The farmer and mechanic. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 18??-19??, 1911-02-21
INVENTIONS OF
THE NOVE[|STS
Time Has Turned Their
inventions into Solid
Facts
FANC|FUL TALEsCOMET TRUE
I,t,nto,ranhy Long FOresiiadOWcd-
Jules EeFne'S Book IuI OF NarNess,
Some Of Which Are Real.

Some Of Which Are Real.
on hardly an invention can finger De
laid hich some imaginative mind mas
not made use Of in fiction before It pc
came q fact. Fiction has always lore
Swallowed fact.
Too far back for counting Chinese
stories nave been based upon the traut-
to-. crediting the sun with producing
pictures of n~eignboring objects upon
the i~ce-coyered surfaces Of lakes and
rivers. FeneIon, in 1890, borrowed
the idea for his "Une Voyage Sup
pose
There was no painter In that
try he wrote ~imaginatiyely on an
imaginary country, but II anybody
wished to have the portrait Of a
friend, Of a picture, a beautiful land
scape. or Of any object. water was
placed III great basins Of gold or sill
yer. and the object desired to be
painted was placed in front Of that
water. After a while the water
froze and became q glass mir
TOR on which an ineffaceahle image
renamed"
In 1860 Tiphaigne de Ia Roche came
still nearer guessing how pictures
painted by nature would some day be
produced.
You know" said the guide to the
nero y SlIflidtlliC. q ld1S tIlCH 1CIi-
sideFed wildly imaginative, that rays
of light reflected from different
bodies form pictures, paint the image
reflected on all polished surfaces
for example, on the retina of the eye,
on water, on glass. The spirits have
sought to fix these fleeing images;
they have mad a subler matter by
means Of which a picture Is formed in
the twinkling OF an aye. They coat a
piece Of canvass with this matter and
place it in front of the object to be
taken.
The first effect of this cloth is
similar to that Of a mirror, but by
means Of its yiscous nature the pre-
pared canvass, unlike the mirror. re-
tains a facsimile Of the image. The
mirror represents objects faithfully.
but retains none; our canvass reflects
them no less faithfully, but retains
them all. h impression of the i'm
age Is instantaneous.
THE canvas is then removed
deposited in a dark place. All hour
later the impression is dry and you
have a picture the more precious in
that no art can initiate ifs truthful
ness
The genii imagined by de la Roche
were fair predecessors of present-day
users OF the camera.
JULES VERNE-S MARVEIS.
Jules Verne is perlla ps the past mas
ter prognosticator who has to his
credit fOretelling in fictionaI suise,
most inventions and achievements
The phrase Around the World In
highly Days. no longer sounds wild
" improbable, nor does Twenty
Thousand Leagues Under The Sea. A
trip to the moon such as he conceived
has not yet been realized to be sure
n the feature Of his story Give
Weeks in a Balloon but flying has
reached a stage considered equally
impossible when these romances were
written. and even SO more man
are daily being constructed revolvine
on aerial accomplish nents still tc
come.
Solar back as 1870 q Jesuit father
Pierre Lana. published q folio
entitled 'Nuove metodo per potter viag-
gere in aria dentra n barea sostenuta
le gicbbi voIante" in which the aviator
sustained his bark in the air by -four
copper balls in which a vacuum was
formed through the medium of water
but the aerial voyage was to go no fur.
Their han on the paper of his folio.
Tales enlbodying mai.'s dream OF
e1nulatins the birds go Jack furthe,
than history. This was one of mytho.
logy's fayorite subjects. The winged
horses OF the sun. ,Juno's peacocks
Medeas ~gon Pegasus, the fly.
ing carpet and h ebony horse of The
Arabian Nights are but a few ex.
aInples.
From the time Of Icarus anaT,aa.
dasus who attempted to fly from thu
prison Of Minos, down to that Of Pete,
wilkins Darius Green and Danbur,
Rood. aviator. flying heroes hay.
hcen popular in the realms OF rn-
nance the marvel loving ~chronicIer.