NOTES.
Mr. James Weir tells of a spider which stretched its web in the division between two parts of a sawmill, where the lower fastenings of the structure were frequently broken by the repeated passing of lumber through. Discovering the situation, the insect gave up the use of guy threads, and, finding a nail, wove it into the lower edge of its web, so that it should operate as a sinker to keep the web stretched.
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N. G. Johnson, of the Maryland Agricultural Experiment Station, telling the Society for the Promotion of Agricultural Science the story of his fight with the pea louse, represented that the pea raisers in his State had lost this year more than three million dollars by the ravages of this insect. A parasite had been discovered which practically annihilated the pest, but the discovery was not made in time to save the crops in some parts of the State from destruction.
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The American Society for the Promotion of Agricultural Science, after hearing the account of the work of the Gypsy Moth Commission of Massachusetts, which has spent more than a million and a half of dollars in trying to exterminate the mischievous insect, approved the action of the Massachusetts Legislature in maintaining the commission, and requested that the work be kept up for a short time longer. This was because it was represented that the moth was now confined to a limited area, and could be easily exterminated by the expenditure of a small amount more of money.
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The history of science has sustained a great loss by the burning of most of the relics which had been collected for the Volta Centenary Exhibition at Como, Italy. Only a few things were saved, comprising a sword presented by Napoleon Bonaparte to Volta, a cast of the skull of the great electrician, his watch, and a few personal relics. On the other hand, his books and manuscripts, his collection of batteries, the only authentic portrait of him, and his will, were destroyed. Nevertheless, the celebration was not stopped. The fire was attributed to the fusing of some electric wires.
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An example of patient industry is the sorting of hogs’ bristles as it is carried on at Tientsin, China. Each one of the hairs of the six hundred thousand kilogrammes exported from that place in 1897 had to be picked out, measured, and placed in the bundle of hairs of corresponding length; and the different lengths by which the hairs are sorted are very numerous.