The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1899-01-05
is 4 BROAD VIEW
Procession Of the Passing Gen.
tlry Presented.
BY AN ASSOCIATE OF DARWIN
Sketches the Results Achieved.
Material Advancement t-Trans-
portatiOn-lnVenti
Literary Digest.)

Literary Digest)
Alfred Russell Wallace, who cooper
ated with Darwin in formulating the
doctrine of the survival of the fittest,
and who is conspicuous in the fore
most rank of writers on natural his
tory, may be accepted as an observer
eminently qualified to review from the
vantag e-ground of science the process
sion of the passing century, and to
record with understanding and with
the achievements
emblazoned on it's banners.
The task he has set himself has been
TO trace, in compact and forclble
sketches, the great material and intel
lectuai results which especially distln-
guish the nineteenth century from any
or all of its predecessors, and TO show
how fundamental is the change they
have effected in our civilization; for
the passing century must be held TO
constitute the beginning of a new era
OF human progress, and in order to es-
innate it's full Importance and its gran
6eur We must compare 1t, he declares,
not with any preceding century, or
even with the last millennium, but
with the whole historic period-per-
haps even with the whole period that
has elapsed since the Stone Age.
THE one step in material progress
that seems to be really comparable in
importance with several of the steps
we have just made, was when fire first
became the servant and the friend of
man" Without fire there could have
been neither bronze nor an iron age,
hnt
been no effective tools or weapons
with the succession of mechanical dis
coveries and refinements that have
come of them. Without fire there could
be no rudiment even of chemistry;
without fire much of the earth's sur
face would be uninhabitable by man,
and much of what is now wholesome
food would be impossible to him.
BY the magic of fire we are led to
the locomotive and the ocean-steamer,
those overcoming glories of our CEN
fury An ancient Greek or Roman,
Egyptian or ASSyrian, could travel as
rapidly and as comfortably as could
an Englishman, down to the latter part
of the eighteenth century. 1t was main
ly question of roads; and until the
beginning of the nineteenth century,
English roads were commonly far in
ferior to those of the Romans. 1t is
not improbable that during the occupa-
ton of Britain by the Romans. the
Journey from London to York could
have been made in less time than In
1850
And so of commissioners. Five
hundred years ago Vasco de Cana sail
ed from Portugal, round the Cape OF
Good Hope, to India, and in the next
century Columbus crossed the Atlantic,
in it's widest part, to the West Indies
and Mexico. From that time sailing
ships were gradually improved, until
they eliminated in formida BILE frigates
of war and the swift clipper ships OF
the China and California trades. But
during all that period of development
there was no change in principle, and
the grandest three-decker on the full
rugged clipper was but an inevitable
growth from the rudest canoe that ever
| primeval savage padded.
| Now we have the bicycle. and the
principle is old enough. But in the last
century it would not have been posi-
| BILE to construct a first-class bicycle a.
| less cost than seven or eight hundred
dollars. And all this wonderful ad
| vance in the means and methods o.
locomotion has been achieved within
| the memory of a man Of three score
and ten.
Then came the sewing-machine
which at first was for embroiderins
only About 1890, one was made TO
stitching shoes; a crocheting- machln'
| was patented in 1884, one for rough
basting somewhat later: but it was no
until 1916 that the first effective lock
stitch machine was produced by Ella
Howe of Massachusetts.
Then followed the typewriter, an'
the wonderful harvesting machine
reaping, threshing, winnowing, an
sacking, ready for the granary or tn
market And these were all conceive
in the first half, and brought to per
lection in the last half, of this wonder
full century. Nor must we forget tn
Jacquard loom, the revolver, the ma
chine gun, the iron ship, and the screw
propeller.
The invention of writing supersede,
the slow functions of the messenger
the herald, the ambassador. Hence
forth the progress of communicate
was inseparable from that of locOmo
ton.
Even with good roads and mail
coaches the actual time taken in tn
despatch of a letter to a distant plac
was hardly less than that required b
the runner or the mounted courier
With railways and steamships cam
activity, regularity, economy TO IN
postal service-Rowland Hill and pen
ny postage, and the money order
It was not until 1887 that the Effort
of many workers, striving TO the sam
end, overcame the practical dif1cultie
and the electric telegraph was set NJ
The first submarine line was laid fror
Dover to Calais in 1851; and in lS5
a company was formed to lay cabl
across the Atlantic; another, more sue
cessful, was completed in 1866, and no.
all the seas are electrically bridged.
And then came the telephone, Wit
its vibrating disks, eliminating N
line of a thousand miles, bringing III
ear Of Chicago, to the lips Of New Ycrl
Z Rr1dnnnSt thnv have rhlenh Ani