SOMME. This department of France pro duces oleaginous seeds, beetroot, potherbs, hops, dyeing and medicinal plants, grass seeds, and apples for making cider and beer, which are the chief beverages of the inha bitants. A great deal of hemp and flax is grown in the north of the department. The minerals are building stone, paving flints, marble, chalk, vitriolic earth, potters' clay, and gypsum ; coal has been found near Doullens, but no mines are worked. The manufactures are important, comprising fine and coarse woollen cloths, cotton fabrics of every descrip tion ; also silks, linen, lawn, cambric, gauze, 'cashmere shawls, canvas, furniture, cotton, carpets, muslin, hosiery, ropes; locks, hard ware, nails, leather, paper, oil, soap, glue, glass, pottery, mineral acids and other chemi cal 1Voducts. The department has several bleach works, large cotton mills driven by kteare machinery, beet-root sugar refineries, dye-houses, oil and tan mills. The commerce iu the agricultural and industrial products named above, and in salt, colonial provisions,' wine, brandy, coals, raw cotton, sheep and , goats' wool, fish, kc., is very considerable.
SONOMtTER. Mr. T. Wakley introduced, in 1849, an ingenious acoustic instrument, not for enabling partially deaf persons to hear, but measure the extent of their power of hearing, so as to enable the aurist to adapt his curative means to the circumstances of each case. The instrument, which is called a consists of a bell fixed to a table with its .mouth uppermost. The hammer or clapper which is to strike the bell is attached to a spring, which catches into notches in a steel bar; and according as the spring is de tained in a notch near the end or the middle of the bar, so does the hammer make a small or a considerable movement when released, and so does it elicit a soft or a loud sound from the bell. The aurist determines by periment which of these sounds can be heard by the patient, and the instrument thus be comes a meter or measure of the auditive power.