The Montgomery advertiser., 1901-08-25
UNKNOWN GREAT MEN.
Densfactors of the World Whose Identity is Hopelessly Lost.

PhtlAdelphia Times.
 Early last year Capt. F. s. Slater of the schooner Sea-Serpent. found him self adrift in small boat, with five of his snip wrecked crew, and without compass at least, he though he was without. But after i've days of aimless drifting in a fog, he found one in the bottom of a locker, says London An- swers, and managed to steer Into safe- ty. The compass saved their lives, for they were on the verge of starvation.
 Captain Slater was 50 thankful for that compass that he decided to get up q public subscription for a monument to its inventor, and over a thousand pounds had actually been subscribed before he discovered that no one on earth knows who did invent the marin. CTS compass. The monument idea' or course, fell through.
 Every one is familiar with photo graphs or copies of that wonderful piece of sculpture, the Venus di Milo. IL was found in the Island of Melos ana is now in the Louvre. at Paris. The arms, unfortunately, have been broken off; but for perfect beauty of face and nieure no other piece of sculpture. an cient or modern, can compare With IL. Yet no one has the faintest idea Wno executed the marvellous piece Of work' and it Is safe to say that it's origin new or will bs known.
 Giuseppe Rabatini. the famous Vene- tfan collector of old paintings, possesses a most exquisite picture, over wnich ex,erv beholder raves. Everybodys opinion of the painting is expressed m three words-"It simply talks! II represents the rescue of a marveiiously beautiful woman, with her cnilo, 1roIn a small wrecked yacht. MT. Raoatini says he would not sell 1t at any price. Indeed, 50 recently as last May ne re- fused an offer of f100. 900 for 1t ana ois- couraged further offers. IL IS tao~ lion over four feet square ana IS un- s,snsS If was unearthed two years ago in an old curiosity shop Tn Milan ana all efforts to trace it's origin nave prove dfutile. ,..s r"your own M. P probably derived r,ucr of his political wisdom from the famous Letters of Junus'-one or tne eieyerest political works ever puniisn' ed. The fact that, although Wrltton isO years ago, they are standaro MorA to this very, day. and were carelully studied by Gladstone, Disraen. anu every poiiticisn of note, speaks volumes ;hs remarkahlo cleverness of the Iet4srs But no one knows who wrote +hsro and it is too late now to nope ever to find out.
 The humble lucifer match is sup nosed to have been invented by Sir Isaac Holden. Someone eise' however nut in on the market before he did and claimed to be the first inventor. Even Sir isaac Himself admitted dnat it was doubtful who really was the inventor, so that no one VIII ever pc able to say for certain.
 Chess is a game which arouses in- terest All the world over. Other games coyoe and TO. but this one has lived for ages and shows no signs of decay. where, when, or by whom it was in vented Is a mystery. Stonehenge and the Pyramids of Egypt are everlasting monuments to the extraordinary build tng skill of the ancients, but their origin Is hopelessiy lost.
 One would think that the identity ot the architect of such a superbly-de- signed building as Cologne Cathedral could not possibly be lost to the world. But it is. The Cathedral took cen- turies to build, and many architects have modelled parts of 1t according to their own ideas. .Jn the main, however, the original gratad idea-an idea which simply astoWads every pnodern archi- tect, but the origin of which Is abso- lutely unknown-was carried out, and the resuk is the most beautiful cathe- dral In %D world
 Think how mus the world owes to the inventor of ,fhe common wheel. Wheels form the principal portion of every kind of machinery. Familiarity having bred contempt. we are apt to regard the wheel as being a very sim pie thing, which did not need to be invented by anybody. We suppose that it simply growed." In point of fact. however, 1t is a most ingenious con- trivance. for which we ought to be very thankful indeed to somebody, but no one can say to whom.