SCIENTIFIC.

Waikato Times, Volume XVI, Issue 1346, 15 February 1881, Page 3

SCIENTIFIC.

Recent ocean dredgings indicate that no marine life exists at a greater depth than 150 fathoms. The Academy of the Lyucaci, founded at the beginning of the seventeenth century, is stated to be the oldest scientific society in the world. The Academy was leorganised in 1575, and has members of various nationalities. The Swiss colony in North Carolina has discovered that the mulberry tree grows with as much luxuriance as the cherry, and that the soil and climate of that (Stale alike foretell the futiue pioduction of silk under tbc most favourable conditions. M. Javel says that the fatigue experienced by the eyes from reading with artificial light is due more to the waut of light than to itb excess. Even in a very brightly illuminated lOom the pupils are very much more dilated than by daylight, and tln^> dilation pioduees fatigue. A French olectrician has deviled an ingenious electrical low water signal for steam boilers, which indicates tho existing water level at any distance from the generator, nnd when the water has sunk below a certain point rings a signal bell, while at the same time the sign "low water" appears on the indicating tablet. The elephant hunters of Ceylon and India corroborate Hinbad's story that elephants, when they feel the approach of death, ictire to a solitary and inaccessible valley, and there die in peace. The superintendent of elephants to the government of India states that no living man has come across the corpse of a wild elephant that has died a natural death. In the wiitings of Confuoiu&, the great Chinese philosopher, occurs the following passage: "As we use a glas* to examine the form of things, so must we study antiquity in order to understand the present." This sentence points unmistakably to the u&e of magnifying-glasses long before the time of the writer, who died 178 years B.C. A very slight declivity suffices to give the limning motion to water. Three inches per mile in a smooth, straight channel gives a velocity of about three miles an hour. The Ganges, which gathers the waters of the Himalaya mountains, the loftiest in the world, is at ISO milea from its mouth only 800 feet above the sea, and tp fall these 800 feet in the long course of the river is said to require more than a month. It is stated that the Bank of France has almost entirely abandoned chemical tests in favor of the camera in detecting forgeries. The sensitive plate not only proclaims forthwith the doing of the eraser or the pen-knife, but frequently shows, under tne bold figures of the forger, the sum originally borne by the check So ready is the camera to detect ink marks that a carte de visite enclosed in a letter may to the eye appear without a blemish, while a copy of it m the camera will probably exhibit traces of writing across the face, where it has merely been in contact with the written page.

Fertility of Dairy Farms —Much misapprehension exists in regard to the rapid loss of fertility of dairy farms, by reason of the carrying away of the phosphates in the milk. Now 1000 lbs. of milk contain about 4 to 5 lbs. of phosphates, of which nearly the whole is phosphate of lime. Of this, less than onehalf is phosphoric acid. Therefore 5000 lbs of milk contain but 7^lbs of phosphoric acid, which may be taken as the yearly consumption, iv this way, of each cow. As wheat bran contains 2.9 per cent, of phosphoric acid, it needs only that about 260 lbs. bran be fed to each cow yearly to replace the draught upon the soil. , There are few dairy cows that are fed less than this quantity of bran or some feed equivalent to it, and it is pretty certain very little., if any, phosphoric acid is really taken -from the soil 'of the dairy farm. On the contrary, to say nothing of • the natural supply in the soil, which slowly becomes soluble,' there is good reason to believe that every well kejit dairy farm becomes • gradually richer in jthos-/ pnates every yotx^AinericahPapen - JV In BttcHanU.ohurohyard, near Doy'er, isay,ew ( fcree jytfarg" b)3 % The chnrch is about to be enlarged,^ and' an attempt to, transplant ' this grand old tree is to be made ; ever^ 'cautidnCwill- be' taken got to erfwgw , j|s vitality, , - ' ; i