Before beginning to mount pictures trim each one and lay it on the card on which it is to be mounted. Some amateurs when mounting pictures always mark where the picture is to be placed on the card. This is not necessary, for the eye can be readily trained to see when a picture is straight if the picture itself is properly trimmed.
A simple arrangement for drying negatives is made by taking a stout wire, bending it in the middle at a right angle, and then bending the ends over to make short hooks, which clasp the edges of a plate. The wire should be bent close enough so that it is necessary to spring it a little to fit it to the plate. Put the wet side of the plate toward the wire, and set the plate on a shelf with the edge resting on the shelf, the wire supporting it somewhat after the fashion of an easel.
In filtering solutions, unless one has a fluted glass funnel, the filtering paper adheres to the glass and allows the liquid to pass through very slowly. A simple way to hurry the process is to fold the circle of filtering paper together, and then fold it from the centre back and forth like a fan. Crease the folds so that they will remain, and when put in the funnel there will be spaces between the glass and the paper through which the solution will run very quickly.
Films are quite inclined to curl both in the developing solution and in the fixing solution. This necessitates pushing them down into the fixing bath, and often causes much annoyance to the operator. If the hypo is put into a large glass tumbler the film may be curled round a bottle, and the bottle set in the tumbler of hypo, which will do away with any trouble of keeping the film down into the hypo. The bottle should be clean, and filled with water so that it will set flat in the tumbler.
Sir Knight Frank Evans, Jun., 1116 Brown Street, Philadelphia, Pa., wishes to correspond with some of the Camera Club members. Sir Knight Frank says he has some good formulas which he would be pleased to send to the Camera Club. We shall be glad to have them and to publish them. Send full directions for use, please, and write on one side of the paper only.
Sir Knight Ragean Tuttle, Auburn, Col., asks where to get the photographic supplies mentioned in the Round Table. They may be bought of any reliable dealer in photographic goods.
Lady Mana M. Monahan, of Michigan, asks the address of a good school of photography. At Effingham, Ill., is a school of photography called Illinois College of Photography, where all the branches of photography are taught.
Sir Knight Herschel F. Davis wants to know the right exposure for a moonlight view, with largest stop, and if it will blur the plate to include the moon in the picture. From a half-hour to an hour is the usual time given for a moonlight view, according to the brightness of the light. The moon may be included in the picture, and will not have a halo; but the moon, instead of being round, will make a longer or shorter streak on the plate, according to the length of time it is exposed, as, of course, with the motion of the earth and moon, it will have traversed quite a space in the course of an hour.
A CHANCE FOR AN EXPERIMENT.
Have plants intelligence? Do they ever think? These are interesting questions that would have to be answered by the statement of an observer of the ways of pumpkins and melons. Says he: "Plants often exhibit something very much like intelligence. If a bucket of water, during a dry season, be placed a few inches from a growing pumpkin or melon vine, the latter will turn from its course, and in a day or two will get one of its leaves in the water."
We do not vouch for the truth of this, but if there be any young gardeners among the readers of the Round Table it might make an interesting experiment for them next summer when they are pursuing their avocation.