Evening Republican, Volume 19, Number 225, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 22 September 1915 — Page 2

SEALS ACT MUCH LIKE SUBMARINE

rri HAT airship*, gliding planes, and aeroplanes U have been suggested to a* man by the flight of f. birds is well understood -Mr by ua. That the dead- ' ly submarine of our present maritime war has been suggested to us by any form of natural animal life is not so patent. Doubtless It has often been in the minds of fishermen and whalers when tempest tossed and severely driven. Certainly it yould be a happy ship for them that could be so constructed which would safely dive with all on board to the quiet depths below, there to rest content and easy until the "clouds rolled by” above. We have come to regard the soaring albatross or the condor as the prototype of the aeroplane. When we look for a natural model for the submarine we find it well made in the body of the fur seal and fully suggested by its method of progression in the sea.

for it travels there only when wholly submerged. Unlike, however, the "Unterseebot,” the fur seal is not fitted for swimming on the surface; it dnly rises there to survey, to breathe, and to sleep; .t never attempts to swim with head above water on any course, no matter how short. It rises, when undisturbed or not alarmed, looks about with head and neck well stretched up above

the surface of the sea, fills its lungs with air (literally compressed), turns its head down, and, with its powerful flippers, drives it below the surface to the depth of five or ten feet, then ahead on that level; thus submerged, the body of the seal glides through the water as swiftly as a swallow in the air—it is a vanishing streak to our eyes. How long it remains thus submerged when traveling, *no one has any definite knowledge, but the best consensus of opinion gives it a rise a intervals of every three or four minutes to breathe —that is, a pause of less than two or three seconds with barely more than Its nose and eyes above the surface, tor exhalation and renewed inhalation ' —when down goes the trim body to speed ahead again. When our submarines were first brought out, a trip of more than 300 miles from base was the utmost limit of their cruising. Today, they have been so perfected by the Germans that we know they can cruise safely more than 3,000 miles frona that base. Therefcre, in this connection it is interesting to know that the fur seal makes a

HAVE SAVED MOUNT VERNON

Potomac Was Threatening to Cut Away the Whole Bluff —Good Engineering Work.

The high Bluff oh which stands Mount Vernon, the home of our first president, has for years been in danger of gradually sliding into the Potomac. This danger became acute a few years ago when it was discovered that a new landslide was beginning that threatened to destroy the broad iawn in front of the mansion, if not the foundations of t v .e mansion itself, and engineering work, recently completed, was begun at that time to sa\-e the historic site from further damage. . The ground slopes from the mansion to the edge of the bluff, and from this point drops steeply for a hundred feet or more to the edge of the Potomac. The river at this point is a wide tidal estuary and the action of the waves has caused a steady erosion at the foot of the bluff.

Underlying the bluff are strata of sand, clay and soft sandstone, which, on investigation, were found to be saturated with water, and this, combined with the erosion of the waves, has resulted in landslides that have doubtless been going on intermittently for agss. . To cure the trouble a small drainage tunnel was first driven in the bottom of the sandstone stratum and carried back from the river front a distance of about 20C feet.

From this tunnel a heavy flow of water immediately started, and this flow continued for several months. At the end of that time the flow diminished to a moderate amount, and Jias remained practically constant ever since. To prevent further erosion at the

IVORY ABSORBING MOISTURE

The average person does not associate ivory as an absorber of water, hut this quality of the product was brought out in a customs case, says an exchange. The American Express company entered ivory, which it claimed had absorbed moisture on the voyage from Africa. , Collector Malone's men weighed the product and (found that it exceeded the invoiced 'weight by a flair margin. The colJaeter sccordi"g'y took duty on tbej

submarine journey in the North Pacific ocean of more than 5,000 miles from its base on the Priblloff islands in Bering 'ea, and then returns. An animal which can not only make such an extended journey, but can steer its course over an uncharted waste from point to point, month by month, with positive regularity and in perfect time, must be a fine type of swimming machine —it is. There is to be observed a close resemblance between the cigar-shaped submarine boat and the body form of the fur seal. As we view them laterally, this resembtance is complete; they are both driven ahead by feathering screws, and they are both kept on the level of their submerged course at a given distance below the surface by rudders. Then we observe that the periscope, to which the submarine craft owes all its efficiency, is duplicated exactly by the seal’s nose and eyes, and which are all that it ever lifts above the surface when startled, and in flight or passage. Again we note that the fur seal as

foot of the bluff thrqugh the action of the waves a heavy masonry wall was then built along the edge of the river. It is hoped that danger of future slides has been eliminated. — Popular Mechanics.

Prairie schooners, as the long can-vas-covered wagons which cross the deserts of Arizona are called, are guided by the only desert lighthouse in the world. The lighthouse marks the position of a well, the only place where water can be found for 33 miles to the eastward, and 30 miles in any other direction.

Many a wayfarer in this vast, waterless region has died of thirst practically within sight of the well, the whereabouts of which he was ignorant. It was a tragedy of this sort which led to the erection of the beacon. A boy, perishing of thirst, had fallen in the last stages of exhaustion. When night came, he noticed the light from the well keeper's cabin burning dimly in the distance. With a last heroic effort, the boy reached the cabin. This gave the well keeper an idea, and now every night a light flashes out from the only desert lighthouse in the world. —American Boy.

The girls demand that the men they wed shall be tall and distinguished looking, with ( curling locks and gold galore, and have perfect dispositions andj soulful eyes, dance divinely, be masterful, yet tender, and otherwise more or less resemble Greek godp and he-angels. And then they marry us poor, skinny, blundering, shambling, misshapen, awkward runts, with our Bins and foolishness heavy upon us, and look as fondly triumphant, bless ’em, as if they had each won a capital prize! —Kansas City Star.

weight found after the ivory had been unloaded from the vessel. When the ivory was later weighed at the factory of the ultimate importer the weights were lower than those returned by the government officials and approximated the weights' contained on the invoice. When the question came before the board of general appraisers, Judge Waite did not attempt to decide whether ivory is an absorbent of moisture, but held that the importer had failed to prove his case. So the question remains an open one.

Desert Lighthouse.

The Way It Goes.

THE EVENING REPUBLICAN, RENSSELAER, IND.

a submarine has a great advantage over the human has eyes that can look ahead and around under wa-ter-«-how far, we do not know, but It is reasonable to assume that the seal’s eyes can see as far under water as the eye of a camera can, and which we have the evidence of in good records. -1 Then, too, it also has an acute sense of hearing under sea, for we knbw that the whirring of a propeller's screw will drive all the seals away for miles around a steamer. We know

as we have any proof of. That it can remain that long has been well known to us by the evidence curiously given to us by the seals themselves. They have a habit of turning themselves head down in the sea, with their hind flippers lifted up entirely out of the water, completely reversing their normal attitude when rising to breathe and survey. This habit is to enable them better to scratch their sides and loins with the fore flippers than they can when not thus inverted, because the hair and fur open better in this queer position under water when rubbed by their flippers. A great many stop-watch records have been made of the time under water which a seal would keep its head when thus scratching, and the limit of four to five minutes was frequently made —never longer. With reference to the powers of destruction, of course our fur seal boat has no torpedo tubes, but it can and does “shoot its mouth ofT” at fish with a deadly certainty. In this connection it is interesting to note that seals do noU catch fish by pursuit of them —not at all; they shoot down, from above, upon the backs, or up from below, to strike at the bellies of their finny prey.

How fast these rhoctne submarines can speed up under the stimulus of excitement or fear no one knows. But it is well known when a vessel is coming down before a gale of wind from the islands, logging 14 to 16 knots, that a bevy of fur seals will often follow the ship for hours, and repeatedly swim by it, swim around it, and then renew the chase and circling of it. — Henry W. Elliott in New York Times.

Extinct Ground Sloth.

The remains of an extinct ground sloth found in Patagonia and brought to this country by Mr. Roosevelt is now in the American Museum of Natural History in New York. These remains possess extraordinary interest, because the surroundings in which they were found seem to prove that the animal was living only a few centuries ago. and was not only contemporary with primitive man, but was to some extent domesticated by him. Previous to this discovery it had been believed that all the great ground sloths of South America, of which many fossil remains have been found, became extinct thousands of years ago. The remains recently found were discovered in a dry cave, in company with tools or weapons or stone and bone, together with bungles of grass spread as though intended for fodder. There were other indications that the animals had been stabled or imprisoned in the cave and fed by their captors.

Less Than Human.

Tom. the country six-year-old, presenting himself one day in even more than his usual state of dust and disorder. was asked by his mother if he would not like to be a little city boy. and always be nice and clean in white suits and shoes and, stockings. Tom answered scornfully; “They’re nod children; they’re pets.’’—Harper’s Monthly. r

Depends on the Ripeness.

“An apple a day keeps the doctor away.” "Not much in those adages,” con»| mented the physician. “I make my vacation money out of green apple cases.”

Without Doubt.

“Did yon see where France is going to make all her fat men do military duty?” “That confirms the claim that they are going to continue a stoat fight”

that because some of the early pelagio sealing vessels were fitted with small auxiliary screws, and these, when put into U6e, had to be removed. Then, on the other hand, we find that our submarine boat has one great advantage over its sealing prototype —it can remain for many hours, yes, days—under sea. The seal cannot stay there more than four or five minutes, as far

BUILT ON NEW LINES

DOUBLE-END LOCOMOTIVES ARE THE LATEST. One Hundred Have Been Constructed In America for the French Government—Designed for Particular Use. One hundred narrow-gauge locomotives of the Pechot type, each mounted on two bogles and provided with double-barreled boilers and two fireboxes, were recently made in America and shipped abroad'.tor the use of the French government. Although ‘ these engines are of a design entirely foreign and were constructed according to metric measurements, they were built and the last one shipped seven weeks after the order was received. Because of its great flexibility, which allowß its use on narrow, uneven tracks where sharp curves are frequent, this engine being employed by the French, particularly in drawing its munition trains over hur-

One of the Curiously Designed Double-Ended Locomotives Built in America for the French Government.

riedly built lines leading to its war camps. The engine is not doubleended only in appearance, but is built much the same as if the rear parts of two small locomotives were Joined- Each boiler barrel has a separate set of tubes and is supported on saddles placed immediately over the center pins of the bogies. An outside shell, between the two trucks, and supported on plate frames riveted to .the saddles, carries the two fire boxes. The inside of these is made of copper, the tubes are of brass, and the boiler shell of steel. Water is carried in four separate tanks mounted beside the boiler barrels. The two of these "placed on the fireman's side, however, are made shorter than the others to allow space for coal bunkers adjacent to the cab in the middle of the locomotive. Each firebox is independent of the other. When it is desired, the engine can be operated by a single bogie.—Popular Mechanics.

POWER OF MONSTER ENGINE

World’s Largest Locomotive Can Haul Train 4% Miles Long—Simple Operating Mechanisms. The largest locomotive in the world was recently completed and has jußt been put into service on an eastern railroad. This, “the centipede” locomotive, has 24 driving wheels of 63-inch diameter. There are two distinct sets of driving wheels under the locomotive itself, and the weight of the tender is utilized for adhesion for a third driving gqar of eight wheels. The operating mechanisms are all coupled so that the engine can be operated as readily and with as little labor as a single locomotive.

The coal Is fed to the firebox by a mechanical stoker, so that the fireman simply sits in the cab and operates the lever and the coal is automatically carried into the firebox. This locomotive will consume so much coal that it would be impossible for a single fireman to supply fuel without the aid of some such mechanical device.

Repair Work Costly.

Everything that is used on a railroad begins to age and wear out from the moment it goes into use. The wanderings of a steel car or a locomotive are merely circuitous trails from the construction shops to the scrap pile. Parts give way before the whole, hence constant repairs are necessary- A locomotive is rarely in use longer than two weeks at a time without a visit to-the shops for repairs or testing. Repairs and renewals eat up a large slice of the railroad’s dollar every year.

Virginia Auto Owners.

It is estimated that about every sixth farmer in West Virginia is an automobile owner. There are few progressive farmers in the state who do not have an automobile, and some of them have two or three, for business or pleasure. Many of them who collect, and bring produce to market, especially butter and eggs, have discarded the horse and are using the motordriven vehicle.

Neglect Causes Rust.

Where & combination timer and distributor is used few people think to lubricate the working parts. In a timing device the circuit breaker should be frequently cleaned and adjusted; also, a small amount of fresh oil used. If neglected for too great a length of time the parts will rust and stick. If this takes place misfiring is hound to ramit.

WHEN THE AMATEUR “FIRED”

Was Looking for Experience and Got. Enough of It to Be Glad ' of Assistance. t __ - The engineer and the Old Timer of a fireman and I were eating our lunch at the. depot lunch counter in Burlington. Our engine was being given a chance to rest -up along with us, and the train that had come out of Chicago, headed by a new engine and a new crew, was already beating it west across the lowa prairies. I was so “all in” that I could hardly keep my eyes open while I sipped my coffee And gnawed my ham sandwich, but I missed no chance to pose while still garbed in my grimy overalls and jumper and while the mixture of oil and coal dust was still on my face. In fact, I confided to a fellow railroad man sitting beyond me that we had "just come in on No. 1 out of ‘Chi.’” "But on the square now,” asked the engineer in ordinary voice, it being no longer necessary for him to bellow, "ain’t you kind o’ glad that the Old Timer happened to be along with us to help shovel in a little of that coal? Ain’t you kind o’ glad that you got

over the sulks you had up there in Chicago about not getting a chance to make the trip with me alone? He come in sort o’ handy, didn’t he, bo?” “Yeah,” I drawled, indifferently. “He wasn’t in my way to speak of, and I guess it was just as well we let him come along.”—Exchange.

WORK OF TEST DEPARTMENT

Checking Inroads of Age Is One of Most Important Duties—Constant Experiments Made. One of the most important duties of the railroad test department is to devise means for checking the inroads of age—to plan parts and inve6t materials of longer life, in order that the Cost of every investment in car or locomotive may be spread over a greater number of years. Constant experiments are being performed with these objects in view. Ingenious means have been contrived to make the tests as nearly as possible like the conditions of actual service. In doing this some unusual problems have been met and solved. For instance, the staybolts of a locomotive are subject not only to a simple pull but also to a peculiar twisting, bending motion which is very slight but which in time breaks down the structure of particles composing the bolt material and causes it to give way. To test the ability pf bolts of various qualities and sizes to stand up under these conditions)a machine has been devised which duplicates this combination of shearing and bending strains. A number of bolts can be tested at once. The machine works automatically by electric power, while a dial like that of a cyclometer records the number of bends before the bolts break.

CLEAN WORMS FROM TRACKS

Vast Numbers of Caterpillars Impede Railroad, Traffic on Northern California An unusual amount of track clearing was recently necessary to clear caterpillars that swarmed over a railroad right of way in such vast numbers as to seriously impede traffic. The trouble occurred in the lumber regions of northern California, which are served by the McCloud River rail; road, and the pest developed into a positive danger to traffic. Besides, the caterpillars cleaned out everything green from the countryside and made life uncomfortable.

Removing Tar Spots.

First, if the car is dusty, hose it down wherever the tar is sticking, preferably with lukewarm water. Dry off with a leather by dabbling, making ho attempts to pass the leather to* and fro across the surfaces. Having done this take a piece of some sjpft material—such as the best woolen waste or lineh—and charging it with vaseline or unsalted butter, rub the splashes until they disappear. It will be Jound necessary to change the rag frequently. Use plenty of grease. Then wipe off all surplus grease and wash the car down with lukewarm water and some body soap. On no account leave the car standing with the spots on longer than is necessary or they will permanently mark the varnish. •

Directing Headlight.

German railroads are experimenting with electric locomotive headlights so mounted that an engineer can direct their rays wherever needed.

HOME TOWN HELPS

AN o\fl BOXWOOD BORDER There Are Bome Survivals of Beautiful Garden Ornaments Still to Be Found. Time was when the boxwood border was considered the very top notch of frontyard garden ornamentation. And it was thought to be very beautiful when trimmed into fantastic shapes or clipped evenly in rectangular outline. Take almost any of the old time novels, and in them will appear a description of the boxwood borders running a perfectly straight line from the colonial porch to the front gate. Boxwood hall was a favorite name for many an old time home. The privet hedge has , largely usurped the place of the boxwood border, says the Newark (N. J.) News. The latter was such a slow grower. Years after it was out it seemed hardly larger than when first planted. But it didn’t send out impudent shoots in every direction; it grew slowly, sedately and in deliberately chosen directions. It was never in a hurry to be big. Boys may cut whips from an untrimmed privet hedge, but no one ever took such liberties with the dignified old boxwood bush. It did not promote corporal punishment. There * were two things about the boxwood border that none who are acquainted with it will ever forget; its dark green foliage, winter and summer, and its persistently unpleasant odor. The latter isn’t like that of birch, sassafras, sandalwood, willow, butternut or cedar. It is more like that of the simplocarpus fetidus —the skunk cabbage. But the box bush stands up as stiff and dignified as if it were disseminating the perfumes of Araby the blest.

Now and then some very fipe specimens of boxwood are found in this country, and wherever they are they point out a place having a history running back century or two. These bushes have not been clipped or otherwise mutilated since our grandfathers’ days, and have grown into great trees —that is, great for boxwood. Just such a bush was recently sighted near Mount Holly by a Long Island millionaire, and he paid a small fortune to have It removed to his estate. It was 12 feet high, more than 15 feet in diameter and with a great clump of clay attached to its ramified roots, weighed ten tons. It may live in its new home, but as a rule, these grand old box bushes resent removals after they are a hundred years old. A fine group of box bushes adorns the old Elias Boudiqot mansion on East Jersey street, Elizabeth, where both Washington and Lafayette were entertained in the old days. Four large bushes are still flourishing on the .Stoudinger property, 353 Broad street, corner of Clay, in Newark. The house was built in 1832, and the box must have been planted later, but each of the four specimens is at least ten feet high and as many in diameter. Large sums have been offered for them time and again, but have been refused. Doubtless there are many other fine specimens of the oldtime favorite box, but a large and shapely tree is still a valuable and cherished heritage.

BEAUTIFUL ROSE HEDGE

A Hedge of Hardy Roses, the LovellJjsst Fence Imaginable.

Matter Settled.

When the term of the old negro preacher had expired he arose and said: i “Breddren, de time am heah fo’ de selection ob yo’ pastoh for anudder yeah. All dose favorin’ me fo’ yo’ pastoh will please say ‘Aye.’ ’’ The old preacher had mads himself rather unpopular and there was no response. ••pa,” he said, ’silence gibs consent alius. I’s yo* pastoh fo’ anudder yeah,”