Produced by Josephine Paolucci, Don Kretz, Juliet Sutherland and PG Distributed Proofreaders [Illustration] SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN SUPPLEMENT NO. 497 NEW YORK, JULY 11, 1885 Scientific American Supplement. Vol. XX, No. 497. Scientific American established 1845 Scientific American Supplement, $5 a year. Scientific American and Supplement, $7 a year. * * * * * TABLE OF CONTENTS. I. CHEMISTRY AND METALLURGY.--Making Sea Water Potable. --By THOS. KAY The Acids of Wool Oil The New Absorbent for Oxygen Depositing Nickel upon Zinc.--By H.B. SLATER II. ENGINEERING AND MECHANICS.--Foundations in Quicksand, Lift Bridge over the Ourcq Canal.--3 figures St. Petersburg a Seaport.--A canal cut from Cronstadt to St. Petersburg.--Opening of same by the Emperor and Empress.--With full page engraving The New French Dispatch Boat Milan.--With engraving The Launching and Docking of Ships Sidewise.--4 figures Improved High Speed Engine.--12 figures The National Transit Co.'s Pipe Lines for the Transportation of Oil to the Seaboard.--With map and diagram The Fuel of the Future.--History of natural gas.--Relation to petroleum.--Duration of gas, etc.--With table of analyses Closing Leakages for Packing.--Use of asbestos in stuffing boxes III. TECHNOLOGY.--Luminous Paint.--Processes of manufacture Boxwood and its Substitutes.--Preparation of same for market, etc.--A paper written by J.A. JACKSON for the International Forestry Exhibition IV. ARCHAEOLOGY.--An Assyrian Bass-Relief 2,700 years old V. NATURAL HISTORY.-The Flight of the Buzzard.--By R.A. PROCTOR VI. BOTANY, ETC.--Convallaria.--A stemless perennial.--By OTTO A. WALL, M.D.--Several figures VII. MEDICINE, HYGIENE, ETC.--Gaiffe's New Medical Galvanometer.--1 figure The Suspension of Life in Plants and Animals VIII. MISCELLANEOUS.--Composite Portraits.--6 illustrations Hand-Craft and Rede-Craft.--A plea for the first named.--By D.G. GILMAN * * * * * FOUNDATIONS IN QUICKSAND. Foundations in quicksand often have to be built in places where least expected, and sometimes the writer has been able to conveniently span the vein with an arch and avoid trouble; but where it cannot be conveniently arched over, it will be necessary to sheath pile for a trench and lay in broad sections of concrete until the space is crossed, the sheath piling being drawn and reset in sections as fast as the trenches are leveled up. The piling is left in permanently if it is not wanted again for use. Sometimes these bottoms are too soft to be treated in this manner; in that case boxes or caissons are formed, loaded with stone and sunk into place with pig iron until the weight they are to carry is approximated. When settled, the weights are removed and building begins.