Excerpta.

Kaikoura Star, Volume XIV, Issue 733, 27 April 1894, Page 2

Excerpta.

Diffusion of Light.

A paper by Dr Sumpner on the diffusion of light brings out some very important facts of practical value. For it shows at once how to calculate the amount of light necessary to illuminate a room of any shape or size, providing only that we know the material used for decorating it. Hitherto this has been done on the happy-go-lucky system of one candle power being used for every square foot of floor space—a calculation on which mathematicians look rather askance. We learn, for instance from Dr Sumpner, that the amount of light reflected from a newspaper, nr piece of foolscap, is equal within 10 per cent to that reflected from a good glass mirror. The following figures are deduced from his results : Black cloth covering the wall of a room requires proportionately 100 candles to light it; dark brown paper, 87; blue paper, 72 ; yellow paint, 60 ; clean wood, 50 ; dirty wood, 80; cartridge paper, 20 ; and whitewash, 15 candles. It will thus be seen that it takes nearly six times as much candle power to illuminate a room prepared with dark brown paper as it does to illuminate to an equal degree a whitewashed room. If aesthetics could be sacrificed to economy, the gas bill, it is clear, would be considerably lower.

Soliman’s Coffee.

Audiger, a celebrated French house steward, wrote, about 1660, of the Italians More and Salvator, who were summoned to Paris by Cardinal Mazarin and Marshal Gramont, ‘ to prepare the new beverage, coffee.’ ‘ From these two men,’ said he, ‘ I learned to distil all kinds of fruits, flowers, and grains, by heat as well as by cold, and to prepare tea and coffee, which few persons in France had yet learned to do.’ Although a few Parisians were interested in the new beverage, it grew slowly in popularity until something happened to make it fashionable. In 1669 Mahomet IV sent to Louis XIV. an ambassador named Soliman Aga Mustapha Raca. He was a proud and dignified person, and surrounded himself with much magnificence. He offered his guests, who represented the fashion and nobility of Paris, coffee, a beverage which they all considered detestable, and could hardly swallow at first without grimaces. However, no one considered coffee drinking too great a price to pay for the privilege of visiting a real Oriental home. The furniture, hangings and decorations were all such as were used in the richest homes of Constantinople. The guests sat on soft cushions, and talked with their solemn, magnificent host through an interpreter. Slaves in Turkish costume presented them with gold fringed damask napkins, and coffee in exquisite Japanese cups. It was a happy day for Soliman’s guests when he moderated the bitter beverage which they were meekly drinking by adding a lump of sugar. Presently they began to serve it at their own homes, though at first only the wealthiest did so, for it cost 24f. a pound. Soon, however, it was imported from the East and was sold at a price within the reach of everyone. It was some years before coffee drinking became a custom in Paris. Many persons believed that it was injurious to the bealih, and others thought it a mere caprice of fashion. Madame de Sevig-ne was falsely credited with the saying, and she really had expressed some such sentiment, ‘ The fashion of liking Racine will pass like that .of liking coffee.’

The Cross of Ivan the Great.

On the summit of the pricipal dome of the Kremlin at Moscow stands a gigantic cross placed there by Ivan the Great, the potentate who first adopted the title of Tsar, and the

double-beaded eagle as his crest. The simple minded moujiks believe this colossal emblem of their faith to be of gold, but as a matter of fact the ihe material is iron with a very thin coating of the precious metal. Napoleon, when he took Moscow in 1812, resolved to carry off Ivan's cross and set it up on the cupola of the Invalides ; and he directed Marshal Mortier, Due de Treviso, to effect the removal. This was by no means an easy task, for the size and weight were enormous, and the height at which it was placed added to the difficuly. At last, one of the Russian convicts, whom Count Rostopchin had let loose before evacuting the city, volunteered his aid. His services were accepted, and proved extremely efficacious ; nor did they go unrewarded. However, treason in this case did not prosper. On the very night that his labours were biought to a successful issue the wretched man got helplessly drunk, and was robbed of his ill-gotten gains by a band of marauders. A few days later (October 12) Napoleon marched out of the ruins of the capital carrying with him, among other booty, the famous cross. Early in November snow began to fall, and soon the Grande Armee was reduced to a mere herd of stragglers miserably fighting its way across one white plain after another, and leaving behind it a slight elevation to mark the spots where whole regiments had been engulfed. Presently the very guns were abandoned in order that their carriages might be used for fuel. When the convoy in charge of the plunder had reached a point between Mojaisk and Smolensk, despair made the men reckless. They threw into a lake coffers filled with diamonds, pearls, and precious stones, vessels of gold and silver, historic treasures of untold value, retaining only the wood of the cases and carts wherewith to warm their wretched, worn out bodies for the last time. The Cross of Ivan went with all the rest, and for some months lay concealed beneath the muddy waters. Then the peasants of the neighbourhood, knowing its fate, fished it up again, and carried it back in triumph to the Holy City, where it was speedily restored to its former elevated position, testifying by its reappearance to the inviolability of the Russian Empire and the futility of French ambition.

Underground photography has recently made such progress that mining engineers are now able to illustrate their reports with pictures showing the exact appearance of ledges, ore bodies, and other features of importance.

Singleman : 'Do you let your wife have the last word ?’ Benedict: ‘Do I let her ? H’m ! it’s easy to tell that you know nothing of married life.'

It hurts a man just about as much to burn him in effigy, as to have his shadow on a wall butted by a goat.

When we advance a little into life we find that the tongues of men and women create nearly all the mischief in the world.

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