Science Siftings

New Zealand Tablet, 8 May 1913, Page 49

Science Siftings

By ‘Volt.’

A Lofty Building.

The Woolworth building in New York has reached its highest point stories—7sofeet. From its top people walking on the street look like ants, and street cars hardly as large as children's toys.

A Wonderful Arch.

A marvellous arch still stands in the desert about 40 miles south of Bagdad, on the east bank of the winding Tigris River. It is part of the crumbling summer palace of the ancient Parthian kings, only a portion of the facade and the great vaulted arch, 96 feet in height, remains standing..

The Supply of Rubber.

About one-half of the world's supply of rubber comes from the Brazilian sections of Ceara, Manaos and Para. Their product sets the price for the raw material in the consuming markets. The trees grow wild. No systematic preparation of the ground has ever been necessary, and the entire care of the rubber gatherers has been given to obtaining only the juice from the rubber tree and getting it to market.

Cost of Minting Coins.

Judge Rentoul, examining a mint official in a coinage case which came before him, elicited the fact that a crown piece costs the mint Is 6d in the making, leaving a clear profit of 3s 6d. But, indeed, the profit of the silver coinage is exceedingly handsome all round. Five shillings and sixpence weigh one ounce, the metal value of which is 2s 3d. To this there is, of course, the cost of minting to be added, but that is a mere fraction. The profits on bronze coinage are not less attractive, and account for the jealousy with which a recent incursion of French bronze was peremptorily stopped. On every ton of penny pieces taken out from the mint there is a profit of £382.

Development of the Piano.

Have you ever thought, when looking upon a beautiful piano, that the instrument, as it is to-day, is the perfection of centuries of invention ? In tiie beginning it was a harp-shaped piece of wood, having two or three strings. From time to time more strings were added, until the cithara was invented. This was an instrument in the shape of a capital ' P,' with ten strings stretched across the open space. Many centuries afterwards musicians conceived the idea of stretching strings across an open box. About the year 1200 this was done; the dulcimer made its appearance, and the strings were struck with hammers. For another hundred years or so these hammers were held in the hands, and then some genius invented a keyboard, which, being struck by the fingers, caused the hammers to strike the strings. This was called a clavicytherium, or keyed cithara, and from time to time it was modified and improved. During Queen Elizabeth's time it was called a virginal, and then a spinet, because the hammers were covered with the spines or quills, which struck and caught the strings and produced the sound. During the period between 1700 and 1800 it was much improved and enlarged, and was given the name of harpsichord. It was in 1710 that Bartholomeo Christofool, an Italian, invented a keyboard similar to the one we have now, which causes the hammers to strike the wires from above, and thus developed the piano. During the last century the inventive genius of musicians the world over has revised and improved it until it has reached the present-day perfection.