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Charles Dickens, we are told, had no idea of the real cockney lingo, to judge from his books:

'What he set down as the speech of the masses I never once heard in London, and what the cockney lingo really is he gives no hint of in a single line that I can recall in all his books. Had he been dealing realistically with his characters, he could not have made Master Charles Bates say, 'Pray, pray, send them back; the old lady will think I stole them,' because what the thief must have said is, 'Pry, pry, send,' etc.; 'the hold lidy will think I stole 'em.' Dickens makes Bates say, 'Hold me while I laugh it out,' whereas we all know he must have said, * Old me whoile I laugh it aout.'"

WILL AMERICA BECOME THE LITERARY SUCCESSOR OF GREECE?

"THE

HE United States having now established her preeminence in trade and commerce over all other nations of the round earth, it remains for her to conquer certain other worlds and give us a new example of the sublime sovereignty perhaps only once before in the history of nations indubitably wielded by one state against all challengers." This is the brilliant program for the future of intellectual America laid down by the editor of The Herald (Kobe, Japan), a journal published under British auspices. Greece, he goes on to say, before she became a province of Rome, possessed the "dominion of the worlds of mind and of matter in a more authentic sense than any power before or since." Chaldea, Assyria, Babylonia, and Egypt were great powers, but none of these made the "conquest of the world of mind that Greece made while retaining also the political dominion of the important territories of the then known world." It was "a conjunction of a territorial dominion, comparatively the most important and most complete of the times, with a triumph of the powers of the mind which has never been paralleled.” Rome was great as a physical empire, but in the realm of mind she merely followed Greece. Italy was "greatest in the new enthusiasm of learning" which came in the Middle Ages; but she was divided and feeble as a political entity. The day of England's intellectual greatness was not the day of her physical might. France followed with "a fine attempt to realize intellectual and physical supremacy in the world; but the age of the Grand Monarque, splendidly as it shone, never had the luster which is thrown down the ages by the polity and the genius of Greece." Goethe has not brought Germany into rivalry with ancient Hellas. Will America enter that rivalry? It is agreed, says this writer, that "she has come into an inheritance of commercial supremacy which will more and more raise her on the pedestal of a power-a new kind of power comparatively-as unique and certainly as secure as the political supremacy of Greece in her day." But "will she, or can she, possess the same or similar dominion in the kingdom where the mind rules as that held by the genius of Greece in her day?" He does not see many signs of such a dominion. He says:

"Physically we know that she is a weld of all the nations that have divided the mantle of Greece among them, and who now hold the portions thereof. But the signs are few of a possible autocracy of the mind arising in the American republic. She has no contemporary poetry, no philosophy of her own, present or past, no great drama, nor any art that is not as art has been since Greece was, or at least since medieval Italy. American genius has created nothing-nothing that is peculiar, nothing that never was known before, except perhaps its humor, and that is a slim foundation of immortality. America has created

a new commerce, perhaps also she has created new politics; she claims to have created a new diplomacy, which is wonderful in its way if we recall that diplomacy is as old as the serpent and the forbidden fruit. Perhaps the question is-Is there anything left for genius to create? If there be, ten thousand American voices will proclaim that American genius will create it! But will it?"

WORD-COINAGE BY LIVING AMERICAN AUTHORS.

THE

Most of us can

HE English language continues to grow. remember when the number of words as recorded in "Webster's Unabridged” first reached the hundred thousand mark. Now some of the dictionaries include over 300,000, and to keep near that number they are compelled to discard 200,000 words because they are no longer "alive," or are ultra-technical, or for some other reason. Most of this growth has been, of course, in the line of technical words. Many of the new words come from the streets, where they are called slang until some reputable speaker or author gives them countenance and they pass into the language as duly credentialed additions. Others are minted by our poets and essayists and novelists striving to express some shade of meaning or some appearance of nature in a single word.

Mr. Leon Mead has been conducting an investigation in regard to the last form of additions to the language, and he has secured communications from a number of living authors. "Some of the most facile as well as the boldest writers in the gild of American letters to-day," he writes in The Chautauquan (August), "have never coined any words; they do not believe in such experiments; they say that the English language of Shakespeare, Burke, Ruskin, and Washington Irving is good enough for them." But Mr. Mead regards this as the purist's point of view, and thinks that if all men assumed that inflexible attitude our language would be at a standstill. Indeed, he discovers that some of the purists have themselves sinned, if coining words be a sin, for he finds evidence of it in their published works in spite of their disinclination openly to father new words. Some of those who have disclaimed or do not remember having coined any words are: Theodore Roosevelt, Lew Wallace, D. C. Gilman, Prof. Walter A. Wyckoff, Richard Henry Stoddard, F. Marion Crawford, Henry James, W. D. Howells, Charles Dudley Warner, John Burroughs, Owen Wister, Frederick J. Stimson, Donald G. Mitchell, Oscar Fay Adams, Mrs. Amelia E. Barr, Mrs. Margaret Deland, Mrs. M. E. W. Sherwood, Mrs. Margaret E. Sangster, Kate Douglas Wiggin, Mrs. Ella Wheeler Wilcox, and Margaret Sutton Briscoe.

The list of self-confessed "coiners," however, is equally strong, numerically and otherwise. Edmund Clarence Stedman "has a distinct recollection of only one of his 'coinages'—lyronym, an assumed name under which a poet may write." Thomas Wentworth Higginson likewise owns up to using one new word when he wrote, "As the spring comes on and the densening outlines of the elm give daily a new design for a Grecian urn." Prof. Henry A. Beers, of Yale, once used the noun chumlock, in analogy to wedlock, and the word sphinxy, dealing in riddles. Somewhere he employed also the verb troll, to ride on a trolley-car. He pleads in extenuation that these were all playful suggestions. Thomas Dunn English once said in an oration that the French people “form a metropoliarchy." Clinton Scollard wrote of "The tiny king-cup that upon the floor of emerald meads unurns its ample gold," has had something to say about "bold warfarers," and has told of something that happened or didn't happen "on a morning moany." Edgar Saltus believes evidently in free coinage. He can not recall all his own new words, but he admits that "there are a lot of them." His most recent achievements are monopolian and automobilically. Mrs. Gertrude

Atherton's confessed coinages are littleist, as descriptive of the would-be realist, and United Statesman, in lieu of American, the latter being "a descriptive term to which all North and South Americans have an equal right." Ernest Ingersoll recalls only quotated, to designate a paragraph marked as quoted by the use of quotation marks. Prof. J. H. Hyslop has coined conferentia in contrast with differentia; velleity, for the lowest kind of desire; univolism, the "theory of volition that denies alternative choice," and kakistocracy as the antonym of aristocracy. Captain Alfred T. Mahan once used eventless. Henry Val Dyke says, "There was once a little river that could not be described by any other adjective than water-fally, and a bird whose song seemed to me wild-flowery." Lloyd Mifflin has placed thistle finch "on the mullein's tipmost top." Joel Benton also has forgotten most of his verbal coinages, but remembers hypethral, in the sense (adjectively) of out-of-doors; dendral, for woody growths; and poethood, analogous to priesthood. Richard Burton acknowledges cynophiles to characterize lovers of dogs. Viewpoint, watchpoint, and guide—in place of “guidance"-are words which Edgar Fawcett is willing to father, and Robert Burns Wilson "stands for " unimpressioned and for brit, which, he says (and he ought to know), means grating harsh

ness.

MOST POPULAR BOOKS OF THE MONTH.

THE

HE report from leading booksellers and librarians for the month of July (in The World's Work, September) show Mr. Churchill's new novel in the lead and Miss Runkle's second on both lists. Not only was "The Crisis" in the lead in each composite list, but it was also first on each separate list sent by the booksellers. "Tarry Thou Till I Come" moved up from twelfth place on the book-dealers' list for June to the sixth place on the list for July. The great majority of books on each list are, of course, works of fiction, those that are not fiction being Captain Evans's "A Sailor's Log," Booker T. Washington's "Up from Slavery," Allen's "Life of Phillips Brooks," and "The Life and Letters of Huxley." The lists are as follows:

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OVER

REMARKABLE PRICES PAID AT ART SALES. VER five million dollars change hands annually at the art sales conducted in London. Nothing, not even the war in South Africa, seems to depress the prices at these sales, according to Mr. W. Roberts, who gives in The National Review (August) a selection from scores of catalogs to indicate the immense "turn-over" that takes place. "The Heckscher "—a Louis XV. oval gold snuff-box, 34 by 14 inches-cost originally £1,500, and was sold this year for £3.350. At the head of all, in the sales for the last two years in London, is the price paid for a pair of decorative pieces of furniture of the Louis XV. period, signed by the ébeniste Joseph and with the mounts executed by Caffieri. "They are of oak, veneered with king and tulip-wood, the latter inlaid parqueterie-wise in the panels, forming a background for the branches of floral ornaments that decorate the fronts and sides, the whole most elaborately mounted with chased ormolu, and each being 511⁄2 in. wide, 241⁄2 in. deep, and 35 in. high.” The price paid for them last June was $75,000 (£15,000). The writer in The National Review comments as follows on the influence upon prices which the American invasion has had :

"During the past ten or twenty years a new element has entered into art sales, and this has had an immense influence in driving the prices for the finest articles up to figures beyond all precedent. I refer to American competition. It is obvious that the supply of works of art of the sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth centuries, whether pictures, engravings, furniture, or objets-d'art generally, can not last forever. The artists and artisans of olden times worked slowly, and the malign influence of the sweater was unknown. During the last three-quarters of a century the number of public museums has increased enormously, and private collectors now form, not a small band, but a big crowd."

Notable sales of private collections during the season just ended were those of the Hope Edwards collection for $175,000 (£35,780), the Robinson and Fisher pictures for $165,000 (£33,800), and the H. A. Blyth engravings for $105,000 (£21,700). These, and fifteen other sales during the past five seasons occupied about forty days and produced a total of over three-quarters of a million pounds sterling. Mr. Roberts says further:

"Within the last few years the demand for portraits of pretty women has developed into a perfect craze, and prices out of all proportion to artistic merit have been paid, season after season. Male portraits by the same artists, and of far higher corresponding artistic value, have excited very little attention, and realize ridiculously smaller prices. This is one of the many curious anomalies which prevail in the saleroom; it can not be explained in a tangible and logical manner, but the fact remains. For a time the supply of Reynolds, Gainsborough, and Romney portraits of pretty women-it would perhaps be ungallant to say the portraits of women whom these and other artists have immortalized as beautiful-seems to have almost given out. The natu

ral consequence of this is that collectors are satisfying themselves with the next best articles. A few years ago four or five figures for a Hoppner or Raeburn would have been regarded as almost beyond the range of sanity. But the absurdities of one generation become the religious faith of the next. In the case of Romney, one of the pictures in the list I am about to give realized nearly as much as the artist earned in three of his best years of hard work! Even when his charges were highest, Romney appears to have received only about twenty guineas or twenty-five guineas for a head and shoulders, and about forty guineas for a half-length. One would willingly risk even the possible change of fashion in the near future, and gladly lay in a stock of Romneys at these figures. Romney's charges appear to have been less than Sir Joshua Reynolds', but they may be taken as being about the prices at that time paid."

In the 1901 sales a Hoppner brought 14,050 guineas, a Raeburn 2,000, and a Romney 5,600, all portraits of women. In view of the scarcity of Reynolds portraits found nowadays at auction sales, an account, just published in Harper's Weekly, of the

lucky purchase by two Americans this season of a genuine Sir Joshua Reynolds has attracted considerable attention. To quote the article:

"The two visitors [at Christies'] wandered around, catalog in hand, somewhat oppressed with the dulness of the occasion, and finally paused in front of No. 71, 'Portrait of Dr. Johnson, by Sir Joshua Reynolds.' This they promptly repudiated as a copy, and a mighty poor copy, too. The next number in the catalog, 72, read, 'Reynolds (unframed) Robinetta.' It was a most unprepossessing canvas, black, grimy, and sooty in aspect, an uncared-for, frameless outcast among a multitude of characterless associates. The face of a young girl could be discerned, very dimly, and through the veil of dirt it seemed to be illuminated by light reflected from an arm bared to the sunshine. Then presently the eyes seemed to reveal themselves, and after a long hard look one of the transatlantic visitors said to the other, 'That's a scandalous-looking thing, but I've got to have it!'"

An art dealer was commissioned to buy the picture at the next auction.

He did so, paying but five pounds. It turned out that the portrait was misnamed. The Robinetta has been for years in the National Gallery and this was a picture entitled "The Laughing Girl." By reason of the false title it had been looked upon with suspicion. But it is a genuine Reynolds, and since purchasing it the owner has refused an offer of $25,000 for the painting.

THE LATE SIR WALTER BESANT AND IMPROVED CONDITIONS OF AUTHORSHIP. IR WALTER BESANT, it is commonly believed, will find one of his best titles to remembrance in the long-continued and effective labors which he undertook in England for betterment in the status of literary workers. The service which he rendered to literature by the creation of the Society of Authors is the principal portion of his work in this field, altho in numerous ways he lent encouragement to new writers, and in general upheld the rights and dignity of the author's craft. Literature (London, June 15), speaking particularly of the reforms brought about by the Society of Authors, which have had a strong indirect influence in this country as well, says:

"At first that society was sadly misrepresented, and it is not impossible that misconceptions still prevail as to its aims. But its objects really are, and always have been, very simple; and the ideas which inspire its energies can be, and indeed often have been, expressed in two or three simple propositions. These

are:

"1. Literature has as good a claim to rank among the learned professions as Law, Physic, and Divinity.

"2. There is a popular contempt for men of letters based upon the belief that their calling is a beggarly one in which there is no money to be made.

"3. Men of letters would make a vast deal more money than they do if they knew enough of the ins and outs of the publishing trade to be able to enter into business relations with the publishers upon equal terms.

"4. In order that this knowledge may be collected and disseminated authors must combine.

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'Authors were so little accustomed to combining that it was no easy task to impress these simple ideas upon their minds. But Sir Walter Besant had a genius for this kind of task, and he hammered on till the ideas were driven home. Authors gradually realized two things: first that the society they were invited to join was not a Mutual Admiration Society, but a Society for the Defense of Literary Property; secondly, that there was no more objection to such a society than to a Landlords' Protection Association or a Liberty and Property Defense League. One after another they came in with their guineas, enabling the society to get to work; and the society naturally found plenty of work to do. Authors had shown a confiding innocence in their commercial transactions, and it is hardly too much to say that

any man with a little capital had only to call himself a publisher in order to make very questionable profits, without being brought to book. The society changed this condition of things. Such profits could no longer be made with impunity. But, of course, the society has done more than expose indefensible practises. Without in any way presuming to interfere with freedom of contract between author and publisher, it has effectually prevented any ignorance as to the meaning of contracts, and the possible consequences of acceding to their terms. It has shown, for instance, what it costs to produce any given kind of book, and what can or can not be claimed as the custom of the trade; and on various points on which the law seemed doubtful it has taken and published the opinion of counsel. And this, of course, to the benefit not only of authors, but also of those publishers who wanted to act fairly. For, of course, the many who wished to act fairly had nothing to lose and everything to gain from the removal of the competition of the men who wished to act unfairly. Some of them, like Mr. Andrew Tuer, joined the society. Others, like Messrs. Longmans, showed their general approval of its purposes by voluntarily admitting certain of its claims— the right, for instance, of an author who had not sold his copyright to inspection of his publishers' books. Unquestionably Sir Walter Besant did a great work in founding a society which has become so powerful an instrument for good. It is still more to his credit that he established it on such a basis that it ceased to be dependent on him. He retired from the position of chairman of the committee of management some years ago. He has had worthy successors in Sir Frederick Pollock, Sir William Conway, Mr. Rider Haggard, and Mr. Anthony Hope Hawkins. He did not want to be necessary to the society, and he was not. The work will go on, as he would have wished it to."

NOTES.

A NEW French poet of promise has appeared in the Count du Bois, the author of a series of romantic novels. His "Les Rhapsodies Passionnées," recently published, calls forth a highly laudatory review in The Fortnightly Review (August), written by Richard Davey, who asserts that the Count's poetry "compares favorably with that of Musset at his best," The verses seem to have been inspired by residence of the author in London.

ONE of the more interesting features of the educational exhibit in the Pan-American Exposition is that of the Correspondence Schools, which are of comparatively new development, but which are conducting operations whose magnitude is hardly suspected by many ordinarily well-posted perOne such school, it is said, has over one-quarter of a million of pupils on its rolls. In the display in Buffalo the object has not been to show results so much as methods of work, such as sample question papers and the replies thereto.

sons.

Ir is announced that Professor Fiske's death will not delay the publication of his "History of the Two Americas," to which his last few years had been devoted. He had already finished reading the proofs of the first two volumes, entitled severally "The Colonization of the New World" and "The Independence of the New World." The third volume, "The Modern Development of the New World," was also completed by him with the exception of the index. These volumes form part of a series of twenty-four volumes entitled "A History of All Nations," by various authors, under the editorship of Professor Wright, of Harvard University. The whole series will be published together this autumn.

A COPY of the first folio Shakespeare was sold in London last month for the record-breaking price of £1,720. The Sun (New York) gives the following table of prices from the date of publication down to the present day:

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SCIENCE AND INVENTION.

THE INTELLIGENCE OF WASPS.

A VOLUME on this subject has been recently issued by Mr.

and Mrs. G. W. Peckham, well known for their works on the habits of spiders and allied topics. We quote the following from a review of the work and of the general subject contributed by Prof. A. S. Packard, of Brown University, to The Independent (New York). Says Professor Packard :

"As is well known, most of the solitary wasps sting, paralyze, and store up in their deep tunnels spiders or caterpillars as food for their young. A favorite subject for observation was Ammophila arenaria, which uses caterpillars to store its nest. One was observed attacking a caterpillar. Notwithstanding the struggles of the worm, she finally lifted it from the ground, curved the end of her abdomen under its body, and darted her sting between the third and fourth segments. The worm was paralyzed, limp, and helpless. But, not content with this, withdrawing her sting she plunged it successively between the third and second, and between the second and first segments, and then left it lying on the ground. For a moment the wasp circled above it, and then, descending, seized it again, farther back this time, and with great deliberation and nicety of action gave it four more stings, beginning between the ninth and tenth segments and progressing backward.' Then she rested, and smoothing her body with her long hind-legs, washed her face with her forelegs. Two other wasps of the same kind stung their prey in different places, and one of them adopted the process of malaxation, which consists in repeatedly squeezing the neck of the caterpillar between her jaws, turning it around and around so that all sides were equally affected. The wasp lays her egg on one side in the middle of the caterpillar. In making her nest she bores in the earth an inch deep, and then excavates a larger chamber or pocket in which the caterpillars are stored. On closing up the hole the wasp wedges a good-sized piece of earth or a stone deep down into the neck of the burrow, filling the space above solidly

the wonderful and unerring instincts of these insects will have to be given up.

"The Peckhams also confirm the observations of others that some of the solitary wasps have the remarkable habit of cutting off some or all of the legs of the spiders that they use for storing in their nests. If the legs were not removed they would be too large for their coffin.

As

"Another point about which there is now a decided difference of opinion is that of the homing faculty' or 'sense of direction' of insects. A recent German naturalist denies that ants and bees are guided by memory in returning to their homes, and thinks that they are guided by something like scent; hence the act, he thinks, is rather reflex than instinctive or rational. our authors state: The sight of a bee or wasp returning to its home, without hesitation or uncertainty, from some far distant spot is, indeed, marvelous. When we saw our first Ammophila perform this feat, we were filled with wonder.' Our authors repeatedly saw different wasps study the locality about their nest, apparently observing the objects near, until they became so thoroughly acquainted with the topography that they could return directly to their nest. They claim that from their observations both of social and solitary wasps the homing faculty is not instinctive, but is the direct outcome of individual experience.

"Finally they conclude that wasps act intelligently as well as instinctively that acts which are instinctive in one species may be intelligent in another, while there is a considerable variation in the amount of intelligence displayed by different individuals of the same species. After many years spent in studies on the habits of insects they corroborate the view expressed by others, remarking that a single wasp. 'uninfluenced in any way by the example of those about it, displays unusual intelligence in grappling with the affairs of life.' They change their mode of nesting, all their changes being 'intelligent adaptations to new modes of life, serving to keep the species in harmony with its surroundings.""

A WINDMILL ON SHIPBOARD.

with smaller stones and earth. In all cases the mode of closing THE following description of the installation of a windmill

and other details differ with different individuals. There seems considerable variation in their nesting instincts. In fact in all the wasps the nature of the work differs with the individual. The most remarkable case was that of an Ammophila which used a little stone as a tool and made an intelligent use of it. She actually, after covering over her nest with her jaws, picked up a little pebble and used it as a hammer in pounding down the dirt with rapid strokes, thus making this spot as hard and firm as the surrounding surface. She did this not only once, but a second time. It might be doubted whether this should be credited, but a similar instance was observed and published some years ago by Dr. Williston in Western Kansas."

It has always been supposed that the wasp. in stinging insects to be used as food for its unhatched larvæ, had the instinct to aim the sting so as to penetrate the nervous ganglia, and thus paralyze the victim in order that the young larva might have living food. Professor Packard believes that the authors have shown that this may not be the case. He

says:

"No one has actually detected the wound of the wasp's sting in a ganglion. Our authors maintain that 'the purpose of the stinging is not to paralyze and preserve the prey alive, since the wasp has no reason for attempting any such difficult procedure, for the larva thrives quite as well upon dead as upon living food.' They believe that the primary purpose of the stinging is to overcome resistance and to prevent the escape of the victims, and that incidentally some of them are killed and others are paralyzed.' Thus one of the most cherished beliefs as to

for electric lighting on one of the ships of the British Antarctic expedition is quoted from The Electrical World and Engineer (August 17):

"The British steamer Discovery, which has just started for the South polar regions, has some special lighting features. The most singular and conspicuous object on the upper deck is the great windmill, which is the driving agency in the novel lighting arrangements. Oil in sufficient quantities would take up more room than could be spared after the storage of food and

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scientific instruments had been provided for. The ship is therefore to be lighted throughout by electricity. The current is generated by a dynamo driven by this great windmill on deck, both being portable, so that they can be set upon the ice and connected with the accumulators by means of a flexible cable.

"To wind-power the great drawback lies in the fact that, while at one moment the mill may make 200 revolutions per minute, a strong gust will the next instant raise the speed to 2,000, the rate falling with equal rapidity upon the disappearance of the wind. With a dynamo working so irregularly it is impossible to charge accumulating cells. This difficulty has been overcome. . . . The mill drives two dynamos, to one of which is fitted an arrangement which equalizes the current, offering greater resistance when the wind is high and less when it falls. Thus the number of revolutions of the mill can vary from 500 to 2,000 per minute without causing any appreciable difference in the current, which, when the mill stops, is automatically cut off, and when it restarts is switched on to the accumulators, evenly supplying the 50 or more lamps in the ship. A simple contrivance is fitted to the accumulators, causing a bell to ring when too much current is being taken from them. To prevent the accumulators freezing they are placed low down in the vessel, next the engine-room, and as the acid will not freeze till -29° F. is reached the contingency is unlikely to happen."

IMPROVEMENT OF RAILWAY SPEED.

WE

E hear a great deal of the superior speed of a few of our fast trains; and of course the Empire State Express and the Atlantic City flyers can not be beaten anywhere—yet the average speed of ordinary American trains is not what it ought to be. It is a general impression that to get higher speed we must have faster locomotives. This is erroneous, we are told by Egbert P. Watson in The Engineering Magazine (August). Our locomotives are all right; our roadbeds are what need improving, and with proper roads our trains would make 80 miles an hour where they now make 40 or 50. That there is room for improvement must be evident to all. Says Mr. Watson:

"The average speed on the railways of the United States is not markedly higher to-day than it was twenty-five years ago, between the principal cities of the Union, for at the period mentioned it required only six hours to go two hundred and fifty miles upon express trains, and that is the time required now. It is not asserted that the managers of railways are indifferent to this state of affairs, and do not desire to make better time; the contrary is true, and they have done what they could in certain directions to cut down the time between important terminals by straightening curves, reducing grades where possible, employing more powerful engines, and laying heavier rails, but the gains in time are slight in comparison with the public demand.

"Careful consideration of the subject under discussion-higher speed upon railways-leads to the belief that it will not be attained for some years to come unless there is a radical change in the permanent way itself, and I am of opinion that therein is the chief obstacle. All the railways in the United States pass through the lines of least resistance, except where detours are purposely made to include certain districts where large amounts of profitable business can be had. The right-of-way in thickly settled portions is expensive, and if it is less costly to go three or more miles in an indirect line to avoid serious outlays or natural obstacles, the crooked route has in the vast majority of instances been laid out. . . . The topography of certain lines forbids high speeds; nevertheless fast running is attempted upon them, and there is a constant struggle, day by day, to endeavor to overcome natural obstacles by mechanical expedients, and the natural obstacles always win. . . . For, while it is true that the locomotive of to-day is a far more powerful machine than it was twenty, or even ten, years ago, it must be borne in mind that the road and duty imposed upon the modern engine have been largely increased. This is one reason why the average speed is still less than forty miles per hour.

"It seems hopeless to expect any improvement until the roadbeds of the railways of the United States are constructed for high speed. There is no object in building higher-powered locomo

tives to drag trains up steep hills and around short curves, or upon gradients more or less heavy, by brute force. That is merely burning the candle at both ends, for it increases the expense of maintenance without correspondingly improving the service. . .

"There is nothing to prevent a high average speed with the present locomotives if the lines were constructed to permit itthat is, were they nearly straight and level instead of crooked and hilly-and confined to the specific object of high speed in lieu of general traffic. .

"Suppose a railway line upon a causeway, elevated where necessary to clear natural or artificial obstacles, having curves of very long radii, were demanded, but following an air-line generally between New York and Philadelphia, where the sea-level is practically the same. Upon such a causeway there would be no difficulty whatever in reducing the time to eighty minutes, in lieu of the present one hundred and twenty minutes as the best time; there would be no difficulty in reaching New Haven in sixty minutes, instead of twice that time, and real rapid transit would be inaugurated, attended with perfect safety. One objection to such a line would be the first cost and maintenance, but neither of these objections is insuperable. A railway of very much this character is, in fact, now in course of construction under New York City, where the difficulties and consequently the cost are greatly enhanced from its subterranean position, and the contract calls for $34,000,000 for thirty-four miles, or $1,000,ooo per mile. No elevated structure could be made to cost anything like that sum, and travel on it would be far safer than upon the surface of the earth."

THE FLOW OF ROCKS.

GEOLOGISTS believe that the facts of their science show

that the solid rocks of the earth's crust become, under enormous heat and pressure, semiliquid and mobile, so that they may be said to flow like treacle. This fact has been experimentally proved by 'Prof. Frank Dawson Adams, of McGill University, Montreal. With machinery especially made to apply pressures as great as even ninety tons per square inch, during periods varying from fifteen minutes to 128 days, Professor Adams has squeezed columns of marble until the molecules have slipped and twisted, separated and reunited changing entirely the granular appearance of the structure, while weakening it comparatively little. Says Frederick T. C. Lang. don, who contributes an article descriptive of these experiments to The Strand Magazine (July): "These experiments have clearly shown why the rocky strata of the earth are so irregular, why they are rent asunder by earthquakes, why mountains have taken shape, why some of the greatest of geographical changes have occurred. It is a far cry

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PROF. FRANK DAWSON ADAMS.

from the flow of liquids to the flow of rocks, but Professor Adams's experiments have demonstrated that the one resembles the other; that rock-structure under extreme pressure seeks relief along the lines of least resistance and flows in those lines, just as it is known that liquids flow.

"A drop of rain-water on a window-pane moves downward through a zig-zag course, the deviations being due to tiny causes in the shape of bits of dust, imperfections in the glass, etc. That drop of water follows the line of least resistance. A mass of rock deep in the world-crust, pressed down upon by countless tons of like material, seeks to get away from the overpowering force and moves-infinitely slow tho the motion be-along paths of the smallest opposition. The cases are parallel. .

"Altho these complicated bendings and twistings have long been recognized by geologists, there has been much discussion

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