Subjects:

Experiment, Laboratories, Light, Physics, Electricity, Steamships, Geology, Railways, Transport, Engineers, Disease, Bacteriology

    Reports that during the 'past month Professor Tyndall has engaged in some experiments in the laboratory of the Royal Institution with the object of demonstrating the causes of the remarkable sunsets and other atmospheric phenomena which were everywhere observed in December and January. Some time ago Professor Tyndall made certain curious discoveries, showing the fact of light passing through different gases and sprays, and his recent experiments were designed to test by means of a laboratory experiment, the effect sunlight may have upon certain matters floating in the atmosphere'. Meanwhile, the 'committee of the Trinity Board appointed to conduct experiments with illuminants for light-houses have been engaged at the South Foreland light-house in testing the comparative value of electricity, gas and oil'. (813) Records that 'On February 8 the New Zealand Company's steamship Tongariro arrived at Plymouth, having made the passage from New Zealand in 38 days 3 hours steaming, the fastest on record'. Notes that 'Professor Hull has recently returned from the Holy Land, where he formed some startling theories, based on geological grounds', such as the idea 'that at the time of the Exodus there was a continuous connection of the Mediterranean and the Red Sea'. In America, 'work has actually been commenced upon the proposed ship-railway that is to cross the Isthmus of Tehuantepec and rival the Panama Canal', and 'Mr. Eads, C.E., the builder of the great steel bridge across the Mississippi at St. Louis [...] has been recently in London upon business connected with the enterprise'. Also observes that 'In Germany fresh reports have been received from the Commission sent out by the Government, first to Egypt, and then to India, to inquire into the causes and cure of cholera. Experiments prove that there is a close connection between the disease and certain bacilla (minute organisms) which were found with the aid of the micrscope in the bodies of cholera patients'. (814)

Subjects:

Botany

    Records the death of 'Dr. John Hutton Balfour, Emeritus Professor of Medicine and Botany in the University of Edinburgh' who 'wrote valuable books on Botany' (815).