Sketcher.

Alexandra Herald and Central Otago Gazette, Issue 403, 28 January 1904, Page 2

Sketcher.

:THE lEEAKS OF LIGHTNING. §3Bps .QUEBEC correspondent of the f*Xs. 'Scientific Ameiicin' quotes ft wSuBS. number of cases illustrating the freaks of lightning. Some 50 and odd years years ago, he writes, I was witness to the fact that one Polette, of St. Michael de Bellechasse, P. Q., and then about 80 years of age, while in kneeling attitude in the little chapel of Ste. Anne, about a quarter of a mile eastward of the parish church, was struck by lightning, with the tffeet that while he was only daz9d for a while by the stroke, his clothes were torn asunder all aloßg his backbone from neck to base of trunk, where the lightning bifurcated, and thence following the marrow along each of his legs, finally escaped through the heels of his boots. This tendency to bifurcation of the current, from trunk to limbs, when, as in the human system, the nerves of the legs exert an equal pull upon the central column, is further illustrated by the fact that at Peoria, 111, an individual, struck by lightning and who was otherwise uninjured, except by being for a moment dazed as in the case of old Poletce, found that the electric fluid, after traversing his nervous system from head to foot, or rather feet, had finally passed ont through the soles of his boots. Again, as in the Polette case, the fact was evidenced by two tiny boles, one in each sole, through which the fluid had tunnelled for itself an exit.

Some 20 years ago the apex of the roof of a house in the same village of St. Michael was struck by lightning, which trifurcated or divided into three branches

or onneatej fcke one descending jweß|; along the-roof sloping towardthatfidef. the second north, and the third south respectively, tearing? away the shingles on their wajj to and following dwrfn th«i central; bolts or iron fa^nwge^f:'';*as| many windows situt>ted one on eaoh .at) the three sides of the honae, tearing aw»y the fastenings and portions of the wood? work of eaoh window in their respective tr*jeotoriea toward the earths >;" " * At St. Michaelagain, near Beaumont, I was witness to the fact that, as I paaesd" by daring a thunder storm, a man trending toward his-home in an adjoining fieldf was struck dead fcy a flash of the electric fluid frj&m the clouds, and remained suddenly motionless,'.', erect and in the same attitude as when overtaken by the death dealing shaft;.. *

■■■: But the Btrangest and moat beautiful display of lightning or atmospheric electric currents, which it waj my goodfortune to witness, it being the'only time in my life I ever Baw, anything of the kind, was out on the Beaupost flats near Quebec, when, as I than wrote to Flammarion, of' the Sooiete d'Astronomic de France, two electrically laden clouds, as though two trees, their heads toward each other, and their longer branches interwoven, kept on for fully more than ten minutes,- interchanging horizontal flashes of beautifully colored fire, not one of which ever reached the earth; while occasionally a flash would shoot upward as if toward some cloud in that direction, but which I could see no sign of. NEW CAMEEa"wONDERS. Although the cinematograph in its various forms has bo far been a tey, or has served as a iriusic hall'turn,' it has been realised from the first that as its processes improved it would open out enormous new possibilities of scientific application. How. great those possibilities are will be realised in a few weeks, when Mr Charles Urban, the proprietor of the ' Bioscope,' gives to the scientific world the results of a series of experiments he has made in the combination, of the bioscope and .the microscope, In his laboratory last month Mr Urban showed to a representative of the * Daily Mail' a number of cinematographic records of microscopio observations. One living picturs exhibited with absolute clearnoss the circulation of the blood in the web of a frog's foot. The scientist, using a high power microscope, has been I able to observe this before, but never previously has it been possible to place it upon permanent photographic record.

An enormous and almost' inconceivable magnification is necessary fco render these minute processes visible to the naked eye, First of all the microscope magnifies the minute object so as to give a photographic, image, which, though only the size of a, postage stamp, is still ten times larger' than the original. When this photograph, is placed in the lantern and the image! projected upon a screen ot the siz* used for the'bioaoope pictures at the Alhambra, or the Palace Theatres, the magnification is increased to 38.000,000 diameters. The photographs are taken on a strip of film at the rate of sixteen a second. Mr Urbf n's. greatest achievement, however, is the series of films which reproduce on the screen as clearly as a bioscope picture shows the movement of a crowd. the actual processes of protoplasmic life ia a bit of common water weed. As with. the blood in the frog's tissue, so the' movement of the protoplasmic fluid which. gives nutrition and growth to the plant; is rendered plainly visible in a picture enlarged 38.000,000 times. % The possibilities of scientific observation and record by the combination of the microscope and the bioacope are encrmouss Mr Urban has taken a series of picture, which reproduce on the screen the life movements and ferocious habits of the various kinds of bacilli.

Hitherto the photographing of these infinitesimal organisms has been a post mortem operation. Owing to their high transparency it has been necessary to stain them before they" become photographically visible, and to stain therm involved killing them. However, by means of an immense concentration of light and certain secret optical devices,. Mr Urban has found a way to photograph them alive and in movement.

The reproduction for the amusement of music hall audiences of interesting spectacles will before long, Mr Urban declares, be the least important of the uses of the bioscope. For educational and scientific purposes it will have an enormous value. For example, he has designed an automatic camera which can be set to take a series of photographs at any interval that may be desired. The week's growth of a plant might be recorded in this way by a series of snapshot photographs taken at intervals of, say, one minute. Those photographs may then be projected upon the screen with ordinary cinematographic rapid'ty, so that the processes of growth of the entire period might be made visible in a minute. Every chemical discovery that shortens the photographic exposure by a fraction of a second opens out a new field for research, Mr Urban has succeeded in taking a photograph through a red screen in one-seventieth of a second, an achievement which brings instantaneous color photography within sight.

THE, LANGUAGE MAET. We have been laughing long enough, a French contemporary thinks, at the open robbery and the extreme difficulty of the Parisian to put into circulation English words and phrases, and it publishes the following list that Albion has taken over from them: Amour-propre, personal, materiel, rapproachment, role, regime, raison d'etre, bourgeoise, doctrinaire, plebiscite, entente cordiale, esprit de corps, fait accompli, en masse, perfide Albion! raison d'Efcat, aplomb, cause celebre, claque, coup de main, dossiers, noblesse oblige, nom de guerre, a coups de tariffs, alcool d'indnßtrie, bordereau, cbroni jue, scandaleux, cherchez la femme, l'homme nejessaire, partie en cause, en disponibilite, etc I will pass over several of these alleged thefts, because I have iskver come across them in English conversation. But what Ido object to is the ignoring of ennui, bo dear to the girl of sixtees; writing to her lady friends, and .blase, which gives two inches in height and puts several whiskers on to the face of the lad of eighteen. There is, I claim, a certain honesty about the Englishman in this connection. He frankly admits that he has got the words, but he never tries to cover up his tbeft by putting them into new suits, and shaving off their eyebrows. A Frenchman does. He stole ' bull-dog,' and turned it into 'bouledogue'j he purloined 'roast-beef and turned it into ' ros-bif'; he collared ' mutton-shop/ and turned it into 'mouten schoppe.'