eggs before they are of much use for actual nutriment; and many a child has been starved to death through its parents' ignorance of this fact. It is true, medical men often recommend arrowroot for those in delicate health, as it is of great importance to keep up the natural heat of the body with the least exertion of the digestive organs; but it can not be too widely known that arrowroot pure and simple is a mere heat-producer; and milk, beef-tea, soup, or other suitable flesh-forming food, must be given with it, if the child or invalid is to be kept alive. On the other hand, semolina, hominy, lentil-meal, pea-flour, etc., not being prepared by washing, contain a much greater amount of flesh-forming material than sago, arrowroot, etc.
The starches are largely used in several important manufactures. Dextrine or British gum is prepared by heating starch to a temperature of about 400° Fahr., and is preferred to gum-arabic because it is not so liable to crack or curl up the stamps or other paper prepared with it. Immense quantities of starch are used, too, in the manufacture of glucose or grape-sugar, which has exactly the same composition as starch, and is prepared by acting on the starch with sulphuric acid (oil of vitriol), which has the same effect as the ptyaline of the saliva. Linen rags are largely used for the same purpose, too; and, indeed, it is wonderful how few things are altogether useless at the present day. Old boots and horns provide some of our most brilliant colors; while dye-colors innumerable are made from the refuse of out gas-works; and the wash-heaps of our factories are proving mines of wealth, instead of mounds of rubbish.—Chambers's Journal.
| SKETCH OF SIR WILLIAM E. LOGAN, LL.D., F.G.S. |
JAMES LOGAN, the grandfather of Sir William, came to Montreal from the parish of Stirling, Scotland, about 1784, bringing his wife and two sons. He established himself as a baker in that city, the occupation he had followed at home, and was assisted in the business by his older son William, then a young man. After a few years, Miss Janet E. Edmond came to Montreal from Scotland, and was married to her cousin William. The third of their nine children, William Edmond Logan, the subject of this sketch, was born April 20, 1798. The first school to which he was sent was one kept by a Scotchman in Montreal; but, in 1814, he and one of his brothers were sent over to Scotland and placed in an advanced class in the Edinburgh High School. The studies of the school were mainly classical. During his two years here, young William was much of the time "dux" of his class, and won several prizes. In the mean time his father, leaving his oldest son to manage the business in Montreal, had removed the
