SCIENCE AND ENGINEERING NOTES.
By Editor
IN a recent issue of the Scientific American there appeared some interesting and useful notes on various scientific topics, and from them we select the following for the benefit of the SIGNS readers:— To open a [new] book properly, hold it with its back on a smooth or covered table. Let the front board down, then the other; now hold the leaves in one hand while you open a few leaves at the back, then a few at the front, etc., alternately opening back and front until the center of the volume is reached. If this is done two or three times, there will be no danger of breaking the volume. The pine needles of South Oregon are being utilized. The needles are first boiled and then run between horizontal wooden rollers, which extract the juice. This is called pine needle oil, which is supposed to possess medical properties. The pulp is used as a medicated material for upholstering, and is also said to be a good substitute for horsehair. It is said that insect pests will not live in furniture that has been upholstered with pine needles. Fish scales are being utilized in France, where a chemist has discovered that the scales may be used in the manufacture of artificial pearls, and our Consul at Lyons has found that the supply is inadequate, and that there is an actual demand for large quantities of the scales in his consulate, where good prices are paid for them. The scales should be sprinkled with salt as soon as they are removed from the fish, and packed in tin cans. Any specimens sent to Mr. Covert, at Lyons, will receive careful attention, and the results, with any suggestions that may be made, and particulars of price offered, will be duly reported. As the American sturgeon has the most beautiful and largest scales of almost any fish in the world, this may be of considerable importance to fishermen who engage in catching sturgeon. A bill creating a new cabinet office has been favorably acted upon by the House Committee of Mines and Mining. It provides for a cabinet officer, to be known as the Secretary of Mines and Mining. He is to have entire charge of affairs relating to mines, and the Geological Survey will be placed under his care. The Secretary is to have the same rank and salary as other cabinet officers, and he is to have an assistant, who will have the same relative rank as the First Assistant Secretary of the Interior. Another mining measure which was acted upon favorably was for the establishment of mining experiment stations in each of the mining States, somewhat similar to the agricultural experiment stations, and provides for a government geologist, at $3,500 per annum, and an assistant, at $2,500 per annum, in the mining States. These officers are to furnish assays, conduct explorations of mining regions, and issue bulletins for the public.