SCIENCE AND INVENTION.

New Zealand Times, Volume LVIX, Issue 3007, 19 December 1896, Page 1 (Supplement)

SCIENCE AND INVENTION.

The greatest depth, writes Professor Seeley, in Ids "Story of the

THIRTY ifims DOWN.

liarth,” at which earthquakes are known to originate ia about thirty miles. Ic has also been calculated that a

heat sufficient to melt granite might occur at about the same depth.

A Piibnch doctor, B. B. Fischer, asserts

ISEVOLU' TION in SLEEPING.

that after a long series of experiments he has proved conclusively that to sleep in a bod prepared in the oldfashioned way ia simply to induce ailments of every de-

scription.- Ho advocates a complete reversal of the esisting order of things. You must have yonr head on a level with, or lower than, your feet. If pillows are to bo used, they must be under the feet instead of the head. The result, ho claims, will be amazing, being a sure cure for insomnia, as well as a preventive for the nightmare. Dr Fischer says further that sleep in the now position “ will always bo intellectual because more profound, the entire nervous system ameliorated, while people inclined to lung and kidney trouble will bo vastly benefited by sleeping in this position.” To prevent any inconvenience by too sudden a change, the pillows should be gradually reduced and finally placed under the feet. The fact remains, however, that the elevation of the legs after a long walk is the surest relief for fatigue, and the higher the better.

An observing naturalist with a musical ear has been' making the

THE cuckoo’s CALI..

cuckoo’s notes a special subject of study. His objects were to determine the pitch of the bird’s voice, and also

the scale interval between the two notes of its call. Variations were, of course,' observed, and occasionally the call was treble instead of double, three distinct notes being heard; but the conclusion come to was that in the average call of two notes the interval is a minor third, the higher note E, and the,lower C in the middle of the piano.

In the August number of the Astrophysical Journal there is a brief

THE SOLAR ROTATION.

summary of the work being dona at John Hopkins University by Mr Lewis Jewell. These researches dealt with

the question of the solar rotation, and Mr Jewell’s recent work in measuring a largo number of lines in photographs of the solar spectrum has brought out, as is stated, a now and remarkable peculiarity in the law of the solar rolation.Tho following is a brief extract of tbo note in question: ■' It is found that there is a difference of several days in the rotation periods of the outer and inner portions of the sun’s atmosphere, tho period increasing as the photosphere is approached. • The measures ijlso show the equatorial acceleration to be much the greatest for the outer portions of the atmosphere. At the lower levels the acceleration is small, there being little difference in the periods for different latitudes. It is further found that the carbon (cyanogen) lines and the shaded portions of li and K take their rise very low down in the solar atmosphere, Mr Jewell is at present engaged upon the reduction of tho measures.”

The graceful smile, now in evidence of

ORIGIN OF SMILING.

joy, pleasure and welcome, is said by a scientist to be merely the inherited expression of satisfaction from a remote savage progenitor

when anticipating a good time with people to dinner—or for dinner. Again, the opou smile of pleasure is said to bo simply a survival of the gaping mouth with which tho savage prepared to tackle some one’s roast grandmother or relative. An eagle died at Vienna at tho age of 103 years. According to Buffon

LONGEVITY OF BIRDS.

years. ,a.uooruuig w jjuuuu the life of the crow is 10S years, and no observation authorises us to attribute to it, with Hesiod, 1000

years. A paroquet, brought to Florence in 1633 by the Princess Provere d’Urbin,* when she went there to espouse the Grand Duke Ferdinand, was then at.least twenty years old, and lived nearly 100 more. A naturalist whoso testimony cannot be doubted, Willoughby, had certain proof that a goose lived a century; and Buffon did not hesitate to conclude that the swan’s life is longer yet; some authors give it two and even three centuries. Mallerton ppssessed the skeleton of a swan that had lived 307 years. £. ‘ ■

Now that acetylene, the now illuminant, is to ho 'manufactured at

js to bo inanuiaocurcu »iu tho of Foyers with the help of , electric furnaces, it is interesting to note that :. M. liertlielot, with tho assistance of 11. Viello, has made

the NEW I L L UMINANT.

tanco or i>J. V IUUU, oua Uiauo a series of experiments to find the conditions under which acetylene is susceptible of explosion. They have studied the influence of pressure and shock, and indicate the precautions to be taken in preventing explosions. From their results, which have been communicated to tho Acad6mie des Sciences, it would appear that at ordinary pressures acetylene does not detonate, but in a closed vessel at pressures varying from 2 to 21 atmospheres it detonates in from *076 to *Ol7 of a second. The explosion, in fact, becomes more instantaneous the higher the pressure.