The Savannah morning news. (Savannah, Ga.) 1900-current, 1901-09-16
ITEMS OF INTEREST.

ness. BY this title Is meant to be indi-
Gated the disorders of digestion which
are believed to follow the practice of
taking ones meals in solitary state.
The topic is by no means an uninter-
esting one. Thousands of men and wo-
men living alone are compelled to take
their meals for the most part without
company. Week in and week out they
feed themselves without a soul to talk
to, and the medical journal devotes it's
energies to showing that the practice
is not one that is likely to be conducive
to digestion, to proper bodily nourish-
ment Or to health. The solitary man
soon tires of merely eating, and If he
is not of a literary turn of mind his
tendency is to hurry through his meal
to escape from his loneliness into the
society of his fellow-men. Herein, it is
held, lies a danger to health.
Col. Eugene de Pilsoudski's new
system of wireless telegraphy depends
In no way upon the air for transmits
sion of the current. The earth is used
for a conductor. The current passes
from the transmitter to an underground
plate and then to a box containing the
isolating elements of pitch and petrol
cum, whence it is carried to the re-
ceiver at a distance and read off by a
duces the communications transmitted
back to the starting point. The radius
of action depends upon the power of
the electrodes, but Col. de Pilsoudski
declares that messages can traverse
not only mountains and streams, but
more easily still the sea. If you install
at Havre transmitter with 10 Ruhm-
korff bobbins, so centimeters in diam
eter joined togethr for the sake of the
fhnCinn nor n tf.ac v1aft 6n co r1anc
sages to New York owing to the one
million and half or two millions of
volts employed. This system, like that
of Signor Marconi, is based on the
Hertzian waves.
Sugars and starches are chemical
ly very similar, and all the starch and
| fat has to be converted into sugar be-
! fore it can be utilized in the body's
processes. There are. of course, various
kinds of sugar, ranging from ordinary
cane sugar and beet sugar (the one is
very different as a food from the 9TH
er, the latter being inferior to cane
sugar. to glucose, milk sugar, malt
| sugar, honey sugar and the like. Now
in the course of digestion and assim-
| ilation the sugars when used up are
converted into carbonic gas and wa
| ter, which we give off as part of our
bodily waste. and the profit we get
out of this transaction is the produc-
| ton of heat and energy, or the power
! of doing work Sugar is not, therefore,
a body building food. 1t Is rather a
work of power producing material like
fat though it is inferior to fat in this
respect. Sugars may be converted into
| fat, work in which the liver plays
the important part. The balance of ev-
| idence seems all in favor of sugar be-
| ing a muscle food of great value. In
Paris they are feeding their horses on
sugar, or rather, adding sugar to the
dietary of the animals, with excellent
effects.
We have passed unobserved a high
ly memorable anniversary, says an ex-
change. 1t was 127 years. on the LIST
| of August, since Joseph Priestley dis
| covered oxygen. He called it dephlo-
gisticated air; Scheele, who separated it
about the same time, empyreal air;
while Condorcet more happily than
either, suggested vital air Lavoisier
named it oxygen, literally the acid
maker, and in so doing he perpetuated
an error. 1t is not oxygen that is the
essential element in the formation of
acids, but hydrogen, so called because
it helps to form water. The early
chemists would have hit the mark bet
ter if they had interchanged the des-
| iSnations; for oxygen constitutes the
great bulk of water, and hydrogen is
a constituent of all the acids What's
in name in this case is a chemical
misrepresentation. Priestley little
knew how wide was the range of the
element he had found. Oxygen forms
one-fifth of the atmosphere eight
ninths of the waters, and, taking all to-
gether, one-half of all the materials of
the globe. so far as they are known.
AS carbon is the basis of all the or
ganic substances of the world so oxy-
gen, the supporter of life and combus-
ton, represents it's living energies.
AT the beginning of the new CEN
fury, says the Scotsman, we ali patted
each other on the back and talked big
things about progress and civilization.
In our retroSpectS we contrasted the
early years of the nineteenth century
with it's wonderful close. The discovery
and development of the power of
steam, with all its attendant mar
vels, such as machinery applied to
manufacture and the facility of com
munication, were put down to our
credit at tremendous value, and still
more the march of electricity as the
worlds greatest force was held to be
the century's glory and the herald of
a civilization such as the world has
| not yet seen. This wonderful develop
ment of applied science has brought
many comforts and many luxuries
which our forefathers did not enjoy.
The astonishing rate at which we can
travel, the speed with which a thought
from ones brain may be communicated
to the uttermost parts of the earth.
and the thousand and one items which
| together form what we call civiliza
ton seem to us. now that we have
known them, indispensable. Yet. after
I all, are we as individuals much the
happier for these luxuries-for luxu-
! ries they are, and not necessities-has
the world really advanced in what is
civilization in the truest sense of the
| word?
-Rubies are growing scarcer. The
most beautiful come from Ceylon, In
ola and China. The mines of Pegu ara
rearly exhausted or but little worked
to-day. The regions where they are
situated are dangerous of approach:
besides, in the states of the Grand
Mogul the expectation of rubies is for
hidden until they have been exhibited
to the sovereign, who retains the most
beautiful. The ruby of Siam is distin-
! guished by its deep red color. some
what resembling the garnet. Carbun-
! cles, to which the ancients attributed
fantastic properties, were in reality
rubies. They served, it was said. to
give light to large serpents or dragons
H. 49, i