The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1892-02-07
TEE LIGHT OF AGES.
Knox Has Something Interesting to
Say About l..

~
Say About Il.
tCopprioht, 1892, By the United Press.)
New York, Feb. cor all the material
things that add TO the happiness aud pleas
ure of man, in the present day there is
nothing of more value than light.
This can truly be called the age Of light.
All that preceded 1t we're comparatively
dark ages.
1t can hardly be credited that from the
creation of ''the sun to rule by day" until
the date on which the tallow candle was in
vented, more than fifty centuries rolled
down into the crypt Of time, and that in
these ages men used no brighter artificial
light than pine knot.
Improvements In lighting came very
slowly until the beginning OF the present
century. Our forefathers, truly, dwelt in
darkness in what we are pleased to miscsll
the good old days.
The first light known was that Of torches
of resin-charged wood. When Adam got up
in the middle of the night 20 alleviate poor
little Gains collie, he didn't press button
and food the Garden of Eden with electric
light. No, indeed. How disguised the old
man must have been, as he stood shivering
In the dark, hunting around the torn lining
of his waistcoat pocket for match, to sud
denly realize that matches had not yet been
invented, neither had oil lamps nor candles.
So the father of his race had to hustle
out to the pine wood pile Tor IA stick of piue
and, then, down on his knees at the fire.
expend lot of wind on the embers before
he got his torch lighted sufficiently to show
him where Mrs. CastOria's Soothing Syrup
was, while all the time Eve was calling TO
him to hurry if he didn't want to see bis
first-born die in his infantile tracks.
Lamps were Invented at an early date,
but they differed widely from the ornate
affairs of to-day. They were mere concavi-
ties of clay, filled with the fat of bird or
beast. The pith of a reed or rush was
stuck in the grease and lighted. 1t fickered
and splutterei, and made up, i'll the matter
of smell, for what it lacked IN Illuminating
power.
The Egyptians, the Israelites, the Assy~
rians, aud their contemporaries used la npS
They were sometimes called candlesticks,
although nothing in tie shape of candle
was known. Some of these candlesticks
were gorgeous affairs Moses was COM
manded to make one of beaten gold for the
tabernacle. 1t was five feet high and had
seven branches, with a cup in each TO hold
the oil. The gold in it was valued at S25, 600.
Olive oil was used in this caudlestick with a
string Of cotton or fax for a wick Solomon
| had ten of these golden candlesticks in the
temple, and l think we are safe in assuming
that they would not dispel more than a
few quarts of darkness apiece; and the ten
would not give more light than would a
modern gas Jet.
The ancients are supposed never TO have
thought of refining oil If they did think Of
it, they didn't know how to do it, or were
too lazy to invent way. They said: 80,
what's the use of bothering This is good
enough for US. We are too busy fighting
our neighbors who refuse to worship our
gods, to give time to inventing things
| Wen leave that business to those nineteenth
century fellows We don't want to suffer
| from insomnia nor an adverse decision of
the commissioner of patents"
Old Lucullus spent great sums of money
in fighting the awful smell of the penny
worth Of oil in his $4,000 lamps. He mixed
the oil with essence of roses and sandal
wood, but the scent OF the oil knocked that
of the roses out and chung round it STILL"
The smoke was another dreadful nuisance.
| It grimed the walls and coated the freScoes
with shot in the bedrooms and banqueting
| halls in the olden Roman days. There were
no chimneys on the lamps, and, of course
the light fluttered and ficKered continually
and often went out.
| Poor old Homer! When he burned his
midnighG OIL must have felt as If he was
living next door to a soap factory and had
a dead RAJ in his cupboard The lamps of
the day merely Hccentuated the darkness
| and it is difficult to imagine now even the
old Grecian bald head, who sat down close
to the bass drum, could recognize his favor
tie chorus girl over the smoking aud
through the thick smell OF the foot
lights.
In Britain, until the Roman conquest,
| even the crudest kind of lamp was unknown.
The Picts and Scots didn't know what q
rush-light was. They stuck q splinter of
wood into the carcass of fat bird or fish,
| and this dismal, stenchful thing burned
until the oil in the bird or fish was ex-
| hausted. In Iceland that kind Of candle is
sometimes used to this day.
In the medieval ages the people rose at
day break and went to bed at sunset. They
couldn't stand the smell of the lamps. The
| curfew, bell, that during the reign of Will
lam the Conquerer, warned the people to
put out their lights, wasn't much of hard
Ship after all. There could not have been q
great deal of pleasure in sitting around
reading Robert Elsmere. or Mr. Barnes of
New York under the sporadic flashes of a
smoking lump of fat or bluboer.
The first attempt at inventing tallow
candles was in the twelfth century out only
rich people could afford candles. They
we're conside cred a great luxury. 1t was
not until the fifteenth century that trades
people could afford to use candles. A dip,
| that would last an hour, cost pence. 1t
had fiaxen WICK, for cotton was dearer
than silk, and it was only in castles that
cotton wicked candles were burned. The
drippings of the candles were saved and
made into new candles. Wax candles
were also used but only in
churches. During the middle ages wax
taper, presented to q church. was consid-
cred a princely gift, aud q man who pre-
sented a six-to-the-pound to his priest re-
ceived absolution for any rascality Of an
ordinary character, while q candle weighs
| ing a pound would wipe out the most helm
Gus offeuse that man could commit.
At cost of 400 crowns Henry Xl. sent
two wax tapers, weighing ten pounds each,
to the Canterbury cathedral, and LOUIS
XII, whenever he spent few thousand
| dollars in riotous excuses and debauchery,
spenp an equal amount in candles for the
church of "Our Lady of Grace" 80 as to
balance his account with the angel OF record
above.
The ends of wax candles. and the drip
pings from them, we're valuable perquisites
claimed by ords-in-waiting in kings
palaces
Voltaire added to the small stipend paid
him by Frederick the Great, by pocketing
ali the candle ends[he couldlay bis hands on.