MISCELLANEA.

Hawke's Bay Times, Volume 6, Issue 289, 17 July 1865, Page 3

MISCELLANEA.

Fatal Explosion of Gunpowdeb.—On Sunday night the inhabitants ofMarske, near Redcar, were started by a tremendous explosion. The streets were soon filled by numbers of people anxiously seeking the cause, which was soon apparent, the roof and one side of a cottage occupied by a miner, named William Smith, being blown completely off, and the adjoining cottage in the same condition. Smith’s house was in flames, but by the exertions of the inhabitants of the town, who had assembled to the number of about 300 they were soon extinguished. Upon search it was found that a lodger of Smith’s, called Robert Holmes, was quite dead, and his three children were in such a state as to leave no hopes of their recovery. It appears that the men engaged in the ironstone mines are in the habit of bringing home quarter-barrels of blasting powder, which is packed damp in order to prevent ignition ; they then dry this as they want it, and take it to work in tins in small quantities. Holmes had been drying some powder in a bag during the evening, and a little after nine o’clock he left his wife at supper with Smith and his family, and took the bag of powder and a candle and went up stairs into a room where his three children were sleeping, with the intention of going to bed. In this room under the bed there was a cask, containing nearly 281 b. of powder, as well as a quantity iu a tin, and it is supposed Holmes had been pouring some of the powder which he had been drying out of .the bag into the tin, and that a spark had fallen amongst it and caused the explosion, which occurred within a few minutes of his going upstairs. The body of Holmes presented a shocking spectacle, being completely burnt to a cinder and quite black, the flesh coming off in handfuls when touched ; the works of his watch, found in his pocket, being completely melted. The children, one a boy 14 years of age, were also frightfully burnt.—Leeds Mercury. A New Soxjbce of Light.—lt is not quite correct to term magnesium a new discovery, long since Sir Humphrey Davy succeeded in obtaining a few grains of it from one of the many ores in which it abounds in nature. The new discovery consists in the finding out a process by which the metal can be cheaply manufactured. It would be too much to say that the result is fully arrived at as yet. The metal can be produced sufficiently cheap to make it useful for lighting purposes, where intense brilliancy is required. But for ordinary uses, it is somewhat costly. But the manufacture is yet in its infancy —it is confidently announced that very shortly magnesium will be produced as cheaply as zinc, or at about £25 a ton. Seeing that it is now sold by the grain, one may realise how immensely extended will be its use when it comes to be procurable at anything like the figure wo have named. To Mr Sonstadt is due the discovery that magnesium is capable of being obtained in quantity. Already two plans of manufacture are patented, and a company has established a manufactory, and professes itself ready to supply the metal for consumption. It is sold in the shape of wire, weighing about two grains to the yard. It will light in the open air* and burn with a brilliancy that can only be realised by comparison. Wire of the substance referred to gives as much light as seventy-four stearine candles of five to the pound. It burns with great rapidity, at the rate, as far as can be ascertained from the published accounts, of about three feet per minute. So intense is its light that photographs can be taken by it. This alone will afford an immense scope for its use. It is yet too early to predicate a tythe of the other purposes for which it may be found available. It is stated in a magazine which we have before us: —“ Apart from photography, it was very plain that in magnesium a new signal light was discovered, which, for handiness at least, sets the lime and electric lights at defiance. Any one with a bit of magnesium wire and a lucifer match can, in an instant, produce a light which may be discerned miles off; indeed, the light has been plainly discerned at a distance of twenty-eight miles at sea—how much further remains to be determined. In rockets and fire-works, the filings of magnesium scintillate with a dazzling, farreaching, and unequalled power. Already several Governments have taken magnesium in hand, and are diligently prosecuting experiments which, if satisfactory, will result in magnesium being entered as a stock commodity in'all their arsenals. Theatrical managers are also experimenting, with a view to new sensations in Christmas pantomines and Easter pieces. Surgeons find the light highly convenient in examinations with the speculum, and chemists discover a hundred uses for it iu the laboratory. It is said some shopkeepers will astonish the Londoners with the light in the course of the winter. Already two patents have been taken out for magnesium lamps, and others are promised. Tbe purposes to which the light may applied are manifold, and every month reveals new ones.” Besides tbe problem of cheapening its production, another will absorb attention—that of modifying its light sufficiently to stake it serviceable for domestic use. Already it is found that its brilliancy can, to soma extent,

be regulated by alloying it witb other metals; and there is no room to doubt that, ultimately, the means will be found of utilising it for ordinary household purposes. The discovery is peculiarly interesting to the inhabitants of the Middle Island of New Zealand, for it so happens that a large portion of the formation of the island is of magnesium ore. The whole of the Dun mountain, and most of the ranges of the West Coast are of serpentine,—an ore that contains over 40 per cent of magnesia, whilst the magnesian limestone, which is found in great quantity at home, contains little more than a third of the same quantity. Magnesium, in one form or another, abounds over the world. It enters into the composition of frumerable substances it is so largely present in sea-water that Mr, Sonstadt calculates “ the ocean contains 160,000 cubic miles of it—a mass so great that it would cover the entire surface of the globe, both sea and land, to a thickness of eight feet.” The greenstone so prized by the Maoris is a species of serpentine, into the composition of which, as before stated, magnesium largely enters. The sepentine, which is so abundant, is not the same kind as the greenstone, although containing the same components. Another substance of very general use, but of wholly different hardness—meerschaum—has magnesium as one of its principal constituents. In short, there is no presribed limit to the occurrence of magnesium, in one shape or another. — Otago Daily Times. Popular Representatives. —The following judicious remarks are from the Waikouaiti Herald of the 25th June, on the election of a superintendent :—lt is a thing devoutly to be desired that a sufficient variety of choice wiU be presented to the public to enable them to elect an honest and able man, and not a mere self-seeking, time-serv-ing, intriguing politcian. There is too much reason to fear that this and most analogous offices are sought by men who are more intent on theiv own personal aggrandisement than the promotior of the public good. The holding of such an influential position gives a good man opportunities to confer vast benifits on the body he represents. If, however, he is a mere political schemer and adventurer, intent only on his own interest, the opportunities wifi be prostituted to the mere feathering his own nest; the picking out the eyes of the country in the shape of nice lots of land here and there—thus betraying the'trust reposed in him, and casting dishonor on his high position. The electors have the matter, to a great extent, in their own hands—the successful results must be materially influenced by having a number of good men to choose from. Remarkable Calculation. —The following remarkable calculation occurs in a foot-note to a paper published some time since by an eminent English philosopher:—“ For the benefit of those who discuss the subject of population, wars, pestilence, famine, &c., it may be as well to mention that the number of human beings living at the end of the 100th generation, commencing with a single pair, doubling at each generation (say in thirty years), and allowing for each man, woman, and child, say an average space of four feet in height and one foot square, would form a vertical column, having for its base the whole surface of the earth and sea spread out into a plain ; and for its height, 3,674 times the sun’s distance from the earth! The number of human strata thus plied one on the other would amount to 460,799,000,000,000.” [The calculation is easily to be verified, and would form a very instructive arithmetical exercise for some of the young scholars of Napier. —Ed. H.B.T.] Who is Responsible ?— A correspondent calls attention in a letter, which we publish to-day, to a moat serious instance of negligence in dealing witb a cargo of gunpowder. It was landed from a ship on the Government wharf, and left there. The steamer Rangatira came in, hauled alongside the wharf, and discharged her signal gun straight' in the direction of the powder. Fortunately a crate of goods stood in the way, and received the wad from the blank shot; and hut for this, an enormous destruction of life and property would certainly have occurred. We repeat the question of our correspondent—Who is responsible ?—Lyttelton Times, June 24. The Picton Herrings. —A party in this town is now profitably employed in curing these delicious fish, which are so abundant in the Sound. Already 1,500 dozen have been sent to Melbourne, and more than double that quantity is sold for the Syndey market.—Marlborough Press, July 5. A Little Bit op Satire.— Perhaps it was not intended but we would just draw the attention of our readers to a little bit of quiet satire in the heading of an advertismeut which we noticed in the Press. When a person advertises “To Brewers Who Use Malt” the inferrenco is very obvious.— Canterbury Standard.