All anglers must be grateful to Mr Henry Ffennell for the care with which he gathers and publishes statistics relating to the Salmon Fisheries. His record for the past year is a very satisfactory one, for it tells us that fish of large size have fallen victims to the rod and to the net. Huge fish of forty pounds weight have been common, and as usual, the river Tay takes the lead in the number and weight of its fish. One angler, Captain Griffith, landed in a single day thirteen fish of the collective weight of two hundred and thirty-seven and a half pounds. In the Dee, a fish of fifty-seven pounds fell to the rod of the keeper, and a fish of the same weight was taken in Ireland, on the Shannon. On the Dee, it is reported that netting in the lower reaches has been carried on to such an extent that the upper proprietors who do so much to nurse the fish during their tender infancy are becoming quite disheartened. The same complaint comes from the water-bailiffs on the upper portion of the Severn fishery. But here, it seems that the fish have other remorseless enemies in the otters, who of late years have increased in numbers to an alarming extent. These voracious hunters do not content themselves with simply killing a salmon now and then to supply their larders, but prefer, as their habit is, to eat a piece out of the shoulder, leaving the rest of the carcase untouched. As many as six or seven dead fish have been found in one place mutilated in this manner.
‘Horses of the Past and Present’ was the subject of a most interesting lecture given lately at the London Institution by Professor Flower, who, it will be remembered, succeeded Professor Owen as Director of the Natural History Museum at South Kensington. He pointed to the tapir as one of the earliest known ancestors of the horse, and showed that the family group to which the horse belonged had undergone great modifications. The changes which had gradually taken place in the horse consisted principally in a great increase of size, especially in the length of the neck and certain structural alterations in the bones. The teeth and the feet exhibit the most marked alterations from previous types, alterations which have been induced by conditions of life. The lecturer held that the domestic horse is undoubtedly derived from the wild species of Europe and Asia, but there is no means of arriving at the time when domestication took place.
The opening, last month, of the tunnel beneath the Mersey, which connects Liverpool with Birkenhead, marks the successful completion of one of the great engineering achievements of modern times. The boring differs from an ordinary railway tunnel in consisting of three separate passages through the solid rock. The lowermost of these is a drainage ‘heading’ eight feet in diameter. Seven feet above this comes the main tunnel, twenty-six feet in diameter, through which the trains are now continually passing, and lastly, by its side runs the ventilating tunnel, seven feet in diameter. This last heading is a most important feature of the works. Revolving fans, forty feet in diameter, at each end of this ventilating tunnel, cause the air to be changed continually in the main heading, so that passengers breathe air as pure as that they have left behind them above ground. Those who have travelled in the choking atmosphere of the Metropolitan Underground Railway will be able to appreciate the importance of this provision for fresh air. Golfers, too, who reside in Liverpool and who frequent the delightful Links of Hoylake, in Cheshire, will doubtless appreciate the convenience of being taken there and back minus the ferry-boat passage.
It would seem almost an impossibility that snow could attach itself to and accumulate upon a strong metal wire suspended in mid-air, to such an extent as to cause that wire to snap by reason of the extra burden imposed upon it. But recurring snowstorms teach us that this is what happens to many of our telegraph wires, to the great and serious injury of communication all over the country. One of the officials of the telegraph department has been at the pains to weigh a portion of the frozen snow which fell from a wire, upon which it had covered a space of one foot. The mass weighed just upon one pound. Now, as the supporting posts of such a wire are commonly two hundred feet apart, it is readily seen that a wire may be called upon by a snowstorm to support an extra weight of two hundred pounds. More than this, a wire so circumstanced may form one of two dozen or more supported on the same set of poles, and these supports naturally succumb to the unusual load. The remedy is obvious; wires should, whenever possible, be laid beneath the ground, and our postal authorities are carrying out that principle as far as they can.
Another advance in photography is represented by a process invented by M. Thiebaut, which has recently been described before the Photographic Society of Great Britain. In this process the glass plate which usually forms the support of the photographic film is superseded by a sheet of cardboard. In other words, the sensitive mixture of silver bromide and gelatine is spread upon sheets of cardboard. After the picture is developed, the film is separated from its support, and can be printed from by the sun in the usual way. The advantage of this process is that a tourist can carry with him the material for a gross of pictures, while the weight is only about that of a dozen of the usual glass plates. More than this, several negatives when complete can be stored away in a very small space.
The great painter Van Dyck, while journeying to Italy, fell sick at the village of St Jean de Maurienne, in Savoy, and was carefully nursed until convalescent by the family of one of the chief residents. As some return for the kindness he received, Van Dyck painted the portrait of one of the children of his host, and left the picture behind him. This picture has been for a long time known to exist, but where it had gone to, nobody could tell. It has at last been discovered, and it is probable that the directors of the Brussels gallery will endeavour to purchase this precious relic of the great master.
The machinery devised for producing cold air, and hitherto exclusively used for freezing meat and other perishable things, has lately been employed in Stockholm for quite another purpose. A tunnel has been in course of construction there which passes through a hill, the soil of which is of a wet, gravelly nature. Upon this hill stand many buildings, which would have been in great danger if the work had proceeded without some means being taken of supporting their foundations. Underpinning was considered too expensive; so the contractor hit upon the entirely novel plan of freezing the wet gravel into a solid icy concrete. The plan has answered admirably, and many of the houses are being tunnelled under with perfect safety.
The professors of the Edinburgh Royal Infirmary have adopted a new form of stretcher, the invention of Mr R. Stevens, who is an engineer employed at the institution. The apparatus consists of a canvas sheet, with carrying-poles on each side, attached to the ends of which are iron cross-bars, to prevent the poles coming too near together, and providing therefore a sufficient space between them for the patient under removal. But the chief feature of the new contrivance, and one which must prove very valuable in some cases of injury is, that the patient can be laid on a bed without being lifted from the stretcher. This end is accomplished by making the canvas sheet in two parts, but secured by a cord or a rod passed through loopholes at the place of junction. When the stretcher, with the patient on it, is placed on the bed, this cord or rod can be readily removed, and the stretcher falls in two halves, leaving the patient comfortable.
We have already noticed the wonderful antiseptic properties of boracic acid in the article ‘[Borax]’ (Journal, January 9th). An interesting testimony as to its properties for preserving fresh fish comes from Norway. Writing in the Scotsman, Professor J. Cossar Ewart draws attention to the fact that between four and five thousand barrels of herrings preserved by means of a mixture of this substance and salt, have been arriving weekly from Norway; and last winter, over twenty thousand barrels found their way into the English market. Cargoes delivered before Christmas had a ready sale at twenty-eight shillings per barrel. The same writer indicates how the boracic acid may be applied in the preservation of fish. For preserving herrings, the best plan seems to be a mixture of powdered boracic acid and fine salt. The mixture having been made, the fresh herrings should be arranged in layers in a barrel in exactly the same way as cured herrings are packed, and each tier covered with a thin layer of the mixture. When the barrel is full, it should be tightened down in the ordinary way and then ‘pickled’ with a weak solution of boracic acid. For treating a barrel of herrings in this manner, two and a half pounds of acid and five pounds of salt are required for spreading on the tiers of herrings during packing, and about ten ounces of pure acid for dissolving in the fresh water used for pickling. The boracic acid may be had for less than sixpence a pound.
Dr Riley, Entomologist to the United States Agricultural Department, has presented his collection of insects to the United States. It is said to contain one hundred and fifteen thousand specimens of twenty thousand species or varieties of insects.