Relief has been brought in this way to vessels in distress and many
lives saved. An important example is that of the sinking of the Titanic
in 1912. By means of wireless messages from ship to ship the width of
the Pacific has been practically covered, as ships en route from America
to Australia or Asia can be kept in touch with Honolulu through almost
the entire journey. A law in the United States now requires that all
ocean passage-steamers carrying fifty or more passengers on routes of
200 miles or over must be equipped with efficient wireless apparatus and
operators. The distance reached must be at least 100 miles. The Canadian
law provides that every sea-going and coasting passenger ship of over
400 tons gross, registered in Canada, and every sea-going and coasting
freight ship of over 1,200 tons gross, shall be equipped with a wireless
apparatus. Wireless messages have been successfully sent from
aeroplanes, balloons and submarine vessels, and the naval vessels of all
nations are kept in easy communication by this method. Wireless press
messages between America and Europe are also matters of daily
performances.
* * * * *
What is Forestry Work?
A Division of Forestry was organized in the Department of Agriculture,
some years ago, and the most earnest efforts are being made to prevent
any needless waste of our timber lands.
The usefulness of forests to man lies: (1) In furnishing him with timber
for building, manufacturing, fuel, etc., and with various other useful
products of trees. (2) In their influence on climate. (3) In their
influence on water-flow, by keeping the ground more moist, making the
outflow more regular, checking the rapid melting of snow, and keeping
the hillsides from being denuded of their soil, thus setting up streams
and covering cultivated valley lands. The necessity of a proper
preservation of the forests seems highly evident, but the nations have
been slow in waking up to this fact. Several of the countries of Europe
have been largely stripped of their woodlands by indiscreet cutting in
the poorest countries, and only recently have the nations been roused to
the necessity of their conservation. This is now being carefully
attended to in several countries, especially Germany. In China broad
mountain regions have been stripped of their trees, with the result that
this soil has been swept away by the rains, leaving the rocks bare,
while broad reaches of formerly fertile lowlands have been made sterile
by the material spread over them by the rains that swept the mountain
slopes.
In the United States the broad original forests have been very largely
cut away, and those remaining have of late years been so largely reduced
by indiscriminate cutting and the ravages of carelessly kindled fires
that great alarm is felt as to the future of the lumber supply. Within
recent years vigorous efforts have been made to overcome this growing
evil. The American Forestry Association, founded in 1882, its purpose
being the conservative use of our forest resources, has now over 5,000
members, residents of every state, and of Canada and foreign countries.
The first State Forest Commission was organized by New York in 1885 and
has now a very large forest reserve set aside in the Adirondacks.
Pennsylvania has also large forest reserves in its mountain districts,
and many other states have taken similar action. The art of forestry is
also being taught in the schools, and a large body of skilled foresters
are now in the service of the states and the general government. In the
new and active movement for the conservation of national resources the
preservation of the public forests ranks high, and to aid in this
purpose the government has withdrawn as national forest areas a vast
amount of the public lands, amounting at the present time to 192,931,197
acres, an area about equal to that of Texas and Ohio combined. These
woodlands are under the charge of the National Forest Service and cared
for by about 3,000 men, of whom 250 are professional foresters. The
trees in these forests are cut with careful discrimination, and new
trees are planted to take their place, there being forest nurseries
containing about 20,000,000 plants and capable of supplying 18,000,000 a
year. New York has 1,600,000 acres in its forest reserve, Pennsylvania
over 920,000, and the reserves of the other states amount to a very
considerable area.
[Illustration: FOREST SERVICE--A LOOKOUT STATION]
[Illustration]
How did the Fashion of Wearing Cravats Commence?
Cravats get their name from the French “cravate,” meaning a croat,
because this piece of dress was adopted in the eleventh century from the
Croats who entered the French service. Towards the end of the eighteenth
and the beginning of the nineteenth century the cravat attained an
incredible degree of extravagance, but common sense at last brought in
the simpler style of neckties that has since prevailed.
How does the Gas Meter Measure Your Gas?
The quantity of gas used by each consumer is measured by an instrument
called a meter, of which there are two classes--the wet and the dry.
The wet meter is composed of an outer box about three-fifths filled with
water. Within this is a revolving four-chambered drum, each chamber
being capable of containing a definite quantity of gas, which is
admitted through a pipe in the center of the meter, and, owing to the
arrangement of the partitions of the chambers, causes the drum to
maintain a constant revolution. This sets in motion a train of wheels
carrying the hands over the dials which mark the quantity of gas
consumed.
The dry meter consists of two or three chambers, each divided by a
flexible partition or diaphragm, by the motion of which the capacity on
one side is diminished while that on the other is increased. By means of
slide valves, like those of a steam engine, worked by the movement of
the diaphragms, the gas to be measured passes alternately in and out of
each space. The contractions and expansions set in motion the clockwork
which marks the rate of consumption. The diaphragms in all the chambers
are so connected that they move in concert.
What is a Game Preserve?
Game preserves have only been introduced comparatively recently in the
United States, for the hunting grounds have been freely open to the
hunter, but they have been common in Britain and other countries of
Europe for centuries.
Their purpose here is the preservation and increase of wild animals
instead of their destruction.
Deer parks have long been kept in this country, but the first systematic
attempt to foster wild game was made about 1860 by Judge J. D. Caton in
a park of Ottawa, Ill.
Chief among those that followed on a large scale is the great game park
of Austin Corbin, near Newport, N. H., an enclosure of 36,000 acres, in
which a wire fence eight feet high encloses an oblong tract twelve by
five miles, through which passes a mountain range 3,000 feet high.
American game of all kinds are kept here, from buffalo, elk, and moose
to the smaller and more timid varieties, and there has been a rapid
increase.
Dr. J. Seward Webb has a 9,000-acre preserve in the Adirondacks, and
various other large parks have been established elsewhere, in which our
fast-disappearing game animals are augmenting in numbers and game birds
of foreign origin have been introduced.