The Arkansaw traveler., 1888-08-11
A BIO PANTRY.
Yankee Blade.

philosophers and astronomers lest the earth should run into a comet and be destroyed, or, st least, be rendered un- suitable for the further residence of man. There are astronomers to-day who fear that the sun will give out some day, and the earth will freeze up solid, like a great terrestrial iceberg, and whirl, frozen clod, through a universe of endless night, There are other weeping Jeremiahs among our modern prophets who are very much afraid that the worlds supply of fuel will give out. The forests of the world, they say, are being very rap- idly cut of, and our coal supply can- not last forever. There are other philosophers who, like Malthus, are very much worried for fear the world is not large enough to hold the peo- pie who are sure to he born in the course of time. Natures supply, they say, will not equal the tremendous demand, and in some future era peo- pie must starve because the world will be too small to raise sufficient food for them.
 But philosophers have always treated good mother earth with tre- mendous unfairness.
 The good mother always has some undiscovered pocket in which she stores her goodies to meet her child ren's wants. When her lArder appar- ently gives out there is some higher shelf discovered in her capacious pam try, where she stores away provisions for her children.
 No one now is afraid of the earth coming in collision with comet. In fact, 1t is quite possible that the earth has passed right through number of comets without Knowing 1t. Com- cts that we cannot feel are not to be particularly dreaded.
 As to the sun burning itself out and leaving the world an iceberg, the best astronomers say this cannot happen for 10,000,000 years. We need not worry for our remote great grand children of that far away era, for a great many new shelves will be dis covered in Mother Natures pantry be- fore that time; for in l0,00O,000 years our learned and highly developed descendants will have found some way of getting along without the sun. Perhaps by that time they will have found some means of emigration to some other solar system; and 30 when their own sun goes out they can bor- row the sun of some neighboring uni- verse. At any rate, we will look out for our own needs and not worry about their affairs.
 As for poor Malthus, who was afraid the world was not big enough, he seems to have been needlessly alarmed. He had never made many trips of discovery into Mother Ma ture's pantry. It Is said that the population of the whole United States could be crowded into Texas, and then the state would not be so thickly settled as Belgium. In fact, it is said that even in Belgium, where the peo- pie are packed in almost like sardines in box, the country is capable of supporting much greater number. It is said that certain gardeners in the suburbs of Paris can raise from an acre of ground as much as & New England farmer can get from forty acres. By the use of chemical fertil- izers, by artificial irrigation, by con- centrating the active rays of the sun by the use Of glass, the earth can be made almost hundred fold more prolific than it has been given credit for. Man has never properly esti- mated the true value of pound of soil. The common dirt under our feet, considering its possibilities which have probably not yet been half discovered, is precious as gold dust. Natures pantry is deep and high, and her children have not found the top shelf by any means.
 As to the worlds supply of fuel becoming exhausted, we will not worry. There is a tremendously big fire in the center of the earth that burns as necessarily as the fire of the old vestal virgins. In fact the world Is an immense egg of fire, with very thin shell upon the outside upon which we stand. After our fuel supply has given out we will bore through the shell and boil our teakettles and cook our breakfasts by the blasts from Vulcan's own smithy in the under world. IfVulcan himself runs out of heat we will burn water. Chemists know how to do it now, and in the course of time they will learn how to do 1t cheaper. Besides there are other ways of producing heat except by combustion. It can be produced by chemical changes, by friction, and doubtless by some undis- covered recipe which nature has hid den away in her cook book, some- where in that capacious pantry of which we have spoken.
 Nature never goes to her cupboard, like good Mothey Hubbard, and finds 1t bare. Let us still trust in child like simplicity to the immense re-