Part 7

There was once a young man who started out bravely in life, resolved to reform the world. After trying for some time he gave it up and was ever after entirely contented if he paid his board regularly every week. It is useless to think we can reform this matter all in a day. The day will come when these things will be changed and equity and justice will take the place of the utter selfishness that now marks competition in business. Our best plan is to see what we can do to become producers ourselves. We want the lettuce ourselves. We must pay the retail price for it, and if at this price there is a big profit in raising it, we would like the entire profit placed in our hands. The people in these United States are divided into two great classes—the producers and the consumers—those who raise things to eat, and those who are in other trades and eat without producing. The producers are the farmers and fishermen. The consumers make all the rest of the people. The producers also eat, but their food costs them very much less than the food used by the non-producers. Of course we can see there must be non-producers or the trades and arts would perish, and the nation would become a mere agricultural community, content with sleeping and eating. At the same time, we must observe that a very large proportion of those who produce nothing live in small towns and villages and own land. We see everywhere in our smaller cities and towns hundreds of homes having gardens about the house. A little discouraged grass, a dyspeptic tree or two, a forlorn grape vine straggling over the fence, plenty of dusty gravel, and a mortgage on the house and lot. Within the house bitter complaints against the high price of food, much fretfulness and weariness at the scant, monotonous bill of fare. Boys and girls growing up with white hands and narrow chests (to say nothing of stomachs that they should be ashamed to own) and the storekeeper saving money on the next corner.

This is the reason it does not pay. We want to have white hands and be genteel and all that. We want to be consumers, and we unwittingly combine to get all we can out of the selling and handling of food and leave the producer as little as we think he can be forced to take. We must get rid of this imported nonsense about work. (It all came from Europe, and is wholly un-American.) We must make the land give us more food. Our boys and girls must go out of doors, must learn to be producers. They should be shown that it is disgraceful to live in a mortgaged house, that it is disgraceful to stand on any part of God’s ground and complain that food is scarce or high when that food might come out of the very ground under our ungrateful feet. The Chinese, the Japanese, the Dutch, the French, the Swiss cultivate every rod of ground they own. No barren yards about their houses, taxed and yet paying no return. Why, in England even the strips of waste land along the railway tracks are cultivated, and the trains move between rows of cabbages half a hundred miles long.

This is the way for thousands of families to make it pay. Produce your own food and sell it to yourselves. A head of lettuce grown on your own ground and eaten on your own table saves the retail price of a head of lettuce, and if there is a profit on it for all the people who touch it, clearly you have the entire profit for yourself. On reading this about five hundred people will calmly remark that this is not so. They have tried it and it cost more to raise their own vegetables than it did to buy them at the stores. The wages of the gardener come to more than all the things were worth. So much the worse for the gardener. You should be your own gardener. Where are your boys and girls? At the base ball grounds, or the rink, or at the foolish piano—doing nothing—earning nothing and trying to be genteel? Garden work is hard on the back and hurts the hands. Yes, because your hands are weak and your back is not strong, and of these things you should be ashamed.

The price of land in this country is steadily rising. All the best farm land is being taken up. The cost of food is advancing. It will never again be as cheap as it has been in the past. The time has come when we must economize. We can not longer afford to carry those neglected garden plots and waste spaces about our houses. They must produce food for the people who own them. We must be our own producers. We must study plants and animals. These represent food and wealth, and it is simply an untruth to say it will not pay to raise them. If your garden costs more than the retail price of food in your neighborhood the fault is your own. There is something the matter with your soil or your seeds, or your method of culture. Think of the profit of raising lettuce at $2,000 an acre, and yet that is the return that an acre will produce if paid for at the retail price. Moreover, the lettuce would be removed from the ground in ample time for another crop, likewise bringing a profit. Of course, if your land is worth five dollars a foot, the interest on one foot would be more than the value of the single lettuce plant you could raise upon it. In such a case you had better sell out and buy cheaper land. For the majority of homes where there is a garden the land is cheap enough to produce more or less of the food needed in the house, and there is no reason whatever why it may not be raised at a handsome profit.

The Chautauqua University recognizes the importance of this matter. Its aim is to help, to guide, and to instruct, and it is now, through the liberality of its friends, able to help, guide and instruct all who wish to learn something of the art of producing food and saving money. It sees hundreds of boys and girls totally ignorant of these common things. It sees young people wondering what they shall do, perplexed and worried over this question of earning a living, and discouraged at the high cost of living, when a part of their living is going to waste beneath their feet. The Chautauqua Town and Country Club was formed to help those who wish to help themselves. It aims to show by simple lessons how to raise plants of all kinds, how to care for animals, how to take care of your garden so that it will be a source of pleasure and profit. Half a thousand people have already joined the club and are now at work in good earnest. Should you wish to know more about it, write to Miss K. F. Kimball, Plainfield, N. J.

All this is meant for you.

What are you going to do about it?

GEOGRAPHY OF THE HEAVENS FOR JULY.

BY PROF. M. B. GOFF,

Western University of Pennsylvania.

THE SUN,

Of which so much has been said in these pages, continues to be discussed with increasing interest by astronomers of both hemispheres, who every day supply their quota of new ideas as the result of their investigations. In THE CHAUTAUQUAN for March, 1884, the statement was made that “it has already been demonstrated that the colored prominences may be examined at any time when the sun can be seen; and it is believed that Mr. Huggins has accomplished the difficult feat of photographing the corona, so that it, too, may be scrutinized _at leisure_.” In the April number of the _Nineteenth Century_, we find a very interesting account by Mr. Huggins himself, of his operations in this line. As yet the experiments have not been in all respects satisfactory; but so much has been done as to leave no doubt of the final result. As Mr. H. tells us, the great obstacle to overcome is the immense curtain of air, which “hangs” between us and the sun, and absorbs some forty per cent. of the sun’s light (and heat). This absorption renders our atmosphere as light at least as the sun’s corona, and makes it as difficult of observation as a lesser light placed behind a greater. The same atmosphere being as bright, or brighter, than the stars, prevents our seeing the latter in daylight. During an eclipse of the sun, the shadow of the moon affords us a long, funnel shaped tube through this great air curtain (which may be forty, or one hundred, or more miles in thickness) and we are enabled through it to see the sun’s corona. But “on an average, once in two years this curtain of light is lifted for from _three_ to _six_ minutes”—a very contracted period in which to obtain a knowledge of a phenomenon that we know is constantly changing. If we had a Joshua, who could command sun, moon and earth to stand still for the space of a few hours even, we might discover what we so much wish to know, what is this corona. Or, if we could go beyond this atmosphere of ours—place it between us and the earth, we might do without a Joshua. But we can not get outside. Then the next best thing is to get as nearly outside as possible. Dr. Copeland tried this by climbing an elevation of 12,400 feet. Prof. Langley ascended Mt. Etna, and on Mt. Whitney ascended to the height of 15,000 feet; but at these heights the curtain was still too heavy, and no view of the corona was obtained; or, as Prof. Langley expressed it, he “met with entire non-success.” From reports in regard to observations made in Egypt of the total eclipse of 1882, Mr. Huggins conceived the idea of making a photographic plate so sensitive that it would distinguish differences imperceptible to the eye, and on this plate take a picture of the corona, and then examine it as one would the “photo” of a friend, and mark its peculiarities. He made his first experiment in 1882, and as a result “there seemed to be good ground to hope that the corona had really been obtained upon the plates.” In 1883, a second attempt, under more favorable circumstances was made, and “images of the sun exquisitely defined, and free from all sensible trace of instrumental imperfection were obtained.” On the 6th of May of the same year (1883) a total eclipse of the sun occurred at Caroline Islands, and was there photographed by Messrs. Lawrence and Woods, photographers of the Royal Society; and on a comparison of these photographs of the sun’s corona during an eclipse with his own taken both before and after the time of the eclipse (which was not visible to Mr. H.), he had the satisfaction of seeing so strong a resemblance as to convince him that he had photographed the corona without an eclipse. Although having no doubt of the success of his experiment, yet, on account of the unfavorable conditions of the climate, it was determined to try a higher elevation; and the Riffel, near Zarmatt, Switzerland, was selected as a suitable place to make further trials. Mr. Ray Wood was selected as artist, and reached Riffel in July, 1884. But unfortunately, the “veil of finely divided matter of some sort,” “of which we have heard so much in the accounts from all parts of the earth of gorgeous sunsets and after-glows” seriously interfered with the work; nevertheless, a number of plates were obtained on which the corona showed itself with more or less distinctness. Not satisfied with these results, Mr. Woods was deputed to go to the Cape of Good Hope, where, under the direction of Dr. Gill, he is to make, or is, perhaps, now making daily photographic representations of the corona, and laboring fully to realize the anticipations of the esteemed Mr. Huggins.

Meantime our sun makes his accustomed rounds, bringing with him the usual accompaniments, hot weather and the “dog days.” He will on the 1st rise at 4:34 a. m. and set at 7:33 p. m.; on the 16th, rise at 4:43 a. m., set at 7:28 p. m.; and on the 30th, rise at 4:56 a. m., and set at 7:17 p. m. During the month the length of the day will decrease from 15 h. 1 m. on the 1st to 14 h. 21 m. on the 30th. The declination will in the same time decrease four degrees and forty-three minutes.

THE MOON

Enters upon its last quarter on the 5th, at 7:18 a. m.; new moon occurs on the 12th, at 12:07 a. m.; first quarter on the 18th, at 7:11 p. m.; full moon on the 26th, at 9:14 p. m. In perigee, or nearest the earth, on the 11th, at 8:24 p. m.; in apogee, or farthest from the earth, on 25th, at 4:18 a. m. Reaches its greatest elevation above the horizon, 66° 55′, on the 11th; least elevation, 30° 7′, on the 23d. On the 1st, rises at 10:00 p. m.; on the 16th, sets at 10:26 p. m.; on the 30th, rises 9:05 p. m.

MERCURY

On the 13th, at 6:57 a. m., is 5° 39′ north of the moon; on the 17th, at 9:00 a. m., 11′ south of Venus; and on the 26th, at 2:00 a. m., 11′ south of _Alpha_ in the constellation _Leo_, a very interesting conjunction, but not visible to the naked eye. Mercury has a direct motion during the month of 51° 51′; and his diameter increases from 5″ to 6.8″. On the 1st, he rises at 4:56 a. m., and sets at 7:56 p. m.; on the 16th, rises at 6:23 a. m., and sets at 8:31 p. m.; on the 30th, rises at 7:16 a. m., and sets at 8:22 p. m.

VENUS

Makes but little show this month, being too near the “Source of Light.” She will be evening star throughout the month, growing brighter as the days pass by; her diameter increasing from 10.4″ on the 1st to 11.2″ on the 30th. She has a direct motion of 38° 8′ 45″. On the 1st, rises at 5:50 a. m., sets at 8:34 p. m.; on the 16th, rises at 6:25 a. m., sets at 8:33 p. m.; and on the 30th, rises at 6:57 a. m., sets at 8:23 p. m. On the 13th, at 10:21 p. m., 5° 22′ north of the moon; on 17th, at 9:00 a. m., 11′ north of Mercury.

MARS

Will be a morning star during this month. On the 1st rising at 2:30 a. m., and setting at 5:08 p. m.; on the 16th, rising at 2:11 a. m., setting at 5:01 p. m.; and on the 30th, rising at 1:54 a. m., setting at 4:50 p. m. His diameter increases one tenth of a second of arc, and he makes a direct motion of 22° 56′. On the 9th, at 3:44 p. m., he is 5° 1′ north of the moon.

JUPITER.

_Et tu, Jupiter_, art on the wane. Each day he sets more nearly with the sun, and his diameter grows smaller, though monarch still of all the planets. He rises on the 1st, 16th and 30th, at 9:00, 8:14, and 7:33 a. m., respectively, and sets on the corresponding days at 10:19, 9:28, and 8:39 p. m. He makes a direct motion of 5° 25′ 42″. On the 15th, at 2:02 a. m., is 3° 7′ north of the moon.

SATURN.

Those who have not improved the past few months to obtain a view of the beauties of this planet can not blame the writer. Their attention has been called to the fact that his rings stand more widely open now than they will again for fifteen years. But they need not despair; for in the delightful coolness of a summer morning they may still improve their opportunities; for Saturn rises the latter part of this month nearly with the dawn, and those who care to leave their “downy couch” can catch him before the rising of the sun. 3:56, 3:05, and 2:18 a. m., on the 1st, 16th and 30th will find him “at home;” and in August an earlier hour will suit as well. During the month his diameter increases two tenths of a second. On the 10th, at 5:48 p. m., he may be found 4° 7′ north of the moon; and on the 20th, one minute south of the star _Eta_ in the constellation _Gemini_.

URANUS.

This planet, on the 1st, rises at 11:14 a. m., and sets at 11:20 p. m.; on the 16th, rises at 10:17 a. m., sets at 10:23 p. m.; on the 30th, rises at 9:25 a. m., sets at 9:29 p. m. No change in diameter, which remains at 3.6″. On the 16th, at 6:37 p. m., 34′ north of the moon.

NEPTUNE.

This slow motioned body, of which we know so little, and which not more than one person out of 10,000 ever saw, makes a direct motion during the month of 42′ 55″; its diameter is 2.6″; and on the 8th, at 6:59 a. m., its position is 2° 33′ directly north of the moon. It may be interesting to know that it will be a morning star which “will _not_ light the traveler on his way,” during the entire month. Its times of rising are 1:52 a. m. on the 1st; 12:57 a. m. on the 16th, and at midnight on the 30th.

HOW AIR HAS BEEN LIQUEFIED.

BY J. JAMIN,

Of the French Academy.

In the interval between 1602 and 1626 four philosophers were born who seem to have been divinely appointed to teach men the mysteries of air. These were a German, Otto von Guericke (1602); two Frenchmen, Mariotte and Pascal (1620, 1623), and finally an Englishman, Boyle (1626). Pascal conceived the idea that air being material must have weight like other materials, and consequently that the earth must be pressed upon by its atmospheric envelope, and he proved this by the celebrated experiment at Puy de Dôme.

Soon after, Otto von Guericke, having invented the air pump, succeeded in exhausting the air from a vessel and confirmed Pascal’s idea that air was really heavy, while Mariotte and Boyle at the same time, each in his own country, and by almost identical experiments, proved that air is elastic, that its volume decreases by pressure, and generally in proportion to the weight to which it is subjected. Mariotte modestly called this discovery a rule of nature. We call it a physical law, and very suitably name it in France “Mariotte’s Law,” and in England “Boyle’s Law.”

It seemed necessary for science to collect her thoughts after this great achievement. She seemed to think there was nothing more to discover. Boyle and Mariotte would have been very much astonished if some one had told them that this air, whose properties they had been demonstrating, could be reduced to a liquid like water, and even to a solid like snow. Nearly two centuries passed before the world was prepared for this new discovery. We ourselves were ignorant of it until the month of April, 1883, when the Academy of Sciences received from Cracow these two dispatches:

“Oxygen completely liquefied; the liquid colorless as carbonic acid.” (April 9th.)

“Nitrogen frozen, liquefied by expansion; the liquid colorless.” (April 16th.)

WROBLEWSKI.

Thus air has been reduced to a volume a thousand or fifteen hundred times less than under ordinary conditions. It ceased to be a gas and took the appearance of water. This astonishing result is only the last in a long list of experiments which for a long time were fruitless; it is the finishing touch to a building begun long ago, and on which many workmen have labored. What has been the work of each of them? It is a long story.

Van Marum, a philosopher and chemist of Harlem, is celebrated as the constructor of an electric machine, the largest known, but he is more justly celebrated for having been the first to liquefy a gas. Wishing to know if ammonia would obey Mariotte’s law, he compressed it. Under a pressure of six atmospheres it changed quickly to a transparent liquid. Van Marum did not foresee the consequences of his experiments, and is honored only as being the first successful performer of the experiment. But Lavoisier, whose keener mind grasped all that these results implied, did not hesitate to declare the general law that all substances were capable of existing in three different states, and he illustrated his belief most forcibly. “Let us consider for a moment what would happen to the different substances which form the earth, if the temperature should be quickly changed. Let us suppose that the earth were suddenly placed in a region where the temperature would be much above that of boiling water; soon the air, all liquids which can be vaporized at a temperature near that of boiling water, and many metallic substances even, would expand, be transformed into air-like fluids, and form part of the atmosphere.

“On the contrary, if the earth should be suddenly placed in a very cold temperature, for example, that of Jupiter or Saturn, the water of our rivers and seas, and, probably, the greatest number of liquids which we know would become solid.”

“Air,” according to this supposition, or at least a part of the air-like substances which compose it, “would doubtless cease to exist in its present form; it would be changed to a liquid state, and this change would produce new liquids of which we know nothing.”

Lavoisier was mistaken about the temperature of Jupiter and Saturn, but was right in his supposition that air would become a liquid; however, as experiment did not prove the theory, the prediction was forgotten and the question dropped. It slept a long time, for it was not until 1823 that it was revived by Faraday. The first experiments of this great philosopher were on this subject. He was but twenty-two when he made his first discovery, the liquefaction of chlorine. The details of this experiment have been told by Tyndall. It is well known that when chlorine gas and cold water are united, crystals are formed which contain to every molecule of chlorine ten molecules of water. Faraday put some of these into a closed tube and heated them until two separate liquids appeared; one was water, the other floated on the surface of the water, and a certain professor of Paris declared that it could be nothing but oil carelessly left in the vessel. Faraday having opened the tube, found that this substance began to boil, and then changed with an explosion into a green gas. It was chlorine. Faraday, who was quick-tempered, immediately took his revenge on the professor, to whom he wrote: “You will be pleased to know, sir, that the oil left by carelessness in my apparatus was nothing less than liquefied chlorine.”

This first success decided the career of the young chemist. He announced that all gases could be reduced to this state if subjected to a sufficient pressure, and he undertook a series of experiments, of which the success was doubtful, but the danger certain. He operated in this way: He took a thick glass tube in the form of an inverted U; one branch was left empty, in the other the materials for producing the gas to be studied were placed and the whole closed. Obliged to gather in the empty branch, the gas continually increased in pressure, and there were two possible results to the experiment; either the gas would not change its state, and the pressure would increase until the vessel broke, or when a certain limit of pressure was reached, then the liquid would appear and would continue to accumulate as long as the gas was disengaged. A dozen gases were reduced in this way; among them were the following, which we shall need: Ammonia, sulphurous acid, carbonic acid, and protoxide of nitrogen, which at a temperature of ten degrees required a pressure equal to sixty atmospheres.

This pressure leaves no doubt about the danger which one runs in carrying on such researches. If we remember that steam boilers generally support a pressure of no more than ten atmospheres, if we recall the number and the horror of their explosions we can hardly understand how a simple glass tube could resist a pressure five or six times as great. When a gas reaches the point of liquefaction, then the pressure ceases to increase, but if it does not change from that condition the pressure increases until an explosion necessarily occurs, and the debris of the vessel is scattered as powder scatters the fragments of a shell. In the course of Faraday’s researches he had thirty explosions. They did not stop him, but it is easy to see that they did not encourage others.

Happily there is a less dangerous method of reaching the same result, it is to freeze the gas. In the same way that the vapor of water is condensed when the temperature is lowered, so gases, which are really vapors, will yield to sufficient cold. In 1824, Bussy succeeded in condensing sulphurous acid gas. The gas was introduced into a balloon, which was plunged into a freezing mixture of ice and salt. The gas was liquefied and could be preserved indefinitely, if the balloon were enclosed in an enamel vessel. In heating, it gave off vapors which, by their pressure kept the remainder of the fluid, providing the glass was strong enough. Thus, in two ways, by cold and by pressure, and still better, by both combined, it is possible to liquefy a large number of gases.