loan of the collection
for exhibition in other large cities.
M. Daubrie, an authority on meteorites, has been examining two of
these bodies which fell in India last year. One of them fell at the
village of Pirthalla, in the Punjaub. It weighed twenty pounds, and
had the appearance of granite, coated with a blackened skin. The
other meteorite fell in the North-western Provinces, and its fall was
accompanied by a flash of light and a noise resembling thunder. A great
deal of interest has been aroused lately in the subject of meteorites
by the course of lectures which Professor Dewar has just concluded
at the Royal Institution, London, and which have been addressed to a
juvenile audience. Children of an older growth as well can hardly fail
to be interested in these mysterious bodies, the only visitors that
come to us from space.
We stated last month in these columns that MM. Paul and Prosper
Henry had succeeded in photographing a portion of the Milky-way. It
has now been suggested by the same eminent French astronomers that
the different observatories of the world should join hands in the
stupendous undertaking of charting in their true positions all the
stars, about twenty millions, which are included in the first fifteen
magnitudes. It is calculated that the work might be accomplished within
the present century, if twelve observatories in different parts of
the northern and southern hemisphere were to undertake it. About five
hundred and ten photographic plates would have to be taken at each
place, and each plate would require perhaps one night’s attention. But
the only nights available would be those having no moon and having a
clear and still air. If this work be carried out, its value to the
future of astronomical science will be incalculable.
A shock of earthquake was felt at about seven o’clock on the morning
of January 20 in Cornwall, at St Austell and in the neighbourhood. It
appeared as if an explosion had taken place, so great was the noise,
and the sound was immediately followed by the shaking of the ground.
Persons felt their beds moving under them, and many others had an
impression that a portion of their house was falling down. The shock
was also felt at Mevagissey. Many people were shaken in their beds.
In one instance a clock was stopped, and in many houses the doors and
windows shook violently. The inhabitants of St Blazey and neighbourhood
were greatly startled, about a quarter past seven, by hearing a loud
rumbling noise and by houses being shaken from foundation to roof.
It appeared to come from a northerly direction, and the vibration
lasted about four or five seconds. Persons coming in from the outlying
districts and giving an account of the shock being more or less severe,
all agree as to the time of its taking place.
A more important instance of subterranean activity has been reported
to the Admiralty by the United States government. A submarine volcano,
southward of the Culebras reef, has suddenly become active, and has
thrown up an island two miles in length and about two hundred and fifty
feet in height. A similar volcano on the same spot was reported in the
year 1877.
From a study of six hundred and fifty thunderstorms that occurred in
Italy in 1881, Signor Ferrari concludes that every thunderstorm is
connected with a barometric, hygrometric, and thermic depression; it
is behind the two former, and in front of the last. Most of those
storms arose in the wide plain of the Po. Coming from west-north-west
with a velocity of from eighteen to twenty-four miles per hour, they
passed (in case of their greatest range) with slackening speed over
the Apennines in Upper and Middle Italy. For a given moment the
thunderstorm has the form of a long narrow band, advancing, with
numerous bends outwards and inwards, parallel to itself, and having
its various characteristic phenomena most intense along the middle
line. The dominant wind-direction is generally parallel to that of
propagation of the storm.
M. de Lesseps, with delegates from the Chambers of Commerce of
Paris, Marseilles, Havre, Rouen, Bordeaux, and Lyons, as well as
representatives from England, Holland, Germany, &c., whom he has
invited to accompany him, has started for the Panama Canal works. The
object of the journey is to dispel any doubts as to the completion of
the undertaking, and also to give the representatives of the various
nationalities an opportunity of seeing for themselves how far the work
has progressed. It is said that there are now twenty-seven contractors
on the works, who are tied down to finish their sections by certain
dates. So many adverse reports have been circulated as to the real
condition of affairs, that news from competent and disinterested
observers will be looked for with some anxiety.
A scheme, under influential support, has been started for the
pacification and administration of that unfortunate part of Africa
called the Soudan. This happy consummation is to be brought about by
the establishment of a chartered corporation of somewhat the same type
as the defunct East India Company. The nominal capital of this proposed
Company is to be ten millions, with power to borrow as much more; and
it is further proposed that the English government, in consideration of
having the white-elephant taken off their hands, should find a handsome
subsidy. The money would be employed in the development of the country
generally, by the maintenance of roads, railways, irrigation-works,
and other works of public utility. As the tribes generally have the
instinct of keen traders, it is hoped that these measures may induce
them to ‘turn their swords into ploughshares, and their spears into
pruning-hooks.’ It is hoped, too, that the operations of the Company
may stamp out for ever the slave-trade of equatorial Africa. The scheme
is a magnificent one; but its success will depend upon the tact of
those who are brought into contact with the natives.
Lieutenant Taunt, who was employed by the United States government
upon a mission to the Congo, has recently returned, and gives a very
favourable report as to the healthy infancy of the free state. With few
exceptions, the chiefs of the different stations are on good terms with
the natives. Cattle are reared with great success, and fresh meat is
therefore abundant, and the same may be said of European vegetables.
Lieutenant Taunt enjoyed good health, and considers that there is no
reason why other white men should not do the same, if they will only
exercise common prudence. Upon only one occasion did the explorer meet
with any animosity from the natives, and this he attributed to the
fact that no station had been established in that particular district.
He considers that it would be to the interest of the free state if a
great many more stations were established. Finally, Lieutenant Taunt
agrees with Mr Stanley that on the Congo there are abundant resources
to develop.
We have much pleasure in calling attention to the Typewriting and
General Copying Association, which for twelve months has been
established for the employment of reduced gentlewomen at Lonsdale
Chambers, Chancery Lane, London. This worthy little Association has
during its first year been so successful in paying its way and making a
profit on the work done, that three new type-writers have been bought
by it. Authors, dramatists, and many others find it very convenient to
have their writings translated into a form which can be so easily read.
We wish the enterprise continued success.
The miniature hills and vales exhibited by the wood-pavement of a
roadway where there is a constant traffic, is a familiar sight to
dwellers in our cities. The only remedy hitherto found for the disease
is the relaying of the road with fresh blocks of wood and a long
exhibition of the notice ‘No Thoroughfare,’ while the tedious operation
is going forward. Mr Bicknell, of the Sandycroft Foundry Company,
Chester, has invented a machine to obviate this inconvenience, and it
has been tried with some success at Manchester. It has the appearance
of a traction-engine, and it carries before it a revolving disc
furnished with cutters. These cutters pare the road level, after the
manner of a planing-machine, advancing upon the work at the rate of one
foot per minute.
All anglers must be grateful to Mr Henry Ffennell for the care with
which he gathers and publishes statistics relating to the Salmon
Fisheries. His record for the past year is a very satisfactory one,
for it tells us that fish of large size have fallen victims to the rod
and to the net. Huge fish of forty pounds weight have been common,
and as usual, the river Tay takes the lead in the number and weight
of its fish. One angler, Captain Griffith, landed in a single day
thirteen fish of the collective weight of two hundred and thirty-seven
and a half pounds. In the Dee, a fish of fifty-seven pounds fell to
the rod of the keeper, and a fish of the same weight was taken in
Ireland, on the Shannon. On the Dee, it is reported that netting in
the lower reaches has been carried on to such an extent that the upper
proprietors who do so much to nurse the fish during their tender
infancy are becoming quite disheartened. The same complaint comes from
the water-bailiffs on the upper portion of the Severn fishery. But
here, it seems that the fish have other remorseless enemies in the
otters, who of late years have increased in numbers to an alarming
extent. These voracious hunters do not content themselves with simply
killing a salmon now and then to supply their larders, but prefer, as
their habit is, to eat a piece out of the shoulder, leaving the rest
of the carcase untouched. As many as six or seven dead fish have been
found in one place mutilated in this manner.
‘Horses of the Past and Present’ was the subject of a most interesting
lecture given lately at the London Institution by Professor Flower,
who, it will be remembered, succeeded Professor Owen as Director of
the Natural History Museum at South Kensington. He pointed to the
tapir as one of the earliest known ancestors of the horse, and showed
that the family group to which the horse belonged had undergone great
modifications. The changes which had gradually taken place in the horse
consisted principally in a great increase of size, especially in the
length of the neck and certain structural alterations in the bones. The
teeth and the feet exhibit the most marked alterations from previous
types, alterations which have been induced by conditions of life. The
lecturer held that the domestic horse is undoubtedly derived from the
wild species of Europe and Asia, but there is no means of arriving at
the time when domestication took place.
The opening, last month, of the tunnel beneath the Mersey, which
connects Liverpool with Birkenhead, marks the successful completion
of one of the great engineering achievements of modern times. The
boring differs from an ordinary railway tunnel in consisting of three
separate passages through the solid rock. The lowermost of these is
a drainage ‘heading’ eight feet in diameter. Seven feet above this
comes the main tunnel, twenty-six feet in diameter, through which the
trains are now continually passing, and lastly, by its side runs the
ventilating tunnel, seven feet in diameter. This last heading is a most
important feature of the works. Revolving fans, forty feet in diameter,
at each end of this ventilating tunnel, cause the air to be changed
continually in the main heading, so that passengers breathe air as
pure as that they have left behind them above ground. Those who have
travelled in the choking atmosphere of the Metropolitan Underground
Railway will be able to appreciate the importance of this provision for
fresh air. Golfers, too, who reside in Liverpool and who frequent the
delightful Links of Hoylake, in Cheshire, will doubtless appreciate the
convenience of being taken there and back minus the ferry-boat passage.
It would seem almost an impossibility that snow could attach itself
to and accumulate upon a strong metal wire suspended in mid-air, to
such an extent as to cause that wire to snap by reason of the extra
burden imposed upon it. But recurring snowstorms teach us that this is
what happens to many of our telegraph wires, to the great and serious
injury of communication all over the country. One of the officials of
the telegraph department has been at the pains to weigh a portion of
the frozen snow which fell from a wire, upon which it had covered a
space of one foot. The mass weighed just upon one pound. Now, as the
supporting posts of such a wire are commonly two hundred feet apart,
it is readily seen that a wire may be called upon by a snowstorm to
support an extra weight of two hundred pounds. More than this, a wire
so circumstanced may form one of two dozen or more supported on the
same set of poles, and these supports naturally succumb to the unusual
load. The remedy is obvious; wires should, whenever possible, be laid
beneath the ground, and our postal authorities are carrying out that
principle as far as they can.
Another advance in photography is represented by a process invented by
M. Thiebaut, which has recently been described before the Photographic
Society of Great Britain. In this process the glass plate which usually
forms the support of the photographic film is superseded by a sheet
of cardboard. In other words, the sensitive mixture of silver bromide
and gelatine is spread upon sheets of cardboard. After the picture is
developed, the film is separated from its support, and can be printed
from by the sun in the usual way. The advantage of this process is that
a tourist can carry with him the material for a gross of pictures,
while the weight is only about that of a dozen of the usual glass
plates. More than this, several negatives when complete can be stored
away in a very small space.
The great painter Van Dyck, while journeying to Italy, fell sick at the
village of St Jean de Maurienne, in Savoy, and was carefully nursed
until convalescent by the family of one of the chief residents. As some
return for the kindness he received, Van Dyck painted the portrait
of one of the children of his host, and left the picture behind him.
This picture has been for a long time known to exist, but where it had
gone to, nobody could tell. It has at last been discovered, and it is
probable that the directors of the Brussels gallery will endeavour to
purchase this precious relic of the great master.
The machinery devised for producing cold air, and hitherto exclusively
used for freezing meat and other perishable things, has lately been
employed in Stockholm for quite another purpose. A tunnel has been
in course of construction there which passes through a hill, the
soil of which is of a wet, gravelly nature. Upon this hill stand
many buildings, which would have been in great danger if the work
had proceeded without some means being taken of supporting their
foundations. Underpinning was considered too expensive; so the
contractor hit upon the entirely novel plan of freezing the wet gravel
into a solid icy concrete. The plan has answered admirably, and many of
the houses are being tunnelled under with perfect safety.
The professors of the Edinburgh Royal Infirmary have adopted a new
form of stretcher, the invention of Mr R. Stevens, who is an engineer
employed at the institution. The apparatus consists of a canvas sheet,
with carrying-poles on each side, attached to the ends of which are
iron cross-bars, to prevent the poles coming too near together, and
providing therefore a sufficient space between them for the patient
under removal. But the chief feature of the new contrivance, and one
which must prove very valuable in some cases of injury is, that the
patient can be laid on a bed without being lifted from the stretcher.
This end is accomplished by making the canvas sheet in two parts, but
secured by a cord or a rod passed through loopholes at the place of
junction. When the stretcher, with the patient on it, is placed on the
bed, this cord or rod can be readily removed, and the stretcher falls
in two halves, leaving the patient comfortable.
We have already noticed the wonderful antiseptic properties of boracic
acid in the article ‘Borax’ (_Journal_, January 9th). An interesting
testimony as to its properties for preserving fresh fish comes from
Norway. Writing in the _Scotsman_, Professor J. Cossar Ewart draws
attention to the fact that between four and five thousand barrels of
herrings preserved by means of a mixture of this substance and salt,
have been arriving weekly from Norway; and last winter, over twenty
thousand barrels found their way into the English market. Cargoes
delivered before Christmas had a ready sale at twenty-eight shillings
per barrel. The same writer indicates how the boracic acid may be
applied in the preservation of fish. For preserving herrings, the best
plan seems to be a mixture of powdered boracic acid and fine salt.
The mixture having been made, the fresh herrings should be arranged
in layers in a barrel in exactly the same way as cured herrings are
packed, and each tier covered with a thin layer of the mixture. When
the barrel is full, it should be tightened down in the ordinary way
and then ‘pickled’ with a weak solution of boracic acid. For treating
a barrel of herrings in this manner, two and a half pounds of acid and
five pounds of salt are required for spreading on the tiers of herrings
during packing, and about ten ounces of pure acid for dissolving in the
fresh water used for pickling. The boracic acid may be had for less
than sixpence a pound.
Dr Riley, Entomologist to the United States Agricultural Department,
has presented his collection of insects to the United States. It is
said to contain one hundred and fifteen thousand specimens of twenty
thousand species or varieties of insects.
In Germany, an unusual number of white varieties of animals are noticed
this winter. A white chamois was shot in the Totengebirge, a white
otter was caught near Luxemburg, white partridges were shot near
Brunswick, and a white fox was killed in Hessen.
In the eleven years from 1873 to 1884, the number of lions killed in
Algeria was two hundred and two, for which a premium of four hundred
pounds has been paid by the government. The number of panthers
destroyed in the same period is twelve hundred and fourteen, and the
money paid by the government seven hundred and twenty pounds. About
four hundred pounds has been paid for eighteen hundred and eighty-two
hyenas, and sixteen hundred pounds for twenty-seven thousand jackals.
The large felidæ are almost extirpated principally in the western
provinces, and the lion of the desert is fast becoming a thing of the
past.