The Roanoke times. [volume] (Roanoke, Va.) 1890-1895, 1892-06-04


shining ray OF glory. At the foot of
every altar lies sacrifice.
The fabulous aspects of his career be-
came almost incredible. Bcholding how
Columbus stored his mind with all tho
gathered knowledge of his day, how he
urged before universities and learned
men the Indispensable adoption of his
plans, based in part on his personal
conjecturcs and in part on his expert
ence and his researches; how in all that
time of steadfast preparation he stallcd
his hopes upon magnatcs, archbishops,
monks and potent queens and kings;
how learning and calculation entered
into his plans as much as intuition and
genius, many pious souls profcsscd to
discover therein revelations such as God
made of old to his prophets, and pro-
posed to the church his canonization.
attribute such exceptional treatment of
Columbus to the fact that discoveries
and discoveries exert potent influence
upon the imagination; and yet they
hold lesser place in popular history
than statesmen or warriors. How much
more important would it be in our day
to know who invented the flourmill
than to know who won the bat
tie of Arbela! The fact is that.
comparing the volumes devoted to
statccraft and to war with those
treating of labor and industry, one is
astounded and dismaycd at the in
credible disproportion. can under
stand why this should have been SO in
ages when manual toll was considered;
degrading, and when trade, relegated
a fbp common cOrt xxh<> ,,,a,, ,,ol:4:o.l
ly dcbarred from coping with the
patrcian classes, was dcspised. But
even in our day, transcendently the
age OF labor and OF industry, while the
names of great commanders are borne
on the worldwide wings of fame,
those of discoverers fall with the ut
most ease into ungrateful oblivion.
For one Galvani, one Franklin, one
Daguerre, one Edison, who has spread
his renown among all classes and
stamped an invention forever with his
name, what vastnumber of unremem,
bercd or unknown glories.
The peoples of the future will not be
so ungrlteful. The first wears of this
century will grow in universal remem-
brance, not by reason of those Ma
polconic victories, whose godlil1c re-
nown thousand poems sing, but
rather because of another and better
title to glory-the voltaic pile, i'm
prisoning the all-diffused electric fluid,
and by its chemicals and metals enpen-
dering currents and forces as though it
were microcosmic universe, an epitomc
of the alchemy whereby the great
powers of nature produce and maintain
life. Without the astrolabe, invented
by the Arab schools of Cordova and
Seville for the study of the heavens;
without the science of algebra. so great
~ facilitating the labor of calculation;
without the mariners compass, which
fixes sure point to guide the bark lost
in the infinitudc of Sky and sea; without
the printing press, which within a
short half century after its invention
had already become potent auxiliary
to the development of the human in
tellect, the discovery of the new world
itself the logical result of a slow but
sure evolution, wrought out in sue
ccssive stages Ike all great human
achievements, and not by sudden chance
could never have taken place.
The observation exhibited nv a horse
belonging to Prof Romanes is both in
structivc and amusing. ~ had
horse" the professor writes, (which
was very clever at slipping his halter.
after he knew the coachman was in
bed. lie would then draw out the two
sticks in the pipe of the oat bin SO ns
10 let the oats run down from the bin
above upon the stable floor OF course
he must have observed that this wcs
inc manner in which the coachman OBJ
tanned the oats. On other occasions, he
used TO turn on the water tap TO obtain
drink, and pull the window cord {,