SCIENCE NOTES.

Otago Witness, Issue 2921, 9 March 1910, Page 76

SCIENCE NOTES.

—Almost Priceless. — Arrangement*, will shortly be made bjr the Austriar Government fot the public sale of radium for medical and experimental purposes. The total quantity of radium which has been thus far recovered for scientific use throughout the world is estimated net to exceed r quartei of a pound. --Use of Slag Waste Blast-furnace slag waste, of whicn there are millions of tone at present disfiguring the face of Great Britain, especially in the West,of Scotland, is, we understand, being successfully created, chemically and otherwise, for utilisatior as cement, the product being claimed as superior even to Portland oemenfc, and much cheaper. —The Pipes of a Liner.— In a big Atlantic liner there are over 1000 tons of piping of various kinds. The boiler tubes, if placed end to end, would etretch about ten miles, the tubes over 25 milesw The condensers pump up more than 50,(j0C tons of water a day. and the furnaces consume, about eight million cubio feet of air per hour. No fewer thai! 50,000 separate pieces of steel are usfid in the main structure of the ship. —Mind and Disease.— A French orrespondent of the Lancet points out that hypnotism does not always mean enfeeblement of will. A patient may, with the sane part of his mind, desire a healthy ideal, but may be kept, nevertheless, in hopeless degradation by a morbid obsessive idea. In such a ease—chronic Wooholiem, for example—rational persuasion, as we all know, may fail atterly, whereas the intermentaf influence of hypnotic- suggestion may strengthen the mind against unhealthy impulse, and often cures such cases definitely, twice in our authority's experience, in the courst of five minutes. —Well-guarded Secrets. — There are two trade secrets, at least, that -.he world at large may never learn, but which it is well worth the while of inventors to study. One is the Chinese method of making the bright and beautiful colour known as vermilion, or Chinese red; and the- othei is a Turkish secret—the inlaying of the hardest steel with gold and silver. Among the Chinese and the Turks these two secrets are guarded well. Apprentices, before they are Saken for eithei trade, must swear an ironclad oath to reveal nothing of what passes : n the workshop. These apprentices, furthermore, must be long to families of standing, must pay a targe sum by way of guarantee, and must furnish certificates of good character and honesty. These secrets (says Popular Science Sittings) have. been handed down faithfully from one generation to another for hundreds of years. —Seeing by Wire.— Two Danes, the brothers Andersen, (already known as inventors, have invented as apparatus bv the use of which it is possible to see what is going on at the other end of a telephone wire. The technical details of this invention are so far kepi, secret, but recently an engineer of repute was employed to test the brothers' claim, and this expert declared the process as entirely new and very simple. The process differs from the Korn and other systems ot phototelegraphy in that it makes no use of photography, but transmits light and colour directly. A speaker at a telephone fitted with the apparatus can be seen, and he can show anything he likes across the wires. The inventors are described as sons oi a saddler of Odense and are aged 28 and 30. They have been eight years at work or the invention. . —Big Transvaal Telescope.— The southern hemisphere is badly off for observatories, and many problems of astronomy depend on o chain of properly equipped observatories commanding the whole of the stellar firmament from one celestial pole to the other. It is gratifying to hear, therefore, that the new Transvaal Observatory will soon be in a position, to tafcr its place with the best centres of astronomical research in the northern hemisphere, being about to erect at a cost cf £IO,OOO r 26in refracting telescope, the lenses alone of which will cost £2suu. In the whole of Europe (says the Westminster Gazette) there are onlj half a dozen refracting telescopes exceeding 26m in Siameter, two of which (the only two in Great Britain) are at Greenwich. —The Siberiar Snow Flower.— The latest plant wonder is the snow flowei. reported to have been discovered by Count Anthoskoff in the most northern portions of Siberia, where the ground is continuously covered with frost. This wonderful object shoots forth from the frozen soil only on the first day of each succeeding year It shines but for a single day, and ther resolves to its original elements. The leaves are three in number, and each ftbouc three inches in diameter. They are developed only on that side o. the stern toward: the north, and each seems covered with rriicroscopio crystals of snow. The flower, when it opens, is star-shaped, its petals of the same length as the leaves and about half an inch in width. On the third day the extremities of the anthers, which are five ip number, show minute glistening specks like diamonds, about the size of a pin's head., which are the seeds' of this wonderful flower. —Astronomical Watch. — A Coventry firm has produced < an astronomical watch showing the various functions of the heavenly body. By its aid it Is possible to tell what constellations are visible at any particular time, and the relative positions of the sun and moon. It shows the ordinary time, and strikes the hours and quarters in the same way as a ■clock. ' The time of sun-rising and sunsetting is set forth on one of the several Sdials. The advent of the seasons is also announced, together with the tides. There are altogether seven dials, four being on one side and three on the other. Ihe watch, being not more than 2lin in diameter, is little larger than, the ordinary timekeeper. Over four years have been occupied in its production, and tfo value set Upon the watch is nearly £IOOO. —How the Ancients Wrote Letters.— A mission of the Chicago University to the East has resulted in the discovery of more than 2000 tablets covered with wedgeshaped characters (writing) dating 5000 years p.c. They are of everv pomblrvariety <if size and shapa.. Tue m*>=,fc Ancient look like a little orange- -n which

Jhe scribe responsible 'or the , writing tainted scrawling characters nix! Wt them ior the sun to dry. That particular form v«f tablet was replaced by flater discs, and, last of all, about 4000 years before Christ, came the perfectly flat, square, and rectangular tablets which were to hoid their place indefinitely. Among the rectangular tablets of the ancients there were a few designed for special use. Some of them were for the rue of school children:. One of the most remarkable of these special forms was that of the tablet used for correspondence, dating from 2500 years B.C. The clay slate was prepared and the inscription made as for all the ordinary documents; then when that part of the work was done the slate, or tablet, was covered with a thin envelope, also of slate-clay, just as we use envelopes to-day, to protect the lettei from curious eyes.

—lmagination and Science. —

Men of science, your facilities are weakened by the very exactitude which is your pride. You measure and weigh, and you are surrounded and overwhelmed by the limitations imposed by the experiences of your senses. You seek causes upon oboerving effects, or determine the effects resulting from given causes; but such analyses dc not lead you into the realm of imagination, Ycu are too material. If you had been Newton; upon observing the apple fall, you would have thought, "The reason why it fell was because its stem became too weak tc hold it." Newton, however, had an imagination, and thereby he discovered the law of gravitation. Columbus did not care to prove simply that the earth was round. His imagination fired him with, a knowledge of benefits to mankind resulting from a possible (and, as it turned out, chimerical) north-west passage due tc such roundness. His imagination inspired the discovery of a continent. And so it is with name after name in history, and so it will be with you and me. Wo may achieve some small measure of success by doing what our fathers did before us. but our really big deeds will be offspring of our imaginations. Sometimes we see inventions accomplished by chance or a benefit opened to mankind by a stumbling fcoostep. Such are rare, and shiftless we should be did we count, upon circumstances for success. —Julian Chase Smalhvood, in (,'assier's Magazine.

—"Sailing" Over Boads. —

A German, at Chemnitz, haa invented a "sailing" vehicle for us on highways, which is said to make fair progress over good roads and across sandy stretches, such as a se? beaoh. The present form, says an American Consular -eoort, is a light framework supporting a saddle and a mast for the sail, and resting upon four wheels, one wheel on either side and one before and one behind. The two latter are <f a larger diameter than the former, and all are far apart. The chief peculiarity «is the connection of the wheels with one another. The rear wheel and the right side wheel are rigidly connected together, and the same in the case with the front wheel and the left-side wheel. The two connecting bars are joined with each other by means of ar axle- or crossbar, the attachment at each" end being of a hinged type. A person, sitting or the saddle rests his feet on, this transverse axle, and by suitable pres sure cau alter at once the relation of the wheels to the main axis of the framework . This arrangement, furthermore, leaves hit hands completely free for adjusting the position of the Sail or using the brake. The whole device has a certain lightness and elegance which will appeal probably at first to the lover of sport. Contests of speed will involve but little of the danger accompanying competition with cycles or automobiles, but will afford play rather foi the quickness and deftness required of the "mariner" in utilising to the utmost the surrounding atmospheric conditions.