ENGLISH EXTRACTS.

New Zealand Spectator and Cook's Strait Guardian, Volume III, Issue 180, 21 April 1847, Page 3

ENGLISH EXTRACTS.

The Premier has been elected Lord Rector of th~ University of Glasgow. His opponent was Mr. Wordsworth. Mr. Vaughan Williams has been appointed the successor of Sir John Williams as one of the Judges of the Court of Queen's Bench. He is the author of the admirable work "On Executors." He also published, in conjunction with Sjgrjeant D'Oyley, an edition of Burns' Justice. He has been twenly-three years at the bar, but still wears a stuff gown.

An agitalion in favour of a reduction of the duiy on tea is beginning to be of importance. Sir Edward Parry had received the office of Superintendent of Ha&lar Hospital. Captain Manby, R. N., the inventor of the life rope for saving shipwrecked mariners, died on the 19th November, in bis 76 th year. Mrs. Banim, the widow of the late Mr. Banim, the Irish novelist, has been placed on the pension list for an annuity of £50. The principal streets and shops in Turin are now lighted by gas made from Newcastle coal, which is shipped to Genoa, and costs, including carriage to Turin, about three guineas a ton.

Flour Mill. — A new flour mill, of greatly applauded powers, has been for some time past attracting public attention in America ; and the American Institute has lately awarded its gold medal to the inventor. Instead of the usual mill-stones, steel plates indented with circular grooves are employed ; but the centres of the plates, instead of being in the vertical line, are removed about an inch therefrom, whereby each grooved plate becomes a species of circular shears that will cut, tear, aud abrade any substance lying between them. On account of this peculiarity, it is called the "Eccentric Mill," though the eccentricity might properly enough express a different conception. The grinding plates need not be large, and hence the mill may be made exceedingly portable. The plates revolve in the same direction with somewhat different speeds, the quicker of the speeds being about 300 revolutions in the minute. The mill, it is stated is suitable for grinding many substances besides wheat, requiring to be levigated or reduced to powder. The fineness of the powder is regulated by a screw, which raises or lowers the step in which the shaft of one of the revolving plates runs. The material to be ground enters at the centre of the grinding surface as usual, and is delivered at the rim, whither it is carried by the centrifugal force. — Artisan.

Australia. — The following extract from "Stokes* Discoveries in Australia," describes the strong contrast of that part of the world he had surveyed with all other parts :—": — " Its cherries with their stones growing outside, its trees which shed their bark instead of their leaves, its strange animals, its still strauger population, its mushroom cities, and, finally, the fact that approach to human habitations is not announced by the barking of dogs, but by the barking of trees."

A Sure Charge. — A merchant of Mississippi, during a day's business in which he bad been crowded with customers, sold a saddle of the value of forty dollars, but had neg- j lected to make the charge. Next day he missed the saddle and recollected the fact of the sale, but not the individual who had bought it. After racking his memory for some time to no purpose, he directed his clerk Jim to turn his ledger alphabet and read off the W's, then the S's, the B's, the C's, and other letters in succession, all to no purpose. Tired out by the rental exercise, and as the readiest way of settling the difficulty, ' Jim,' said he, ' charge a saddle to every one of the customers.' This was accordingly done. When the planters had got their cotton in, and settling time came round, the bills were presented, and if occasionally one man, more prudent than his neighbour, went through the drudgery of examining a long list of sundries got by the different members of the family, he might possibly discover a saddle which they had not got, cr one more than he had got, and object to the item, it would be struck out of course, alleging there was some mistake. W hen all the accounts had been settled up, " Well, Jim, said tbe storekeeper, "how many customers paid you for that saddle ?" Jim examined and reported thirty-one. " Little enough," exclaimed his employer, " for the trouble we bave had to find out who got it."

American Ice. — (From Sir Francis Head's " Emigrant.") —I have often been amused at observing how imperfectly the theory of ice is, practically speaking, understood in England. People talk of its being "as hot as fire," and "as cold as ice," just as if the temperature of each were a fixed quantity, whereas there are as many temperatures of fire, and as many temperatures of ice, as there are climates on the face of the globe. The heat of boiling water is a fixed quantity, and any attempt to make water hotter than "boiling" only creates steam, which flies off from the top exactly as fast as, and exactly in the same proportion to, the amount of heat, be it great or small, that is applied at the bottom. Now, for want of half a moment's reflection, people in England are very prone to believe that water cannot be made colder than ice ; and accordingly if a good humoured man succeeds in filling his ice-house, he feels satisfied that his ice is as good as any other man's ice ; in short, that ice is ice, snd that there is no use in anybody attemptiug to deny it. But the truth is, that the temperature of £2 degrees of Fahrenheit, that at which water freezes, is only the commencement of an operation that

is almost infinite ; for after its congelation water is as competent to continue to receive cold as it was when it was fluid. The application of cold to a block of ice does not, therefore, as in the case of heat applied beneath boiling water, cause what is added at one end to fly out at the other ; but on the contrary, the extra cold is added to and retained by the mass, and thus the temperature of the ice falls with the temperature of the air, until in Lower Canada it occasionally sinks to 40 degrees bplow zero, or to 72 degrees below the temperature of ice just congealed. It is evident, therefore, that if two ice-houses were to be filled, the one with the former, say Canada ice, and the other with the latter, say English ice, the difference between the quantity of cold stored up in each would-be as appreciable as the difference between a cellar full of gold and a cellar full of copper ; in short, the intrinsic value of ice, like that of metals, depends on the investigation of an assayer — that is to say, a cubic foot of Lower Canada ice is infinitely more valuable, or, in other words, it contains infinitely more cold, than a cubic foot of Upper Canada ice, which again contains mure cold than a cubic foot of Wenham ice, which contains infinitely more cold than a cubic foot of English ice ; and thus, although each of these four cubic feet of ice has precisely the same shape, they each, as summer approaches, diminish in value, that is to say, they each gradually lose a portion of their cold, until before the Lower Canada ice is melted, the English ice has been converted into lukewarm water. The above theory is so clearly understood in North America, that the inhabitants of Boston, who annually store for exportation immense quantities of Wenham ice, and who know quite well that cold ice will meet the markets in India, while the warmer article melts on the passage, talk of their " crops of ice" just as an English farmer talks of his crop of wheat.

The Gun Cotton. — Since Schonbein made known to the world the explosive power to be communicated to cotton by chemical agents, a great many " discoverers" of the same article have started up. Among others we notice the names of Bottger, of Frankfort; Morel, of Paris, Dr. Otto, of Brunswick; M. Chodsko, a Pole ; and a couple of others at Mayence ; — all pretenders to the invention. It does not appear, however, that any of them made their experiments until the recent announcements of Schonbein ; and it would be more creditable to men of science to call their experiments reproductions of Schonbein's (the original discoverer's), cotton. The following experiments of Mr. Barron Stanmove, reported in the Aihenesum, were witnessed by the writer : — | " Previously to trying its power with fire arms, the professor made several experiments to show iis explosive properties and perfect combustion. He placed some gun-cotton upon a heap of the strongest and most easily ignited sporting gunpowder. The cotton was then fired by heated platinum wire ; and, although there wore innumerable points of contact between the cotton and the powder, the former exploded so instantaneously as to leave the gunpowder unexploded. The gun-cotton explodes at about 400 degrees of Fahrenheit, with a vividness of flame which is perfectly dazzling — leaving scarcelyany residue behind. It has been stated that no smoke is emitted : this is erroneous. A slight smoke, or rather vapour, is thrown off; but it so soon disappears, as to occasion no inconvenience. After repeated explosions of the cotton, the room in v.hich the experiments were conducted was perfectly clear. It is difficult to over-estimate the advantages attendant upon the use of the gun-cotton in mines ; since the smoke proceeding from the coarse gunpowder used for blasting purposes occasions so much annoyance and injury to the health of the miners. The experiments in blasting tried in the Cornwall mines a short time ago, were most satisfactory and conclusive in favour of the guncotton. Another of its strange qualities consists in its not being deteriorated by damp or wet. Some gun-cotton which had been steeped in water for sixty hours, and dried by exposure to the air, exploded with the same facility, and as instantaneously, as cotton which had not been wetted. Professor Schonbein stated that immersion in water for two months has not impaired its explosive qualities in the slightest degree. The experiments \i ith fowling pieces and rifles were highly interesting and satisfactory. A gun charged with thirty grains of cotton propelled an equal charge of shot with greater force and precision, at a distance of forty yards, than was done by the same gun loaded with a hundred and twenty grains of gunpowder. A rifle charged with fifty-four and a half grains of gunpowder sent a ball through seven boards half an inch thickness, at a distance of forty yards : the same rifle charged with forty grains of gun-cotton propelled the ball into the eighth board. Another rifle, which had been used for elephant shooting, and consequently carried a much larger ball, charged with forty grains of guncotton, propelled the ball through eight boards.

at a distance of ninety yards. In no case was the discharge accompanied by a greater recoil than usual ; and the reports were not louder than those accompanying the discharge of guns and rifles loaded with gunpowder. We understand that a hundred weight of the guncotton is on its way from Basle to Woolwich ; ha /ing been ordered by government, with the view of testing its applicability to heavy ordnance. Professor states that the manufacture of the gun-cotton is unattended by risk ; and that it can be effected in the small space of eight hours, and at a less cost than gunpowder. If these statements shall turn out to be correct, the adoption of the guncotton will follow as a matter of course."

Anecdote of Schonbein's Gun-Cot-ton. — When Mr. S. attended Osborne House to exhibit the qualities of his gun-cotton to Prince Albert, he offered to explode a portion on the hand of Colonel B ; but the gallant Colonel recoiled from the experiment, and would have nothing to do with the novel power. Prince Albert himself, however, submitted to the test, and off went the cotton, without smoke, stain, or burning of the skin. Thus encouraged, the Colonel took his turn ; but whether the material was changed or not for the coarser preparation, it gave him such a singeing that he leaped up with a cry of pain. A hearty laugh was all the commiseration he received. Alter this Mr. S. loaded a fowling-piece with cotton in the place of powder, and the Prince fired both ball and shot from it, with the usual effect and perfect impunity. — Literary Gazette.

The City of Earthquakes. — " The city of earthquakes " would be a tar more appropriate name for Lima, than the city of the kings. On an average of years, five-and-forty shocks are annually felt, most of which occur in the latter half of October, in November, December, January, May, and June. January is the worst month, during which, in many years, scarcely a day passes without convulsions of this kind. The terrible earthquakes, that play such havoc with the city, come at intervals of forty to sixty years. Since the west coast of South America has been known to Europeans the following are the date 5: —1586 ,1630 ,1687 ,1713 ,1746,1806; always two in a century. It is greatly to be feared that ten more years will not elapse without Lima being visited by another of these awful calamites. Dr. Tschudi gives a brief account of the earthquake of 1746. It was on the 28th of October, St. Simon and St. Jude's day, that at thirty-one minutes past 10, p.m , the earth shook with a fearful bellowing noise, and in an instant the whole of Lima was a heap of ruins. Noise, earthquake, and destruction were all the affair of one moment. The few buildings whose strength resisted the first shock were thrown down by a regular horizontal motion of the earth, which succeeded it, and lasted four minutes. Out of more than 3000 houses, only twenty-one remained uninjured. Nearly all the public buildings were overthrown. At the port of Callao the destruction was never more complete, for scarcely was the earthquake over when the sea arose with a mighty rushing sound, and swallowed up both town and inhabitants. In an instant 5000 human beings became the prey of the waters. The Spanish corvette, San Fermin, which lay at anchor in the harbour, was hurled far over the walls of the fortress, and stranded at more than 500 yards from the shore. A cross marks the place where she struck. Three heavily-laden merchantmen met the same fate, and nineteen other vessels foundered. The town had disappeared, and travellers have related how, even now, when the sky is bright and the sea still, the houses and churches may be dimly seen through the transparent waters. Such a tale as this is scarcely worth refuting, seeing that the houses were overturned by the earthquake before they were overwhelmed by the sea, whose action must long since have destroyed their every vestige. But the old sailors along that coast love to tell how, on certain days, the people are seen sitting at the doors of their houses, and standing about in the streets, and how, in the silent watches of the night, a cock has been heard to crow from out of the depths of the lakes. — Blackicood's Magazine.