The morning call., 1891-01-18
TALKS FOR BOYS.
II.
By Colonel Thomas v. Knox.

| ing OF the faucet gives US the result which
, Moses obtained with his wand. The En-
| chanted Carpet of the Arabian Nights is
| found in the ocean steamship and the Pull
man car; the Burning Bush, which, though
| burning, was unconSumed, is repeated in
the incandescent lamp of Edison and his
| rivals, and the girdle which Puck would
| put around the earth in forty minutes is
accomplished by the telegraph. Nay, more
the forty minutes of Puck are altogether
surpassed, as the lightning's flash is
made in an instant, and far out
strips that slothful laggard, the sun.
fopulous cities that rose in the desert in a
| single night are brought to mind in the won
| ueriul groWths OF many modern cities which
| could be named, and the work OF the magi-
clans who sswept away great armies by
| means OF their spells is fairly riYaled by
| the Dreech-l0adlng cannon of KruDn and the
| machlne-guns of inventors by the score. The
| Monograph flashes Intelligence over long dis
tanceS with magical speed, and without the
ana OF the electric wire, and the torpedo
| buried in our harbors places the volcano ot
| our service for protection against n hostile
| Heet ana now we are told that through the
| SIKH OF western inventor we are shortly
to lily through the air in machines under our
eontrol, ana bld defiance TO the accidents of
| sollu eartn and the impedimenis il presents
10 i0eomotion. What is 10 come next?
| -
| Recently | was one of dinner party that
| met MIR. Mounteney Jephson, one of the
| ofncerS, and very efficient one he was who
| accompanied Stanley in his march through
| Africa for the relief of Emin Pasha. Dur
| Ing the conversation at the table some one
| asked Mr.. JephSOn what he considered the
most remarkable thing about Africa. 1.-The
! greatest wonder about Africa" he replied
| lis to know how they got along there before
| they had opened communication with the
| rest oil the world, and especially with
| America. Plantains and bananas, which
| form large part of their food, came
| from Asia and were not known in Africa
for long time after the history of
| the human race begins. Maize, what
| you IN this country call corn, came from
! America, and so did manioc and tobacco of
course men can get along without tobacco,
| but II you should take maize and maniOc
away from Africa to-day you would deprive
the people of two very important articles of
food. There Is the potato, too, which came
from America; think what a boon it has
been, not only to Africa, but all the rest of
the world. especially to Ireland Hardly a
thing can be named in Africa that is an ar
ticle of food which did not come from some
other part of the world, and that, too, after
great ngdoms had tlourished there for a
long time and the country, from one end to
the other, was well populated. Deprive
them to-day Of their edible eXotics, and
there would be famine in the land which
would sweep off three-fDurths of the popu-
The remark of the guest, who is a delight
full cUnyerSatonallst and one of the most
modest OF men, turned the table talk in the
direction OF the benefits that the different
countries o. the earth have conferred on
each other. One OF the party called atlen-
ton to the fact that in one respect Afr ca is
to-day very much in the condition of Amer
lea before its discovery by Columbus.
When asked to explain he said that 400
years ago America had no beast of burden
ot any klnd save the llama, whose habitat
was the southern half of the continent.
North America had no load-bearing animal
whatever and ANYTHING TO be transported
on land was carried by men, as Africa ar
Iies its burdens to-day. Horses and
cattle are eXotics. aud are
sheep. goats. pigs, dogs and even
the harmless necessary cat. Then the
sources whence lea, coffee, sugar and
Other edible things Of our daily life come
were brought under consideration, and the
| conclusion the party reached was that
! America must have been a dreary sort of
| pla g to have good dinner in at the time
| Columbus first saw its shores. There was
little to eat, very little t. wear, no furniture
that was worth the name, and those VINO
/ went home after dinner We're obliged to
| walk. No wonder the Indians were thin
and slender, said one OF the takers.
q Who ever heard of fat Indian in those
| days." Mr.. Jephson admitted that
America might have been very dull place
| 400 years ago, but not much duiler than
! Europe before it had the good things it
! afterward received from America and
| especially the potato, which he dwelt upon
| with enthusiasm, and then explained that
he was born IN Ireland.
observe that the subject of the preserva-
! ton If forests has received fresh impetus
| in the past few days by the meeting of the
| American Forestry Association. The future
| OF the eountry-not perhaps, in our day,
| but surely within the next hundred years
| will be seriously affected by the condition of
| our forests, and this circumstance should be
| brought to the mind of every American of
! whatever age. Let every boy bear in mind
| that the forests are among orr best friends;
| that they prevent droughts or greatly miti-
| gate them, and have the same influence
| upon floods. Here Is a range of hills, COW
| cred with forests, which is subjected to 4
! long-cuntinued rain. The rain is held In the
ground in the dead vegetation among the
| trees ana around their roots, and is drained
away very slowly. Let the same hills be
| bare of trees and the rainfall which
| the forests would be weeks or months
| in parting with is drained off in few
| hours, with the result that the streams are
| severely swollen, and often to the deStruc-
| tiun OF property and the peril and destrnc-
| ton of lie. Every boy should be taught
that tree has life, and the destruction of
| that life should be as repugnant to him as
| the killing of pet horse or other domestic
|
| friends, and hesitate as much to destroy a
| tree in the forest as you would to cut down
| the elm that shades the front Of your house.
! Take lesson from the japanese peasant,
| VINO has such reverence Tor the trees that
| he would rather move his house than cut off
| the limb of a tree that is growing against it.
| In certain parts of Spain there is custom
| which might be adopted here to great ad-
| vantage. When man eats an orange or
other article of fruit he drops the seeds by
| the wayside and forces them into the ground
| with his foot, trusting that they Will grow
| and become useful to those who come after
| him. The result is that in the part of Spain
| where this custom has long been followed
there are many fruit trees by the side of the
| road, aud the product has satisfied the hun
| ger of thousands of travellers.
Late accounts from Russia say that the
| Government Is pushing forward its project
| for a railway through Siberia. Several nun
| dred miles of the line are already completed,
the railway being in operation from Perm to
| Ilumtn, and considerable distance beyond
| the iast-named point has been taken in
hand by the contractors. But there is a very
| large ca to be filed. as it is nearly if not
| quite 1000 miles from the end of the present
| line to Nladivostok on the eastern coast,
| where the railway is intended to terminate
| Generally speaking the country is a vast
| plain, and therefore an easy one for the
| construction OF railway, There are only
| two or three mountain chains in the whole
| distance. and these offer no more obsta-
cles than are presented in this coun-
| try by the Alleghanes and far less
| than those of the Rocky Mountains
and the Sierras. When The railway is
| completed so that one can travel by train
| from Nladiyostuk to ST. Petersburg the time
| around the world Will be materially short
| ened. With steamers making direct connec-
| lion between VladivoStok end San Francisco
| the Journey from New York to New York
| again can be made inside of forty-tiye DAYS.
aud may easily be brought down to forty
| days if the steamers and trains run at fair
speed, and do not keep the traveller waiting
too long in the connecting ports. How the
world moves! Yesterday picked up book
| upon California, written in 1880, in which
the writer said 81 venture the prediction
that the time will yet come when men now
| living may go from New York TO San Fran
cisco i'll less than thirty days" ! might be
| ,l,o