Science/Nature Books

MACHINE TOOLS FOR BOILER-MAKERS. We give this week an engraving of a radial drilling machine designed especially for the use of boiler-makers, this machine, together with the plate bending rolls, forming portion of a plant constructed for Messrs. Beesley and Sons, boiler makers, of Barrow-in-Furness. [Illustration: IMPROVED BOILER PLATERADIAL DRILL.] This radial drill, which is a tool of substantial... more...

In admiring the recent developments of electric science as evidenced by the number of important inventions which have during the past few years been given to the world, especially in those branches of applied science which deal more particularly with the generation of electricity and the production of the electric light, there is often too great a tendency to forget, or, at least, to pass over in... more...

IMPROVED FIFTEEN TON CRANE. IMPROVED FIFTEEN TON TRAVELING CRANE.The machine illustrated on first page has been constructed for Port Alfred Harbor, this being one of several harbors now being made by Sir J. Coode in South Africa. The pier for the construction of which the crane will be employed will consist of concrete blocks laid on what is known as the "overend system." The blocks, being... more...

NEW EIGHTY TON STEAM HAMMER AT THE SAINT CHAMOND WORKS Ever since the improvements that have been introduced into the manufacture of steel, and especially into the erection of works for its production, have made it possible to obtain this metal in very large masses, it has necessarily been preferred to iron for all pieces of large dimensions, inasmuch as it possesses in the highest degree that... more...

The death of this distinguished man must be recorded. An interesting résumé of his labors by M. Daubree has appeared, from which we take the following facts. After a training in his native town at the Lyceum of Metz, which furnished so many scholars to the Polytechnic school, Delesse was admitted at the age of twenty to this school. In 1839 he left to enter the Corps des Mines. From the beginning of... more...

A Chemist of merit, Mr. A. Müntz, who has already made himself known by important labors and by analytical researches of great precision, has been led to a very curious and totally unexpected discovery, on the subject of which he has kindly given us information in detail, which we place before our readers.[1] Mr. Müntz has discovered that arable soil, waters of the ocean and streams, and the... more...

MR. E. H. PLUMACHER, U. S. Consul at Maracaibo, sends to the State Department the following information touching the wealth of coal and petroleum probable in Venezuela: The asphalt mines and petroleum fountains are most abundant in that part of the country lying between the River Zulia and the River Catatumbo, and the Cordilleras. The wonderful sand-bank is about seven kilometers from the confluence of... more...

In consequence of the interest that has been recently excited on the subject of bread reform, we have, says the London Miller, translated the interesting contribution of H. Mège-Mouriès to the Imperial and Central Society of Agriculture of France, and subsequently published in a separate form in 1860, on "Wheat and Wheat Bread," with the illustration prepared by the author for the... more...

TOMBS OF THE FIRST EGYPTIAN DYNASTY. By LUDWIG BORCHARDT, Ph.D., Director of the German School in Cairo. For many years various European collections of Egyptian antiquities have contained a certain series of objects which gave archæologists great difficulty. There were vases of a peculiar form and color, greenish plates of slate, many of them in curious animal forms, and other similar things. It was... more...

EMPEROR WILLIAM II. OF GERMANY. Since William II. of Germany ascended the throne as German Emperor and King of Prussia, on June 15, 1888, the eyes of Europe have been fixed on him. He has always been rather an unknown quantity, and he is regarded by the powers as an enfant terrible. The press of the world delights in showing up his weak points, and the "war lord" undoubtedly has them, but, at... more...