Melting Tin on a Card.

Place some tin upon an ordinary business card and hold it over the flame of a spirit lamp. The tin becomes completely melted, but the card remains unburnt, the heat being entirely absorbed by the metal, which draws it through the card into itself. It is through a similar effect that metals appear cold to us when we take them in our hands; by their conductibility they remove the heat from our hands, and give us the peculiar impression which we do not experience when we handle substances that are bad conductors, such as wood or woolen materials.

Changing Flowers From Red to Green.

To do this take the columbine; on dipping it into ammoni acal ether, which can be readily obtained from the druggist, the blossom will change its color to a beautiful green. The experimenter should be careful not to inhale the fumes of the ether.

Changing the Color of the Rose.

Take a common full-blown rose, and having thrown flour of sulphur into a chafing dish of hot coals, hold the rose over the fumes thereof, and it will change to nearly white. If the rose has been a long time plucked, the white will be perfectly so. Afterward dip it in water a short time, lay it aside for a few hours, and its color will return as the effects of the sulphur are decomposed. A damp or humid atmosphere will bring about the same decomposition, but slower.

To Melt Steel as Easily as Lead.

Heat a piece of steel in the fire until it is red, then take it out and touch it with a piece of brimstone. As soon as the brimstone touches the steel the metal will melt and drop down like liquid.

To Make Fireproof Paper.

Dip a sheet of paper in a strong solution of alum water, and, after drying it, repeat the process three times; then, hold it in the flame, and it will not burn. To one who does not understand the process your sheet of paper has undergone, the surprise will be great.

The Three Spectral Wafers.

Place three different colored wafers, say red, violet, and orange, upon a piece of white paper, in a triangular form, and fix your eyes steadily on them for two minutes, and then turn them away from the wafers to a blank part of the paper, and you will see three spectral wafers; but the colors will be different; the red wafer is now represented by green, the violet by yellow, and the orange by blue.

To Mesmerize a Rooster.

Take a rooster and place him on a table. Point his beak down as straight as possible, and let some one draw a line with a piece of chalk directly from the beak for about two feet. This will make the rooster cataleptic, or put him in a mesmerized state, and he will stand perfectly still for some time, as if transfixed, to the amusement of the audience.

Miraculous Lifting.

This surprising trick is for five persons to place their forefingers under the sixth person and lift him up. One lifts the chin, two others the elbows, and two others the hollows of the insteps. If the person weighs 140 pounds, each person will lift twenty pounds. The lifted person will seem to dance up and down like a feather to the astonishment of the audience.

To Bring a Dead Fly to Life.

Take a dead fly-one killed by drowning-put it in a glass or cup full of water, and cover up so as deprive the fly of al air. When the fly becomes motionless take it out, put it in the sun, and cover it with salt. In two minutes it will come to life and fly away. The fly may have been dead twenty-four hours.

A Jumping Egg.

An egg being placed in a wine-glass, it is possible, by forcible blowing between the egg and the side of the glass, to make the egg leap from the glass, and even into another glass placed near it. It will be seen that much amusement can be obtained by very simple experiments, requiring little or no apparatus, while receiving at the same time valuable lessons in the laws of physics.

A Lamp that will Burn a Year.

Take a stick of phosphorus and put it into a large dry phial not corked, and it will afford a light sufficient to discern any object in a room when held near it. The phials should be kept in a cool place where there is no great current of air, and it will continue its luminous appearance for more than twelve months.

Instantaneous Crystallizations.

The following experiment illustrates in a striking manner the process of instantaneous crystallizations:

Let one hundred and fifty parts of hyposulphite of soda be dissolved in fifteen parts of water, and the solution slowly poured into a test-glass, previously warmed by means of boiling water, until the vessel is half full. One hundred parts of acetate of soda is then dissolved in fifteen parts of water, and

that they form two The two solutions After it has been

poured slowly into the first solution, so layers perfectly distinct from each other. are then covered with a little boiling water. left to stand and cool slowly, we have two solutions of hyposulphite of soda and acetate of soda superposed on each other. A thread, at the end of which is fixed a small crystal of hyposulphite of soda, is then lowered into the test-glass; hardly does it reach the lower solution of hyposulphite when it crystallizes instantaneously. We then lower into the upper solution a crystal of acetate of soda, suspended from another cord, when this salt also crystallizes.

Hands and Face Become Black by Washing.

Take a few galls, bruise them to a fine powder, and strew the powder nicely upon a towel; then put a little ground copperas into a basin of water, which will dissolve and leave the water perfectly transparent. After any person has washed in this water and wiped with the towel on which the galls were strewed, his hands and face will immediately become black; but in a few days, by washing with soap, they will again be come clean.

LIST OF AUTHORS.

MELVILLE D. LANDON .9, 80, 138, 254, 263, 266, 304, 525, 708, 721, 742

...199, 379, 431, 442, 507, 508, 509, 512, 548, 639, 704