Class r5.-il^-, Simon l^feC^^'rf^Sft^ p^ Lake's curious craft, the " Argonaut," is a submarine boat, and much more be- sides. She not only swims beneath the sur- face of the water and upon it, but she adds to these accomplish- ments the extraordi- nary power of diving deep, and rolling along the bottom of the sea on wheels. ISTo ma- chine ever before did that. Indeed, the " Argonaut " is more prop- erly a " sea-mo tocycle " or " sea-tricycle " than AT THE BOTTOM OF THE ATLANTIC. The " Argonaut " here lies sub- merged in twenty-eight feet of water. 2 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. a boat. The inventor himself has described it as "a boat- wagon for riding on the bottom of the sea." In October, 1898, the " Argonaut " lay off the pier at Atlantic Highlands, IS^ew Jersey. She had just finished a tedious voyage from Balti- more, where she was built, and she was quietly anchored from a barrel buoy. Mr. Lake had invited Mr. Stevens, the artist, and myself to make a trip with him on the bottom of the ocean. As we walked up the pier, we watched eagerly for the first glimpse of the wonderful sea-wagon of which we had heard so many strange stories. " There she lies," said Mr. Lake, not without a touch of pride in his voice. But all we could see was a great black letter A, made of gas-pipe, rising forty feet above the water. A flag rippled at its summit. As we drew nearer, we saAV that the big A rested on a small oblong deck, shouldering deep in the water. At the center of this deck there was a slightly higher platform surmounted by an iron tower about the size of a small barrel. A curious brass cap which covered the top of the tower was tilted back, and as our boat ran alongside, a man stuck his head up over the rim and sang out, ''Ahoy there! " THE "ARGONAUT SAILING ON THE SUllFACE. From a photograph. A VOYAGE ON THE BOTTOM OF THE SEA. 5 A considerable sea was running, but I ob- served that the ' ' Argonaut ' ' was planted as firmly in the water as a stone pillar, the big waves splitting over her without imparting any perceptible motion. ''She weighs fifty-seven tons," said Mr. Lake, ' ' and there are only two or three tons above water. I never have seen the time when she rolled." We scrambled up on the little platform and peered down through the open tower — " con- ning- tower," Mr. Lake called it — into the depths of the ship below. Wilson, the engineer, had started the fire in his gasolene engine, and it wasn't long before we saw a white plume of steam rising from the very summit of the gas- pipe frame above us. "This leg of the A," explained Mr. Lake, ''carries off the burnt gases, and this one brings in the fresh air while we are submerged. You see the pipes are tall enough, so that we can use them until we are more than fifty feet under water. Below that we have to depend on the compressed air in our tanks, or on a hose reaching from the upper end of the pipe to a buoy on the surface." Mr. Lake had taken his place at the wheel, and we were going ahead slowly, steering straight across the bay toward Sandy Hook G THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. and deeper water. The ' ' Argonaut ' ' makes about fiNQ knots an hour on the surface, but when she gets deep down on the sea bottom, where she belongs, she can spin along more rapidly. "Are you ready to go down?" asked Mr. Lake. The waves were already washing entirely over the lower platform and occasionally break- ing around our feet, but we both nodded sol- emnly. '' Open the center compartments," Mr. Lake shouted down the conning tower. " I'm flood- ing the air ballast compartments," he ex- plained. " Usually we submerge by letting down two half -ton iron weights and then, after admitting enough water to overcome our buoy- ancy, we can readily pull the boat to the bot- tom by winding in on the weight cables. Un- fortunately we have lost one of the weights, and so we have to depend entirely on the compartments. ' ' The '^Argonaut" was slowly sinking under the water. We became momentarily more im- pressed with the extreme smallness of the craft to which we were trusting our lives. The little platform around the conning tower on which we stood^in reality the top of the gasolene tank — was scarcely a half-dozen feet across, .1 VOYAGIJ ON THE B0TT03I OF THE SEA. 7 and the " Argonaut" herself was only thirty-six feet h)ng. Her sides had ah-eady faded out of sight, but not before we had seen how solidly they were built, all of steel, riveted and re- enforced, so that the wonder grew how such a tremendous Aveight, when submerged, could ever again be raised. ''We had to give lier immense strength," said Mr. Lake, '' to resist the water pressure at great depths. She is built of the same thick- ness of steel as the government used for the 2,000-ton cruisers 'Detroit' and 'Montgom- ery.' She'll stand a hundred feet, although we never took her deeper than fifty. We like to keep our margins safe. " I think we made some inquiries about the safety of submarine boats in general. Other air compartments had been opened, and we had settled so far down that the waves dashed repeatedly over the platform on which we stood — and the conning-tower was still wide open, inviting a sudden engulfing rush of water. '' You mustn't confuse the ' Argonaut ' with ordinary submarine boats," said Mr. Lake. ' ' She is quite different and much safer. When I fi.rst began experimenting, I saw that the greatest problem of submarine navigation was the inability to steer accurately when sub- 8 ♦ THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. SUBMERGING THE "ARGONAUT." The man is looking up through the canning-tower at the compass. merged. You see, below the surface of the water you have four directions in which you may go instead of two, as on the surface, and no one has yet succeeded in inventing a rudder that will keep a submarine boat in a steady course, so that it will not leap out of water at A VOYAGE ON THE BOTTOM OF THE SEI. 9 one moment and plunge to the bottom at the next. I simply gave up the problem and de- cided to run on the bottom, where I can steer as easily as if I were on shore." That was originality; it was so simple that no one ever had dreamed of trying it before. '^I think we'd better go below," said Mr. Lake, Avith a trace of haste in his voice. I went first, slipping hand over hand down the ladder. Mr. Stevens followed, and a. great wave came slapping in after him, sousing down over his shoulders. Mr. Lake quickly shut down the conning-tower cap and screwed it fast over its rubber rims. We found ourselves in a long, narrow com- partment, dimly illuminated by yellowish-green light from the little, round glass windows. The stern was filled with Wilson's gasolene engine and the electric motor, and in front of us, toward the bow, we could see through the heavy steel doorways of the divers' compart- ment into the lookout-room, where there was a single round eye of light. '' She's almost under," said Mr. Lake. I climbed up the ladder of the conning-tower and looked out through one of the glass ports. My eyes were just even with the surface of the water. In the trough of the waves I could catch a glimpse of the distant sunny shores of 10 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. New Jersey, and here and there, off toward Staten Island, the bright sails of oyster smacks. Then the next wave came driving and foaming entirely over the top of the little vessel, and I could see the curiousl}^ beautiful sheen of the bright summit of the water above us. It was a most impressive sight. ISTot many people ever have had the opportunity of looking calmly upon the surface of the sea from below. Mr. Lake told me that in very clear water it Avas difficult to tell just where the air left off and the water began; bub in the muddy bay, where we were going down, the surface looked like a peculiarly clear, greenish pane of glass moving straight up and down, not forward, as the waves appear to move when seen from above. Now we were entirely under water. The ripping noises that the waves had made in beating against the upper structure of the boat had "Ceased. As I looked through the thick glass port, the water was only three inches from my eyes, and I could see thousands of dainty, semi-translucent jelly-fish floating about us lightly as thistle down. They gath- ered in the eddy behind the conning-tower in great numbers, bumping up sociably against one another, and darting up and down with each gentle movement of the water. And I THE "argonaut" SUBMERGED — A SCENE IN THE LIVING-ROOM. On the left, Mr. Lake is seated; the steersman is in the center. The feet of the lookout in the conning-tower can be seen on the ladder to the right. A VOYAGE ON THE BOTTOM OF THE SEA. 13 realized that we were in the domain of the fishes. I returned to the bottom of the boat, to find that it was brilliantly lighted by electricity, and to have my ears pain me sharply. '^You see, the air is beginning to come down," said Jim, the first mate, ''and we are getting a little pressure." I held up my hand and felt the strong gust which was being drawn down through the tall air-pipe above us. It was comforting to know that the air arrangements were in working order. Mr. Lake now hung a small mirror at an angle of forty-five degrees, just at the bottom of the conning- tower, and stepped back to the steering wheel. Upon looking into the mirror he could see the reflection of the compass, which is placed at the very highest tip of the brass binnacle that crowns the conning-tower. ''We can't use a compass down here," said Mr. Lake, ' ' because there is too much ma- chinery and steel. ' ' Mr. Lake has found by repeated experiments that the compass points as accurately under water as on the surface. Jim, the mate, brought the government chart, and Mr. Lake announced that we were heading directly for Sandy Hook and the open 14 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. FISH LOOKING IN AT THE WINDOW OF THE "ARGONAUT." Both pictures are from photographs taken by Mr. Lake out of the forward lookout window of the '^ Argonaut, ^^ while she was running up the Patapsco River to Baltimore. ocean. But we had not yet reached the bot- tom, and John was busily opening air compart- ments and letting in more water. I went forward to the little steel cubby-hole in the extreme prow of the boat, and looked out through the watch-port. The water had grown denser and yellower, and I couldn't see much beyond the dim outlines of the ship's spar reaching out forward. Jim said that he had often seen fishes come swimming up won- deringly to gaze into the port. They would remain quite motionless until he stirred his head, and then they vanished instantly. Mr. Lake has a remarkable ])hotograph wliich he took of a visiting fish, and Wilson tells of nur- turing a queer flat crab for days in the crevice A VOYAGE ON THE BOTTOM OF THE SEA. 15 of one of the view-holes. As I turned from the watch-port, my eye fell on an everyday- looking telephone, with the receiver comfort- ably hung up next the steel walls. '' Oh, yes," said Jim, ^' we have all the mod- ern conveniences. That's for telephoning to the main part of the boat when the diver's com- partment is closed and we can't get through." He also showed me a complex system of call- bells by means of which the man at the look- out could direct the engineer. '^ When we are down in unknown waters," he said, ' ' we have a big electric search-light which points out the way. ' ' At that moment I felt a faint jolt, and Mr. Lake said that we were on the bottom of the sea, thirty feet below the surface. '"' The bottom here is very muddy," he said, '^and we are only resting a few hundred pounds' weight on our wheels. By taking in or pumping out water we can press down on the bottom like a locomotive or like a feather. Where we have good hard sand to run on we use our wheels for propelling the boat; but m mud like this, where there's nothing to get hold of, we make our propeller do the work." Here we were running as comfortably along the bottom of Sandy Hook Bay as we would ride in a Broadway car, and with quite as much 16 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. THE "argonaut" IN DRY-DOCK. Draivn from photographs by Mr. Lake. The door of the diver's compart- ment, just under the bow, is open, ajid resting on some of the keel-blocks. Through this door the divers leave the boat when it is submerged, compressed air in the compartment preventing the entrance of water. safety. Wilson, who was of a musical turn, was whistling "Down went McGinty," and Mr. Lake, with his hands on the pilot wheel, put in an occasional word about his marvelous invention. On the wall opposite there was a A VOYAGE ON THE BOTTOM OF THE SEA. 17 row of dials which told automatically every fact about our condition that the most nervous of men could wish to know. One of them shows the pressure of air in the main compart- ment of the boat, another registers vacuum, and when both are at zero, Mr. Lake knows that the pressure of the air is normal, the same as it is on the surface, and he tries to maintain it in this condition. There are also a cyclo- meter, not unlike those used on bicycles, to show how far the boat travels on its wheels; a depth gauge which keeps us accurately in- formed as to the depth of the boat in the water; and a declension indicator. By the long finger of the declension dial we could tell whether we were going up hill or down. Once, while we were out, there was a sudden sharp shock, the pointer leaped back, and then quiv- ered steady again. Mr. Lake said that we had probably struck a bit of wreckage or an em- bankment, but the ^^ Argonaut" was running so lightly that she had leaped up jauntily and slid over the obstruction. Strange things has Mr. Lake discovered about the bottom of the sea. He has found that nearly all sea roads are level, a fact of great importance to sea carriages like the '' Argonaut." ' ' People get the impression from the sea- 18 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS, AMIDSHIPS CROSS SECTION OF THE "ARGONAUT." bottom contours of the school-books," he says, *^'that the ocean is filled with vast mountain ranges and deep valleys. As a matter of fact, these contours, in representing thousands of miles of width on a printed page, greatly exaggerate the depth, which at its greatest is only a few thousand feet, thus giving a very A VOYAGE ON THE BOTTOM OF THE SEA. 19 false idea. Some shores slope more than others, bat I venture to say that there are few spots on the bottom of the Atlantic that would not be called level if they were bare of water. ' ' We had been keeping our eyes on the depth dial, the most fascinating and interesting of any of the number. It showed that we were going down, down, down. When we had been submerged for more than an hour, and there was thirty feet of yellowish-green ocean over our heads, Mr. Lake suddenly ordered the ma- chinery stopped. The clacking noises of the dynamo ceased, and the electric lights blinked out, leaving us at once in almost absolute dark- ness and silence. Before this we had found it hard to realize that we were on the bottom of the ocean ; now it came upon us suddenly, and not without a touch of awe. This absence of sound and light, this unchanging motionless- ness and coolness, this absolute negation— this was the bottom of the sea. It lasted only a moment, but in that moment we realized acutely the meaning and joy of sunshine and moving winds, trees, and the world of men. A minute light twinkled out like a star, and then another and another, until the boat was bright again, and we knew that among the other wonders of this most astonishing of in- ventions there was storage electricity which 20 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. would keep the boat illuminated for hours with- out so much as a single turn of the dynamo. "With the stoppage of the engine the air supply from above had ceased, but Mr. Lake laid his hand on the steel wall above us, where, he said, there was enough air compressed to last us all for two days should anything happen. Indeed, the possibility of ' ' something hap- pening ' ' had been lurking in our minds ever since we started. '' What if your engine should break down so that you couldn't pump the water out of the air compartments ? " I asked. ^^ Here we have hand pumps," said Mr. Lake promptly, ^'and if those failed, a single touch of this lever would release our lead keel, which weighs three thousand pounds, and up we would go like a rocket. ' ' I questioned further, only to find that every imaginable contingency, and some that were not at all imaginable to the uninitiated, had been absolutely provided for by the genius of the inventor. And everything from the gaso- lene engine to the hand pump was as compact and ingenious as the mechanism of a watch. Moreover, the boat was not crowded ; we had plenty of room to move around and to sleep, if we wished, to say nothing of eating. Indeed, John had brought out the kerosene 8 ^ "S S II Is Is ^ 8 ■to o g « it j)orf s( y is poured mold IS tltei, into n paper mold having a screw-eye inserted in placed in a, basin ofliiinid air, inhere the mercury ispciidcd in the man ner shown, the mercury block d lion nils for half an hour. LIQUID AIR. 63 that it could be used for driving nails into a hard-wood block. What would the scientists of twenty-five years ago have said if any one had predicted the use of a mercury hammer for driving nails ? Liquid air freezes other metals just as thor- oughly as it freezes mercury. Iron and steel become as brittle as glass. A tin cup which DRIVING A NAIL WITH A HAMMER MADE OF MERCURY FROZEN BY LIQUID AIR. has been filled with liquid air for a few min- utes will, if dropped, shatter into a hundred little fragments like thin glass. Copper, gold, and all precious metals, on the other hand, are made more pliable, so that even a thick piece can be bent readily between the fingers. JN'ot long ago Mr. Tripler took a can of liquid air to the Harlem River, and poured it out on 64 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS, LIQUID AIR IN WATER. Liquid air is slightly lighter than water. When a small quantity of it is poured into a tall flask of water, it floats for a f etc seconds ; and then the nitrogen boils away, leaving the liquid oxygen, which, being slightly heavier than ivater, sinks in big silvery bubbles. in a tall jar of water, part gen, which is lighter than rate first, then the liquid the water in order to see its effect. Small masses of it at once collected in little round balls on the sur- face of the river, and being so much colder than the water, they froze small cups or boats of ice, in which they began floating about swiftly, bumping up against one another like so many lively water bugs, finally boil- ing away and disappearing, leaving the min- iature ice boats quite still. If a small quantity of liquid air is placed of the liquid nitro- water, will evapo- oxygen, which is LIQUID AIR. 65 slightly heavier than the water, will sink in beautiful silvery bubbles. I saw an eg^ frozen in liquid air. It came out so hard, that it took a sharp blow of the hammer to crack it, and the inside of it had the peculiar crystalline appearance of quartz — a kind of mineral egg. At one time in Bos- ton, Mr. Tripler had some of his liquid air with him at a hotel, where he was explaining its wonders to a party of friends. The waiter served a fine beefsteak for dinner, and Mr. Tripler promptly dipped it into the liquid air and then returned it with some show of indig- nation to the chef. It was as hard as rock crystal and when dropped on the floor it shiv- ered into a thousand pieces. "The time is certainly coming," says Mr. Tripler, "when every great packing house, every market, every hospital, every hotel, and many private houses will have plants for mak- ing liquid air. The machinery is not expensive, it can be set up in a tenth part of the space occupied by an ammonia ice machine, and its product can be easily handled and placed where it is most needed. Ten years from now hotel guests will call for cool rooms in summer with as much certainty of getting them as they now call for ^varm rooms in Avinter. "And think of what unspeakable value the 5 66 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. liquid air will be in hospitals. In the first place, it is absolutely pure air; in the second place the proportion of oxygen is ver}^ large, so that it is vitalizing air. Why, it will not be necessary for the tired-out man of the future to make his usual summer trip to the moun- tains. He can have his ozone and his cool heights served to him in his room.. Cold is always a disinfectant ; some disease germs, like yellow fever, it kills outright. Think of the value of a ' cold ward ' in a hospital, where the air could be kept absolutely fresh, and where nurses and friends could visit the patient with- out fear of infection ! " The property of liquid oxygen to promote rapid combustion will make it invaluable, Mr. Tripler thinks, for use as an explosive. A bit of oily waste, soaked in liquid air, was placed inside of a small iron tube, open at both ends. This was laid inside of a larger and stronger pipe, also open at both ends. When the waste was ignited by a fuse, the explosion was so terrific that it not only blew the smaller tube to pieces, but it burst a great hole in the outer tube. Mr. Tripler thinks that by the proper mixture of liquid air with cotton, wool, glycer- ine, or any other liydrocarbon, an explosive of enormous power could l)e produced. And un- like dynamite or nitro-glycerine, it could be LIQUID AIR. 67 handled like so much sand, there being not the slightest danger of explosion from concussion, al- though, of course, it would have to be kept away from fire. It will take many careful experiments to ascertain the best method for making this new explosive, but think of the reward for its suc- cessful application ! The expense of heavy ammunition and its difficult transportation and storage would be en- tirely done away with. JSIo more would Avar- ships be loaded down with cumbersome explo- sives, and no more could there be terrible powder explosions on shipboard, because the ammunition could be made for the guns as it was needed, a plant on shipboard furnishing the necessary liquid air. Liquid air, owing to the large amount of IRON AND COPPER TUBES BURST BY EXPLOSION OP LIQUID AIR WITH OILY WASTE. THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. BUKNING STEEL IN AN ICE TUMBLER PARTLY FILLED WITH LIQUID AIR. A point of interest in this experiment is the contrasts in temperatures ; steel is burning at 3,500° F. in an ice receptacle containing liquid air at 312"' below zero. oxygen which it contains, will make steel burn violently. Mr. Tripler places a little of it in a tumbler made of ice, and then thrusts into it a LIQUID AIR. 09 steel spring having at the end a, lighted match. The moment the steel strikes the lic^uid air it burns like a splinter of fat pine. This experi- ment shows a most astonishing range of tem- perature. Here is steel burning at 3,500 de- grees above zero in an ice receptacle containing liquid air at 312 degrees below zero. But all other uses of liquid air fade into in- significance when compared Avith the possi- bility of its utilization as power for running machinery, which is Mr. Tripler's chief object. I saw Mr. Tripler admit a quart or more of the liquid air into a small engine. A few seconds later the piston began to pump vigorously, driving the fly-wheel as if under a heavy head of steam. The liquid air had not been forced into the engine under pressure, and there was no perceptible heat under the boiler ; indeed, the tube Avhich passed for a boiler was soon shaggy with white frost. Yet the little engine stood there in the middle of the room, running apparently without motive power, making no noise and giving out no heat and no smoke, and producing no ashes. And that is some- thing that can be seen nowhere else in the world. ''If I can make little engines run by this power, why not big ones ? ' ' asks Mr. Tripler. '' And run them ^tirely with air? " 70 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. '' Yes, with liquid air in place of the water now used in steam boilers, and the ordinary heat of the air instead of the coal under the boilers. Air is the cheapest material in the world, but Ave have only begun learning how to use it. We know a little about compressed and liquid air, but almost nothing about utiliz- ing the heat of the air. Coal is only the sun's energy stored up. What I do is to use the sun's energy direct. '^It is really one of the simplest things in the world," Mr. Tripler continued, 'Svhen you understand it. In the case of a steam- engine you have water and coal. You must take heat enough out of the coal, and put it into the water to change the water into a gas — that is, steam. The expansion of this gas produces power. And the water will not give off any steam until it has reached the boiling point of 212 degrees Fahrenheit. ' ' ISTow steam bears the same relation to water that air does to liquid air. Air is a liquid at 312 degrees below zero — a degree of cold that we can hardly imagine. If you raise it above 312 degrees below zero it boils, just as water boils above 212 degrees, l^ow, then, we live at a temperature averaging, say, sev- enty degrees above zero — about the present temperature of this room. In other words, LIQUID AIR. 73 we are 382 degrees warmer than liquid air. Therefore, compared with the cokl of liquid air we are living in a furnace. A race of people who could live at 312 degrees below zero would shrivel up as quickly in this room as we would if we were shut up in a baking oven. Now then, you have liquid air — a liquid at 312 de- grees below zero. You expose it to the heat of this furnace in which we live, and it boils instantly and throws off a vapor which ex- pands and produces power. That's simple, isn't it ?" It did seem simple; and you remember with admiration that Mr. Tripler is the first man who ever ran an engine with liquid air, as he was also the first to invent a machine for mak- ing liquid air in quantities, a machine which has since been patented. In some respects liquid air possesses a vast supremacy over steam. In the first place, it has about one hundred times the expansive power of steam. In the second place, it begins to produce power the instant it is exposed to the atmosphere. In making steam, water has first to be raised to a temperature of 212 de- grees Fahrenheit. That is, if the water as it enters the boiler has a temperature of 50 de- grees, 162 degrees of heat must be put into it before it will yield a single pound of pressure. 74 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. CHARLES E. TRIPLER. After that, every additional degree of heat pro- duces one pound of pressure, whereas every degree of heat applied to liquid air gives about twenty pounds of pressure. LIQUID AIR. 75 ''Liquid air can be applied to any engine," says Mr. Tripler, "and used as easily and as safely as steam. You need no large boiler, no water, no coal, and you have no waste. The heat of the atmosphere, as I have said before, does all the work of expansion. ' ' The advantages of compactness, and the ease with which liquid air can be made to produce power by the hea,t of the atmosphere, at once suggested its use in all kinds of motor vehicles, and a firm in Philadelphia is now making ex- tensive experiments looking to its use. A sat- isfactory application may do away with the present huge, misshapen, machinery -laden au- tomobiles, and make possible small, light, and inexpensive motors. Mr. Tripler even predicts that by the agency of liquid air, practical aerial navigation can be assured. The problem which has hitherto de- feated the purposes of aerial navigators has been the difficulty of producing a propelling machine sufficiently light and yet strong enough to keep the propeller in motion. Liquid air requires no boilers, no fuel, no smoke- stacks, and the machinery necessary to its use will be a mere feather's weight compared with the ordinary steam engine. Much has yet to be done before liquid air becomes the revolutionizing power of which 76 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. Mr. Tripler has j^rophesied. It has many dis- advantages as well as advantages, and it will undoubtedly take Mr. Tripler and other inven- tors many years to perfect the machines neces- sary for using it practically. It will probably be chiefly valuable in cases where a source of power must be produced at one place and used at another. This much, however, has been positively accomplished: A machine has been built which will make liquid air in large quan- tities at small expense, and an engine has been successfully run by liquid air. Other devel- opments will undoubtedly come later. CHAPTER III. TELEGRAPHING WITHOUT WIRES. JIoiv 2Iarconi Seiids Jlessages Through Space. Marconi was a mere boy when he first be- gan to dream of the marvellous possibility of sending telegraph messages without wires. He was barely twenty-one, a shy, modest, beardless youth, when he went up to London from his quiet country home in Italy to tell the world about one of the greatest inventions of the century. A few months later this boy had set up his apparatus and was telegraphing all sorts of messages through the air, through Avails, through houses and towns, through mountains, and even through the earth itself, and that with a mechanism hardly more com- plicated or expensive than a toy telephone. The present system of telegraphy by means of wires, the sending of long despatches over con- tinents and under oceans, is quite wonderful enough in itself, but here was an inventor who did away entirely with wires and all other means of mechanical connection, and sent his 80 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. messages directly through space. It is for this that Marconi was famous the world over at twenty-five. The young inventor is described as being tall and slender, and dark of complexion. Al though he bears an Italian name and Avas born in Bologna, Italy (in 1874), and educated at Bologna, Leghorn, and Florence, he is only half Italian, his mother being an English woman. He speaks English readily and fluently, and he appears to like London better than his native land. His first experiments were carried on in the fields of his father's estate, and consisted merely of tin boxes set up on poles of varying heights, one of which was connected with a crude transmitting machine, and the other with an equally crude receiver, which he himself had manufactured. Before going into the details of Guglielmo, or William, Marconi's apparatus and telling more of his astonishing successes, it may be well to look somewhat into the theories on which he bases his work. It must be under- stood, however, that Marconi was not the first to suggest wireless telegraphy, nor to signal experimentally for short distances without wires ; but he was the first to perfect a system and to put it into practical operation, and to liim, therefore, belongs the laurels of the inven- o > 'A < > tf tH o h K p^ C_) n M ^ -< o 1^ i-i M a Q ;z; W H ^ ai t> ts « ^ ^ ^ n M >-l fe H Q P^ ^ pi <(J M kJ P, ^ ^ o W o a" o H o r^ ^ p « << W !^ ki rt o o w U^ pci l_l w t^ H r/3 7J ■A H fi P K w H K H TELEGRAPHING WITHOUT WIRES. 83 tion. Our own Prof. S. F. B. Morse, the in- ventor of telegraphy, experimented with wire- less signals, and so did Dr. Oliver Lodge and W. H. Preece of London, Thomas A. Edison, Mkola Tesla, Professor Trowbridge of Har- vard, and others. In sending messages through space, Marconi deals with that mysterious all-pervading sub- stance known as the ether. In the English language the word "ether" has two totally different meanings. It is the name of a clear, colorless liquid, which is used in surgical opera- tions for easing a patient of pain. Every one has heard of ' ' taking eth er. ' ' This liquid, however, has nothing to do with the present subject, and it should be entirely dismissed from the mind. The ether which carries Marconi's messages is a colorless, odorless, un- seen, inconceivabl}^ rarefied substance which is supposed to fill all space. Scientists know almost nothing as to its properties, but they do know that it will vibrate, and they have called these vibrations electricity, heat, and light. It seems strange enough that we should use the ether every time we build a fire under the tea-kettle, every time we read by the light of a gas-jet, every time we talk over the tele- phone, and yet know next to nothing about it. Throw a stone into a pond and you will pro- 84 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. duce a series of small waves or ripples — in other words, water vibrations. Strike a bell and vibrations in the air bring the sound to your ear. In a similar way ether has its own peculiar vibrations. For instance, a star rail- lions of miles away starts the enormously rapid vibrations of light, and these vibrations finally reach our eyes, as the ripples in a pond reach the shore. We do not really see the star; we are merely conscious of light waves in the ether. In the same manner ethereal vi- brations bring us the heat and light of the sun, and the awful energy of the lightning stroke. Irom this Ave know that the ether extends everywhere through space, and that the SLin and the earth and the stars are set in it, like cherries in a jelly. Light will pass through such a hard, brittle substance as glass, heat will go through iron, and electricity " flows " in a copper wire. These facts show us that the ether must be inside of the glass and the iron and the copper, else the vibrations would not go through. In the same way the air is full of ether, and so are our bodies and every- thing else, for science laiows nothing which entirely resists the passage of heat, light, and electricity. We call some substances solids, owing to their hardness, but so far as the ether is concerned there is no sucli thing as a TELEGRAPHING WITHOUT WIRES. 87 solid. Every atom, even of the hardest dia- mond, is afloat in ether. But if heat, light, and electricity are all caused by ether waves, how can we tell them apart ? The larger the stone you throw into tlie pond the larger the waves produced and the more rapidly they travel. In a similar way ether waves are of widely different lengths and ra- pidity or frequency. Yibrations of one speed give light, another speed give heat, and still another give electricity. Science has learned by a series of wonderful experiments that if the ether vibrates at the inconceivable swiftness of 400 trillions of waves every second, we see the color red, if twice as fast we see violet. If more slowly, from 200 to 400 trillions to the second, we experience the sensation of heat. If more rapidly than violet, we have what science knows as "unseen light" — the actinic rays and, probably, X-rays. Our eyes will take in only seven colors with vibrations from 400 to 800 trillions a second. If our eyes were better we might see other degrees of vibrations, such as X-rays and various elec- trical currents, and know new colors, stranger and more beautiful, perhaps, than any that we now see. Ether waves should not be confused with air 88 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. waves. Sound is a result of the vibration of the air; if we had ether and no air we should still see and feel heat and electricity, but there would be nothing to hear. Air or sound waves are very slow compared with ether waves. A man's ordinary voice produces only about 130 waves a second, a woman's shrill scream will reach 2,000 vibrations— a mere nothing compared with the hundreds of tril- lions which represent light. ]^or do air waves travel as rapidly as ether waves. In a storm the ether brings the flash of the lightning long before the air brings the sound of thunder, as every one knows. IS^ow, to get down to electricity. Certain vibrations of the ether are recognized as elec- tricity — and there are many kinds of electrical waves to correspond with diiferent degrees of vibration. Inventors have been able to utilize electricity by producing these ether waves by artificial means. I have compared the ether to a jelly. The electrician merely jars this jelly, and the vibrations which we know as a " current " are produced. A current does not really pass through a telegraph wire — it does not flow like water in a pipe, — although our common language has no other means of ex- pressing its passage. In reality a vibration is started at one end of the wire, and it is the MAST AND STATION AT SOUTH FOKELAND, NEAR DOVER, ENGLAND, USED BY MARCONI IN TELEGRAPHING WITH- OUT WIRES ACROSS THE CHANNEL TO BOULOGNE, FRANCE. TELEGRAPHING WITHOUT WIRES. 91 wave that travels. Set up a row of toy blocks. Tip over the first one, and it will tip over the second, and so on to the end. The blocks stay Avhere they are, but the motion or THE GOODWIN SANDS LIGHTSHIP. Struck in a collision on April 28, 1899, the lightship used her Marconi apparatus (shown suspended by a spar from the masthead), and so got help from shore, twelve miles atcay. wave goes onward to the end. An electric wave is, of course, invisible. Imagine a cork on the surface of a pond at any distance from the place where a stone is dropped ; the cork. 92 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. when the wave reaches it, will bob up and down. I^ow, though we cannot see the electric wave, we can devise an arrangement which indicates the presence of the wave exactly after the manner of a cork. Electric waves were discovered in 1842 by Joseph Henr}^, an American. He did not use the phrase '^ electric waves"; but he discov- ered that when he produced an electric spark an inch long in a room at the top of his house, electrical action was instantly set up in another wire circuit in his cellar. There was no visible means of communication between the two cir- cuits, and after studj^ing the matter he saw and announced that the electric spark set up some kind of an action in the ether, which passed through two floors and ceilings, each fourteen inches thick, and caused ^' induction " — set up what is called an induced current — in the wires in the cellar. This fact of induction is now one of the simplest and most commonplace phe- nomena in the work of electricians. Edison has already used it in telegraphing from a flying train. Hertz, the great German investigator, developed the study of these waves, and an- nounced that they penetrated wood and brick, but not metal. The ''Hertzian wave" is, in- deed, an important feature of wireless teleg- raphy. Strange to say, however, considering Marconi. WILLIAM MARCONI AND HIS ASSISTANT, A. E. BULLOCKS. TELEGRAPHING WITHOUT WIRES. 95 the number of brilliant electricians in the world, and the great interest in electrical phenomena, it was left to the young Italian, Marconi, to frame the largest conception of what might be done with electric waves, and to invent instru- ments for doing it. Marconi's reasoning was exceedingly simple. The ether is everywhere ; it is in the air and in the mountains and in houses as well as in a copper wire. Electricity must, therefore, pass through the air and the mountain as well as through the wire. The difficulty lay in mak- ing an apparatus that would produce a pecu- liar kind of wave, and to catch or receive this wave in a second apparatus located at a distance from the first. This he finally succeeded in doing by the use of waves similar to those pro- duced by Hertz, which he excited in a specially constructed apparatus. These waves have a frequency of about 250 millions every second. From the generating apparatus this peculiar current is communicated to a wire which hangs from the top of a long pole or mast, or from a kite, and it passes by induction, through miles of air and earth and buildings, to a second hanging wire, which conveys it to a receiving instrument, where the signals are registered. To understand this transfer we must under- stand exactly what induction means. An elec- 96 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. tricai current may be conducted through copper wire, water, iron, or any other good " conduc- tor." In induGtio7i VcLQ GxxYYent passes directly through the ether. When a current of elec- tricity passes through a wire, magnetism is present around that wire ; and if another wire be brought within the magnetic field of the charged wire and placed parallel with it, it will also become charged with electricity. That is induction, and it enables Marconi to send his messages across the Channel from England to France, from ships on the sea to shore, from light-house to light-house, and across wide stretches of open country. And now, having come to an understanding of the theory of sending messages without wires, we may take a look at Marconi's actual apparatus as it is now transmitting messages from the I^eedles in Alum Bay, at the extreme west end- of the Isle of Wi^^^ht, eio^hteen miles across the Channel, to Poole on the mainland of England. Erom the yqyj peak of Marconi's telegra])h mast at the ]N"eedles hangs a line of wire that runs through a window into the little sending- room. Here two matter-of-fact young men are at \\oy\s. as calmly as any ordinary telegraphers, talking througli the ether. One of them has his fingers on a black-handled key. He is say- (-) xn ^ 1 M ^ ? Hi H f. P n H W W !h w k w H ^ H ^ o ^ g S ^ i W m c>^ << H rA> r/; m ■«1 g W w W u H w ^ !>' s § <1 (^ tn "^ S r> H S ^ :^ O ll< H t> ij H EC 1^ H r^^ h-i iz; a 1=^ W H o H pf a o H ;zi fi P5 r-ri ^ h K -«1 ^ wj w w ^ Y. Ph o n Q 1^ h^ Y P w o W H w 7J U o TELEGRAPIIING WITHOUT WIRES. 99 ing something to the Poole station eighteen miles away in England. " Brripp — brripp — brripp — brrrrrr. Brripp — brripp — brripp — brrrrrr — Brripp — brrrrrr — brripp. Brripp — brripp ! " So speaks the sender with noise and deliber- ation. It is the Morse code working — ordinary dots and dashes which can be made into letters and words, as everybody knows. With each movement of the key bluish sparks jump an inch between the two brass knobs of the induc- tion coil, the same kind of coil and the same kind of sparks that are familiar in experiments with the Rontgen rays. For one dot, a single spark jumps; for one dash, there comes a stream of sparks. One knob of the induction coil is connected with the earth, the other with the wire hanging from the masthead. Each spark indicates a certain impulse from the electrical battery; each one of these im- pulses shoots through the wire, and from the wire through space by vibrations of the ether, travelling at the speed of light, or seven times around the earth in a second. That is all there is in the sending of these Marconi messages. Any person of fair intelligence could learn to do it, Morse code and all, in a few hours. After sending a message the young opera- 100 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. tor switches on to the receiver, which is con- tained in a metal box about the size of a valise. The same perpendicular wire from the mast- head serves to receive messages as well as to send them, but the instruments within the ofRce for sending and for receiving are quite different. The receiving apparatus is kept in a lead box to protect it against the influence of the sending machine, which rests beside it on the table. You can easily believe that a receiver, sensitive enough to record impulses from a point eighteen miles away, might be disorgan- ized if these impulses came from a distance of two or three feet. But the lead box keeps out these nearby vibrations. The coherer is the part of the receiving ap- paratus which makes wireless telegraphy pos- sible, and to it more than to anything else has Marconi given his attention. He did not make the first coherer, but he made the first one that was practically useful, and to this great and important invention he owes his success. I will try to give a clear idea of what this coherer is like, and why it is so important. It consists of a tube made of glass, about the thickness of a thermometer tube, and about two inches long. It seems absurd that so tiny and sim])le an affair can come as a benefit to all TELEGRAPHING WITHOUT WIRES. 101 mankind; yet the chief virtne of Marconi's in- vention lies here in this fragile coherer. But for this, induction coils would snap their mes- sages in vain, for none could read them. In each end of this tube there is a silver plug, the two plugs nearly meeting within the tube. In the narrow space between the plugs nestle several hundred minute fragments of nickel and silver, the finest dust, sif tings through silk, and these enjoy the strange property (as Marconi discovered) of being alternately very good conductors and very bad conductors for the Hertzian waves — very good conductors when welded together by the passing current into a continuous metal path, very bad con- ductors when they fall apart under a blow from the electrical tapper which is a part of the receiving apparatus. One end of the co- herer is connected with the wire which hangs from the mast outside, the other with the earth and also with a home battery that Avorks the tapper and the Morse printing instrument. And the practical operation is this: A single vibration comes through the ether, down the wire and into the coherer, cansing the particles of metal to stick together or cohere (hence the name). Then the Morse instrument prints a dot, and the tapper strikes its little hammer against the glass tube. That blow jars apart 102 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. or decoheres the ])articles of metal, and sto]:)S the current of the home battery. And each successive impulse through the ether produces the same curious coherence and decoherence, and the same printing of dot or dash. The impulses through the ether would never be strong enough of themselves to work the print- ing instrument and the tapper, but they are strong enough to open and close a valve (the metal dust), which lets in or shuts out the stronger current of the home battery — all of which is simple enough after some one has taught the world how to do it. Mr. Cleveland Moffett, who has made a per- sonal study of wireless telegraphy with Mr. Marconi and his assistant, Dr. Erskine-Murray, says that even the curvature of the earth itself seems to make no difference in the transmittal of messages. ' ' We have telegraphed twenty-five miles from a ship to the shore, ' ' Dr. Murray told Mr. Moffett, '^ and in that distance the earth's dip amounts to about 500 feet. If the curva- ture counted against us then, the messages would have passed some hundreds of feet over the receiving station ; but nothing of the sort happened. So Ave feel reasonably confident that these Hertzian waves follow around smoothly as the earth curves." TELEGRAPHING WITHOUT WIRES. 105 ' ' And you can send messages tlirongii hills, can you not, and in all kinds of weather? " ' ' Easil}^ We have done so repeatedly. ' ' ''Then if neither land nor sea nor atmos- pheric conditions can stop you, I don't see why you can't send messages to any distance." " So we can," said the electrician — " so we can, given a sufficient height of wire. It has become simply a question now how high a mast you are willing to erect. If you double the height of your mast, you can send a message four times as far. If you treble the height of your mast, you can send a message nine times as far, and so on up. To start with, you may assume that a wire suspended from an eighty- foot mast will send a message twenty miles. We are doing about that here. ' ' " Then a mast 160 feet high would send a message eighty miles? " "Exactly." " And a mast 320 feet high would send a message 320 miles; a mast 640 feet high would send a message 1,280 miles; and a mast 1,280 feet high would send a message 5,120 miles?" " That's right. So you see if there were another Eiffel Tower in New York, it would be possible to send messages to Paris through the ether and get answers without ocean cables." 106 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. ' ' Do you really think that would be possi- ble?" '' I see no reason to doubt it," answered Dr. Erskine-Murray. " What are a few thousand miles to this wonderful ether, which brings us our light every day from millions of miles away ? " One of the greatest of present difficulties is that of securing secrecy in the transmission of these ethereal messages. The vibrations from tlie perpendicular wires are transmitted equally well in every direction, exactly as circular waves are produced when a stone is thrown in the water. Therefore any one may set up a receiver anywhere within the range of the waves, and take the message. Thus, in times of war, communications between battleships or armies might be at the mercy of any one who' had a Marconi receiver, although, of course, generals and admirals might use ci- pher despatches. Marconi realizes the very great importance of sending messages in one and only one direc- tion. Light waves can be reflected by a mir- ror, and thrown upon one particular spot. Every boy who has played in school with a bit of looking-glass knows this fact well. J^ow, electricity, Avhich is also produced by vibrations in the ether, can also be reflected. TELEGRAPHING WITHOUT WIRES. 107 Marconi has been experimenting with a copper reflector, by means of which he throws a pecu- liar kind of electrical wave directly through space to the distant receiver. In this way a message may be aimed in any direction by sim- ply turning the reflector a little, and no one but the man at the receiver can knoAV what is being sent. This exceedingly important fea- ture of the work is, however, still in an experi- mental stage, and the inventor who is success- ful in making a really practical reflecting apparatus will win a fortune. The practical nses of wireless telegraphy are man}^. In December, 1898, the English light- ship service authorized the establishment of wireless communication between the South Foreland lighthouse at Dover and the East Goodwin lightship, twelve miles distant. This was installed in the usual way without difficulty, and has been in operation ever since, the lightship keepers learning to use the instru- ments in a few days. And before the appa- ratus had been up six months several warnings of wrecks and vessels in distress reached shore, when, but for the Marconi signals, nothing of the danger would have been known. Another application of wireless telegraphy that promises to become important is the sig- nalling of incoming and outgoing vessels. 108 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. With Marconi stations all along the coast, it would be possible for all vessels within twenty- five miles of shore to make their ])resence known and to send or receive communications. So apparent are the advantages of such a system that in May, 1898, Lloyds began nego- tiations with the Wireless Telegraph Company for setting up instruments at various Lloyds stations ; and a preliminary trial was made between Bally- castle and Rathlin Island in the north of Ireland. The distance signalled was seven and a half miles, with a high cliff inter- vening between the two positions, and the results of many trials were absolutely satis- factory. We come now to that historic week in March, 1899, when the S3^stem of wireless tel- egraphy was put to its most severe test in ex- periments across the English Channel between Dover and Boulogne. These were undertaken by request of the French Government, which was considering a purchase of the rights to the invention in France. At five o'clock on the afternoon of Monday, March 27th, every- thing being ready, Marconi pressed the sound- ing-key for the first cross-channel message. The transmitter sounded, the sparks flashed, and a dozen eyes looked out anxiously upon the sea. Would the message carry all the way THE MAST AND STATION AT BOUOLGNE, FRANCE, USED BY MAKCONI IN TELE- GRAPHING WITHOUT WIRES ACROSS THE CHANNEL. Drawn from a photograph. TELEGRAPHING WITHOUT WIRES. Ill to England ? Thirty -two miles seemed a long way ! Marconi transmitted deliberately a short message, telling the Englishmen that he was using a two-centimetre spark, and signing three Y's at the end. Then he stopped, and the room was silent with a straining of ears for some sound from the receiver. A moment's pause, and then it came briskly, and the tape rolled off its message. There it was, short and commonplace enough, yet vastly important, since it was the first Avireless message sent from England to the Continent: First "Y," the call; then ''M," meaning "Your message is perfect " ; then, ^' Same here, 2 c m s. Y Y Y. , " the last being an abbreviation for two cen- timetres and the conventional finishing signal. And so the thing was done; a marvellous new invention was come into the world to stay. On the following Wednesday Marconi did a graceful thing by sending a complimentary message to M. Branl}^ (in Paris), the inventor of the original coherer, which Marconi had im- proved upon. He also sent a long message to the Queen of Italy. Mr. Moffett asked one of Marconi's chief engineers if there was not a great saving by the wireless system over cables. 112 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. "Judge for yourself," was the answer. ' ' Every mile of deep-sea cable costs about $Y50; every mile for the land-ends about $1,000. We save all that, also the great ex- pense of keeping a cable steamer constantly in commission making repairs and laying new lengths. All we need is a couple of masts and a little wire. The wear and tear is practically nothing. The cost of running is simply the cost of home batteries and operators' keep." ' ' How fast can you transmit messages ? ' ' ' ' Just now at the rate of about fifteen words a minute; but we shall do better than that, no doubt, with experience." ''Do you think there is much field for the Marconi system in overland transmission? " " In certain cases, yes. For instance, where you can't get the right of way to put up wires and poles. What is a disobliging farmer going to do if you send messages right through his farm, barns and all? He can't sue the Hertzian waves for trespass, can he? Then see the advantage, in time of war, for quick communication, and no chance that the enemy may cut your wires." " But they may read your messages." " That is not so sure, for besides the possi- bility of directing the waves with reflectors, Marconi is now engaged in most promising ex- TELEGRAPHING WITHOUT WIRES. 113 periments in syntony, which I may describe as the electrical tuning of a particular transmitter to a particular receiver, so that the latter will respond to the former and no other, while the former will influence the latter and no other. That, of course, is a possibility in the future, but it may soon be realized. There are even some who maintain that there may be produced as many separate sets of transmitters and re- ceivers capable of working together as there are separate sets of Yale locks and keys. In that event, any two private individuals might communicate freely without fear of be- ing understood by others. There are possibili- ties here, granting a limitless number of dis- tinct tunings for transmitter and receiver, that threaten our whole telephone system — I may add, our whole newspaper system." " Our newspaper system ? " ''Certainly, the news might be ticked off tapes every hour right into the houses of all subscribers who had receiving instruments tuned to a certain transmitter at the news-dis- tributing station. Then the subscribers would have merely to glance over their tapes, and they would learn what was happening in the world." ' ' Will the wireless company sell its instru- ments ? " 114 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. '^ 1^0, it will rent them on a royalty, as tele- phone companies do, except, of course, where rights for a whole country are absolutely dis- posed of." There was further talk of the possibilities in wireless telegraphy, and of the services Mar- coni's invention may render in coming wars. '' If you care to stray a little into the realm of speculation," said the engineer, '^I will point out a rather sensational role that our instru- ments might play in military strategy. Sup- pose, for instance, you Americans were at war with Spain, and wished to keep close guard over Havana harbor without sending your fleet there. The thing might be done with a single fast cruiser in this way : Supposing a telegraphic cable laid from Key West, and ending at the bottom of the sea a few miles out from the harbor. And supposing a Marconi receiving instrument, properly protected, to be lying there at the bottom in connection with the cable. Now, it is plain that this receiver will be influenced in the usual way by a Marconi transmitter aboard the cruiser, for the Hert- zian waves pass well enough through water. With this arrangement, the captain of your cruiser may now converse freely with the ad- miral of the fleet at Key West or with the President himself at Washington, without so TELEGRAPHING WITHOUT WIRES. 117 much as quitting Lis deck. He may report every movement of the Spanish warships as they take place, even while he is following them or being pursued by them. So long as he keeps within twenty or thirty miles of the submerged cable-end, he may continue his com- munications, may tell of arrivals and depart- ures, of sorties, of loading transports, of filling bunkers with coal, and a hundred other details of practical warfare. In short, this captain and his innocent-looking cruiser may become a never-closing eye for the distant American fleet. And it needs but little thought to see how easily an enemy at such disadvantage may be taken unawares or be led into betraying im- portant plans." And here, I think, we may leave this fasci- nating subject, in the hope that we have seen clearly what already is, and Avith a half dis- cernment of what is yet to be. JENATZY AND HIS "NEVER CONTENT," MAKING SIXTY-SIX MILES AN IIOUE. From instantaneous plLotographs appearing in " The Autocar.'" m: CHAPTER lY. THE MODERN MOTOR VEHICLE. Sixty -six Jliles an Hour on an Ordinary Road. Step np and take your seat in the world's very newest and most marvellous vehicle — the motor carriage. As you sit facing forward, where the horse ought to be and isn't, your right hand fits easily and naturally over the smooth handle of a lever. Press your thumb down hard on a little button at the top and a bell rings sharply — a mere friendly warning that you are about to start. Now push the lever forward one notch and off you go, smoothly and steadily, but slowly; another notch, and you are making the speed of a trotting horse ; still another notch, and you are flying like the wind, far faster than any horse ever goes 122 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. A FRENCH TOURING CART, DRIVEN BY GASOLENE. under harness. While your right hand is thus employed with the speeding lever, your left is firmly holding the steering handle, swinging the vehicle, this way and that, around corners and past obstacles as easily as if it were a bicy- cle. If you wish to stop suddenly, your foot is on a brake ; a slight push and the vehicle comes to a standstill. Variations there are in the arrangement of levers and brakes in different vehicles, but A MOTOR TALLY-HO, PROPELLED BY STORED ELECTRICITY. THE MODERN 310 TOR VEHICLE. 125 A TYPICAL AMERICAN ELECTRIC CARRIAGE. they are all equally simple of management. Yon can travel from daylight to dark and never suffer with a worn-out horse ; you can run away from the dust and escape the flies, and if you reach a railroad crossing just as a train is pass- ing, your motor carriage never takes fright and runs away. When you reach home there is no troublesome unharnessing, nor rubbing-down, and your carriage is ready at a second's notice to start on a new expedition. And as for the carriage-whip, it will follow the horse out of existence. 126 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. A LIGHT RUNABOUT, DRIVEN BY GASOLENE. Only a few years ago, in 1894, there were not thirty of these remarkable vehicles in prac- tical use in all the world. At the beginning of 1898 there were not thirt}^ in all America. And yet so great was the success of the inven- tor, and so widespread the interest of the pub- lic, that the manufacture of motor vehicles sud- denly became a great industry. In the first four months of the year 1899 alone, corporations with the enormous aggregate capitalization of more than $300,000,000 were organized in New York, Boston, Chicago, and Philadelphia; and THE MODERN MOTOR VEHICLE. 127 THE SERPOLLET STEAM CAB. in many cities of the East motor vehicles have become so familiar on the streets that they are MORRIS & SALVIN'S " ELECTROBAT. From, a photograph by Copelin, Chicago. 128 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. noticed hardly more than horse carriages. More than that, motor ambulances, motor trucks, motor gun-carriages, motor stages, and motor fire-engines are in operation in various cities. A DAIMLER PETROLEUM-ENGINE CARRIAGE. In France and England the motor vehicle has become an established and powerful factor in the common affairs of life. France has a power- ful motor vehicle or ' ' automobile ' ' club which gives frequent races and exhibitions. At a sin- THE MODERN MOTOR VEHICLE. 129 - ■ ^. -^ :- 'A'm^' 1 S^ h «^ji» «i^i»:^'9HHL THE' SERPOLLET STEAM CARRIAGE. ffle ffatherino^ more than 1,500 vehicles were shown, representing every conceivable model, jfe- r-r-^ DCRYEA MOTOR WAGON, WINNER OF THE CHICAGO "times-herald" race, NOVEMBER 28, 1895. Fro)n a photograph, hrj permission o/" The Ilbtseless Age." 9 130 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. from milk-wagons to fashionable broughams and the huge brakes of De Dion and Bouton, which carry almost as many passengers as a railroad car. Some of the exjDert ' ^ drivers ' ' of Paris have ridden thousands of iniles in their road wagons, have climbed mountains, and raced through half of Europe, meeting new accidents, facing new adventures, and using strange new devices for which names have yet to be coined. The motor races of Paris have been by far the most unique and remarkable that the world has ever seen. Both M. Rene de Knyif and Count Chasseloup-Laubat, of Paris, have made 60 miles an hour on an ordinary road track. Just think of it ! Faster than the Empire State Express, and that with no advantage of steel rails nor level road-bed. But even the records of these two famous racers have been beaten by M. Jenatzy with his lightning carriage, ^' La Jamais Contente " (''The I^ever Content"). This wonderful vehicle is built of sheet iron in the form of a long cigar or torpedo, so that it plunges through the air like a dart. The wheels are very small and, of course, fitted with rubber tires. There is a manhole in the top of the vehicle, where the driver sits. Just in front of it there is a little steering wheel and electrical meters to show the voltage and am- THE MODERN MOTOR VEHICLE. IBl AN ELECTRIC HANSOM CAB. pereage of the current. To see ^'La Jamais Contente ' ' one ayouM think that no driver ever would dare to risk his life upon it. And, in- deed, after the current is turned on and the wheels begin to revolve, it is either fly or burn, so tremendous is the power of the batteries. At the famous record trial " La Jamais Con- ^32 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. tente ' ' was towed out from Paris to the racing road by a humble petroleum car. M. Rene de Knyff gave the word to start. M. Jenatzy turned on the current and braced himself, lean- ing well forward, with his hands firmly clasping the steering wheel. The car moved off some- what slowly at first, but after going about 10 yards, literally bounded forward, the wheels for a moment almost leaving the track. There was a blue-gra}^ streak down the road, a faint cloud of dust, and the famous carriage was making more than a mile a minute. The sound of the motor was described by a spectator as resembling the rustling of wings, and the car undulated like a swallow in flying, this no doubt being due to the action of the springs and the rubber tires. Nothing had ever before travelled on a common road at such a speed, and the spectators were anxious to know, not whether Jenatzy liad broken the record, but by how much he had broken it. The wheels left two broad white tracks in the middle of the road, absolutely straight and converging in the distance like a line of rails. It was a remark- able exhibition of accurate steering. Indeed, if Jenatzy had swerved an inch to the right or to the left, he would not have survived to tell the tale. After the trial was over it was found that ^' La Jamais Contente " had made Q>Q miles ^^^^^^^^1 .^■. .^! i| i -'^^H^^^^H^^H ^^EF^ 1 M ^^^^^^^Kb2^'^ 1 M " o i25 M THE MODERN MOTOR VEHICLE. 135 an hour, and M. Jenatzy went away declaring that he should soon make Y5 miles an hour. In general it may be said that France has led in. gasolene vehicles, and England in steam vehicles, while America, as was to be expected, has been far in the lead in electrical convey- ances of all kinds. Belgium and Germany, and to some extent Austria, have also been experi- menting with more or less success, but no such progress has been made in these countries as in France. It was not until 1898 that Spain rubbed its eyes for the first time at the sight of a motor vehicle, which rolled through Mad- rid with half a dozen little policemen careering after it. In a general way, it may be said that the best modern motor vehicle, whatever its pro- pelling power, is practically noiseless and odor- less and nearly free from vibrations. It is still heavy and clumsy in appearance, although it is lighter than the present means of convey- ance when the weight of the horse or horses is counted in with the carriage. And invention will soon lighten it still further. It cannot possibly explode. It will climb all ordinary hills, and on a level road it will give all speeds from two miles an hour up to twenty or more. Its mechanism has been made so simple that any one can learn to manage it in an hour or two. 136 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS, And yet it is mechanism ; and intelligence, cool- ness, and caution are required to manage a mo- tor vehicle in a crowded street. The operator must combine the intelligence of the driver with that of the horse, and he does not appreciate the almost human sagacity of that despised ani- mal until he has tried to steer a motor vehicle down Fifth Avenue on a sunny afternoon. Seven different motive powers are now ac- tually employed in this country: electricity, gasolene, steam, compressed air, carbonic-acid gas, alcohol, and liquid air. The first three of these have been practically applied with great success; all the others are more or less in the experimental stage. The electric vehicle, which has had its most successful development in this country, has its well-defined advantages and disadvantages. It is simpler in construction and more easily man- aged than any other vehicle : one manufacturer calls it ''fool proof." It is wholly without odor or vibrations and practically noiseless. It will make any permissible rate of speed, and climb any ordinary hill. On the other hand, it is immensely heavy, owing to the use of stor- age batteries ; it can rnn only a limited distance without recharging, and it requires a moder- ately smooth road. In cost it is the most ex- pensive of all vehicles. And yet for city use, A DAIMLER MOTOK CARRIAGE NEAR FIFTH AVENUE AND FIFTY-EIGHTH STREET, NEW YORK. THE MODERN MOTOR VEHICLE. 139 where a constant supply of electricity can be had, electrical cabs, carriages, and delivery wagons have demonstrated their remarkable practicability. The vital feature of the electric vehicle is the storage battery, which weighs from 500 to 1,500 pounds, the entire weight of the vehicles varying from about 900 to 4,000 pounds. A phaeton for ordinary private use will weigh upwards of a ton, with a battery of 900 pounds. This immense weight requires ex- ceedingly rigid construction and high-grade, expensive tires. The electrical current is easily controlled by means of a lever under the hand of the driver, the propelling machinery being comparatively simple. When the battery is nearly empty, it may be recharged at any elec- tric-lighting station by the insertion of a plug, the time required varying from two to three hours. Or, if the owner prefers, he can own his own charging plant and generate his own electricity: it will cost him from $500 to $Y00.^ The current not only operates the vehicle, but it lights the lamps, rings the gong, and in cabs and broughams actuates a push-button arrange- ment for communication between passenger and driver. The limit of travel without recharging is from 20 to 30 miles. A good electric car- riage for family use cannot be obtained for 140 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. much less than $2,000, although one or two manufacturers advertise runabouts and buggies at from $Y50 to $1,500. An omnibus costs from $3,000 to $4,000. The company which operates the electric cab system in New York has a most exten- sive charging plant. Two batteries are pro- vided for each vehicle, so that, when one is empty, it may be removed by the huge fin- gers of a travelling crane, placed on a long table, and recharged at leisure, while a com- pletely filled battery is introduced in its place. This change takes only a few minutes, and the cab can be used continuously day and night. The '^lightning cabby" is a product of the new industry. He Avears a blue uniform some- what resembling that of a fireman, and he is a cool-headed, intelligent fellow, who can make 10 miles an hour in a crowded street without once catching the suspicious eye of a police- *man. Most of the " cabbies " have had previ- ous experience as drivers, but they are given a very thorough training before they are allowed to venture on the streets with a vehicle of their own. A special instructor's cab is in use by the company. It has a flaring front platform with a solid wooden bumper, so that it may crash into a stone curb or run down a lamp- THE MODERN MOTOR VEHICLE. 143 post without injury. The new man perches himself on the seat behind, and the instructor takes his place inside, where he is provided with a special arrangement for cutting off the cur- rent or applying the brakes, should the vehicle escape from the control of the learner. It usually takes a week to train a new ]iian so that he can manage all the brakes and levers with perfect presence of mind. Both of his hands and both of his feet are fully employed. With his left hand he manages the power lever, push- ing it forward one notch at a time to increase the speed. With his right hand he controls the steering lever, which, by the way, turns the' rear wheels and not the front ones, as is done with horse-propelled vehicles. His left heel is on the emergency switch, and his left toe rings the gong. With his right heel he turns the reversing switch, and he may apply the brake with either his right or his left foot. When he wishes to turn on the lights, he presses a button, under the edge of the seat. Hence, he is very fully employed, both men- tally and physically. He can't go to sleep and let the old horse carry him home. In France the system of instruction for drivers or chauffeurs (stokers), as they are called, is much more complicated and exten- sive, but hardly more thorough. There the 144 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. cab company has prepared a YOO-yard course up hill and down, and paved it alternately with cobbles, asphalt, wooden blocks, and macadam, so as to give the incipient " cabby " experience in every difficulty which he will meet in the streets of Paris. Upon the inclines are placed numerous lay figures, made of iron — a typical Parisian nurse-maid with a bassinet, a bicycle rider ; an old gentleman, presumably deaf, who is not spry in getting out of the way; a dog or two, and paper bricks galore. Down through this throng must the motorman thread his way and clang his gong, and he is not considered proficient until he can course the full length of the " Eue de Magdebourg, " as the cabbies call it, without so much as overturning a single pastry cook's boy or crushing a dummy brick. IsTew York cabs will run 20 miles without re- charging. But it is not at all infrequent for a new man to have his vehicle stop suddenly and most unexpectedly; the current deserts him before he knows it. He must let the central office know at once, and the ambulance cab comes spinning out, hooks to the helpless ve- hicle, and drags it into the charging station. The company expects soon to have ten charg- ing stations in operation in various parts of the city, so that a cab will never have far to go for a new charge of electricity. Indeed, all the THE TRAINING COUUSE FOR AUTOMOBILE DRIVERS AT AUBERVILLIERS, NEAR PARIS. The course, besides being obstructed bij the dummy figures shown in the i>iclure, is strewn icith jjuper bricks, and thus becomes as severe a test asjjossible of the skill of the motorman. , THE MODERN 310 TOR VEHICLE. 147 manufacturers of electrical vehicles s])eak with confidence of the day when the whole of the United States will be as thoroughly sprinkled with electric charging stations as it is to-day with bicycle road-houses. One manufacturer has issued lists of hundreds of central stations throughout JS^ew England, New York, and other Eastern States where automobiles may be provided with power. It is not hard to imagine what a country touring station will be like on a sunny summer afternoon some five or ten years hence. Long rows of vehicles will stand backed up comfort- ably to the charging bars, each with its elec- tric plug filling the battery with power. The owners will be lolling at the tables on the ve- randas of the nearby road-house. Men with re- pair kits Avill bustle about tightening up a nut here, oiling this bearing, and regulating that gear. From a long rubber tube compressed air will be hissing into pneumatic tires. There will also be many gasolene carts and road wagons and tricycles, and they, too, will need repairs and pumping, and their owners will em- ploy themselves busily in filling their little tin cans with gasolene, recharging their tanks, re- filling the water-jackets, and looking to the working of their sparking devices. And then there will be boys selling peanuts, arnica, and 148 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. court-plasters, and undoubtedly a cynical old farmer or two with a pair of ambling- mares to carry home such of these new-fangled vehicles as may become hopelessly indisposed. Add to this bustling assembly of amateur '' self -propel- lers " a host of bicycle riders — for there will doubtless be as many bicycles in those days as ever— and it will be a sight to awaken every serious-minded horse to an uneasy considera- tion of his future. JSTor is this dream so far from being a picture of actual conditions. In Belgium a company has recently been formed to establish electric posting stations. Its promoters plan to have a bar and restaurant connected with the charg- ing plant, a regular medical attendant, and an expert mechanic who will know how to remedy all the ills of motor vehicles. In the larger cities the time must soon come when there will be coin-in-the-slot "hydrants" for electricity at many public places, from which owners of vehicles may charge their batteries while they wait. A number of prominent New York physicians own their own motor vehicles, these being espe- cially adapted to the varied necessities of a phy- sician's practice. A motor vehicle is alwa3^s ready at a moment's notice — it does not have to be harnessed. It can work twenty-four 1^ 1 »> ?! « . f^ -2 -II K ^ 5 i 3 8 ill .2 1 1 s s THE MODERN MOTOR VEHICLE. 151 hours Ji day. When it is left in the street out- side, the doctor takes with him a little brass plug, or key, without which the vehicle cannot run away or be moved or stolen. And, more- over, it is swifter by half than the ordinary means of locomotion, so that in emergency cases it may mean the saving of a life. One New York physician recently put an electric cab to a most extraordinary use. His patient had a broken arm, and he wished to photograph the fracture with Eontgen rays, but there was no source of electricity available in the resi- dence of the patient. So he made a connection with the battery in his cab, which stood at the door; the rays were promptly applied, and the injury was located. While the electric vehicle has been winning plaudits for its work in the cities, where pave- ments are smooth and hard, the gasolene vehicle has been equally successful both in the city and in the country. For ordinary use the gasolene- propelled vehicle has many important advan- tages. It is much lighter than the electric vehicle; it requires no charging station, gaso- lene being obtainable at every cross-roads store ; and it is moderately cheap. All of the famous long-distance races and rides in Europe have been made in gasolene vehicles. On the other hand, most of the gasolene vehicles are subject 15^ "THE BOY'S BOOK 0"F mVENTlOMS. to slight vibrations due to the motor, and it is ahnost impossible to do away entirely with the unpleasant odors of burnt gases. Gasolene vehicles are never self- starting, it being neces- sary to give the piston one turn by hand. In general, also, they are not as simple of man- agement as the electric vehicle ; there is more machinery to. understand and to operate, and more care is necessary to keep it in order. But when once the details are mastered, the travel- ler can go almost anywhere on earth with his gasolene carriage : up hill and down, over the roughest roads, through mud and snow, a law unto himself. He can make almost any speed he chooses. The power principle of the gasolene vehicle is very simple. It is a well-known fact that when gasolene is mixed with air in proper pro- portions and ignited, it explodes violently. By admitting this mixture at the end or head of the engine cylinder, and exploding it at the proper moment, the piston is driven violently forward, and then, by the action of the fly- wheel or an equivalent device, it is forced back again, and the motor is kept in motion. Most gasolene engines are of what is known as the four-cycle variety. During the first impulse of the piston the vapor is drawn into the end of the cylinder, durino^ the second it is com- THE MODERN MOTOR VEHICLE. 155 pressed by the return of the piston, in the third it is exploded, and in the fourth the products of the combustion are driven out, and the end of the cylinder is ready for another charge. The explosion of the gas is produced in the most approved motors by means of an electric spark, there being no fire anywhere connected with the machine. Owing to the constant com- pression of the gases and the succeeding explo- sions, a gasolene motor becomes highly heated, and in order to maintain a normal temperature, it must be provided with a jacket of cold water, or a peculiar ribbed arrangement of iron for in- creasing the radiating surface. A vast number of ingenious devices are used for making all of these processes as simple as possible. One mo- tor is so arranged that no igniter is necessary, the gas being compressed in the cylinder to such a degree that it explodes of its own heat, thereby doing away entirely with electricity or any other sparking device. In France most of the gasolene vehicles are still provided with what are known as ^'carburetters," or small chambers where the gas and air are mixed in the proper proportions and heated before they are driven into the cylinder. In this country carburetters have been largely done away with, the gas being mixed as it passes into the cyl- inder. 156 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. Every driver of a gasolene vehicle must know these general facts about the mechanism of his motor. He must know how to fill the gasolene and water tanks, how to replenish or regulate the battery which ignites the gas, and he must understand the ordinary processes of cleaning and oiling machinery. When he is ready to start, he must connect up the sparking device and turn the wheel controlling the piston until the explosions begin. After that, he must see that the valves which admit the air and the gas are carefully adjusted, so that the mixture is admitted to the cylinder in the proper propor- tions, and then he is read}^ to go ahead, steering and controlling his engine by means of levers, and operating the brake and gong with his feet. All gasolene vehicles are provided with numer- ous means of stopping, besides the ordinary use of the brake, so that there is practically no possible danger of a runaway. The Duryea vehicle, for instance, has no fewer than five dif- ferent means of turning off the power of the motor, all within convenient reach. The sec- retary of the company that manufactures this vehicle told me that he had often stopped his carryall within 20 feet, when going at a speed of 20 miles an hour, without great inconven- ience to the passengers. By a clever arrange- ment for changing gearings, the gasolene vehicle THE MODERN MOTOR VEHICLE. 157 can be made to ascend almost any hill, and it can be turned in half the space necessar}^ for a horse vehicle. It is astonishing how little fuel it takes to run a gasolene vehicle. One manufacturer showed me a phaeton weighing 700 pounds which he said would run 100 miles on five gallons of gasolene, a bare half-dollar's Avortli. A tricycle manufactured by the same company, weighing 150 pounds, will run 80 miles on three pints of gasolene. Gasolene vehicles vary in cost, over an even wider range than electrical vehicles. A tri- cycle can be obtained as low as $350, while an omnibus may cost into the thousands. A first- class road carriage, built with all the latest im- provements and highly serviceable in every respect, can be obtained for $1,000. At this price, the manufacturers assert that gasolene power is much cheaper than horse power. One motor- vehicle expert has made some interesting- comparisons, based on an average daily run of 25 miles for five years — more than the maxi- mum endurance of a first-class horse. His esti- mates represent ordinary city conditions, and rate the cost of the gasolene used at one-half cent a mile: 158 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. GASOLENE MOTOE VEHICLE. Original cost of vehicle .... |1,000 00 Cost of operation, 1 cent per mile, 25 miles per day 456 50 ^N'ew sets of tires during five years. 100 00 Kepairs on motor and vehicle . . 150 00 Painting vehicle four times . . . 100 00 Storing and care of vehicles, $100.00 per year 500 00 $2,306 50 HOKSE AND VEHICLE. Original cost of horse, harness, and vehicle $500 00 Cost of keeping horse, $30.00 per month, five years 1,800 00 Repairs on vehicle, including rubber tires 150 00 Shoeing horse, $3.00 per month, five years 180 00 Repairs on harness, $10.00 per year. 50 00 Painting vehicle four times . . . 100 00 $2,780 00 ''At the end of five years," explained this expert, ' ' the motor vehicle should be in rea- sonably good condition, while the value of the horse and carriage would be doubtful. There is always the possibility that at least one of the horses may die in five years, Avhile the motor vehicle can always be repaired at a compara- tively nominal cost. But even assuming that THE MODERN 310 TOR VEHICLE. 161 the relative value of each is the same at the end of five years, the cost of actual maintenance during" that period would be $1,306.50 for the motor vehicle and $2,280 for the horse and vehicle, or $973.50 in favor of the motor vehi- cle. This comparison is really doing more than justice to the horse, because a motor vehicle can do the work of three horses without injury." Steam has been successfully applied to the heavier grades of vehicles, notably trucks, fire- engines, and omnibuses ; and two or three American manufacturers have gone still fur- ther, and have produced light and natty steam buggies and runabouts, and even steam tri- cycles. Steam vehicles are easily started and stopped, and fuel and water are always readily obtainable; but there is also the disadvantage of a slight cloud of steam escaping from the exhaust, accompanied by more or less noise. Moreover, in many States there are regulations (mostly unenforced in the case of motor vehi- cles) against the operation of steam-engines ex- cept by licensed engineers, and it is probable that steam automobiles will not be widely ac- cepted for pleasure purposes until the inventors have succeeded in producing a strictly automatic engine. Much has been said as to the use of com- pressed air for heavy trucks, and several im- 11 163 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. meiise corporations Lave been organized to pro- mote its use. The air is compressed at a central station, and admitted to heavy steel storage bottles, or tubes, connected with the truck and used much like steam. The main difficulty in the process has been the sudden cooling of the machinery when the air is released from pres- sure and begins to take up heat. Often the pipes and valves are frozen solid. To deal with this problem, a jacket of water heated by a gasolene flame is provided for " reheating " the air, a difficult and cumbersome process. Owing to the weight of the steel tubes, the compressed- air vehicles are enormously heavy, and, like electric vehicles, they must return to some charging station, after travelling 20 or 30 miles, for a new supply of power. And yet both inventors and financial promoters are sanguine of ultimate success with them. A Chicago inventor has been building a truck in which he combines gasolene and electrical power. An eight-horse-power gasolene engine situated over the front axle drives an electrical generator, which in turn feeds a small storage battery, thus producing power as the vehicle moves, and rendering it entirely independent of a charging station. One man can handle the entire truck, and it is said that the cost of operation will not exceed 80 cents a day. The THE MODERN MOTOR VEHICLE. 163 main objection to this system, as Avitli com- pressed air, is the enormous weight of the vehi- cle, \yhich is upwards of 9,000 pounds. The truck has a carrying capacity of eight tons, making a total of 25,000 pounds. Such a vehi- cle presents problems which modern pavement builders have yet to solve. But the time is certainly coming, and that soon, when all heavy loads must be drawn by automobiles. Recent English experiments, al- ready mentioned, have established the feasibil- ity of the auto-truck even in its present experi- mental stage, and the inventor needs no further encouragement to prosecute his work. It is hardly possible to conceive the appearance of a crowded wholesale street in the day of the automatic vehicle. In the first place, it will be almost as quiet as a country lane — all the crash of horses' hoofs and the rumble of steel tires will be gone. The vehicles will be fewer and heavier, although much shorter than the present truck and span, so that the streets will appear much less crowded. And with larger loads, more room, and less necessary attention, more business can be done, and at less expense. A ISTew York manufacturer produces an odd variation of the motor vehicle in what he calls a ''mechanical horse." It is a one- or three- wheeled equipment provided Avith an electric 164 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. motor, and it can be attached to almost any kind of carriage or wagon body and used for propulsion like a veritable meclianical horse. As to just what form the future motor vehicle will take there is the widest diversity of opin- ion. Business clashes with art. Horse car- riages are built high so that the driver can see over the horse and avoid the dust. The first motor vehicles were merely " carriages- with - out-the-horse, ' ' and some of them looked clumsy and odd enough, ^' bobbed off in front," as one enthusiast told me. Strangely enough, how- ever, manufacturers say that at present the pub- lie demands just such vehicles, the low, light, and comfortable models being too much of an innovation to sell. '' But you may depend upon it," one manu- facturer told me, ''the future motor vehicle will be within a step of the ground, with an artistically rounded front, neither a machine nor a carriage-without-the-horse, but a new and distinct type — the motor vehicle. ' ' The utility of the automobile in any city is in direct proportion to the condition of its streets. It is hardly surprising that manufacturers are receiving the greatest number of inquiries from cities like Buffalo and Detroit, where the pave- ments are good, and from California and part of E"ew England. The automobile has had such THE MODERN MOTOR VEHICLE. 167 acceptance in France because the highways are all as smooth as park paths. Bicycling already has had a profound influence in spurring the road-makers, and the introduction of the motor vehicle will be still more effective. Colonel Waring estimated that two-thirds of all street dirt is traceable to the horse. A.i present it costs E'ew York nearly $3,000,000 a year to clean its streets. With new pavements such as the new soft-tired vehicles and the absence of pounding hoofs would make possible, street cleaning would become a minor problem. And new asphalt pavement, the best in the world, could be put down at the rate of 40 miles a year for what New York now spends for half cleaning its streets. As yet American law-makers have hardly touched on the subject of motor vehicles. In I^ew York, if drivers keep oat of Central Park, display a light, ring a gong, and do not speed faster than eight miles an hour, no one inter- feres with them. Similar regulations prevail in Boston, and in other American cities. In Brooklyn the parks are free. France and Eng- land, on the other hand, hedge in automobile drivers with all manner of rules and regula- tions, and require them to be officially licensed. In France, by recently promulgated articles, every type of vehicle employed must offer com- 168 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. plete conditions of security in its mechanism, its steering gear, and its brakes. The constructors of automobiles must have the specifications of each type of machine verified by the Service des Mines. After a certificate of such verification has been granted, the constructor is at libert}^ to manufacture an unlimited number of vehi- cles. Each vehicle must bear the name of the constructor, an indication of the type of ma- chine, the number of the vehicle in that type, and the name and domicile of its owner. No one may drive an automobile who is not the holder of a certificate of capacity signed by the prefect of the department in which he resides. The regulations are most explicit on the important question of speed. In narrow or crowded thoroughfares the speed must be re- duced to walking pace. In no case may the speed exceed 18|^ miles an hour in the open country, or 12^ miles an hour when passing houses. Kelative to signals, the regulations say that ' ' the approach of an automobile must, if necessary, be signaled by means of a trumpet." Each automobile must be provided with two lamps, one white, the other green. Racing is allowed, provided an authorization is obtained from the prefect and the mayors are warned. In racing, the speed of 18^ miles an hour may be exceeded in the open country, but when THE 310DERN MOTOR VEHICLE. 169 passing houses, the maximum of 12^ miles must not be exceeded. One curious difficulty in connection with the new vehicle is the difficulty of finding suitable English names to designate it and its driver. The French, with characteristic readiness in getting settled names for things, have, as al- ready noted, formally adopted the word '' au- tomobile " for the vehicle and "chauffeur" (stoker) for the driver. But we of the English tongue are slower. At least a dozen names have been used to a greater or less extent, such as "motor carriao:e," " auto-carriao^e, " and " horseless carriage." In England, " self -pro- peller " is popular and so is "auto-car," the latter being apparently the favored designa- tion. "Motor vehicle" seems to be the more generally accepted name in this country. But whatever it is, or is yet to be called, the thing itself must now be rated an accepted and estab- lished appliance of every-day life. PHOTOGRAPH OP A LADY'S HAND, SHOWING THE BONES, AND A BING ON THE THIRD FINGER, WITH FAINT OUTLINES OF THE FLESH. From a photograph taken hy Mr. P. Spies, director of the " Urania," Berlin. CHAPTER y. X-KAY PHOTOGKAPHY Dr. liontgens Great Discovery. Perhaps no inveiitoi' ever achieved world- wide distinction so quickly as Dr. William Konrad Rontgen. He discovered his famous X-Ravs on iN^ovember S, 1895; in December he described them before the Wllrzburg Physico- Medical Society ; in January the marvel of the new rays which penetrate and photograph through almost every known substance was known all over the world, as well to news- paper readers as to the learned societies. A few months later many prominent scientists, both in Europe and in America, were experi- menting with Rontgen's rays, and within a year they had become a regular and exceed- ingly important factor in surgical operations. Moreover, no one disputed the originality of Dr. Rontgen's discovery; he had invented the first machine for photographing through solid substances, for taking pictures of the skeleton framework of the human body through the 174 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. flesh. 'Eo one ever before had done that, and the scientific world was quick with its appre- ciation and liberal with its honors. And yet this discovery, which many scien- tists rank side by side with Lister's system of antiseptics in its importance as a life saver, was not the result of happy chance. It was not mere luck. At the time that Dr. Rontgen saw the X-Rays shimmering and glowing for the first time on a bit of sensitive paper he was past fifty 3^ears old, and during the greater part of his life he had been working quietly but industriously and thoughtfully with the great problems of physics and electricity. He laid the foundation of his career in a thorough education at Zurich, his birthplace, and at Utrecht. Seven years before the discovery he had become a professor at the Royal Univer- sity in the quaint old Bavarian town of Wiirz- burg. Here, in a bare little laboratory in an equally modest two-story house, with few of the modern appliances, he made his famous ex- periments, and from here he went out when the Avorld heard, of him to receive the praise and decorations of his emperor. And after that he returned to his work, just as if he wasn't famous. Dr. Rontgen (pronounced Rentgen) is a tall, slender, somewhat loosely built man, with a DTI. AVTLLIAM KONllAD Kr)JN'TGEN, UISCOVEREE OF THE X-RAYS. From a X)hotograph htj TIdiifstaciiac, F ra itlforf-oii-the-Main. X-EAY PHOTOGRAPHY. 177 busily beard and long hair rising straight up from a high white forehead. When he is ex- cited or much in earnest he thrusts his fingers through this mass of hair until it bristles all over his head. He has an amiable face, with kindly although penetrating eyes. His voice is full and deep, and he speaks with the rapidit}^ of great enthusiasm. Indeed, his whole bear- ing tells of boundless energy and unremitting vigor. One visitor compared him on first sight to an amiable gust of wind. Previous to the discovery which made him famous, Dr. Rontgen had actually been pro- ducing and working with X-Eays for some time without knowing it. Indeed, other scien- tists had been doing much the same thing — experimenting all unconsciously on the very verge of the greatest discovery of years, but it remained for Dr. Eontgen, with his keener scientific insight, to see the unseen. The famous electrician Hertz, whose discov- eries have made possible inore than one great invention, had tried sending a high-pressure electric current through a vacuum tube, a so- called Crookes tube. A vacuum tube is a ves- sel of very thin glass, having a platinum wire fixed in each end. This vessel is as nearly empty of everything as human ingenuity can make it ; even the air is pumped out until only one 13 178 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. one-millionth of an atmosphere remains. Hertz connected one of these tubes to the poles of his battery by means of the platinum wires. When the discharge began he observed that the anode COINS PHOTOGRAPHED INSIDE A PUKSE. From a photograph hij A. A. C. Swjnton, Victoria Street, London. —that is, the end of the tube connected with .the positive pole of the battery — gave off cer- tain peculiar and faint bands of light. But these were quite insignificant compared with the brilliant and beautiful glow at the other or SKELETON OF A FROG, PHOTOGRAPHED THROUGH THE FLESH. THE SHADINGS INDICATE, IN ADDITION TO THE BONES, ALSO THE LUNGS AND THE CEREBRAL LOBES. From a photograph by Professors Inibert and Bertin-Sans; reproduced i the " Presse Medicate," Paris. the courtesy of X-RAF PHOTOGRAPHY. 181 negative end of the tube, which is called the cathode. This glow resembled somewhat the fierce burning of an alcohol lamp, only it was softer, more evanescent, and more striking in its coloring. It produced brilliant phosphor- escence in glass and many other substances, and Professor Lenard, Hertz's assistant, ob- served, in 1894, that the rays — ^'' cathode rays," as they were called — would penetrate thin films of wood, aluminum, and other sub- stances. But this was as far as any of the ex- perimenters who preceded Eontgen succeeded in going. Strangely enough, both Hertz and Lenard produced X-Rays in abundance without know- ing it. These were, indeed, present in the glow from the cathode, only they were entirely invisible to the human eye. They are differ- ent from the rays described by Lenard, in that they are not deflected — that is, turned aside — by a magnet, and they are incomparably more powerful in range and in penetrating power. It will be seen, therefore, that while Dr. Eont- gen was not Avorking in a wholly new field, his discovery is none the less entirely original. The discovery itself was made in a peculiarly interesting way. Dr. Eontgen had been ex- perimenting steadily for several weeks with his Crookes tubes. One day he had covered the 182 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. PICTUKE OF AN ALUMINUM CIGAR-CASE, SHOWING CIGAKS WITHIN. From a photograph by A. A. C, Swinton, Victoria Street, London. Exposure, ten minutes. tube Avith a light-excluding black shield. Then he had darkened his laboratory so that not a ray of light could anywhere enter. To the eye everything was absolutely black. When the electric current Avas turned on, the 6 A TTFMAN FOOT PHOTOOTIAPHED THKOTTOH THE SOLE OF A SHOE. THE SHADUNa SHOWS THE PEGS OF THE SHOE AS WELL AS TRACES OF THE FOOT. From a photograph by Dr. W. L. Eobb of Trinity College. X-RAY PHOTOGRAPHY. 185 hooded tube did not show even a glint of light ; but something on a shelf below began to glow, very strangely. It was a piece of sensitive paper — barium platino-cyanide paper. Dr. Kontgen knew that no light could come from the tube, because the shield that covered it was wholly impervious to light — even the strongest electric light. Where, then, did it come from? Dr. Rontgen began at once an eager investiga- tion, moving the sensitive paper from side to side and covering the tube with a still denser screen. And finally he came to the conclusion that certain unknown rays, whether of light or not, he did not know, were actually coming through the screen, and giving the sensitive paper a distinct luminescence. It was contrary to all reason, to everything that the text-books taught, and yet Dr. Rontgen was forced to be- lieve it. And having discovered the existence of the new rays, he began at once to experi- ment with them. He found that they readily penetrated paper, wood, and cloth, and that the thickness of these mediums made little dif- ference. That is, they would penetrate a thick book almost as easily as they would a single sheet of paper. Then he tried photographing, and found to his astonishment that the rays affected the sensitive film of the photographic plate, leaving the shadows of the objects ex- 186 THE BOY'S IBOOK OF INVEh^TIOm. posed plainly outlined. For instance, lie placed bits of platinnni, alaminmn, and brass inside of a wooden box, and found that not only did he get skiagraphs (shadowgraphs) of them through the wood, but all the nails that held the box together and the brass hinges were likewise reproduced. Then he photo- graphed a spool of wire, the wooden ends of the spool leaving a very faint shadow, and the wire a dark one. When he tried glass, which is one of the most transparent of substances so far as ordinary light is concerned, he found that the new rays passed through it only with difficulty, and that aluminum was much more transparent to them than glass. In other words, if we lived in an X-Ray world we might use aluminum for windows to let in the X-Ray ' ^ light, ' ' and glass for shutters to keep it out. After many experiments of this kind, it sud- denly occurred to Dr. Rontgen that if the new rays penetrated all manner of substances, they would also penetrate the human body ; that, in fact, they were probably going straight through his hands and his head as he worked with them. So he placed his hand, palm down, on a photo- graphic plate, still in its black holder, arranged the Crookes tube above it, turned on the cur- rent, and in a short time he had a photograph, dim, it is true, but perfect, of the bony frame- X-EAY PHOTOGRAPHY. 189 work of his hand — the first of the liind ever talven, and a marvel up to that time absolutely inconceivable. A little later he built a closet of tin jast big enough to accommodate one man comfortably, and fitted it up with an aluminum window. Outside of the window he placed his new ap- paratus. Only the new rays would, of course, shine through the aluminum, and he could study them at his leisure. But after long and careful experimenting he could not decide what the new rays really were, and although many theories have been advanced by prominent scientists, a really satisfactory explanation is still wanting. It is- pretty generally believed, however, that Rontgen's rays are only a " mode of motion ' ' through the ether — that is, they are produced by a certain peculiar kind of vi- brations in the ether. Dr. Rontgen himself gave them the name " X-Rays " — the unknown rays. But if the exact nature of the rays was a mystery, their uses and importance became familiar almost immediately. The apparatus was so simple that it could be fitted up in almost any laboratory. It consisted merely of a battery or dynamo current; a coil, usually a Rhumkorff coil, for intensifying the current, and a Crookes tube, which might have any one 190 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS, of twenty-odd shapes. As a result of this sim- plicity thousands of surgeons and scientists were able to prepare experimental apparatus, and some of the results -in this country were excellent, especially in photographing the hu- man skeleton. Even Edison, the greatest of American in- ventors, took up the work with great enthu- siasm, and he shortly invented a curious but simple device by means of which one may actu- ally see the bones of the hand or foot through the flesh. He called it the fliioroscope. It is merely a wooden box, larger at one end than at the other, the smaller end being so con- structed and padded with cloth that it will fit exactly over the eyes without admitting any light. The other end of the box is covered Avith a sheet of thin cardboard coated with a chemical compound w^hicli becomes fluorescent — that is, shines or glows — when placed in range of the X-Eays. By holding this box be- tween one's eyes and a Crookes tube, and plac- ing one hand on the sensitive cardboard, the X-Kays will readily pierce the flesh, and the dark shadow of the skeleton of the hand may be seeUo In this way a doctor can tell quickly the location of a bullet or a needle in the hand or foot, for he is able to look through the flesh as if it were glass. THOMAS A. EDISON EXPERIMENTING WITH THE RONTGEN RAYS. X-RAY PHOTOGRAPBY. 195 The Kontgen rays have been put to many marvellous uses, most of them connected with bone photography in surgery cases. And, strangely enough, when a physician is ready to photograph a broken arm, for instance, to see if it is properly set, he never thinks of removing the splints or the bandages; he sim- ply photographs through them. And that is the reason why such a photograph often shows pins and buckles. Frequently, in cases where the patient is very weak, the photograph is taken through the bed-clothes as well as through the bandages — it doesn't make the slightest difference to these wonderful rays. It takes from two minutes to more than a hour to get a good skiagraph, but the operation is no more painful, if we count out the necessity of keeping still, than having a snap-shot taken. One of the earliest skiagraphs, showing the medical importance of the X-Rays, was taken in England. A boy of nineteen had injured his little finger playing ball, so that it was bent at the last joint, and he could neither ex- tend it nor bend it further down. Any at- tempt to do so caused him sharp pain. Before the skiagraph was taken the doctors declared that the finger must be amputated. A skia- graph showed, hoAvever, that there was only a little bridge of bone uniting the last two joints, 196 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. thereby preventing the proper flexing of the finger. As soon as this was known an an- aesthetic was administered, and by the use of a little force this bridge of bone was snapped, and the finger saved. That was the first fin- ger to the credit of Dr. Rontgen's discovery. Since then the X-Rays have been used con- stantly for finding bullets embedded in the flesh — X-Ray machines are now taken to war with every civilized army — for finding needles that have been driven into the foot, for ex- amining deformities of the bones, and, more recently, for photographing foreign bodies in the larynx and windpipe, and even in the stomach. Think of the sufferings caused by probing for bullets, shot, and needles in the flesh, all saved by an easily taken skiagraph ! An English Avoman came to a doctor saying that she was suffering tortures from her shoes, so that she found it difficult to walk, and she even wanted some of iier toes amputated. A skiagraph, showed exactly what the trouble was. She ]iad been wearing shoes much too small for her, and the bones had become avo- fully tAvisted and bent. One sight of the pho- tograph convinced her that she must Avear broad-soled shoes. In a somcAvhat similar case in Austria, the doctors found tliat the great toe of the patient Avas twice as large as X.RAY PHOTOGRAPHY. lUD it should be. They foimd by feeling that there were tAvo bones instead of one, but they could not tell Avhich Avas the normal bone and CORKSCREW, KEY, PENCIL WITH METALLIC PROTECTOR, AND PIECE OF COIN, AS PHOTOGRAPHED WHILE IN- SIDE A CALICO POCKET. From, a photograph by A. A. C. Swinton, Victoria Street, London. Four min- utes' exposure through a sheet of aluminum. Avhich the one to be removed. A skiagraph showed the whole condition instantly. One of the strangest uses to Avhich X-Rays ever have been put Avas at the instance of a 200 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. Philadelphia woman. She had been travelling in Egypt, and had brought home what she believed to be the hand of a mummy. But some of her friends told her how Egyptian curiosities are likely to be manufactured and sold to unsuspecting travellers as genuine relics. One friend, himself a great traveller, assured her that she had bought a mere mass of pitch, plaster of Paris, and refuse mummy-cloth, not a hand. For a long time there was no way of deciding the question, until at last the owner of the relic had an X-Pay photograph taken. And lo and behold! there in the picture was the complete skeleton of the hand of some ancient Egyptian ; the relic was genuine, after all. Another curious and important use of X-Pays is in determining genuine from imitation dia- monds. A European scientist has made many tests in this field, and he finds that while the X-Pays will penetrate the genuine diamond and leave almost no shadoAv in the photograph, the false ones are nearly opaque to tte rays, and appear very dark in the photograph. This unusual new test may some time supersede all others. A great many experiments have been made looking to the use of X-Pays in curing dis- eases. Several prominent physicians assert a _g ^ s Q iw ^ ^ < '» W § P^ z^ o e ^ SI < '"- "§ A , thus 246 THE BOY'S BOOK OW INVJSNTlONS. forming the bridle, «, J, c ; the main line be- ing attached at the point c by a kind of knot shown enlarged at one side. This will not slip of itself, but the point of attachment can easily be adjusted as may be desired. To be perfectly safe, the flying line for this kite should have a tensile strength of from fifty to sixty pounds, and be equally strong throughout. If the wind is favorable for flying, the best way to start the kite in flight is to run out 150 feet or so of twine while the kite is held by an assistant. When all is ready, the assistant may toss the kite upward a little in the direction in which it is to go. It will take care of itself afterward. It is important that the kite be cast off directly in line with the wind, other- wise it may seem, to dart badly. When fairly up, the kite may sweep a little from side to side, but if it ever darts or turns over, there is something radically wrong, probably due to an uneven distribution of the cloth surface, or some permanent distortion of the framework. Sometimes the weight of the wood varies, and one side is heavier than the other. This should be corrected by weighting the light side with a small strip of sheet lead, or otherwise. If the wind is very light, a finer twine may be used in flying, and it may be necessary to TAILLESS KITES. 247 run a little with a long string out, in order to get the kite into upper and more rapidly mov- ing currents. When the wind is very strong, drop the ball of twine on the ground so that the cord can pay out rapidly, and let the kite go up directly and quickly from the hand. CAPTAIN BADEN-POWELL FOLDING UP A BIG KITE. SAIIAII BERNHARDT MAKING A PnONOGRAPH RECORD. CHAPTER YII. THE STORY OF THE PHONOGRAPH. Making Pictures of Sounds and Sounds of Pictures. This is the wonder of the phonograph: ib is a machine which makes pictures of sounds, and then, at will, changes these pictures back into sounds again. A picture of a matchless solo by Melba is made in Paris on a little wax cylinder ; the cylinder is sent through the mails to ISTew York like any other picture, here to be transformed again into the voice of Melba, repeating all the sweetness and richness of the original tones. The voice of Mcolini, preserved in pictures, still sings, although the singer himself is dead. And this is something hard to realize, even at this day when the phon- ograph has become almost as familiar as the sewing-machine. Every man has in his throat a delicate mem- brane Avhich is set to quivering every time he speaks. The vibrations thus produced in turn set the air to quivering, and these waves roll through space, very much like the waves on 252 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. the seashore, until they strike on the drum or membrane of the ear. That is the way we hear; it is nature's telephone. If the vibra- tions are rapid we say that the voice is high; SCOTT S PHON AUTOGRAPH. The first suggestion of a talking machine, in which the sound pictures were scratched on a cylinder covered with lampblack, by means of a hog's bristle. if slow, we say that it is deep. Each note has its own different vibrations. Away back in 185Y Leon Scott, knowing these simple facts in physics, conceived the idea of making sounds produce pictures. It was an idea as original as it was bold. In the experiments which followed, Scott constructed a curious little device called the Phonautograph, which vividly foreshadowed a part of the THE STORY OF THE PHONOGRAPH. 253 operation of the phonograph. It consisted of a thin membrane — a bit of bladder — stretched tightly over a barrel-shaped frame. In the center of this membrane a stiff hog's bristle was firmly fastened. On speaking with the lips close to the outer end of the frame the membrane vibrated in accordance with the sound waves thus produced, the bristle moved back and forth and scratched a continuous wavy track on a revolving cylinder which had been well daubed with lampblack. This wavy line was an actual picture of the human voice. But it Avas a mere laboratory experiment, and no one even dreamed that such a sound picture could be again transformed into speech — until the idea came to Thomas A. Edison with the suddenness of inspiration. It was in 1877, long before Edison had become Avidely famous. At that time his experiments were carried on in a shop in ]S"ewark, New Jer- sey, where he was surrounded with a little company of trusted workmen. It was at the time when Edison often became so absorbed in his schemes for inventions that he forgot his meals, and frequently worked night and day for two or three days together, keeping all of those about him as busy as he was himself. Sometimes he would call in an organ-grinder to keep the men awake and cheerful until the 254 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. strain was over, and then he would hire a boat and take all hands down the bay with him on a fishing excursion. It was with this single- ness of purpose and loyalty that Edison and his men always worked together. ]^ot long ago I visited Edison's great lab- oratory at Orange, ISTew Jersey, where more than seven hundred men are employed in coin- ing the visions of the master's brain. I found EDISON'S FIRST PHONOGRAPH. Edison himself sitting in one of his character- istic positions, half leaning upon a table filled with drawings, his head on his hand and his fingers thrust through his hair. He told me briefly how he came to invent the phonograph, and his story was later much extended by John Ott, who was with him through all of the ex- periments. The inventor had been working during the early part of the year 1877 in developing and THE STORY OF THE PHONOGRAPH. 255 improving the telephone, inventing the trans- mitter which has since borne his name. This consisted of a disk of carbon, having a sharp- pointed pin on the back of it. He had noticed many times that when he spoke against the face of the disk the vibrations would cause the pin to prick his fingers or to indent any soft substances held near it. This was one fact; he carried it in mind, but it gave him no particu- lar suggestion. It was, indeed, only a step be- yond Scott's discovery. Previous to this time Edison had invented a remarkable device for the automatic repetition of telegraph messages. It consisted of a sim- ple apparatus by means of which the dots and dashes of the original message were recorded in a series of indentations on a long, narrow strip of paper. This record could be fed into a sending machine and the message re- trans- mitted without the service of an operator. In other words, Edison had made pictures on pa- per of the sounds communicated over the tele- graph wires, thereby approaching the phono- graph from another direction. ^'In manipulating this machine," Edison wrote in 1888, "^ I found that when the cylinder carrying the indented paper was turned with great swiftness it gave off a humming noise from the indentations^ — a musical, rhythmic 256 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. sound, resembling that of human talk heard indistinctly." Here was another fact — unconnected as yet. CROSS SECTION OF EDISON S FIRST PHONOGRAPH, SHOWING METHOD OP OPERATION. but exceedingly important as ])ointing to the great discovery. "I remember," John Ott told me, "that Edison had been working at liis l)ench in the laboratory nearly all day, silent for the most THE STORY OF THE PHONOGRAPH, 257 part. Quite suddenly he jumped up and said with some excitement : ' By George, I can make a talking machine ! ' Then he sat down again and drew the designs of his proposed machine on a slip of yellow paper. I don't think it took him above ten minutes alto- gether. ' ' On the margin of that design Edison marked '^$8," and handed it to his foreman, John Kruesi. ' ' My men all worked by the piece in those days," Mr. Edison told me, "and when I wanted a model made I always marked the price on it. In this case it was $8, I remem- ber, Kruesi went to work at it the same day, and I think he had it completed within thirty- six hours. We used to try all sorts of things, and most of them were failures; so that I didn't expect much from the new model, at least at first, although I knew it was correct in principle." But Kruesi fitted the tin-foil on the cylinder, and brought the machine to Mr. Edison. The inventor turned the handle and spoke into the mouthpiece : *'Mary had a little lamb, Its fleece was white as snow, And everywhere that Mary went The lamb was sure to go." 17 258 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. Then, he set the recorder back to the start- ing-place and began to turn the cylinder. At the very best he had not expected to hear more than a burring confusion of sounds, but to his astonishment and awe the machine began to repeat in a curious, metallic, distant voice: ' ' Mary had a little lamb . . ." And thus the first words ever spoken by a phonograph were the four simple lines of Mother Goose's melody. The idea had come to the inventor with a flash of inspiration, and the machine had proved its marvelous possi- bilities on the first trial. Few inventions ever have been conceived and carried to success so swiftly. Kruesi's eight-dollar machine, which could not now be bought for hundreds, is in the patent museum at South Kensington, London. This first machine, although it talked, was a very crude affair compared with the all but perfect phonographs of to-day. In principle it was exceedingly simple. There was a dia- phragm or membrane, having a sharp-pointed pin attached to its under surface. When sound waves, caused by a spoken word or a piece of music, struck this diaphragm, it vibrated, and the pin rose up and down. The cylinder on which the sound pictures or records were to be MAKING A IlECOKD ON ONE OP THE EARLY FORMS OF THE GRAPHOPHONE. ^fHAyitfii c^ BHOWING HOW THE RECORD IS ENGRAVED ON THE WAX CYLINDER — MUCH ENLARGED. 260 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. made was covered with tin-foil. At every vi- bration of the pin, indentations of various depths were made in this tin-foil. These little holes were so small as to be scarcely visible to the naked eye, but when the diaphragm was set back to the beginning and the cylinder was turned, the pin, travelling up and down over the rough road of indentations, caused the dia- phragm to vibrate and give out the same sounds which had been previously spoken into it. A reference to the pictures on pages 254 and 256 will show clearly just how the machine worked. A is the plate or diaphragm, 1-100 of an inch thick, which vibrated when spoken against, driving the point P into the cylinder C. F is the mouthpiece, and D the crank by means of which the cylinder was turned. Few^ inventions ever awakened a world-wide interest more suddenly than did this of the phonograph. When it was first exhibited in the '^Tribune" building in E'ew York, every scientific paper, every magazine, and every newspaper in this and in foreign countries gave accounts of the invention, and dealt with its dizzying possibilities. Edison himself wrote an article for the ' ' ^orth American Review, ' ' in which he told of some of the marvelous uses to which the machine would be put in the future. PREDECESSOKS OF THE GRAPHOPHONE. Talking machines, one for recording and the other for reproducing sounds, as invented by Alexander Graham Bell, Chichester A. Bell, and Professor Sumner Tainter of the Volta Laboratory Association. THE STORY OF THE PHONOGRAPH. 263 Edison patented his invention both in the United States and abroad, and manufactured a considerable number of machines, chiefly for use in college laboratories. Then he became deeply interested in a series of experiments with incandescent electric lights, and the pho- nograph dropped out of his mind for many years. In the meantime Alexander Graham Bell, the inventor of the telephone, had received the most distinguished honor that can come to an inventor — France had bestowed upon him the Yolta prize, an honor instituted by Emperor Napoleon the Great. It had been awarded only once before — to Faradaj^ — and it has never been awarded since. With the money portion of the prize, amounting to 50,000 francs, Mr. Bell conceived the idea of forming an association for the advancement of the sci- ence of sound. To this association, composed of himself, Dr. Chichester A. Bell, and Charles Sumner Tainter, he gave the name ''Yolta Laboratory Association." From 1881 to 1885 these three men labored hard upon improve- ments in the method of recording and repro- ducing sound, finally producing a machine differing from Mr. Edison's in that it engraved the sound pictures on a cylinder of wax instead of indenting them on tin-foil, a very great and 264 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. important change, which enabled them to re- produce speech and music in a wonderfully life- like manner. This machine was called the grajpliojplione. Another machine, the gramophone, was in- vented by Charles Cros, a Frenchman. In this device the record is scratched on a metal ?^eprt>du((2r' J^ecofde/ BETTINI SPIDER DIAPHRAGM ATTACHMENT. For making and reproducing difficult records. cylinder which has first been daubed with a Avaxy substance. The cylinder is then taken out and immersed in acid. Where the record- ing stylus has scratched the wax away there the acid does its work, etching in the solid metal the wavy sound pictures left by the stylus. The sounds are then reproduced as in the other machines. THE STORY OF THE PHONOGRAPH. 265 In later years Mr. Edison and Mr. Bell have made many improvements in the talking ma- chine until it has reached its present perfected state. Other important additions have been made by Lieutenant G. Bettini. Bettini discovered that all parts of the glass diaphragm used by Mr. Edison did not vibrate equally when spoken against. For instance, the center might vibrate at one speed and the sides at another, thereby producing the peculiar metallic or " tinny " effect which makes many phonograph records disagreeable. Consequently, instead of attaching the recording point directly and firmly to the center of the diaphragm, Bettini used what he called a ' ' spider " — a little frame having several legs, the feet of which rested against the diaphragm at many differ- ent points, thereby making the diaphragm sen- sitive to every variety of sound, even high soprano voices, which have been exceedingly difficult to record. Bettini uses a diaphragm of aluminum instead of glass. The sound pictures or records of the phono- graph are now engraved on a wax cylinder with a fine stylus, the point of which is a bit of sapphire. After one record is made it can be readily duplicated. The old-fashioned ear tubes are giving wa}^ to horns, which bring out 266 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. the sound more distinctly, and distribute it over a whole room. When one record is worn out — and it can often be used more than a hun- dred times — the wax is shaved down and the cylinder is ready for another impression. Most of the modern talking machines are operated by clock-work, although some are fitted to run by electrical power, or even by foot-power like a sewing-machine. The prices vary from five dollars well up beyond a hundred dollars. One of the most interesting things in con- nection with the phonograph is the new pro- fession of record-making — for a real profession it is. At Mr. Edison's laboratory in Orange, l^ew Jersey, a whole building is devoted to the production of singing cylinders, instrumental music, band music, solo, and speaking cylin- ders. A curious and wonderful place it is. In one little room shut off from all the others by tight doors I saw a man seated on a tall stool. He was talking and laughing uproari- ously in Yankee dialect into the flaring end of a long tin tube. At the other end of this tube there was a phonograph with a boy about twelve years old watching the cylinder to see that the stylus was doing its work. The speaker, who had his coat off and was perspir- ing profusely, would first announce himself: '' A humorous sketch, entitled ' Uncle Eben in THE STORY OF THE PHONOGRAPH. 269 Fifth Avenue,' by the well-known comedian ," and then he would begin his talk with no audience but the tin tube and the boy, who looked vastly bored. In another room there were several phonographs placed close together on a shelf, with their horns grouped around a slim 3^oung man, who was playing a lively jig on a banjo. Close behind him loomed the back of a piano, upon which a companion was playing an accompaniment. In still an- other room two men and a woman were sing- ing a church anthem into the receiving horn of a phonograph. Their heads were close to- gether, and both tlie men had their coats off, it being a hot day. Behind them on a pair of saw-horses stood a piano, which was being played with the utmost unconcern. If I had closed my eyes I certainly should have thought that I was sitting in church, and that the an- them was coming from the choir loft. When a record is finished it is taken out and repeated to see if it is connect, and the players or talkers gather around to hear their own words. If the cylinder is a success it is duplicated many times, and placed in the regular library of the phonograph, read}" to go out to the users of the machines in different parts of the countr}^ And yet records of this sort are not alwa^^s successful. Not every one can make a first- 270 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. class phonograph record. Some there are whose voices are too soft to make distinct im- pressions in the wax. The best voice is one that is almost metallic in its timbre^even harsh and hard. For the same reason a cornet makes a far better record than a guitar ; a piano, from its sharp and ringing tones, is bet- ter than a violin. In this way the phonograph has developed its own especial singers and players. Some soloists and talkers, who have never been able to make a success on the stage, have earned a peculiar and valuable reputation of their own among the users of phonographs. They may be as awkward as they please or as unprepossessing of manner or of face — if only they sing so that their voices come out clearly and beautifully from the little wax cylinders, their fame is made. And some of these singers and players earn ver}^ large sums of money. They receive, in general, one dollar for every song they sing or every " piece " they speak, and they often make from twenty to fifty rec- ords in a day. In Mr. Bettini's studio more attention is given to voice records of famous men and women. Here Sarah Bernhardt came and talked into the phonograph, and here Cam- panari, Ancona, Plan9on, and other singers equally famous, have sung. Here, too, you A DUET WITH ACCOMPANIMENT. From a photograph loaned by Frank A. Munsey. THE STORY OF THE PHONOGRAPH, 273 may hear the voice of Mark Twain talking out with beautiful distinctness. Indeed, through this means, a famous man's voice may become as familiar as his picture, and it may go on ONE OF THE NEWEST TALKING MACHINES. talking and giving pleasure to the world long after the man himself is dead. Recently a phonograph with a large-sized cylinder has been constructed for making un- usually clear records. This improvement was 18 274 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. suggested by Thomas H. McDonald, and one wonders that no one thought of trying it be- fore, since the principle of the improvement is simplicity itself. The surface of the large cylinder moves much more rapidly than the surface of the small cylinder, and the groove cut by the recording stylus is much longer. That is, the stylus, instead of making a series of abrupt holes in the wax, as it does when the cylinder moves slowly, scoops out long hol- lows with sloping ends. There being no sharp crests or holes in the groove, the reproducing ball follows every gradual ascent and descent, and does not leap from crest to crest, blurring the sound, as in the case of some of the smaller cylinders. This new style of cylinder has been found to be especially valuable for recording the music of a full brass band or of an orchestra, and some exceedingly fine and popular records of this sort have recently been made. But of all phonograph records, jolly negro and comic songs are the most popular. E'ext to them come instrumental solos, and after that church chimes, quartettes, and so on. Recently a set of cylinder records have been made to play dance music, and at the same time to call the figures, so that for a small dancing party no regular musicians are needed. TEE STORY OF THE PRONOGRAPH. 375 Another very wonderful development of the phonograph which is now in course of evolu- tion is the reproduction of entire operas. ^N'ot long ago Mr. Edison had a portion of the opera of '^ Martha" performed before one of his kinetoscopes ; he succeeded in taking 320 feet of pictures. The acting of the opera can now be thrown in lifelike moving pictures on a screen, and at the same time the phonograph may sing the music which goes with each scene, so that together a portion of the opera will be completely reproduced — a marvel which could not have been imagined even ten years ago. It has been found that the phonograph will ''hear" and record sounds too high and too low to reach the human ear. The very deepest tones to which our ears will respond have six- teen vibrations to the second, whereas the phonograph will record down to ten vibra- tions. And then, more wonderful than all, the pitch can be raised until we hear a repro- duction of these low sound waves — until we hear the unbearable. Within the last few years the phonograph has developed many curious and important uses. It has been employed with success as a teacher of languages. It reproduces perfectly the words and accents of a foreign tongue so that a student may hear the difficult inflection 276 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. repeated over and over until he learns it, with- out a living teacher. Indeed, whole lessons, including the meanings of the various words and any necessary explanations, can be talked into the phonograph without the least diffi- culty. In similar manner the phonograph has A MODERN HIGH-CLASS PHONOGRAPH. been used for teaching small children their les- sons, and in one case that I know of a minister actually preaches his sermons first into a phono- graph and then sits back and listens to his own words as if he were a member of the congre- gation, noting the mistakes in delivery, and at THE STORY OF THE PHONOGRAPH. 277 the same time committing the sermon to mem- ory. In many scores of business offices the phonograph is used exclusively for purposes of dictation. The machine is frequently placed in a drawer of the desk, so that whenever the business man wishes to dictate a letter he merely opens the drawer, starts the machine, A ruoxoGiiAriiic kecokd. How a line of the song " She was Bred in Old Kentucky " looks on a wax cylinder. talks as long as he wishes, and then stops the cylinder. In this way he does without the services of a stenographer. At any time dur- ing the day the typewriter girl may come and take the record away, place it in her machine, insert the tubes in her ears, and copy the letters which the business man has dictated. In this way both may work without interruption. 278 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. Several busy men in New York have pho- nographs in their offices into which visitors who call during their absence may tell of their errands. A phonograph in a restaurant or a barber shop has long been a popular attrac- tion, and I have known of a phonograph being used by a newspaper writer for dictating his articles.. Two St. Louis inventors have re- cently suggested the use of phonographs in place of the whistling buoys on dangerous shoals. One of these inventors says: ' ' We intend to place one of our phonograph buoys on the noted Kitty Hawk reef at the mouth of the Savannah Hiver. At present a bell buoy marks that dangerous reef, and you know the action of the waves tolls the bell of the buoy. It will doubtless surprise many vessel captains to hear our buoy, with its clear, distinct sound, say, ' I am Kitty Hawk, Kitty Hawk, ' and they will hear it farther than they can hear the bell buoy." Many years ago Mr. Edison suggested the use of phonographs for recording the works of the greatest writers of fiction. He himself dictated a considerable extract of " ISTicholas Mckleby " into a phonograph, and he found that six cylinders, twelve inches long and six inches in diameter, would hold the entire novel. Think what a boon such records would THE STORY OF THE PHONOGRAPH. 279 be to a blind man, or, indeed, to a man who comes home with worn-out eyes from a long day's work in the office. The phonograph could talk off the story without a break, and if it had been dictated with expression and ANOTHER VIEW OF " SHE WAS BRED IN OLD KENTUCKY.' The records are here very much enlarged. That on the left shows the sound pictures on a rapidly revolving large-sized cylinder of the McDonald pattern. That on the right is one of the ordinary records, showing how much more abrupt the indentations are. spirit, the effect would be that of listening to a good elocutionist. And thus the phonograph has become a great factor in promoting the pleasure of the race as well as in assisting it with its work. The wonder of the invention — a machine which talks like a man — is yet new enough to make us feel as the famous Emperor Menelek of Abyssinia did when he first heard the phono- 280 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. graph. After the recent victory in the Sou- dan, Queen Victoria spoke a message of friend- ship and good-will into a phonograph. The royal words were delivered one Sunday after- noon, the phonograph working perfectly. The Queen's voice was produced with great clear- ness, and Menelek insisted upon hearing the message repeated many times. First he would listen to it as it came from the trumpet, then he would use the ear tubes. And when it was over he relapsed into silence, and then ordered a royal salute to be fired, while he stood in solemn wonder before the strange machine that talked. Copyright, 1899, by Irving Underhill. THE TALLEST BUILDING IN THE WORLD. Park Row Building, New York City, twenty-nine stories high. CHAPTER VIII. THE MODERN SKYSCRAPER. Story of the Tallest Building in the World. " A STEEL bridge standing on end, with pas- senger cars running up and down within it." This is the engaging definition of a ''sky- scraper ' ' given me by an architect who is as famous for his quaint conceits of speech as he is for his tall buildings. It seems odd to speak of any building as a new invention, since there have been buildings almost as long as there have been men; and yet the very fact — and. curious enough it is when you come to think of it — that the skyscraper is truly more a bridge than a building, and that cars do actually run on perpendicular tracks within it, makes it not only one of the latest feats of the inventor, but one of the very great- est. For thousands of years every large build- ing in the workl was constructed with enor- mous walls of masonry to hold up the inner framework of floors and partitions. It was 284 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. a substantial and worthy method of construc- tion, and there seemed no need of changing it. But one day a daring builder with an idea as- tonished the world by reversing this order of construction, and building an inner framework strong enough to hold up the outside walls of masonry. The invention was instantly suc- cessful, so that to-day the construction of a tall building is ' ' not architecture, ' ' as one writer ob- serves, '' but engineering with a stone veneer." Ten years ago, in 1889, there was not a '' sky- scraper" in the world; to-day there are scores of them in American cities, the heights varying from seven stories up to thirty, making them by all odds the greatest structures reared by the hand of man. The idea of constructing a building like a bridge is said to have originated in Chicago ; it has, indeed, been given the name ^' Chicago construction. " Some of the earliest buildings embodying the steel-cage idea were the Tacoma (completed in 1889), the Home In- surance, and the Rookery buildings of Chi- cago, and the Drexel Building in Philadelphia. IS'early all of these were constructed in spite of the opposition and prophecies of failure of scores of experienced builders, often including the building commissioners who issued the per- mits. Every invention has its reason for being. THE MODERN SKYSCRAPER, 287 Unless it is needed, it does not appear. So with the skyscraper. Great cities had grown with a rapidity unknown anywhere in the world; business centres were much overcrowded; pro- gressive professional men wished to be within easy reach of the districts ^vhere money was making fastest. Property owners said : We can't spread oat, so we must go up. In ]N"ew York single acres are worth more than $Y,000,- 000. Land of this value covered with build- ings of ordinary height could not be made to pay; again the conclusion was resistless: We must go up. Moreover, engineering and the various processes of steel construction had been advancing at great strides ; steel was compara- tively cheap, and a light skeleton framework cost less in the beginning and required less room than immense masonry walls. And, lastly, and by no means of least importance, the modern elevator had been invented. I remember once of talking with a grizzle-headed elevator man in what is noAV an old skyscraper. He had evi- dently done some quiet thinking as he travelled up and down, year after year, on his perpendic- ular railroad. '' Did you ever think," he asked, "that sky- scrapers would be an impossibility without ele- vators ? It's a fact. IS'othing above seven or eight stories without 'em. You'd never catch 288 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. any business man climbing eight flights to his office." And yet if the elevator has made the sky- scraper a possibility, the skyscraper has in no less degree developed the elevator; both have gone up together, and both would seem to have approached very near to perfection. The building of a modern skyscraper is a mighty task, full of difficult problems, more difficult even than those connected with a great steamship, a great bridge, or even a rail- road line. Knowing how far the building is going up, the architect must determine from the character of the ground on which it is to stand how far it must go down. In ]S"ew York many of the greatest buildings have foundations so deep that they rest on the solid rock, seventy- five feet below the surface, and there are two or three stories beneath the street, as well as twenty or thirty above. In Chicago all of the great buildings rest on what may reasonably be called flat-boats. Indeed, Chicago is a floating city — floating on a bed of soft sand and mud. These boats are made of great timbers, driven straight down, or else of steel rails or steel girders laid criss-cross and filled in with cement until they form a great solid slab of iron and stone. And as might be expected, these boats frequently tip a little to one side, so that many REALTY BUILDING, PHILADELPHIA. As it looked August I2th. (.See page 285.) THE 310DERN SKYSCRAPER. 291 of the greatest skyscrapers are slightly out of plumb, like modern towers of Pisa, although they do not lean enough to be at all dangerous. I remember distinctly how a keen-eyed news- paper man made the discovery tha,t one of the most famous skyscrapers in the world — and one of the largest — was out of plumb . He was in th e sixteenth story of the building across the street. The doctor who occupied the room had tied a weight to a window cord in order to keep the shade well down, thus making it a plumb-bob. It so happened that the newspaper man glanced along this cord and across the street to the cor- ner of the great building opposite. At first he couldn't believe his eyes; the cord was cer- tainly plumb, or else all the school-books were incorrect ; therefore the building must certainly be leaning to one side. He called several friends, and each of them bore him out in his observation. He rushed off in great feather, secured an engineer, and had careful ]neasure- ments taken. The building was found to lean nine inches to the eastward at the top, and there was a news '' beat " in one of the news- ])apers the next morning. All great buildings are expected to settle, and the main effort is to make this settle- ment uniform throughout. In New York the tall buildings which rest on a foundation of fine 293 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. wet sand have all settled from one-quarter to nine-sixteenths of an inch. The Marquette Building, Chicago, and the St. Paul Building, Kew York, have provisions made at the bases of their columns for lifting them up with pow- erful hydraulic presses and inserting packing of steel should they settle too much. And thus it will be seen how difficult and delicate a problem the builder must meet in securing a solid foundation for the end of his bridge which goes into the ground. He must know, not only just how much the entire build- ing will weigh, almost to the ton, but he must know the weight of each part of it, so that the load may be equally distributed over the foun- dation, thereby preventing any tendency to tip over. He must also compute the ''live" weight which his building is expected to carry, that is, the furniture, the safes, the tenants themselves. And in Chicago, where the foun- dation is clay, he must not put a weight of more than one and one-half to two tons on every square foot of surface ; the solid rock of N^ew York will bear more. Moreover, he must determine exactly how much strain each steel girder, each column, even each rivet will bear. If he overloads any single girder, he endangers his whole building. Then he must calculate how much wind is going to blow against his THE FIRST FLAG AT THE SUMMIT OF REALTY BUILDING. As it looked two weeks later, August 27th, (See page 285.) THE MODERN SKYSCRAPER. 295 building, and from what direction most of it is coming ; he must even calculate on the pound- ing of horses' hoofs and heavy wagons on the pavement outside; he must make provisions for supplying water to the top stories, where the city cannot pump it; he must provide amply against possible fires — and that's one of the most difficult of all the problems ; he must see to the prevention of rust in his steel work ; he must secure proper ventilation and lighting, so that every room has its windows with a street front if possible; and, more difficult than all else, he must keep well within the hampering limits of the city's building laws. These are only a few of thousands of intricate details, not to consider the tremendous question of cost with which the builder must grapple. And then it sometimes happens that he is blamed if he does not make this tower of steel, with its hun- dreds of rectangular windows, a thing of archi- tectural grace and. beauty. Perhaps it will be possible to give the best idea of what a modern skyscraper really is, when completed, by relating some of the im- portant facts concerning what is now the greatest modern building — indeed the tallest inhabited building in the world — the Park Eow Building in l^ew York City. It was designed by R. H. Robertson, and it stands as one of 296 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. the greatest monuments to the daring and en- terprise of the American builder. It can be seen from far out in ^ew Jersey, from Staten Island, from Long Island, and the lookout of every ship that enters the harbor sees it loom- ing like a huge tower above its neighbors. To begin with, it has twenty-nine stories, and its height from the sidewalk to the tops of the cupolas on the towers is 390 feet. Thus it is over 100 feet taller than the dome of the Capitol at Washington, and 85 feet above the Statue of Liberty. Even these figures do not represent its full proportions. The flagpoles on top of the building are 57 feet in height. The foundations extend 51 feet below the surface. Therefore, from the base of its foundations to the top of its flagpoles the new building spans 501 feet, or nearly the tenth of a mile, exceed- ing by 48 feet the extreme height of the Pyramids. The restaurant on top of the main building is 308 feet above the street, while the topmost offices — and they are all large, comfortable rooms — are 340 feet in air. Their windows command a view of over 40 miles. The new building has a frontage of 103 feet on the street which it faces, of 23 feet on a side street, and of 47 feet on a rear alley. . It may therefore be said to look in three directions. liu^y- mmm i:ilUi!lillil|f siwiffiif FIRST STONEWOIIK, SIXTH AND NINTH STORIES, REALTY BUILDING. As it looked September 10th. (See page 285.) THE MODERN SKYSCRAPER. 399 It is nearly four times as high as its main front- age. The difficulty presented by that propor- tion is an architectural problem of some mag- nitude in itself. It need not be said that a vast amount of steel and stone, glass, and other material enter into the construction of such a building. As a matter of fact, the building weighs about 20,000 tons. The material of Avhich it is constructed would build all the houses of an ordinary sub- urban town, with enough left over to construct a good-sized church. As with all skyscrapers, the foundation of the Park Kow Building is its most interesting, as well as its most perplexing, feature. Sev- eral acres of Georgia timberland were denuded to furnish the 1,200 great pine piles, some of them 40 feet long, which were driven into the sand of the site. These piles are in rows, two feet apart, under the vertical columns which support the building. They were driven into the ground as far as they would go under the blows of the one-ton hammer. They are thus prepared to sustain a weight of 20 tons, although the most that will be put upon them is about 16 tons, a margin great enough to give any builder a sense of safety. Moreover, they are below the water-line, so that they are inde- structible by the ordinary process of decay. 300 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. "When the piles were driven as far as possi- ble their tops were cut off, and the sand was cleared away for a foot down around their tops and concrete was poured about them, forming a solid rock surface resting securely upon theii' tops. On this concrete base were laid largo blocks of granite, and above them the brick piers of the building. The Aveight of the building is not allowed to come directly upon the granite capstones which surmount these piers. Instead, it is distributed by the system of steel girders, some of them 8 feet in depth aud 4Y feet long. These are in effect big bridges placed between the founda- tions and the footings of the vertical columns to distribute the weight evenly. The heaviest girder in the building, which lies deep beneath one wall of the building, weighs over 52 tons. Above the surface the building is a mere steel framework — a big steel box — built like a canti- lever bridge. The walls are comparatively light, being hardly more than thin sheeting for the skeleton, and, curiously enough, the stone- work of the second and some of the higher stories was constructed before the wall founda- tions were laid, being entirely supported by the steel framework. As I said before, the dead weight of the building itself is about 20,000 tons. But with RUSHING THE STONEWORK ON FOUR FLOORS AT ONCE. The ReuUtj Building on September 2ith. (Seepage 285.) THE MODERN SKYSCRAPER, 303 the addition of the maximum load which the twenty-nine floors are calculated to carry, the total weight of the structure will amount to something like 61,400 tons. There are 950 rooms in the building. Count- ing four persons to each office, this will make the permanent population of the building nearly 4,000, or equal to that of many a flourishing county seat. To this must be added a large transient population amounting probably to one person for each resident at any given time during business hours. This would make an ordinary population, resident and floating, of 8,000 for this one building! If twenty persons visit each office during the day, there would be 27,000 persons using the building every day. The various elevators have daily passenger traffic of over 60,000, or more than that of many an important railway line. It is a curious reflection that if the regular occupants of the building were placed shoulder to shoulder on the ground that it occupies, there would be barely standing room for them ; while if all the persons who visit the building during a day were gathered on the ground site at one time they would make a group standing five feet deep on one another's heads. The cost of the building was $2,400,000, but it will collect more in revenues every year than 304 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. many a populous county. If a building as high and as large could have been constructed by the old solid masonry process, it would have cost fourteen times as much, and the walls would have been so thick at the base that there would have been little or no room for oiRces and stores. The time may come, and come soon, when buildings higher even than this one may be built. There is nothing in the engineering problem to prevent the construction of a fifty- story building, but such a sight will probably never vex the eye of man. Already various American cities are passing laws limiting the height of buildings. Moreover, many property- owners feel that time should be given to ascer- tain how the skyscraper will endure — whether the steel will weaken with rust, whether the foundations will hold true, whether the fire- proofing is efficient. Most skyscrapers are only a few years old; but examinations of steel columns erected ten 3^ears ago and housed in cement, and of foundation beams lying below the water-line, have shown that not even the blue-black scale from the rolling-mill finish has turned color. Wherever it is possible, these steels are buried in cement, in itself a rust- proofing, and under such conditions the steel- ponstructed building promises to stand as long STONEWOKK COMPLETE FIRST IN THE MIDDLE OP THE BUILDING. The Realty Building as it looked October Sth. (.Seepage 285.) THE MODERN SKYSCRAPER. 307 as the building itself shall be satisfactory to its owner and its tenants. A great office building is really a city under one roof. It has its own electric-lighting plant and sometimes a gas plant in addition; it has its own water- works system, with a big stand- pipe at the top to supply the upper floors, and sometimes an artesian well underneath; it has its own well-drilled fire department, with fire plugs on every floor, and hose-lines and chemi- cal extinguishers ; it has its own police depart- ment, for ever}^ great building is now supplied with regular detectives who watch for petty thieves and pickpockets, and prevent peddlers and beggars from entering their domain. It is even governed like a city ; for the superintend- ent is the mayor, and he has a large force of workmen always busy cleaning the streets and stairways of the big structure. In some of the Chicago buildings, Avhere a peculiar glazed terra-cotta brick is used for sheathing, the walls are washed outside as well as in. In its elevators it has a complete system of electric railroads, and a very wonderful and intricate system it is, too, with automatic arrangements for opening and shutting doors, for indicating exactly where the car is in its ascent and de- scent, and for preventing accidents from fall- ing. And there is in many of the greatest 308 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. buildings a complete express service of cars, some cars not stopping below the tenth or some other skyward floor. A number of buildings there are that have their own telephone system as well as connections throughout with cit}- lines, their pneumatic- tube parcel and message delivery systems, and at least one has a net- work of pipes conveying compressed air for power, while every great skyscraper is provided with one or more telegraph, cable, and district messenger offices, so that a tenant sitting at his desk can send a message almost anywhere on earth by merely pushing a button call for a messenger. In the modern mail-chute — a long glass and iron tube through which a tenant on any floor may drop a letter to the big box in the basement — the skyscraper has its own mail system. A young Englishman, a friend of mine, who was on his first visit to J^ew York, stood for half an hour watching the letters flit downward through one of these glass tubes. '^ That is the most wonderful thing I've seen in America," he said; "that, and the little tube with red oil in it which tells when the lift is coming." Many of the modern buildings now have a bathroom on every floor, a regular barber- shop, a restaurant on the roof, a stand where the latest newspapers and magazines, cigars KOOF-BUILDING ON THE REALTY STKUCTURE. ^s it looked October 22d. (See page 285.) TEE 2I0DERN SKYSCRAPER. 311 and candies may be obtained, with frequently a library to which a tenant in ay go when look- ing up references or to while away an idle half- hour. In the basement there is frequently a safety-deposit vault and a place for storing DETAIL OF STEEL SKELETON WORK, SHOWING HOW A BIG BUILDING IS BRACED AND RIVETED TOGETHER. bicycles ; on the first floor, a bank where a busi- ness man may keep his money ; and somewhere up at the top, not so frequently, a social club. And of late some of the great buildings have actually been provided with bedrooms and bachelor apartments, so that a tenant may sleep near his offices if he is busy. Indeed, a 312 TEE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. man might live in a modern skyscraper year in and year out, luxuriously, too, with every want richly supplied, and never pass beyond the revolving storm doors at the street entrance. As to the future of the skyscraper no one knows definitely, but all the architects proph- JOINING OF BEAMS AND PILLARS. esy greater beauty. They are learning how to treat these great slim towers so that the effect is pleasing to the eye. In times past the neces- sity of a fagade from 250 to 350 feet high has often resulted in the bold, staring resemblance to a chimney, which is both ugly and painful to the sight. But the architect is learning to READY FOR INSIDE FINISHING. The Realty Building on November 5th. {See page 285.) W jttfs^ ^ ^1; jj^ylll 1 iwif Ml' ■])":' sv^ ':-| :-^iiii-4^ ^nri 1 "•^> "^^^1 ■■'■'■■■■■.■/v. ' 8 SHOWING IMMENSELY STRONG SKELETON WORK OP A TALL AND NARROW BUILDING IN BOSTON. TNTEllIOR "well" OF A SKYSCRAPER LOOKING UP A photograph taken from the bottom of a tall building toward the top. THE MODERN SKYSCRAPER. 819 relieve this tendency by treating the stories in groups of four or five. This lessens the effect of extreme height. At the same time the width is made to seem greater than it really is by the addition of heavy cornices and project- ing balconies. While it is perhaps too much to expect that a skyscraper shall become an object of beauty, these various devices do much to give the build- ing personality and distinction, and perhaps this is as far as the architect ever can go. CHAPTER IX. THKQUaH THE AIK. Flying-machine inventors and enthusiasts, may be divided into two great classes, each of which is certain that it has discovered the only straight and narrow path to aerial navigation. Those who belong to the first of these classes place their faith in the steerable or dirigible balloon; they secure their lifting power with gas, and seek to control the direction of flight by various contrivances of wings and screw propellers. They are air soarers. Those of the second class go to the bird for their model. The bird, they assert, is nature's first and best flying machine; and if a bird, which is nearh^ a thousand times as heavy as the air it dis- places, can soar for hours aloft without tiring,- why shouldn't a man do the same, provided he can build the proper mechanism? Conse- quently these inventors, who have given the subject of bird fliglit long and serious atten- tion, discard the balloon system with some- 324 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. thing of disdain, and plan their machines after the perfect model of a bird's wing. Both of these methods have been thoroughly tested, and, what is ]nore, with astonishing suc- cess, considering the difficulties which have had to be overcome. Balloon flying macliines have really been steered, not to the limits of success, but far enough to demonstrate that the feat can be accomplished. On the other hand, a WING OF A SOARING BIIID. soaring or aeroplane machine has been con- structed and actually made to fly for consid- erable distances ; and yet more curious and interesting, a number of daring inventors have constructed real wings with which they have soared with success from hill-tops and high walls. Both of these methods are, therefore, worthy of careful consideration, although in this chap- THROUGH THE AIR. 325 ter I shall take up only flying machines proper — the aeroplanes and bird-like contrivances — the balloon machines or air floaters coming more properly under the important subject of ballooning. I suppose more inventors have been fasci- nated with the idea of building a machine that would fly than with almost any other single subject, perpetual motion possibly excepted. Nearly every town has its flying-machine en- thusiast, and the Patent Office at Washington is busy constantly with curious designs for winged mechanisms; and yet the perfect ma- chine, the machine which will one day supplant the steamship, bankrupt the railroad, and an- nihilate space is yet to be invented. And in- vented it positively will be, perhaps by some reader of this book; for mathematicians have demonstrated its possibility by unerring fig- ures, and it only remains for the clever mech- anician to build the necessary machinery. I shall not try to cover the whole story of the flying machine, which is almost as old as the inventive imagination of man, for it would fill a big book. I shall, rather, describe the efforts of a few of the inventors who have made the most notable recent achievements. Probably no American inventor of flying machines is so well known and has been so 326 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. PROFESSOK S. P. LANGLEY. From the painting by Robert Gordon Hardie, 1893. successful in liis experiments as Professor S. P. Langley, the distinguished secretary of the Smithsonian Institution at Washington. Pro- fessor Langley has built a machine with wings, THROUGH THE AIR. 827 driven by a . steam-engine, and wholly without gas Of other lifting power beyond its own in- ternal energy. And this machine, to which has been given the name Aerodrome (air-run- ner), actually flies for considerable distances. So successful were Professor Langiej^'s early tests, that the United States Government re- cently made a considerable appropriation to enable him to carry forward his experiments in the hope of finally securing a practical flying machine. His work is, therefore, the most significant and important of any now before the public. The invention of the aerodrome was the re- sult of long years of persevering and exacting labor, with so many disappointments and set- backs that one cannot help admiring the as- tonishing patience which kept hope alive to the end. Early in his experiments. Professor Langley had proved positively, by mathemati- cal calculations, tliat a machine conld be made to fly, provided its structure were light enough and the actuating power great enough. There- fore ho was not in pursuit of a mere w411-o'- the-wisp. It was a mechanical difficulty which he had to sarmoiint, and he surmounted it. Professor Langley made his first experiments more than twelve years ago at Allegheny, Pennsylvania. He began, not by building a 328 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. flying machine, but with a thorough investiga- . tion into the theory of the flight of birds, in order to find out ho^y much power was needed to sustain a surface of given weight by means of its motion through the air. For this pur- pose he built a very large ' ' whirling table ' ' — a device having an arm which swept around a central pivot, the outer end of which could be given a velocity of seventy miles an hour. Yarious objects were hung at the end of the arm and dragged through the air, until its resistance supported them just as a kite is sup- ported by the wind. A plate of brass weigh- ing one pound, for instance, was hung from the end of the arm by a spring, which was drawn out until it registered a pound weight when the arm was still. When the arm was in mo- tion, it might be expected that, as it was drawn faster, the pull would be greater ; but Profes- sor Langley's observations, strangely enough, showed just the contrary, for under these cir- cumstances the spring contracted until it regis- tered less than an ounce. With the speed in- creased to that of a bird in flight, the brass plate seemed to float on the air. Preliminary experiments of this nature were continued for three long years, and Professor Langley formed the general conclusion that by simply moving any given weight in plate form fast enough in THROUGH THE AIR. 329 a horizontal path through the air it was jwssi- ble to sustain it Avith very little ])ower. It was proved that, if horizontal flight without friction could be insured, 200 pounds of plates could be moved through the air and sustained upon it at the speed of an express train, with the expen- DIAGRAM OP THE FINAL AERODROME. diture of only one horse-power, and that, of course, without using any gas to lighten the Aveight. Every boy who has skated knows that when the ice is very thin he must skate rapidly, else he may break through. In the same way, a stone may be skipped over the water for consid- 330 THE BOY'S BOOK 01" INVENTIONS. erable distances. If it stops in any one place it sinks instantly. In exactly the same way, the plate of brass, if left in any one place in the air, would instantly drop to the earth; but if driven swiftly forward in a horizontal direc- tion it rests only an instant in any particular place, and the air under it at any single mo- ment does not have time to give way, so to speak, before it has passed over a new area of air. In fact. Professor Langley came to the conclusion that flight was theoretically possible with engines he could then build, since he was satisfied that engines could be constructed to weigh less than twenty pounds to the horse- power, and that one Ijorse-power would support two hundred pounds if the flight was hori- zontal. That AYas the beginning of the aerodrome. Professor Langley had worked out its theory, and now came the much more difficult task of building a machine in which theory should take form in fact. In the first place, there was the vast problem of getting an engine light enough to do the work. A few years ago an engine that developed one horse-power weighed nearly as much as an actual horse. Professor Langley wished to make one weighing only twenty pounds, a feat never before accom- plished. And then, having made his engine, THROUGH THE AIR. 831 how was he to apply the power to obtain hori- zontal speed? Should it be by flapping wings like a bird, or by a screw propeller like a ship ? This question led him into a close study of the bird compared with the man. He found how wonderfully the two were alike in bony forma- tion, how curiously the skeleton of a bird's wing was like a man's arm, and yet he finally de- BONES OF A BIRD S WING AND OF A HUMAN ARM- ING THEIR CLOSE RESEMBLANCE. cided that flapping Avings would not make the best propeller for his machiue. Men have not adopted machinery legs for swift locomotion, although legs are nature's models, but they have, rather, constructed wheels — ^contrivances which practically do not exist in nature. Therefore, while Professor Langley admits that successful flying machines may one day be made with flapping wings, he began his experiments with the screw propeller. 332 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. There were three great problems in build- ing the flying machine. First, an engine and boilers light enough and at the same time of sufficient power. Secoud, a structure which should be rigid and very light. Third, the SKELETONS OF A MAN AND A BIRD DRAWN TO THE SAME SCALE, SHOWING THE CURIOUS RESEMBLANCE BE- TWEEN THEM. enormously difficult problem of properly bal- aijcing the machine, which. Professor Langley says, '' took years to acquire." For his propelling power he tried compressed air, gas, electricity, carbonic-acid gas, and many other sources of energy, but he finally THROUGH THE AIR, 333 settled on the steam-engine, and he succeeded, after all manner of difficulties, in building a mechanism light enough. He says in regard to this part of the work: ' ' The chief obstacle proved to be not with the engines, which were made surprisingly light after sufficient experiment. The great difficulty was to make a boiler, of almost no weight, which would give steam enough, and this was a most wearying one. There must be also a certain amount of wing surface, and large wings weighed prohibitively; there must be a frame to hold all together, and the frame, if made strong enough, must yet weigh so little that it seemed impossible to make it. These were the difficulties that I still found myself in after two years of experiment, and it seemed at this stage again as if it must, after all, be given up as a hopeless task, for somehow the thing had to be built stronger and lighter yet. l^ow, in all ordinary construction, as in build- ing a steamboat or a house, engineers have what they call a factor of safety. An iron col- umn, for instance, will be made strong enough to hold five or ten times the weight that is ever going to be put upon it; but if Ave try anything of the kind here the construction will be too heavy to fly. Everything in the Avork lias got to be so light as to be on the edge of breaking 334 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. down and disaster, and when the breakdown comes, all we can do is to find what is the weakest part and make that part stronger; and in this way work went on, week by week and month by month, constantly altering the form of construction so as to strengthen the weakest parts, until, to abridge a story which extended over years, it was finafly brought nearly to the shape it is now, where the completed mechan- ism, furnishing over a horse-power, weighs collectively something less than seven pounds. This does not include water, the amount of which depends on how long Ave are to run ; but the whole thing, as now constructed, boiler, fire-grate, and all that is required to turn out an actual horse-power and more, weighs some- thing less than one one-hundredth part of what the horse himself does." From this it will be seen what tremendous difficulties had to be met and solved, and yet the machine could not fly independently, al- though the mechanical power was there. Professor Langley established an experimen- tal station in the Potomac Kiver, some miles be- low Washington. An old scow Avas obtained, and a platform alTout tAventy feet high Avas built on top of it. To this spot, in 1893, the machine Avas taken, and here failure folloAved failure; the machine Avould not ily properly, THROUGH THE AIR. 335 and yet every failure, costl}^ as it might be in time and money, brought some additional ex- perience. Professor Langley found out that PKEPARIJNGr TO LAUJSiCH THE AEKUDilUME. From a photograph by A. Graham Bell, Esq. the aerodrome must begin to fly against the wind, just in the opposite way from a ship. He found that he must get up full speed in his eno-ine before the machine wa^ allowed to 336 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. go, in the same way that a soaring bird must make an initial run on the ground before it can mount into the air, and this was, for vari- ous reasons, a difficult problem. And then there was the balancing. ' ' If the reader will look at the hawk or any DIAGRAM SHOWING THE COURSE OF THE AERODROME IN ITS FLIGHT ON THE POTOMAC RIVER AT QUANTICO. soaring bird," sa3^s Professor Langley, ^'he will see that as it sails through the air without flapping the Aving, there are hardly two con- secutive seconds of its flight in Avhich it is not swaying a little from side to side, lifting one wing or the other, or turning in a way that suggests an acrobat on a tight-rope, only that THROUGH THE AIR. 337 the bird uses its widely outstretched wings in place of the pole. ' ' It must be remembered that air currents, unlike the Gulf Stream, do not flow steadily in one direction. They are forever changing and shifting, now fast, now slow, with some- thing of the commotion and restlessness of the rapids below Niagara. All of these things Professor Langley had to meet as a part of the difficult balancing prob- lem, and it is hardly surprising that nearly three years passed before the machine was actually made to fly — on May 6, 1896. '' I had journeyed, perhaps for the twentieth time," says Professor Langley, ^' to the distant river station, and recommenced the weary routine of another launch, with very moderate expectation indeed; and when, on that, to me, memorable afternoon the signal was given and the aerodrome sprang into the air, I watched it from the shore with hardly a hope that the long series of accidents had come to a close. And yet it had, and for the first time the aero- drome swept continuously through the air like a living thing, and as second after second passed on the face of the stop-watch, until a minute had gone by, and it still flew on, and as I heard the cheering of the few spectators, I felt that something had been accomplished at 338 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. last; for never in any part of the world, or in any period, had any machine of man's con- structioR sustained itself in the air before for even half of this brief time. Still the aero- drome went on in a rising course until, at the end of a minute and a half (for which time only it was provided with fuel and water), it had accomplished a little over half a mile, and now it settled, rather than fell, into the river, with a gentle descent. It was immediately taken out and flown again with equal success, nor was there anything to indicate that it might not have flown indefinitely, except for the limit put upon it." Only a brief description of Professor Lang- ley's machine, a very good idea of which may be had from the pictures, can here be given. It has two pairs of wings, each slightly curved, at- tached to a long steel rod from which hang the boilers, engines, and other machinery, and the propeller wheels. The hub itself is formed of steel tubing; in front there is a little conical float to keep the machine from sinking, should it fall in the water. The boiler weighs a little over live pounds, while the engine, which gives one and one-half horse-power, weighs only twenty-six ounces. The rudder is arranged for steering in four directions — up, down, to the right, and to the left, and all automatically. THK AERODROME IN FLIGHT, MAY 6, 1896. Two views from instantaneous photoijraphs taken, by 4. Groham Bd(^ Esq, THROUGH THE AIR. 341 The Avidtli of the wings from tip to tip is be- tween twelve and thirteen feet, and the length of the whole about sixteen feet. The weight is nearly thirty pounds, of which about one- fourth is the machinery. So much for Professor Langley's aerodrome, the first and most wonderful of machines of its kind. Hiram Maxim, the famous inventor of the Maxim gun, has experimented on a colossal affair of aeroplanes to carry three men — and she ran swiftly when her wheels rested firmly on the wide rails of her little railroad, but her inventor never has ventured to lift her free in the air. These two inventions, Langley's and Maxim's, have been the greatest efforts toward the utilization of the soaring plane. The possibility of using wings for flight is one of the mqvj oldest of mechanical ideas. It is so easy to say, ' ' A bird flies ; why shouldn't a man ? " and more than one brilliant inventor has been dashed to death trying to answer this very question. What boy hasn't read of the amusing adventures of Darius Green? And yet of late years, wonderful enough, men have actually flown with wings, wings resembling those of a soaring bird. Only last year Lilien- thal, the famous ' ^ flying man ' ' of Berlin, was killed from a fall received while he was career- ing high above the earth with his great wings. 842 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. Chanute, an American inventor, has flown suc- cessfully with wings; and only recently Har- grave, the Australian inventor of the famous box-kite, has been making kite-like wings which OTTO LILIENTHAL, "THE FLYIJNG MAN." he asserts will solve the great problem of prac- tical aerial navigation. Lilienthal, the flying man, built his wings after a long and close study of the flight of birds. He finally came to the conclusion that a bird is able to sustain itself without apparent effort in the air, and even to soar against the THROUGH THE AIR. 343 wind, owing to the peculiar curved surface of its wings. The fins of many fishes and the web feet of aquatic birds are strikingly analo- gous in construction The sails of a ship as- A START FROM A WALL. sume a similar form. It would be impossible to sail so near the wind in beating if the in- strument of propulsion were a rigid flat sur- face. It is the effort of the sail to get away from the wind Avhich it gathers in its ample 3i4 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. bosom which drives the boat forward, ahnost in the very teeth of the breeze. The flying machine devised and used by Herr Lilienthal was designed rather for sailing than iov flying, in the proper sense of the term'; or, as he once LILIENTHAL STARTING FROM A HILL. said, ^'for being carried steadily and without danger, under the least possible angle of de- scent, against a moderate wind, from an ele- vated point to the plain below. " It was made almost entirely of closely woven muslin, washed THROUOII THE AIR. 345 with collodion to render it impervious to air, and stretched upon a ril)bed frame of split wil- low, which was found to be the lightest and strongest material for this purpose. Its main elements were the arched wings; a vertical rud- PREPAIIING FOR A START FROM A HILL. der, shaped like a palm-leaf fan, which acted as a vane in keeping the head always towards the wind ; and a flat, horizontal rudder, to pre- vent sudden changes in the equilibrium. The operator so adjusted the apparatus to his person that, when in the air, he either rested 346 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. SOARING IN A STRONG BREEZE. on his elbows or was seated upon a narrow sup- port near the front. With the wings folded behind him, he made a short run from some elevated point, always against the wind, and when he attained sufficient velocity, launched THROUGH THE AIR. 351 himself into the air by a spring or jump, at the same time spreading the wings, ^Yhich were at once extended to their full breadth, whereupon he sailed majestically along like a gigantic sea- THE DESCENT. gull. In this Avay Herr Lilienthal often ac- complished flights of three hundred yards and more from the starting-point. " Ko one," Herr Lilienthal once explained, ^'can realize how suhsUmtud the air is until 352 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. A, The Alighting breeze. E. OF ONE OP LILIENTHAI/S FLIGHTS. start. B, The gliding deticent. C. still air. D, Course , Soaring in strong breeze. ten -VI He lie feels its sup- porting power beneath him. It inspires confi- dence at once. With flat wings it would be al- most impossible to guard against a fall. With arched wings it is possible to sail against a moderate breeze at an angle of not more than six degrees to the horizon." The principle is recognized in the umbrella form universally adopted for the parachute. Try to run with an open umbrella held above the head and slight - Iv inclined back- THROUGH THE AIR. 353 wards, and see what a lifting power it ex- erts. Lilienthal spent many years of toil on his in- vention, and after his final perfected wings were finished, it required much skill and strength to use them successfully, to guide the direction of flight by careful movements of the arms, to go up by leaning back, and down by leaning forward. And "at the last the inventor himself was hurled to his death, but not until he had contributed much to the knowledge of aero- nautics. Mr. Hargrave has contributed to scientific information a very clear statement as to why a bird is able to soar against the wind, and he is using his discoveries as the basis for a new invention in flying machines. Ilargrave's idea is that the thick forward part of a bird's wing acts as an obstruction, like a dam in a river, causing a whirlpool below the wing, Avhich rolls with great force against the back side of this obstruction, thereby forcing it forward. In other words, progress through the air is caused by an undertow of air. He suggests, there- fore, a flying machine shaped somcAvhat in the form of a toboggan turned upside down. The Avind, striking the edge of the toboggan curve in front, creates a Avhirlpool in the inverted hol- lo av, and propels the whole machine forAvard 354 THE BOY'S BOOK OF INVENTIONS. and upward, according to the way it is steered by the suspended ballast, which determines its angle of flight. Each year the inventor presses closer to the great secret of human flight, each year the mechanic is able to build more perfect ma- chinery, and the two, working side by side, may be expected before many years have passed to produce a flying machine which will be practically a success as well as an experi- mental success. A ;;J ' ''"^m * i '■^■^w < t> 't?w^l 1 ^3 /•' ^^^ 1^. 'f: \ % i •^^ ,_ „ .^.,;' ':^^^, _ . .„.-_J A SAFE LANDING. Lh Mr 10