The Cecil Whig. [volume] (Elkton, Md.) 1841-current, 1879-02-01
INSTRUMENTS to..fndia until

/ 10 'ake their INSTRUMENTS t0.fndia until
they were gilded To prevent rust But Sal
adm S sword never rn.ted. They had a
/ Damascus sword al the London Exhibition,
and you could bend us point llI It tuached
! the hit lou could Turn the blade IN any
way without breaking. they compared i; To
an American politician. We don't know
when this immortal steel Was invented.
An English Colonel will get a better sword
to-day IN India than he eau at Sheffield
The lecturer here quoted from one OF
scott novels the story of King Richards
interview with SaladIn. The latter asked
him TO show HIM the strength that had
made him famous. Richard drew a sword
and cut aud iron bar in two Saladiu said
cam do that; but, taking a light almost
impalpablc vail, he let it float in the air.
and passing his scimeter here and there
through it, made it fall to the ground in
many pieces. Richard declared 1t was
nothing less than msgic
The lecturer then spoke Of the engineer
ing skill OF the ancisnis rs compared with
that OF TO day, and showed that in the days
when the Pyramids were built stones were
brought from immense distances and lifted
hundreds Of feet in the air by means of ma
chinery that was still mystery to our best
engineers.
Patterson, the head of Il company of en-
sineers IN Egypt, was asked by the archi.
tect OF the Thames tunnel if he Thought
much OF Egyptian engineering. Pointing
to Pompey's pillar, he said: Somebody .
900 years ago hung up $50 tons of granite
in mid-ar; would you like to Try it?"
The ancient architects disdained mortar.
he temple of Postum, which was in ruins
before the Savior was born, was built with
stones so nicely fitted together without
mortar that you cannot To day get the point
OF penknife between them.
Did the ancients have railways? Herodo
tus says that rails were laid from the uuar-
ries to Thebes, l56 miles, and they carried
these blocks Of stone on them by machinery.
That must mean locomotives. 1t is claim
cd that the ancients had steamboa,s-we
know that they had steam. Arago connects
this with those pictures have told you Of
There is ship with paddle wheels outside
and the hold full of machinery
There is no known power in mechanics
that will move that machinery but steam
We have our mowers and reapers on the
plairies. The old war chariots had scythes
extending from both wheel. that moved
down whole ranks of men. An Italian that
exhibited some old Etruscan gold. frosted
with bright gold, at the Centennial, had
spent seventy years trying to find ont how
tha, gold frosting is kept in its place with
out solder.
Schieman opened grave at Mycenn. and
found gold such that neither London nor
Paris has the like. L.psius was sent to
Carthage to examine ruins. al have seem
he says, carved on the ruins of Carthage
ever known spinning machine in Europe
All Egypt knew was hidden know ledge
was sacred to the upper classes, the Inher-
lance of the aristocracy; aud when Cam
byses came down from Persia and thunder
ed across Egypt and trod out royalty and
priesthood, God let him tread out civilizs-
ton. 1t was fit punishment. That could
not happen to day. The printing press, tho
only real discovery Of modern times, would
prevent it.
The ancients, indeed stamped bricks 1t
is only one step from that brickmaker's
stamp TO the printing press When that
step was taken civlliz alton changed it's
character Learning was no longer seclud-
ed TO eloisters, but came out To IN mister to
the daily wants of many people. We do
not have astrology, but astronomy. We
have Liebg with his agricultural chemis-
try, doubling every farmers harvest: not
the search after the philosophers stone to
trausmute metals to gold
could tell you what they knew. aud We
do not, but it is not what we know but the
use we make Of what we know tina; is val
liable Gibben congrLtulates his readers
that the dark ages can never coma again,
as looking out one night. he heard the
monks singing vespers in the ruins of the
temple of Jupiter.
Ii is neither fire nor iron that saves civil.
cation. IL is a very difi-it element No
man has right to know anything that lie
does not make servicrable To his feilowman.
That will make our art immortal.