NOTES ON SCIENCE, MECHANICAL INVENTIONS, ETC.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXV, Issue 9064, 26 May 1888, Page 4 (Supplement)

NOTES ON SCIENCE, MECHANICAL INVENTIONS, ETC.

A FURY OF THE CHEMICAL WORLD. TnREB things were sought by the ancient alchemist — the philosopher's stone, the elixir of life, and the universal solvent. The last of those, though long known to modern chemistry, has jusb been separated, bub cannot be retained, simply because it attacks or destroys everything. This fury of the chemical world, says Mr. W. Mattieu Williams, is the element iiourino ; it exists peacefully in company with calcicum in lluor-spur and also in a few other compounds, but when isolated, as it recently has been by M. Henri Moissan, is a rabid gas that nothing can resist. It combines with all the metals, explosively with some, or if they are already combined with some other non-metallic element, it tears them from it, and takes them to itself. In uniting with sodium, potassium, calcium, magnesium, and aluminium, the metals become heated even to redness by the fervour of its embrace. Iron-tilings, slightly warmed, burst into brilliant scintillations when exposed to it ; manganese does the same. Even the noble metals, which even at a melting heat proudly resist the fascinations of oxygen, succumb to this chemical siren at moderate temperatures. Glass is devoured at once, and water ceases to bo water by contact with this gas, which combining with its hydrogen, at the same moment forms the acrid glass-dissolv-ing hydro-fluoric acid and liberates ozone. SETTLING THIS QUESTION. Nitrate of amyl, according to Mr. Edward Weston, an American electrician, is the agent which will either make naval warfare an impossibility or enable contending iloets to capture each other without the least loss of life, ho to be the victor who, possesses the greatest skill in handling and distributing that compound. Nitrate of amyl, which is very cheap and plentiful, possesses the power of causing insensibility very quickly in a human being breathing its fumes, and its effect is equivalent, temporarily, to a paralytic stroke. Mr. Wesfcon proposes to lire shells iilled with this chemical, which shells need not penetrate tho ship. A few gallons of this nitrate dashed on the deck of a war ship would soon render her crew helpless. The most powerful ironclads would bo even more vulnerable than the light cruisers, for they would be sucking down great draughts of air through their artificial ventilators, and the odour would thus rapidly penetrate the whole ship. Tho whole crew being rendered helpless for an hour or two, the ship could bo towed into a safe spot, while the captors ventilated her and secured the insensible men.

WHAT MAY JIAPI'KX. Speculation is ever rife us to what catastrophes may overtake this globo of ours. Some one has made a calculation of how the earth may be completely submerged—that is to say, if only the terrestrial forces could be directed in the way required to accomplish such an end. The mean height of the land above sen-level is '2'2M feet, and the mean depth of the ocean is 12.450 feet. Only 2 per cent of the sea is included within a depth of 500 fathoms, while 77 per cent, lies between 500 and ;iOOO fathoms. If, now, the land were tilled into the hollows of the sea, the latter would roll over the earth's crust to a uniform depth of two miles. Another curious speculation has been made concerning what would happen were the earth's rotation to cease. The equatorial diameter being twenty-six miles more than the polar diameter, the earth would present an equatorial zone of solid ground miles high above sea-level, the water all being drawn to the poles. This land zone would then be like our Arctic regions, anil would be banded by a ring of permanent ice and snow. liLAss-crrriM; by electricity. The cutting of glass tubes of wide diameter is another of the almost innumerable industrial applications of electricity. The tube is surrounded with fine wire, and the extremities of the latter are put in communication with a source of electricity, and it is of course necessary that the wire adhere closely to the glass. When a current is passed through the wire, the latter becomes red hot and heats the glass beneath it, and a single drop of water deposited on the heated place will cause a clean breakage of the glass at that point. Contrary to what takes place with the usual processes in the treatment of this frangible material, it is found that the thicker the sides of the tube are the better the experiment succeeds. PURIFYING WATER BY ELECTRICITY. Professor Hugo Blanok, of Pittsburgh Pa., says that the passing of an electric current through water kills all the germs of disease that are in it. Experiments, it is stated, have been made with water taken from the Monongahela River, near the sewer escapes, with entirely .satisfactory results. A Pittsburg capitalist has built large tanks in that city from which ho proposes to supply citizens with water made pure by the electrical process.

AN" DNSINKABLE LIFEBOAT. Aii ingenious invention, by ZNIr. Robert Chambers, of Dumbarton, with the object of obviating the difficulty experienced in increasing the lifebo.'ii capacity on board mail and passenger vessels, owing to the scarcity of accommodation available on deck, was exhibited recently on the river in front of the terrace of the Houses of Parliament. The lower portion of the craft is constructed of wood, subdivided into forty-four airtight compartments, the upper works being of a thick waterproof canvas, stretched over a collapsible iron frame. The boat thua possesses the solidity of the ordinary wooden structure, combined with the capacity of the purely canvas boats. It measures 2Gft. long by 7ft. wide, and is only 14in. deep to the fixed gunwale. With the canvas upper works erect, however, its depth is increased to oft. 4in. The boat is about half the weight of one of the ordinary type, and occupies one quarter of the space. Mr. Chambers declares his invention to be unsinkable, but this, of course, remains to be proved by experience. The boat was manned by upwards of thirty seamen, and rowed along the river. It was then made to oscillate violently from side to side, until a portion of the canvas upperworks was submerged, but it did not show the slightest inclination to capsize. The exhibition was witnessed from the terrace by a numerous company of members of both Houses of Parliament, including many of those connected with the navy and the shipping interests to whom the invention was explained by Messrs. Chambers and Liddoll, the patentees. MATURING WINES BY ELECTRICITY. M. Mengarini is continuing the investigations of Blaserna and Carpine upon the method of artificially maturing wines by the electric current. In his experiments a current of about four amperes (our authority, Le Cosmos, says 3-99 amperes per hour) was passed through the wine for periods of varying length. The electrodes, which are of platinum, become coated with a deposit which consists chiefly of albuminous substances. The proportion of alcohol was diminished by the formation of n small quantity of acetic acid, and also by evaporation. It is also probable that some or the alcohol was directly oxidised. The bouquot of the wine is developed almost exactly as if by lapse of time, and it was sensibly increased at every application of the current. The colour is also modified. There is also reason to believe that the wine is sterilised, so as to be incapable of further change but on this point M. Mengarini is not able to speak positively at present.

MISCELLANEOUS. The London Lancet doubts that persons who perish in burning buildings sufl'er as much as has been popularly supposed. The victim is generally made faint and pulseless by the carbonic acid or carbonic-acid gas, and becomes insensible before the fire reaches him. Prof. Tyndall has decided that the sky is blue, but the blue is not pure. He says: "On looking at the sky through a spectroscope we observe all the colours of the spectrum ; blue is merely the predominant colour." Iron articles, when forged, can be casehardened by heating to bright red and sifting on the surface finely powdered prussiate of potash. When cooled to a dull red, plunge into cold water. The Municipal Council of Paris has voted one million francs for the establishment of a central electric light station for lighting certain portions of the city, and is at present considering the question of the system to be adopted, the points to be illuminated, and the method of canalisation. Meanwhile we see announced the formation of the Paris Electric Light Company, which proposes to undertake the lighting of the Communes of Asni&res, Bois, Colombes, and Courbevoie.