SCIENCE NOTES.

Otago Witness, Issue 3250, 28 June 1916, Page 65

SCIENCE NOTES.

—Shipbuilding in Scotland. —

The shipbuilding yards all over the country continue busily engaged in naval work and in repair and overhaul contracts, so that, although it is understood that the firms are now allowed to devote more time to mercantile vessels, there is not yet. any appreciable increase in the output of new tonnage. During April there were launched all over Scotland only four merchant vessels of 15,171 'tons. Of these, two were launched on the Clyde, one at Leith, and ono at Dundee. The Clyde four months' total consists of seven vessels of 24,513 tons, figures which bear no comparison whatever with those of previous years. There has been only one monthly total anything like so low as that of April, even reckoning merchant work only in previous years. For the next lowest we have to go back to 1887, when the April launches aggregated 9720 tons. As for the four months' figures, they compare with 114,183 tons of purely merchant work in the first four months of last year, rather less than one-fourth—while they are very much lower still when compared with earlier years —in which naval and military work is included. —A Home Water-distiller.— Sufferers from rheumatism, gout, and kindred maladies realise the importance of absolutely #urc drinking water. Distilled water is desirable for this purpose, as there 13 then no risk of the disease becoming aggravated, or .a treatment which is in progress being impeded, if not entirely arrested, by impurities, dissolved in the water. In order to obtain the most satisfactory results it is desirable that the water should be prepared as required, and a convenient apparatus for achieving this end in the homo is now available in the Homo Country. It is a small, compact, complete still, wherewith the water is first converted into steam, and then condensed into liquid free from all organisms, lime deposits, and other impurities. The purifier can be mounted upon a small table, and either a gas-ring or a spirit-stove may be employed for boiling the water. If the apparatus is placed within convenient reach of a watertap a continuous yield of pure water may be obtained while the purifier is in operation. —French-polishing.— Mr W. Laesser, a Canadian painter, sends the Painters' Magazine the following method of French-polishing, which he says he has been using for a good m.any years, and which will do the work in one-eighth the timo that any other polish will do, and is as good and will stand out better than any polish that has been put on the market:—Fill and stain jour woodwork, put on one coat of shellac and two coats of good rubbing varnish; sandpaper in between coats, and rub the last coat to a dead finish with pumicestcne and water. Now you are ready for the polish. Take loz of muriatic acid, loz of turpentine, one pint of raw oil, mix together. Take £lb of waste; fill it with the above polish so that your wasto is moist. Now*take a piece of cheesecloth dipped in water. Put it around the wasto so that it forms a balk Put a little rottenstone on it and go to it. You will find that it will polish instantly. The more you rub, tho higher the polish. After you have your woodwork or doors polished, take a piece of cheesecloth, dampen it with grain alcohol, and rub the oil off. —Colours of Man and Animals. — At a recent meeting of tho German Anthropological Society, Professor Ed. Hahn lectured on human races and properties of domestic animals, dwelling especially on such relations as are found to exist between tho outward appearance of human races and the races of man's animal companions. The hues mainly occurring in the case of man as well as of domestic animals arc black, brown, red, yellow, and white—a remarkable feature being that these external characteristics seem to be connected with tho whole bodily constitu tion. A distinguished anthropologist, Professor Eugene Fischer, of Friburg, Badenia, on evidence afforded by the eye of mam mals, considers the whiteness of domestic animals and white man to bo kindred phenomena, nor does he hesitate to suggest many other analogies of a similar kind between man and animals. According to the lecturer, humanity as a whole, inclusive of what are called primitive peoples, has been subjected for some time to conditions similar to those at work in the case of our domestic animals. Tho classification mainly based on colour may be replaced by a system of darker and lighter strains within a given race. Attention is drawn in this connection to tho Shmnenthal oxen, which, within memory of man, have become remarkably bright coloured, as well as to the fact that the subsequent darkening of adults points to tho merging, in olden times, of brighter and darker varieties of man. Raw v. Cooked Food.— Commenting on tho recent "raw food" school, Dr Toulouse, a French physician, points out some of tho advantages and drawbacks of tho idea of consuming all food raw. Naturally in our common practice this is often done, and even in tho case of animal flesh such as oysters, dried beef, and others, and such substances are well digested, even better, it is claimed, than cooked meat. Salads, radishes, and all fruits are eaten raw, and while they causa more work to tho digestive organs by the character of tho cellulose under such conditions, on tho other hand they afford ferments which greatly aid in digestion. Comparing the two systems, cooked

or raw, the latter is the most essential for preserving Hfe, for when the system is deprived of all fresh food diseases of the scorbutic type appear, especially in children. The only drawback -with raw food is that it may bring disease germs, which cooking destroys, and this consideration recommends, cooking in numerous cases. However, an important point is that certain aliments are quite indigestible, even though the most nutritious —i.e., dried vegetables, such as beans and peas, and even the most convinced of the new vegetarian school could not consume these. Ln the foregoing the question of taste was not considered, but, in fact, cooking develops a flavour which aids in the secretion of digestive substances, and hence it is not; a simple question of enjoyment of food. The practice of eating raw food does not therefore appear to be justified beyond the point where it is already the customary practice.