Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 40.djvu/733

Rh environment, and the difference between this idea and that heretofore common is, that the molecule produces an environment of its own—the space beyond its own geometric boundary, in which it is competent to act upon other bodies and compel other bodies to conform in a greater or less degree to it. More than that, a new constituent in a nearly saturated molecule could not have as firm a grip upon the structure as the older constituents could have, although it might so modify things while present as to organize other molecules in like manner, but slight changes in the neighborhood might slough off the new acquisition in a subsequent generation, so there might be a return to the form and qualities of the ancestry—that is, reversion to a former type would also be a mechanical consequence. Thus growth, heredity, variation, and reversion may be considered as the consequence of atoms vibrating in harmonic orders, each producing its own field in the universal ether, and each group of atoms constituting a molecule, large or small, having a field which is the resultant of all the fields of its constituents. All of them are molecular properties as much as any one of them can be, and growth has been believed for a long time to be a property of inorganic molecules. The cause of variation is therefore molecular as truly as isomerism is a different collocation of atoms. It is a chemical problem."

Snake-myths.—A great deal of nonsense has been published, and a great deal more is believed, about snakes. Some most thrilling stories turn upon a power which serpents are credited with of fascinating their victims. This appears to be a superstition. According to Mr. Vincent Richards, mice, birds, dogs, guinea-pigs, and other small animals, introduced into a rattlesnake's cage, show little fear, even at first, and afterward none whatever. Smaller birds, after fluttering about till they are tired, end by becoming amusingly familiar with the snakes. Mr. Richards put two rats into a cage containing forty cobras. At the outset the rats' appetites were considerably affected, and they were evidently alarmed. In a short time, however, they recovered their spirits, and caused considerable commotion among the cobras by running all over their heads and bodies. The snakes resented this familiarity by darting at each other and at imaginary foes. The rats lived and partook of food in the cage for ten or twelve days, when, one after another, they were found dead—"victims, no doubt, of misplaced confidence." It is still a matter of debate whether snakes are proof against their own poison. The remedies advised for snakebite are of doubtful validity. Because a man recovers after being bitten by a snake, and dosed with opium, mercury, ammonia, or what not, we must not jump to the conclusion that the treatment has effected a cure. A snake may bite without poisoning. Biting, though in appearance simple enough, consists really of a series of complex movements, following rapidly one upon another in ordered sequence, should any of which be inadequately performed, the victim may not be properly poisoned. Ammonia, alcohol, and making the patient move about, are worse than useless; for they increase the activity of the circulation, and thereby promote the absorption of the poison. Even permanganate of potash is of no effect unless it is administered within four minutes. Researches into the nature of the poison have shown that it resides in some proteid, and that there are three toxic elements—globulin, serum albumen, and acid albumen—but wherein the quality consists that gives to these substances, usually so harmless, their poisonous power, is as much in the dark as ever.

The Gems of the Ancients.—The gems of the ancients, according to Prof. J. H. Middleton's book on the Engraved Gems of Classical Times, consisted chiefly of the varieties of quartz—including colorless rock crystal, amethyst, sard, carnelian, chalcedony, chrysoprase, plasma, jasper, onyx, and sardonyx. Among the non-silicious stones were chrysoberyl, topaz, emerald, garnets, peridote, turquoise, opal, and lapis lazuli. The translucent stones are preferred, for artistic purposes, to the transparent ones. They admit the light, but not the forms of objects, and better reveal the charms of fine and noble workmanship. Many "gems" have been wrought or reproduced in paste and glass. Paste was a hard glass colored by various metallic oxides, such as those of manganese, iron,