Science & Invention.

Alexandra Herald and Central Otago Gazette, Issue 700, 3 November 1909, Page 7

Science & Invention.

The circular-cut file is found to act like a hand planing tool instead of an ordinary file, and is claimed to cut two or three times as fast as a common file, and wears longer. The butterfly, like the bat, invarably goes to sleep head downwards, its eyes looking straight down the stem of the grass on which it rests. It folds its wings to the utmost, and thus protects its body from the cold. SPECTACLES FOR HORSES TO OBVIATE SHYING. For many years the horse has worn a sun-bonnet, but it has been left for a Gorman to invent a pair of blinkers which allow it to see what is going on around it. According to the inventor of this appliance, the eye of the horse is not constructed after the fashion of that of man. The animal's optic organ natuTally allows him to see objects around and behind him. Consequently, when he wears blinkers he can only see ahead of him, and objects then appear to him deformed. This accounts for the fact that many horses

become restive when a disturbance takes place in the rear of them. The only end to which blinkers serve is in protecting the eyes from the whip. The transparent blinkers fully meet the necessities of the case, and at the present moment many horse-owners of Berlin are employing them. LIGHT.WEIGHTEO CLOVES FOR GOLFERS. A German inventor has just designed a glove for golfers, thee fingers of which are provided with little lead weights at the base. These weights rest just over the third knuckles of the fingers and thumb, and it is claimed that this additional weight on the hands gives an impelling force to golf clubs which cannot be gained by making them heavier. THE ART OF FLYING. It is a fact that those ingenious and daring minds that devote themselves o the solution of the problem of avia.ion have given no small part of their ueliminary study to considering the p.anner of the flight of birds. A strange result of this investigation is the conclusion, now generally endorsed, that as a whole the bird world is not to be regarded as perfect in its attainment of flight. For instance, it is contended by the best authorities that all birds .obliged to continually flap their wings—and in this category may be mentioned sparrows 4 finches, thrushes, crows, &c. —are still in an imperfect state of advancement. In the next class, as being a degree advanced, are put such birds as pigeons, swallows, etc., which are able to dart ahead for a space after :hcy have gained a good start by the vigorous flapping of their pinions. In the third class, the birds that may be said to be perfect fliers are the eagles, vultures, albaliosses and similar such big birds possessing the ability to rise, and fall and sway and soar in the air indefinitely without a. perceptible movement of their wings.' It is, of course, known to every person of an observant turn that these big fowl are able to soar into the air gradually until at last they disappear from the eye of the watcher, its being almost impossible to detect any movement beyond a slight motion of the tail.

THE FUNCTIONS OF THE BRAIN.

Sir Victor Horsley recently delivered at Cambridge University the Linarce lecture, and described for the first time in public his investigations on the area of the brain which controls movement.

Sir Victor said his attempt would be to sum up the present state of scientific knowledge on one point, and he had chosen a particular and small area of the brain, because he had waited for twenty-four years for what he considered to be a scientific function of that part of the brain. Last year he succeeded in obtaining evidence that there was really such a thing as a motor area of the brain. The movements of various parts of the body were controlled by various parts of the brain, and one object of his researches was to determine how far those parts of the brain which controlled the movements of the arm were recipients of sensation and controllers of- the movements. Experiments had been made both upon animals and men. The experiments on men were of greater importance, because man only could obey directions and indicate sensations. In professional work.tumours had sometimes to be removed from certain parts of the brain, and the presence of these tumours was detected by failure of the arms, hand, or fingers to perform their ordinary functions. When a tumour was removed from the part of the brain supposed to control these movements, temporary paralysis was produced, but gradually sensation was recovered. • Experiments had been made upon patients so as to show in what way sensations were returning. It was found, if the patient's eyes were screened, and parts of the fingers touched, the patient almost always localised the seat of sensation too near the body and too high up. He consideredthat one portion of the lobes of the brain, which were supposed to control these movements, had a more immediate effect upon the sensations than the other. ~,