The Greenville enterprise. [volume] (Greenville, S.C.) 1870-1873, 1871-06-14

II p. - 80 .t-- a- - ..a. :. :.
a The Twentieth Century.
! What a grand field for imagin
} alton and conjecture does this
theme suggestS It is quite be
wildering, in view of tie grea,
achievements of tho nineteenth
century in scientific discovery, In
invent, n, and the arts, and in ma
teriai progress. A writer in the
June number of the Galaxy, who
has plunged into the vast field Of
speculation, recognizes as the diff.
ticulty of conceiving results in the
future that will bear. favorable
comparison with the accomplished
facts of the past. lie thus impress
sively groops together the achieve.
ments of science, invention, and
art during the present century, and
more especially of the last forty
years:
Fulton's steamboat, opening
the nineteenth century, furnished
a new point OF departure to mod.
ern comnerce and the art of navi.
CATION Davy's lamp gave new
possibilities to mining, and hence
to the supply of fuel and to the
products of all manufactures; then,
forty years ago, the first locomo.
tive ran on the Liverpool and
Manchester Railroad, revolution.
izing travel and the carrying trade,
and making it possible for man.
kind to plant tie wilderness with
cities aud to take possession of the
globe. Soon after, in 1888, new
era began in ocean navigation,
when the Great Western steamed
across the Atlantic from Bristol to
New York, and on this followed
Ericsson's screw propeller, that
boon to commerce and to naval
warfare. Morse gave us the cleo,
trio telegraph, jackson and Nor.
ton the inestimable ether to dead
On pain. The wondrous machine.
ry OF the forges and spindles in the
shops, mills and factories OF the
Shefhelds and the Lowells began
to work; ere long came mowers
and reapers, iron hulls, rifed can
non, revolving carbines, chase
pots, nitro.g!ycerine for blasting,
monitors for sea fights, mitraiIleu.
ses, 2O.ton, 80 ton guns, the ocean
telegraph, new anethetics or sooth-
ers Of pain. The travellers mean.
while were spreading over the face
of the earth. As Parry and Ross
had opened the Arctic Sea, so
Wilkes unveiled the Antarctic
Continent /; Champollion found a
key to the hieroglyphics, unlock.
ing Egyptian history, aud Layard
unearthed Nineveh; travellers from
Clapperton and Belzoni to Speke
and Livingstone penetrated the
heats of Africa. Into domestic
life came a swarm of. chemical and
mechanical appliances, substances
interchanging their uses and tunc
tions as if by ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
or grass ground to pulp and shap
ed into whatever can be made OF
wood, even into wash tubs or race
boats india.rubber, by a "presto,
change I" doing the miracle OF half
the metals starch and sulphuric
acid turned to syrups, beet roots
to brandies, petroleum to cham.
pagne. Ten thousand labor. saving
devices, from the steam splow to
the sewing machine, crowd the Pa
tent Office; our age has photo.
graphy, with all its kindred arts,
a new name for each fresh ingeni
Gus process ; we have the caloric
engine, practical ballooning, the
pneumatic dispatch; we have coal
oil, submarine armor, torpedocs.
Wilson gave us gas light, which
throws the eighteenth century, by
contrast, among the Dark Ages !"
Hoe gave US the cylinder press,
making this as distinctively the
newspaper age as it is the iron
age and through some part of al.
most oil our contrivances works
o.eam, doing whatever and more
than ever muscle of man or beas.
has done these five thousand years,
and making the fable OF the Cy.
clops O dim foreshadowing of the
mechanical commonplaces of our
day"
| The humble task is reserved for
the future Of adapting, applying
and perfecting inventions. For
these the resources of mechanics
and chemistry are yet to be in
voked to their full possibilities. LII
tho sciences Of surgery and medi
cine, much may yet be done for
humanity, for these are indefinite
ly progressive; but nothing can
pale the glory Of ether, chloroform,
clloral, and other anodynes.
/ Tho great problem Of transpor-
tation--" transportation of mate.
rial, of messages, OF men" is al.
Il