Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 16.djvu/146

 Carl Vogt on the Archæopteryx.—The Congress of Swiss Naturalists held its sixty-second annual meeting this year at St. Gall. Professor Carl Vogt delivered one of the public lectures, choosing for his subject the archaeopteryx, an animal intermediate between birds and reptiles. Of the archæopteryx there exist only two (fossil) specimens, one of which, that first discovered, is in the British Museum; the other, which is by far the more perfect of the two, was discovered a few years ago at Solenhofen, Germany. It is the property of Dr. Haeberlein, of Pappenheim. It was once fondly hoped that the Emperor of Germany would purchase this treasure and preserve it for the Fatherland; but, as Professor Vogt remarks, a petrified cannon or musket would have found infinitely more favor in that quarter! The naturalists who studied the specimen in the British Museum pronounced this Jurassic animal to be a bird, inasmuch as it had a beak, nails, and feathers. But the Solenhofen archæopteryx proves, undoubtedly, that the animal was a bird-like reptile, of the size of a pigeon, which had both scales and feathers, a beak provided with teeth, armed wings, bird-like feet with nails, and a reptilian tail, consisting of twenty vertebræ.

Stilling the Waves with Oil.—A few months ago we printed some observations on the use of oil as a means of calming a tempestuous sea in cases of danger to mariners. A later number of the journal (Chambers's) from which those observations were quoted contains the official report of a ship-master, whose vessel appears to have escaped disaster through the timely use of oil in a storm. This report was sent to "Chambers's Journal" by Mr. Sprunt, British Vice-Consul at Wilmington, North Carolina. It is as follows:

"British brigantine Gem, of Sackville, New Brunswick, Richardson, master. On the 1st of April last, bound from Wilmington, North Carolina, for Bristol, took a heavy gale of wind about a degree to the eastward of Bermuda, from the south, veering rapidly to the northwest, whence it blew a hurricane for thirty-six hours, with a cross-breaking sea, ship laboring heavily—'started' the after-house and boats, stove lazarette hatch, and took try-sail from the mast. All hands aft in the cabin in case the sea should break over and carry away fore-house. 8, sea getting worse, the master thought of resorting to the oil experiment, which he had read of in 'Chambers's Journal.' Had a canvas bag prepared, holding about three quarts of kerosene oil, with a rope of six fathoms attached, and kept trailing to windward; the oil leaking through the canvas greatly broke topping sea, and made matters much more favorable for the ship. This was kept up through the night; and at 3 on the 2d of April the weather began to moderate. The mate, who had himself lashed to the rigging during the whole of his watch, believed with the captain that the resort to the oil saved the ship, as such fearful weather had never during the captain's experience of fourteen years been witnessed by him. A drop of the oil will smooth about four feet circumference of sea. Captain Richardson suggests that a canvas bag to hold about six gallons is the best size, pierced with small holes with a penknife, the holes to be enlarged as the canvas becomes wet and its texture closer."

Petroleum for Steam-making.—A successful exhibition was recently made at Pittsburg of a method of using petroleum as fuel on board steamers. In its main features this new method resembles other methods which have been tried with more or less success—air, steam, and oil-spray being injected into a suitable fire-box. The spray is said to be immediately converted into inflammable gas, becoming a pure, bright, powerful flame, free from smoke. To accomplish this result, the inventor resorts to a very simple contrivance, described as follows in the "Journal of the Franklin Institute": A small hole is drilled into the iron front of the fire-box, and into this passes a tube which branches, as it leaves this point, into two pipes. One of these connects with the boiler itself, and the other with a receptacle containing crude oil. At the junction of these pipes there is an aperture for the admission of atmospheric air. Valves of peculiar construction regulate the quantity of steam or oil admitted to the furnace. Our contemporary