The Savannah morning news. (Savannah, Ga.) 1900-current, 1901-01-07
MATTERS unoUGHr ovER.

MATTERS BROUGHT OVER.
On New Years Day there hung oves
London dense fog OF what is called
the pea-soup variety" There. them upon
the very first day of the new century,
was presented reminder of one of the
greatest problems brought over from the
cid century. We have mate prodigious
strides forward in the matter of lighting
a clear atmosphere, but the fog is almost
as much our master in 1901 as it was in
1901 1t Is true that We now have sirens
and fog horns which are capable of pro.
jecting their sound for miles, but they
are often positive sources of danger.
Sound, it has been found, does not al
ways travel straight I'm a fog Sometimes
1t is impossible to tell the direction from
which a sound comes in the fog. At one
time it will appear to be from one quar-.
ter of the compass, and then in a mos,
mysterious manner it will shift to some
other quarter which it will abandon i'm
mediately. Neither electric lights nor
steam whistles have lessened i'm any great
degree the dangers of travel at sea dur
ing fog. on lard, too the opaque veil
is as dangerons IS ever, in cities like
London especially B1siness is often sus-
pended there, because Of the inability of
the people to see where to go or what
to do.
The problem of aerial navigation is an
other one of the "carrled-overs' 1t is
true that Count Zeppelin has succeeded
in constructing Il dirigbie balloon with
which he has had a small degree of sue
cess. He has managed to soar and de-
scend at will, and to steer his balloon in
light airs; but the practicable airship
that might be put to commercial ac
count-which is the test for successful
inventions--is still in the future. The OPP
posite of the airship, the submarine ship,
is an accomplished fact 1t was perfected
only during the last years of the old
century. There is nope that the aerial
years have elasped.
Long distance submarine telephony also,
has been brought over. The longest spok-
en- message under the ocean was trans
United from Florida TO Havana some few
days ago. The experiment was imperfect,
but gave good promise of success later.
1t is hardly too much to believe that the
day is not far distant when verbal con-
versations may he carried on between
Europe and America. Wireless or aerial
biography and telephony We're begun in
the last century, and have come over in
har iI N
They will, of course, be perfected. Mr.
Nikola Tesla, indeed holds out the
promise that he will put the earth into
communication with Mars and the other
planets before a great while, if some ex>
periments of his result as he hopes ana
believes they will. He told the Red Cross
Association on New Years night in New
York that he had assurances through
certain phenomena which he had observ-
| ed in his instruments, that some of the
planets were trying to communicate with
the earth What the message was he
could not conjecture, because he had no
proper instrument to receive it. He hopes
to construct one that will not only take
messages from the planets but transmit
replies to them. Some of Mr.. Tesla's fore
casts, it is not out of the way to remark,
have been found rather disappointing in
| the past Still. in this age of wonders, it
is hardly safe to close ones mind against
even that which seems incredible.
Neither of the magnetic poles has been
discovered. The Duke de Abruzzi charae-
| terized the annals of Arctic exploration in
the nineteenth century by returning only
a few months ago from the nearest ap>
proach to the North pole ever made.
Various expeditions are now being fitted
cut for further polar explorations and
one or more of them may succeed in
wrestling from the frozen North its Sc
| cret.