Surely Mr Flinders Petrie is the most successful and energetic digger that the archæological world has ever seen. His past discoveries have already resulted in much increased knowledge of dead nations; but now he has lighted upon a most curious find in the north-eastern delta of the Nile: this is a royal palace, which is identified with the greatest certainty with that building which the Bible calls ‘Pharaoh’s house in Tahpanhes.’ The building carries us back in imagination to the Egypt of two thousand five hundred years ago. Next to its scriptural connection, interest centres in the description of the domestic offices of the building; and as we read of the kitchen with its dresser, the butler’s pantry full of empty wine vessels and their stoppers, the sanctum of the scullery-maid with its sink, we feel that the place has been tenanted by ordinary human beings. Mr Petrie’s account of the sink is worth quoting: ‘It is formed of a large jar with the bottom knocked out, and filled with broken potsherds placed on edge. The water ran through this, and thence into more broken pots below, placed one in another, all bottomless, going down to the clean sand some four or five feet below.’
Mr Francis Greene publishes in an American journal the results of some careful observations which he has made on street traffic. According to him, asphalt is a far better covering for roads than either granite or wood. He puts the matter in this way: a horse will travel five hundred and eighty-three miles on asphalt before meeting with an accident, four hundred and thirteen on granite, and two hundred and seventy-two miles on wood. This agrees with experience in London with regard to the first two materials, but not with regard to wood, which experts say is the safest material of all. Londoners have certainly the best means of judging of this, for there is very little wood-paving in America. At the same time, it is quite certain that altogether accidents are far more frequent in London. This may be accounted for by the dampness of the air, which gives rise to the peculiar greasiness of the streets, so fatal to horses; and also by the increased traffic, which leads to the accumulation of manure, another element in the slippery state of the roads.
The snail harvest has recently begun in France. The ‘poor man’s oyster’ is so appreciated by our neighbours that Paris alone consumes some forty-nine tons daily, the best kind coming from Grenoble or Burgundy. The finest specimens are carefully reared in an escargotière, or snail-park, such as the poor Capuchin monks planned in bygone days at Colmar and Weinbach, when they had no money to buy food, and so cultivated snails. But the majority are collected by the vine-dressers in the evening from the stone heaps where the snails have assembled to enjoy the dew. The creatures are then starved in a dark cellar for two months, and when they have closed up the aperture of their shell, are ready for cooking. According to the true Burgundy method, they are boiled in five or six waters, extracted from the shell, dressed with fresh butter and garlic, then replaced in the shell, covered with parsley and bread crumbs, and finally simmered in white wine.
OCCASIONAL NOTES.
THE PRESENT POSITION OF THE PETROLEUM INDUSTRY.
Mr Charles Marvin, one of the first to direct attention to the Russian petroleum fields at Baku, in speaking lately of the transference of petroleum in bulk, said that America was at present the principal petroleum power. By the development of the petroleum fields at Baku, Russia had recently sprung into the position of the second petroleum power; and Mr Marvin thought that England should come to the front and occupy the third position as soon as possible. By the annexation of King Theebaw’s dominions, we had come into possession of the Burmese petroleum fields, and he thought steps ought to be taken at once by the Indian government to survey these fields and to throw them open to British capital and enterprise. Within the last few years, since the extension of the railway, considerable petroleum deposits had been discovered in Beluchistan, but he regretted that the Indian government had decided to make them a Crown monopoly. Still more recently, petroleum in abundance had been discovered in Egypt. Since he wrote in 1882 of the Caspian petroleum fields, eighty steamers had been placed on that inland sea to carry oil in tanks from Baku to the mouth of the Volga; and on the Volga there were upwards of a hundred vessels running. At present, nearly all the petroleum arriving in Europe from America was brought in barrels; several tank steamers were, however, being constructed on the Tyne for the purpose of carrying petroleum in bulk.
Mr Phillips, in lecturing at the Royal Aquarium on this subject, said that the total shipments of refined oil from America in 1885 amounted to 6,985,637 barrels, of which the United Kingdom received 1,269,723; London taking 666,964 barrels. If the total shipments were placed in barrels end to end, like a string of beads, they would reach from London to New York. It is estimated that the world’s consumption of illuminating oil amounts to 1,800,000 gallons every day. At the present price of oil as sold retail, and taking an ordinary circular-wick burner of forty candle power, it costs about three-sixteenths of a penny per hour, which was fifty per cent. cheaper than gas. In this connection, it may be mentioned that the Balloon Society of Great Britain is offering a prize for a cheap safety-lamp suitable for universal use. The annual production of mineral oil shale has continued to increase in Scotland, until in the present year it stands at the unprecedented figure of about two million tons.
THE CRYSTALLISATION OF FRUIT.
From a paper by Consul Mason, of Marseilles, we learn a good deal about the business of preserving fruits by the crystallising process peculiar to South-eastern France, and practised on a large scale at Apt in the department of Vaucluse, at Clermont in Auvergne, as well as at Marseilles, Grasse, Avignon, and other places. It is curious to find these preserved fruits exported not only to England and the United States, but also to other countries, such as Algiers, the East and West Indies, and even South America, where nature has made the dwellers so far independent of preserved fruit. The fruits preserved by the crystallised process are chiefly pears, cherries, apricots, pine-apples, plums, figs, citrons, oranges, melons, and a dwarf orange called ‘chinois.’ Peaches are found to be too costly to be treated to any extent in this fashion.
For the purposes of crystallisation, the fruit must be fresh, clear of all decay and blemish, and of the proper degree of ripeness. The chief thing to be done in this process is to extract the juice of the fruit and replace it in the pulp with liquid sugar, which, upon hardening, not only preserves the fruit from fermentation and decay, but retains it in its original form and consistency.