THE MONTH: SCIENCE AND ARTS.

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.