NOTES AND QUERIES.

Otago Witness, 1 June 1910, Page 51

NOTES AND QUERIES.

Questions for reply in coming issue to be re> •eived Dot later tlian MONDAY night.

Landlubber writes:—ln the mariners' compass how are the quarter points arranged'? Are they arranged in the directions of N. to E., N. to W., S. to E., and S. to W.? Or how? For example, we have N. i E., N. £ E. N. f E., etc.; but are the quarter points immediately to the S. of E. E. i S., E. i S., E. f S., or E. by S. % E., E. by S. i E., E. by S. a- E.? Again, my card gives N. E. by N. I E.; yet I have heard this called N'. E \ N. Also, is the point midway between the fifth and sixth points N. E. by E. i E. or E. N. E. i N.? And in the same, way what are the names of the points midwav between the—(a) E. S. E. and S* E. by E. points (E. S.* E. i S., or. S. E.«by E. % E.?) (b) S. E. and S. E. by S. points (S. E. J, S., or S. E. by S, i E.?) (c) S. E. by S. and S. S E. points (S. E. by S. h. S., or S. S. E. i E?) (d) S. S. W. and S.-.W. by S. points (S. S. W. i W., or S. W.'by.S. S?) (e) S. W. by S: and S. W.'points (S. W. by S. i ■ W., or S. W. 4'St) (f) N. W. by W. and W. N.-W. points (N. W. by W. i W., or W. N. W. i N?)'. I give a number of examples; I am not sure that I am making our difficulties very clear to you.——As the reply to this query is of general interest, especially to young people, we consulted' Captain Thomson, who (prepared the following sketch of a compass card;;

'The above compass card will give the correct name for each of the quarter points of the compass. It will be noticed that they are arranged, so that they work '•'''•' from the eight principal points, N, ■N. E., E., S. E., S., S. W., W. and N. W., towards the eight intermediate points. N. N.' E., E N. E., E. S. E., S. S. E., S. S. W., W. S. W., W. N. W., and N. N. W. Sometimes one will hear of N. N. . E. i E.. instead of N. E. by N. | N. It sounds all right, and is shorter, but it is not correct; the same with N. N. W. i W, S. S. W. k W. and S. S. E. i E. One seldom or - never hears of E. S. E. i S., S. E. by S. k E., S. W. by S. i W., W. N. W. k N., etc. Inquirer, Cave, asks —(1) If the race between Arnst and Barry is for the championship of the world, or for the stakes only. (2) Has the King of England power to dissolve Parliament at any time with or without a reason? -(3) Are there more Catholics than Protestants ii? the world? (1) The race is for the' championship of. the world. (2) Yes. The Sovereign by the Act of Settlement of 1701 is the head of the Church, the Commander-in-Chief of the army and navy, has the power of making wa.\ peace, and all treaties, appoints ail political and civil officers, bestows titles, grants pardons, summons and dissolves Parliament, and must give consent to laws before they' become vaiid. But the -Sovereign is so hedged round By restrictions that his own will in political affairs avails but little, for he must do everything through "others who are responsible. (3) Statistics for 1908 show that there were then about 263 million , Roman Cathoiics, 180 million Protestants, 110 million belonging to the Greek Church and seven million belonging to the Armenian Church. (W. W., Waitati, forwarded for identification a very unusual rat which he captured on May 27. The specimen was forwarded to Professor Benham, of the Otago Museum, who reports:—The rat is a black variety of the Norway, or brown rat (Mus decumanus). This species is distinguishable from the true black or English rat iM'US rattus) by the greater Size of body and also by the tail being shorter than body and head together. Black varieties are by no means uncommon in Europe. It is, of course, not the Maori rat, but an imported species.. Professor Benham adds that probably the specimen forwarded will be stuffed for the Museum. Amateur asks for the simplest way . to graft apple trees and the proper time to do so? We intend to give full particulars shortly in the Garden Column, with illustrations. Scions for grafting should be selected in July or August, before the trees are pruned, and heeled in* in a shady place till required. Grafting, to be successful) must- be performed in spring, when the saji betting ta oir-

culate freely; say in September and October. The principal points' to be attended to are—First, to use a sharp knife, make the joints fit close, tie them firmly but not too tight; let the bark of the scion and stock always be close together to admit of the inflow of sap on one side at least, whatever be the state of the other, for on that depends everything. Cover the graft when tied with grafting wax or grafting clay. One most important point is that the stock should, at its highest. point, have a bud, because- nothing is_ more common than, stocks dying down to the first joint, so that a graft in such case would be lost: because if the stock.,died back to the first eye and the graft were above it, however well it may be done it must fail; whereas the eye being at the very top of the stock the sap flows to that point, nourishing the scion. The various methods are known as whip grafting, saddle grafting, crown grafting, and shoulder grafting. Gummy asks the best way to clean white kid shoes. The simplest and most effiicient way is to procure a tin of white nugget price 9d, obtainable from all grocers.

Inquirer, Greyrnouth.—We have no copy of Sebastian Evans's "Seven Fiddlers, and therefore cannot say what the metre is. Robert Browning's "An Incident of

the French Camp " is written as a simple quatrain twice used. "Bruised." in the fourth line of the fifth verse, should be read as one syllable. <4 Ceres," Upper Sh.otov.er, writes:—"With an anglemeter I find the altitude of a given point. I 'measure off a base and again apply the anglemeter to the point. I have the base and the means of finding the interior angles; how will I set about to find ray distances from the point? (2) Will you please recommend to me a book (price) on ' Trigonometry for ginners,'-' same •• embodying solutions of above and similar questions. (3) What is the price cf &■ nautical almanac (Southern Hemisphere)?"-;—-" Magister," to whoir • we submitted "Ceres's" letter, writes a® follows: —(1) There is no need to use trigonometry to solve the question submitted. Construct the triangle as in the figure accompanying the letter, drawing the base according to> some scale—-one-tenth of an inch or some other fraction, —to the pole, or chain, or mile, or other actual measurement used; then each tenth on the line drawn from any point on the base line to the apex of the triangle will represent the unit adopted on the base line. If height above the observer's base line is wanted, drop a perpendicular from the apex on to the base line —to be produced or lengthened in the figure sent —and scale off as before. (2) "The Theory of Elementary Trigonometry,'' by D. R. Pickeri, M.A., Professor of Mathematics in Victoria College, Wellington and just published by Whitcombe and Tombs (Ltd.) at 2s 6d, is a good little book, but it contains -no examples. The book ased at the Otago University is "The Elements of Trigonometry," by S. L. Loney, M.A., Cambridge ; at the University Press, 3s 6d, postage 3d extra. "Trignometry in the Tutorial Series," about the same price, is also a very good book ; perhaps for the student working aione even better than the preceding one. (3) Three, shil-ling-is is „ the price for the nautical almanac. J. G,, Tawaniu, asks —(1) If New Zealand time is ahead of London, and (2) If so, what is the difference? (1) Yes. (2) Eleven and a-haif hours. .Subscribed asks for seme method of cleansing blood water before it enters a river. He has tried unsuccessfully coke filter beds and boiling the liquid, adding salt, alum, and other ing re clients. As this matter has given a good deal of trouble at the Dunedin City Abattoirs, Mr W. D. Snowball was oonsulted. That gentleman replies that he finds boiling blood water with a solution of sulphate- of lime and allowing it to cool will cause the

blood to clot and rise to the surface, while the liquid will run from til© bottom practically clear. If commercial sulphate of lime .cannot be procured the natural sulphate called gypsum answers very well. This treatment applies to blood water free from other ingredients.

Inotjisitive, Winton.—Mr H. M. Davey, consulting: engineer, Princes street, replies:— Thinking that the strokes you mentioned -were excessive for the diameter of the cylinder, and also thinking that you might require an engine, I went to Mi- A. Fieklwick, Octagon, who is agent for these sort of engines. We agree that you might get about 2 b.h.p. for the one and perhaps 2£ for the other, but neither he nor I think you will get the proportions named. Perhaps it vyas owing to the long strokes that you give the speed as so slow as 200, for the usual speed is considerably over 300 for the diameter you nam©.

A. 8., Miller's Flat,—Mr H. M. Davey, consulting engineer, Princes street, replies:—l regret that you did not send your name, as it is the desir© of the editor to give as full information to inquirers as possible, and this—as in your case—sometimes necessitates more information than can well be supplied in this column. Please, therefore, call at Miller's Flat Post Office there wdl be a letter waiting for j r ou, directed to "A. B." Under the conditions you now set forth the wheel would give about four brake h.p., but it still goes too quickly. The river at the.wheel goes at Bft; the wheel being 4ft in circumference goes at sft per second instead of rather less than 4ft, which is the speed Molesworth gives for

these wheels under your stated conditions. If it goes so that the rim or periphery of the wheel travels at rather less than half the speed of the water, the power would be 4-i to 4| h.p. S. G. A. —Acting under a misconception, the firm to whom your question was referred communicated with you direct. Inouirer, Lome.—As you do not indicate the ■ nature of your complaint, it is impossible to say whether you would derive as much benefit from a visit to Hanmer during the winter as during the spring. No concessions are made to members of Friendly Societies proceeding to Hanmer. When room is available concessions are made in the case of Rotorua, but until a resident medical officer is placed in charge of Hanmer no concessions are likely to be granted there.

G. H., Te Wae Wae.-Mr H. M. Davey, consulting engine er, replies : —Yes, you have made the situation most clear this time, and I may say that it is generally better to send a sketch of the positions, otherwise it is almost impossible to picture the conditions and advise correctly. You need the pulley on the intermediate shaft four and a-half times the diameter of the one on the cutter; so if the one on the cutter is, 2ft in diameter, the one on the intermediate shaft would be about Bft 6in in diameter. I think the one on the cutter should not be much, if any,' less than 2ft, for a wire rope; but in any case, when you order the irope, mind you state the diameter of the cutter pulley, and get the rope of good flexibility, anywhere from fin to, say, gin in diameter would be ample. I think the cutter pulley should have a tarred rope bed foi the wire to work on; the groove is made deeper than usual, and some tarred rope is wound and fixed in. Mind you wind it so that the working of the wire rope does not tend l to unwind it, but to wind it closer. The. intermediate supports may be as few as possible to keep the ropes off the ground, but do not have the direction pulle3'S too small, as if they are they will strain the rope as well as often get hot by having to travel too quickly. They should not oe less than,, say, about 16in to 18in in diameter. If I might suggest, why go at the angle shown? Could you not take the rope drive so that only one pair of direction pulleys were needed? True, the rope would be slightly longer, but there would be. two pulleys and frames less, and so probably the cost would be no more, and the friction would be less. I am marking on your plan this idea, though I recognise that there may be things that I do not know against your doing so. If I understand your sketch, it unfortunately happens that the strain is on the upper rope,

the-' lower on© being the return or idle on©. The reverse is considered better, as it allows the rope to go more round the pulleys, and also tends to keep the lower rope more off the ground. Of course, I do not know what gear or pulleys you have, but would there be any objection to you taking the milking as well as the cutting off the one pulley instead of two on the intermediate shaft? From your sketch it would seem that the place where you have marked "blocks fixed on an incline" could be dispensed with—that is, if you went on the square principle instead of the inclined, and as the pulleys on the top of the bank would have weight on them, they might drive the milking as well as keep the rope up over the crest of the bank? If you could do this, I think it would be quite possible to have the pair of direction pulleys on a frame ' which could be moored and tighten ! - rope when needed by pulling with tr as indicated If you do this, an.i. the ropes so that the exact proper ;o tion of the straining direction pulleys will be when the frame is tightened — that is, place it a little in, as see dotted lines, first, and tighten to the proper position as the rope stretches. (See sketch posted to you.) Of course, if there are reasons why you must go at the angle you have sketched, there is nothing- more to be said, but you will need more gear, I fear, if you have to do so. I regret that your small wheel has only 12 teeth: it gives more friction than if it had more—say if both wheels had about double, the number of teeth the friction would be less. Anyhow, the gearing should be well looked to and well greased, etc., to make it as effective as possible. You might write. and say how you get on, or if any more information is needed.