The Democratic advocate. [volume] (Westminster, Md.) 1865-1972, 1903-01-03
Were Ahead Of Us.
From the Chicago Tribune.

have been forgotten and revived again al
new.
That highly educated Chinese diplomat
WI Ting fang, who is now on the way
back to China with bag full of curios
was the first to expose the antiquity of the
new game of ping pong. 1t was shown t.
him as an entirely new idea, but the willy
Oriental could not see it in that light anc
explained that while the game was pleas
ant one it was not new, having been played
by his countrymen since 900 B. c. Al
nearly as Mr.. WI could remember OF
hand, the game was invented by Chinese
priest. Mr.. WI is always sure of his facts
and is too polite a diplomat to depart from
the truth to gain slight advantage in pre-
tending to know more than other people
about such simple matters as ping-pong
The world of science in London Is just
now greatly stirred over a substance called
electroid, which has the peculiar property
of making plants grow at an amazing rate
Under the influence of this discovery they
grow. bloom, mature and fade away in the
space of few minutes The scientists are
greatly interested in this discovery and are
trying to find some practical use for it In
the botanical world.
In the Journal de Savants for 1855 can
be found an account written by an engineer
named Papin, which tells of the discovery
of a scientist named Wilde which causes
flowers and plants to grow to full maturity
in the interval of few moments. 80 1t
appears that the latest novelty to the
scientific world of London was known over
two centuries ago.
The now popular military device known
az the Photograph, which was used with
great. success by the British army in South
Africa, was simply taken back to its old
home again. This device is an arrange
ment of mirrors by which sunlight is flashed
from one point to another according to pre-
arranged code of signals. 1t is part of
every first class army, and is looked upon
as more or less of a novelty. There is evil
dence that it was used by the natives of
Northern Africa / centuries ago, or about
the year 800.
Even more ancient is the practice of
homeopathy, which has now become rec
ognized branch of medicine. There was
healing by Similarity nearly 1000 years
ago and curing by minute doses Of poison.
These and other practices died out for
something over II centuries, only to be re-
vived in our own day as nineteenth cen
fury invention.
IF you 90 to the elevated railway station
you pass through self-registering turnstile,
which automatically records the number OF
persons who enter. Yet this same device
was used 8 centuries ago to find out how
many persons attended the big exhibitions
given at the circus. The same persons at
the same date were using condensers aboard
their tiresome war vessels made exactly like
those which a modern steamship carries.
Raised type for the blind is usually look
ed upon as a comparatively recent discov-
cry. So it is in this country. In Persia,
however, such type has been in use from
time immemorial.
Motor cars are by no means so recent In
origin as is generally imagined. Everyone,
of course, knows that steam coaches were
put upon the roads of England early in the
reign of Queen Victoria and that they
worked excellently, only failing because of
repressive legislation. But the self-pro-
PEELED vehicle is far more than 20 years
old There is trustworthy record that
Father Verbrest, a Jesuit missionary to
China in the year 1860, invented and built
a steam driven vehicle for road use during
his stay in the Far East 1t was, indeed,
constructed according to what is now con-
sidered novel style-that of the steam
turbine A jet of steam was made to act
directly upon vaned wheel, which was
affixed to vertical shaft gearing attached
to one of the axles.
About the same date Nuremburg man
named Johann Haustach manufactured
what he described as "a chariot going by
spring and making 1000 PAGES an hour. .
The motive power was, in fact, that Of a
modern American clock-a big coiled
spring. The invention failed because all
four wheels were fixed and not pivoted.
So the machine was useless except on a
straight road.
There are hundreds of persons at work
at present upon the perfecting of the flying
machine, and Santos Dumont's Siderable
balloon has attracted an enormous amount
of attention. There is still in existence a
letter written to the King of Portugal in
1909. II have invented machine, "
the writer says, "by means of which one
can voyage in the air more rapidly than on
land or sea. 1t will travel more than 200
leagues in day and be invaluable to send
dispatches to armies in the most distant
countries. Thanks to aerial navigation, we
may discover the North Pole and such re-
mote regions. " Perhaps the most remark
able fact about this early navigator of the
air is that not only was its writer of the
same nationality as the present Santos-Du
mont, but his name was also Santos.
The wearing of sunbonnets by horses
during hot weather caused a tremendous
when the fashion first appeared,
.hree or four years ago. There is to be
seen at Genoa an old Italian print, dated
1912, in which is depicted man riding
on horseback with an umbrella fixed over
his own head and another over that of his
horse.
Neither the steamboat nor the ironclad
can claim to be nineteenth century inven-
lions. In the year 1886 the Duke of
Parma invested Antwerp so closely that the
burghers were almost at their wits end.
They set to work and built a large ship,
the hull of which they plated thickly with
iron, to protect it it from Spanish shot. In
its construction they embodied another pc
culiarity, usually supposed to be modern
invention. Roomy platforms were built
upon its masts, where sharpshooters might
lie concealed-regular fighting tops, in fact.
The Dutch launched this ship with so GER
tain hope that by its aid the war would
be ended that they christened it "Finls
Belli' the end of the war. Unluckily,
The ship ran upon a shoal and was captured
by the Spaniards before it could be gotten
off.