THE highest chimneys in the world are two in Glasgow, one being 468 feet high and the other 455 feet, while one near Cologne comes next, with a height of 441 feet. By holding the breath, wasps, bees, and hornets may be handled with impunity. The skin becomes sting proof, and holding the insect by the feet and giving it full liberty of action, you can see it drive its sting against the impenetrable surface with a force which lifts its body at every stroke; but let the smallest quantity of air escape from the lungs, and the sting will penetrate at once. “SEMAKUIR,” a Finland stone, turns black before a fall of rain, while in fine weather it is mottled with spots of white. Analysis shows this stone to be a fossil mixed with clay, and containing a portion of rock salt and niter. This salt, absorbing atmosphere, turns black when the atmosphere is supersaturated with aqueous vapor, and a dry air brings the salt in white spots to the surface. It is reported that Professor Hermann has succeeded in photographing the vowel sounds, by speaking them into a phonograph which reproduced them slowly. The vibrations were recorded by a micro-telephone, which has a small mirror in the vibrating drum. A ray of light reflected from the mirror recorded its vibrations—that is to say, the vibrations of the vowel sounds—on a traveling band of sensitized paper. STATISTICS presented at the recent Congress of German Surgeons show that in a total of 157,815 persons who took some form of anæsthetics while undergoing surgical operations, fifty-three persons died, a ratio of 1 in 2,900. Not one of these deaths occurred with persons who took simple unmixed ether, and hitherto none has happened with a mixture of chloroform, ether, and alcohol, recommended by the great Viennese surgeon, Bilroth. The congress strongly indorsed ether as the best and safest anæsthetic.