“In the last few years some very interesting experiments in gardening by electricity have been made by Prof. Selim Lemström, of the University of Helsingfors. These have been carried out both upon the potted plants in the hot-house and upon plants in the open field, the insulated wires in the latter case being stretched upon poles over the plot of ground, and provided with a point for each square metre of area. The current has been supplied by Holtz machines run from eight to eighteen hours daily, the positive pole being connected with the network of wires and the negative with a zinc plate buried in the ground. The electric influence was scarcely perceptible in the growing plants, but was very marked in the yield of many species, especially of barley and wheat, of which the crop was increased by half in some cases. In the hot-house the maturity of strawberries was greatly advanced. The results have shown that plants may be divided into two groups: one, the development of which is favoured by electricity, comprising wheat, rye, barley, oats, red and white beets, parsnips, potatoes, celeriac, beans, raspberries, strawberries and leeks; and the other, whose development is more or less interfered with by electricity, including peas, carrots, kohlrabi, rutabagas, turnips, white cabbages and tobacco. The more fertile the soil, and consequently the more vigorous the vegetation, the greater has been the excess of the crop under electric influence. Prof. Lemström’s experiments up to 1887 were carried on in Finland, but he has since repeated his work in France, and demonstrated that the electric influence is the same in any climate, though likely to be injurious under a scorching sun.” REFERENCES.--Nollet, “Recherches sur l’Electricité,” pp. 366, 382; _Phil. Trans._, abridged, Vol. X. p. 384; _Electrical Review_, London, June 5, 1891, p. 707. =A.D. 1746.=--Knight (Gowan or Gowin), F.R.S., an English physician, is the first to make very powerful steel magnets. The method, which he long succeeded in keeping secret, was described after his death, in the _Phil. Trans._ for 1746–1747, Vol. XLIV. It consists of placing two magnets in the same straight line, with their opposite poles close to or very near each other, and in laying under them the bar to be magnetized after having it tempered at a cherry-red heat. The magnets are then drawn apart in opposite directions along the bar, so that the south pole of one magnet passes over the north polar half, and the north pole of the other magnet passes over the south polar half of the bar.