SCIENTIFIC.

Otago Witness, Issue 1858, 1 July 1887, Page 36

SCIENTIFIC.

A Mr Tainter, who has. long been associated with Professor Alexander Graham, of Bell telephone fame, has taken up the Sdison phonograph at the point where .fie left it, and developed it from'a toy to an- article of commercial value, accomplishing what Edison himself has long hoped 'to do. The machine, as perfected, has been seen by a' number of gentlemen interested in such matters, and before long ifc will be given to the public. It is constructed oh the same principle as the phonograph, but with different -materials,' and instead of giving out a squeaking, metallic sound, as when the sheet of tinfoil was used, it now produces, a full, sonorous sound, which can be distinctly heard and understood in any part of an ordi-nary-sized room. The conversation which a person may address to the graphophone is recorded upon thin sheets of wax, in the shape of a tube placed Upon a cylinder. One of ithese little tabes will hold 1000 word*: A merchant, for instance, Who has 40 letters to answer, can sit before one of these machines, turn the crank, and talk his answers into the machine, which records them upon 1 the Wax tube in the same manner as in the old phonograph. Afterward one of these little tubes can be slipped off the cylinder and sent' by mail to any part of the couritry. When received it will only be necessary to put the. , wax tube into a similar machine and it will reproduce the words of the original speaker as often as may be wished. Tubes, or envelopes, in which to inclose these wax tubes have been invented and, accepted by the Post Office department for transmission through the mails. As soon as the machine comes into general use it will make everyone ! his own amanuensis, doing away with the necessity of a private secretary, a stenographer,' a typewriter. And it will be a preventive of forgery, since ifc reproduces the exact voice of the speaker, so that those who are familiar with it will recognise" it at once.

The flesh of animals sometimes becomes poisonous when they have eaten certain food. Thus it is unsafe, to eat the flesh of the hare when the animal has fed on a certain kind of ! rhododendron, and in America serious injury has often arisen from eating pheasants that have been feeding on laurel leaves. In some districts of America, especially 'on the Allegheny "Mountains, the flesh of all the cattle is poisonous, and so also is the milk they yield, and cheese which is made from it. In Australia, also, it is not uncommon for meat to acquire a poisonous property, from the animals feeding on the wild melon and the wild cucumber of the country. Among poisonous fishes we may mention the barraconda pike, which, at some seasons, produces sickness, pain in the joints, sometimes accompanied with loss of the nails and falling off of the hair. The poisonous property is thought to be occasioned by certain food of which it partakes at such seasons. The rock fish and yellow-billed spratt also, .at times, cause similar effects. This latter fish is so poisonous that men have been known to expire with its flesh unswallowed in their mouths. Dr Grainger says that the flesh of nearly all the fish at one end of the island of NewvProvidence, one of the Bahama Islands, is dangerous, and most commonly fatal, while fish of the same kind, caught else;where, are perfectly wholesome. The poisonous quality of these fish has been accounted for in many ways ; some suppose it to be from eating the machineel apple, a j deadly vegetable poison ; others ascribe it to their eating the gaily fish or medusa.

A study of the physiology of breathing in singers has led M. Piltan to the conclusion that the quality of a voice depends more upon the method of breathing than upon any other factor. Bad singers allow the diaphragm to remain almost motionless, or at least to receive its motion' through the viscera from the abdominal muscles ; whereas the good singer uses the elasticity of his diaphragm to 1 drive a steady stream of air past the vocal cords. The object, as in the well-built organ, is to keep up a small stream of air under low pressure. A bad singer employs an absurdly high pressure, so that he sends a deal of air through his lungs without any vocal return. A good singer does not send as much air through his throat in 30secs as a bad one does in 10, and yet he can produce at the same-time a far more powerful sound. M. Piltan finds by experience that the diaphragm is far more under control than is usually imagined, and that bad voices can be greatly improved if their owners will take the trouble to acquire a command of their diaphragms. However, the quality of the vocal- cords themselves is beyond the control of the will, the singer is born not made ; but it is a comfort to the world to learn that in' the future some of its too many bad singers may be made better by a little diaphragmic gymnastic. ,

—"I notice," said a gentleman, in search of information, to » Herr Most, "that the Anarchists never strike. Why is this?" '.'. That," said the great apostle o£ talk as a factor in social progress, with much dignity, "is easily explained, No true Anarchist ever worm"