GLEANINGS.

Waikato Times, Volume XXI, Issue 1740, 30 August 1883, Page 4

GLEANINGS.

Tjik late John Goold, the eminent orinthologi&t, possessed a remaikuble faculty for imitating tlie calls (it birds. He Mould often bi ing wild birds to him by exercising his power in that lespect. A Hying machine, which does not appear to be exactly a balloon, is to lie taken by Pi of. Nordehskjoid on his expedition to Greenland this summer. It is in pioecss of conjunction at (jiothoiibmgli, in Swcedcn. \\ iih.N General l\'obei t C. .Sclienck was deelaied to bo dying of Blight's disease lie lived on milk and tom itoes for an enhic>eai, by the ad\ iuu oi hib ph^sici.in, aud is now perfectly lestoicd to health At a meeting ot the statistical and L-)oil JiKjtniy .Society for h eland, held in Dablin, one gentleman piebcnt said that w lien he was a boy the Kite Earl of Duncan an planted a quantity of timber winch v.,is, now »oi til about fifty thousand pounds stei !mg. A i Mi.'i'ooiiU'ii of the celeljiated ncl)iil i, or st.niy cloudlet, in the constellation Oi ion, v Inch wa& taken b> Mi A. A. Common, and ivason exhibitionatthe soring inception oi the Royal Society of London, ifi du&ct died as one of the tno&t intcicsting a&tionoinical photogtaphs ovur taken. A lake of asphalt, eighty-eight acres in extent, has been di-sooveicd in the Jujiiy pi ovinee of the Argentine Republic, it would .appear fiom the descu'ptions, to resembly the well known Pitch Lake on the island of Trinadad, the aica of which i& ninety-nine acics. Tub blue water lily {^ymphwu yigcutca) glows with great bounty and luxuriance in Australia. A lake in fiont of the Parliament House in Ihislune, the capital of (Queensland, is desciibcd as btoially eoveicd with its dark green leaves and blue tiuweis. 7'lie blossoms are sometimes ;v fool in dwnu'tev. A Kw.M'ii medical journal of good standing piints a paper to show that the decay of the teeth is hastened by evecssiv c intelkctual woik. The Lmtat remarks, howevei, in lefeience to tuis novel piopnsilion, thiit it i» a matter tor eousidoiation whithm oxoewv c. mental wot k of lttelf is capable of inducing seiious disease. Tin- lifleuuMi at Wimbledon this year cantiavtl about the camp a mile or so on an electiical lailway, which is to be uonstiueled thcie for llie National Rifle Association. The motoi will be poweiful enough to pull <i tiaiu ot ,si.x cais holding one bundled and iorty-four persons in all. Tjh- discovery has recently been made in Russia, that the cm lent of the River Neva, on which stnmU St. Petet&burtr, moves twice as fast in summer us in winter. It is believed that the outflow from Like Ladoga is checked by the accumulation of ice, Projessok C. G. Rock wood's lecord of earthquakes shows seventy-two disturbances in 18iS2, of which thirteen may be classed as doubtful. JFoity eight out of the .seventy. two (U'c assigned to the Mississippi \.illey, the Pacific coast and Mexico, and Central A:neiica. Venezuela and J'eiu have only one eaithquake each. Tjij: new olectiic 1 ail way in London, authoiiscd by act ot Pailiament, will run undei the Tliamcs, tluough iion caissons. The lino will bewoiked by nvaus ot a ■station.ny engine " transmittim; the powei to the c.uiiages, which will inn hcpaiatcly, btait ai filled and occupy tluec and a half minutes in the puiney between Charing Cim.s and Waterloo .Station. Soml yeais ago the late .Sir Robert Christison, the distinguished .Scoti&h physician, began a seiie.s of ob^eivatious upon the compaiativc giowth of the wood in owijriceu and dceiduous trees. These have been continued since his death by Dv fiuisti'so)), his son, who lately repoitcd to the Royal .Sooctj of Kdiniiuigh that evergreens begin their rapid growth much eniherm the ji«ai than dcciduoub ticcs, and also &top growing hoonei. In the four years beginning with IS7B theie weic one hundred and twenty four distini't shocks of eaithquake leconled at the United States Naval Hospital at Yokohama Ur Thomas. 11. Streets, U.S.A., s'iys eai thquakt"! aie associated ■with a oompaialhely high state of at mobpheiic piessme. "At fiist sight," he adds, "it would appear as if the .shocks weie associated with atmospheric commotions. About 7o per cent, of them piccodcdoi accompanied rainy, tbicatcnin<; a\ eathoi , or heralded clearing weathei. ' 'J'he Jiuniidity of the climate of Jjip.in, however, lead's him to lcgaid tins app.uent 1 elation an only accidental. \)i Stieets fiuther lemaikb that eaith(juakes are fewest when typhoons or cyclones aic most mmicious. Mil \Y. Ci-i.M)-\t Lrv has written a long lettei to Nalitu, to show that otdmaiy .sheet or summer lightning is simply the illumination pioduced by a distant thundeistoim. The aveiage distance at which thundar can be distinguished is declmed to be seven miles, while the lightning in an ordinary thundcistoim, at midnight, may be seen toity miles, i'eihaps lightning sometimes occuis .it too great an elevation foi the thunder to reach the earth snrface, paitieularly in the tropics, where the thuudei storms are at great heights. "In vaie instances, in JCniope, lightning is observed in the zenith, followed at an intenal of twenty seconds 01 more by hunt lolling thunder immediately overhead A slight increase of altitude ; would doubtlfcbb lender the thunder inaudible In an aiticle on tlio tic.itmcnt of dog! bitein the Kabt, considered with reference to the ti eat incut of hjdiophobia, jNlr Philip S. JJiito, demonstiator ot anatomy in Abcideen Unncisity, lefeis to the old Tamil pioverb, that " the bite of the dog needs the use of the s-andal,'" and says that tho first tliirn; done in many eastern countius ib to chastise the bitten pait \igoiously vnth a sandal. The beating iv.ike-> the wound l)leed ficely, and thus sui \eb to remove some of the virus. Then the leaves of the so-called diuin.stick tice, w hich appeals to belong to the cassia family, ate macerated witli a little shell lime and applied ro the bitten spot, which should be bandaged. A wound thus treated in Ceylon or Southern India usually heals without giving further tioublc.

Amkuicav Army Officers. •— The present American Secretary of War, the Jion llobeit Lincoln, is making strenuous efforts to impiove the morale of the o/hcers of the army, which, for various, ica.soii.%, lias fallen considerably since the war. One ofjthe nuinjcauses is, doubtless, the fact that a. laigc number of volunteer oiHccis, who were distinguished by their courage and capacity dnrinjr the war, h.ve been appointed to the regular army, They lack the high sense of honour and tlio Jidolifcy to .severe discipline which are inculcated in the graduates of the military academy, Another cause is the fact that the army, reduced to a mere skeleton, has been almost ■wholly stationed in the frontier garrisons, where the olhccrjj ha\o been freed from the icstiaints of that society to which, in the latger cities, their profession always admits them. Gambling and drunkenness, with the usual accompanying faults of financial laxity and fondness for debt, have ciopt Into the army, Under Genei'al Giant, as President, there also grew up a poweiful clique of favourite, whom he admired for their brilliant services, and to whose defects of characters he was blind. When President Hayes came in, he saw these difficulties, but he had not the nerve to correct them. But President Arthur is a man of of sterner mould, and he is specially sensitive to anything which reflects on the dignity of the Federal Government. He is sustaining Secretary Lincoln in his discipline, and a great change has been made. A number of officers have been called to account for extravagant living and unpaid debts ; two have been for cashiered for gambling, others who have been for years in idleness at Washington have been ordered to the frontier ; and on the slightest attempt ito. bring political influence to bear to ohange these orders, their resignations have been ty\itod,~-Aryut Correisppttdenti,