An interesting little plant in which the rise and fall of the tides is used as motive power for the generation of electricity is described in L’Electricien.  Near Ploumanach, on the northern coast of France, where the tides have a daily range of 39 feet, a small fish pond separated from the sea by a dike is arranged with gates so that at high tide the water flows in and fills it, the gates closing automatically when the tide recedes.  The machinery of an old grist mill is used to operate a small dynamo, which charges a storage battery and furnishes light for the fish industry there.  Another wheel in the same mill works an ice making machine, the whole being under the charge of one man.  It is stated that the total daily expense for generating about 2,000 horse power hours is only $2.

Peat bogs as generators of electrical power are suggested by Dr. Frank in Stahl und Eisen.  He says that the great peat bogs of North Germany may be thus utilized, and figures that one acre of bog, averaging 10 feet in thickness, contains about 1,000 tons of dried peat, or 313,000 tons per square mile; and 430 square miles would be equivalent in heating power to the 80,000,000 to 85,000,000 tons of coal annually mined in Germany.  The bogs of the Ems Valley alone cover 13,000 square miles; and Dr. Frank proposes the erection in that district of a 10,000 horse power electric station, which would yearly consume 200,000 tons of peat, or the product of 200 acres.  He would use the electrical energy on the Dortmund and Emshaven Canal, and for the manufacture of calcium carbide.

The success attending an application of electric towing on the Burgundy Canal was such that two new applications of electricity to canal haulage and also for barge propulsion were made last year in the neighborhood of Dijon, on the same canal, under the superintendence of M. Gaillot, Ingenieur des Ponts et Chaussees.  In the method of haulage, says The London Engineer, the receptor dynamo is mounted on a tricycle, to which the name of “electric horse” has been given, and which, running on the towing path, takes its current from an air line consisting of two wires, mounted five meters (nearly 17 feet) above the surface.  This “horse,” which weighs two tons, and is guided by a driver mounted upon it through the front wheel, proceeds on the towing path like a traction engine; and the boats are connected with it by a rope, with automatic disengaging gear, in case the force of the stream or a gust of wind should drive a boat backward.  Speeds of from 1,990 to 4,240 meters (mean 3,319 yards) were obtained with the electric horse, towing from three to four boats, so that it is more suitable than the electric propeller for towage in rivers or very long reaches; but it requires a driver, while the propeller, with which speeds of from 2,150 to 4,240 meters (mean 3,406 yards) per hour were obtained, is worked by the bargee on board his boat.  The towing path is not worn,