Various

“ If we look up at the starry heavens on a clear, moonless night, all seems still, lifeless, and devoid of energy and motion. All of us are—or at least should be—familiar with the apparent diurnal motion of the star sphere, caused by the actual rotation of the earth on its axis, and with the slower annual motion, due to the earth's revolution round the sun, which brings different constellations into view at different seasons of the year. ”

“ Now, I want to show you the most intense form in which heat can be produced on this earth. There is no hotter object that we can obtain than that of the electric arc. I will try and produce this arc. You observe that when I bring these two pieces of carbon together, a current of electricity passes between them, and the passage of the current of electricity between them creates such an intense temperature that a brilliant white light, as you see, is produced. Incandescent particles of carbon pass between the two points, forming a sort of bridge or arch, which is called the electric arc. ”

“ Now, if I take a lump of coal and heat it—it requires to be raised to a certain temperature before the oxygen is directed upon it—and subject it to a jet of oxygen, you will see that it burns with very much more intense light than you are accustomed to in the ordinary fire. If I take a piece of iron wire and place it in a jar of oxygen, you see what a very brilliant effect the combination of oxygen and iron produces through the iron being raised to a very high temperature. ”

“ Many people imagine the electric light to be a cold light. It is a delusion. It is called a cold light because in many of its forms it gives what we may call a cheerless light; it has not got the warmth, the comfortable look, of other artificial means of illumination.
The electric light owes its existence to the intense heat that the electric current produces, and heat lies at the root of every system of artificial illumination. ”

“ We can make the life of a lamp just exactly what we like; we can make a lamp last a minute, or we can make it last a hundred years, and the number of years of its duration is simply dependent upon the current employed. I have here a glow-lamp, and I pass a current through it. There is no blue effect at present; the current is increased, and the carbon filament is raised to a high state of incandescence. ”

“ I will not attempt to occupy your time in speaking of the beauties of this wonderful light, how it removes really poison from our air, how it is very good for sore eyes, because it burns with such steadiness that those who work under it really never find, in any shape or form, any inconvenience or discomfort to the eyes. It is extremely cleanly; it does not fill the air we breathe with noxious fumes. ”

“ The light of the glow-lamp is of just the same form of energy as that which passed from the sun to the earth, and by beginning backward from the lamps we have light, heat, electric currents, mechanical motion, food or fuel in the shape of mutton, grass on the South Downs, to the sun. Whichever way it is taken, you will find there is direct action between the sun and the glow-lamp. The lamps are now burning, and you see that we are able to produce electricity to our hearts' content. Down-stairs there is a gas-engine; the gas-engine is at work ”

“ Now that we have seen an ideal street light, an ideal house light, and an ideal fuel, we will endeavor to show you an ideal gas company; and we cannot do it in a more concise way than to say that an ideal gas company is one that keeps all these ideal commodities for sale at a reasonable price. ”

“ He will still maintain that there is not a company in the country making anything out of electric lighting, and that it is only a matter of time when some fellow slips into his town and, noting things, works up an arc light company, captures the street lighting and some of our friend's best consumers. The price of gas is lowered; all kinds of patent gas burners are invested in to recapture those lost consumers; a fight ensues, factions are made in the town, and the arc light company adds an incandescent plant to the arc light, and captures more of our friend's consumers. ”

“ People are little aware of it, but it is a very simple calculation to show that thirty gas burners produce a gallon of water in an hour, so that if you have thirty burners in a shop, for instance, alight for six hours, six gallons of water are produced and the water can very often be seen running down the cold windows of shops. That water absorbs sulphur and sulphuric acid, and when deposited on books and decorations destroys them. If we could only get the electric light cheap, delivered at our doors, then everybody who has an idea of luxury and comfort would at once take it. ”

“ But is the fuel gas practical, and has there been sufficient progress made to date to warrant gas companies taking hold of it with any assurance of success?
In the first place, what assurance do we require? Do we want some one to come along and guarantee us a profit of 20 per cent. on our investment if we enter the field? If so, the patentees of the different processes might just as well negotiate with the shoe maker as with the gas company. ”

“ In the case of a building designed merely for sustaining of loads, as in a storehouse, a floor would naturally be designed on the basis of considering the breaking strength of the timber. But in the case of a mill, the limitation is the amount of flexure allowable under the circumstances; and therefore the floors of the building are made more nearly rigid than would be required merely from the consideration of the ultimate strength of the structure. ”

“ When we reflect that these substances are the foods from which everything in the tree—new cambium, new roots, buds, flowers, and fruit, etc.—are to be constructed, it becomes clear that if any enemy settles in the cortex and robs it of these substances, it reduces not only the general powers of the tree, but also—and this is the point which especially interests us now—its timber-producing capacity. ”

“ There is a dynamo down-stairs exactly like the dynamo that we have upon the platform, and the current that is produced is exactly as the current we just obtained, and is sending electricity through all the lamps in this room. The currents of electricity passing through the lamps are producing intense heat, the heat is producing the incandescence of a fine carbon filament, such as I will show you directly, and the consequence is that we are now being lighted in this room by the energy that unmistakably and undisputably arrived on this earth millions of years ago in the form of sunshine. ”

“ We have in front of the board one of these carbon filaments suspended, and we will now pass a current through it, and the carbon filament is raised to incandescence, it combines with the oxygen of the air, it is at once consumed, and, as you saw, we only had a light for a few seconds. Now, in order to make that light permanent, it is necessary to inclose the carbon filament in a glass globe, and to exhaust from that glass globe all the air, or as much of it as possible, and then, instead of having a life of a few seconds, the life of a lamp frequently continues for 4,000 or 5,000 hours. ”

“ I cannot understand how some gas companies who have the incandescent electric system as a competitor can console themselves with the fact that it is not injurious to their gas business, even taking it for granted they are selling as much gas as before its advent. ”

“ I should have pointed out that as the quantity of heat generated in a wire increases, so does the color of the light. When heat is applied to a body, that body is first warmed, then it gets gradually hotter and hotter, until it becomes red hot, and the first color that appears is always red. The temperature is further raised, and the body assumes the color of orange, then at a little higher temperature it appears yellow, and so the different colors of the rainbow are perceived according to the different temperatures to which the body tested with is raised. ”

“ Every part of the plant contains a milky juice which is intensely bitter, and a first taste is quite enough to convince the most stupid animal that raw dandelion is not good eating, and most animals know enough to let it severely alone. Curiously enough, however, in this, as in many other cases, it happens that what in nature acts to deter animals from eating the plant, with man offers the chief attraction, for it is this very bitter principle (taraxacin) which gives to dandelion greens their peculiar flavor, and affords the essential element in the extract which physicians prescribe. ”

“ One set of mains for fuel gas, from which our patrons will draw all their fuel, and also light, if they wish. Gas engines will be run economically with this gas. One set of meters only will be required.
There will be no coal gas benches as we have them now, as the method of manufacture is too laborious, too expensive and very primitive, not to say barbarous—everything now being built on the horizontal plan, requiring the greatest possible exertion to both draw a charge and stoke. The generators of the future will be on the cupola style, feeding by gravitation from the top. ”

“ But we have also seen that the cambium is not the only living tissue below the bark: the cortical parenchyma (pa) and the cells (c) of the inner cortex (technically the phloem) are all living and capable of growth and division, as was described above. The release from pressure affects them also; in fact, the "callus," or cushion of tissue which starts from the lips of the wound and closes it over, simply consists of the rapidly growing and dividing cells of this cortex, i.e., the release from pressure enables them to more than catch up the enlarging layer of cortex around the wound. ”