Scientific American Supplement, No. 392, July 7, 1883

V >> Various >> Scientific American Supplement, No. 392, July 7, 1883

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The Malays operate as follows: A dry bamboo rod, about a foot in length,
is split longitudinally, and the pith which lines the inside is scraped
off, pressed, and made into a small ball which is afterward placed in
the center of the cavity of one of the halves of the tube. This latter
half is then fixed to the ground in such a way that the cavity and ball
face downward. The operator next fashions the other half of the tube
into a straight cutting instrument like a knife-blade, which he applies
transversely to the fixed half and gives an alternating motion so as to
produce a sort of sawing. After a certain length of time, a groove, and
finally a hole, is produced. The cutting edge of the instrument is then
so hot that it sets on fire the ball with which it has come in contact.

[Illustration: FIG. 3.--GAUCHO OBTAINING FIRE.]

Some peoples, the Fuegians especially, procure fire by striking together
two flints. In the Aleutian Islands these latter, having been previously
covered with sulphur, are struck against each other over a small saucer
of dry moss dusted with sulphur. The Eskimos employ for this purpose
pieces of quartz and iron pyrites.

In the Sandwich Islands recourse is had to a process that necessitates
much skill. There is arranged in a large dry leaf, rolled into the
shape of a funnel, a certain number of flints along with some easily
combustible twigs. On attaching the leaf to the end of a rod, and
revolving the latter rapidly, it is said that fire is produced.

Processes that are based upon the clashing of two flint stones must be
much more inconvenient of application than we would be led to suppose.
We are, in fact, accustomed to see the flint and steel used, but here
the spark is a bit of iron raised to red heat through a mechanical
action that has violently detached it from the mass under the form of
a small sliver. In the case of two flint stones, the light that
is perceived is of an entirely different nature, for it is a
phosphorescence which is produced, even by a very slight friction, not
only between two pieces of silex, but also between two pieces of quartz,
porcelain, or sugar; and that the heat developed is but slight is proved
by the fact that the phenomenon may occur under water. Of course,
fragments of stones may be raised to a red heat through percussion; but
this does not often occur, so for this reason the Fuegians keep up with
the greatest care the fires that they have lighted, and it is this very
peculiarity that has given their country a characteristic aspect and
caused it to be named Terra del Fuego (land of fire). When they change
their residence they always carry with them a few lighted embers which
rest in their canoes upon a bed of pebbles or ashes.

The same thing occurs, moreover, among the Australians and Tasmanians,
who employ, as we have just seen, the rotary process. There are women
among these peoples whose special mission it is to carry day and night
lighted torches or cones made of a substance that burns slowly like
punk. When, through accident, the fire happens to get extinguished in a
tribe, these people often prefer to undertake a long voyage in order to
obtain another light from a neighboring tribe rather than have recourse
to a direct production of it.

We can understand from what is still taking place in these distant
countries why the worship of fire should have existed among our
ancestors, and why sacerdotal associations, such as the Brahmins of
India, the Guebers of Persia, the Vestals of Rome, the priests of Baal
in Chaldea and Phenicia should have been specially instituted for
producing and preserving it.

Plutarch narrates (Numa, chap. ii.) that when the sacred fire happened
to go out, there was employed for relighting it a brass mirror that
had the form of a cone generated by the hypothenuse of an isosceles
rectangular triangle revolving around one of the sides of the right
angle.

[Illustration: FIG. 4.--NATIVE OF OCEANICA OBTAINING FIRE BY FRICTION.]

In a poem upon stones attributed to Orpheus, it is said that the sacred
fire was also lighted by a bit of crystal which concentrated the rays of
the sun upon the material to be inflamed. This process must have been
the one that was most usually employed before fire became common. In
fact, a plano-convex crystal lens has been found among the ruins of
Nineveh. Aristophanes, in the _Clouds_, puts on the stage a coarse
personage named Strepsiades, who points out to Socrates how he must
manage so as not to pay his debts:

"Streps.--Hast thou seen among druggists that beautiful transparent
stone that they employ for lighting a fire?

"Socr.--Thou meanest glass.

"Streps.--Yes.

"Socr.--Well! what wouldst thou do with it?

"Streps.--When the registrar shall have made out his summons against me,
I will take the glass, and, placing myself thus in the sun, will cause
his writing to melt."

As well known, writing was then traced on waxen tablets. Servius (in
_AEn_., xii., 200) affirms that men of ancient times, instead of lighting
fire upon the altar themselves, in their sacrifices, caused it to
descend from heaven. He adds, according to Pliny, Titus Livius, and
several old Latin historians, that Numa, who was initiated into all the
wisdom of Etruria, practiced this art with success, but that Tullius
Hostilius, having desired to repeat the evocation, guided only by the
books of Numa, did not accomplish all the formalities prescribed by the
rite and was struck dead by lightning.

Is it not curious that twenty-four centuries afterward, in 1753,
the physicist Reichman was killed by lightning in trying to repeat
Franklin's experiment? This coincidence, however, is not the only one.
Pliny (ii., 53) recounts that lightning was evoked by King Porsenna at
the time when a monster named _Volta_, who was ravaging the country, was
directing himself toward the capital, Volsinies.

If we return to the Vedas, who had the habit of personifying all
phenomena, we shall find that the fire Agni was the son of the carpenter
who had manufactured the instrument by which it was produced, and of
_Maya_ (magic). He took the name of Akta (anointed, [Greek: christos])
when, nourished by libations of butter, he had acquired his full
development. The Persians attributed likewise to Zoroaster the power
of causing fire to descend from heaven through magic. Saint Clement of
Alexandria (_Recog_., lib. iv.) and Gregory of Tours (_Hist. de Fr._,
i., 5) speak of this. However this may be, the marvelous art was lost
at an early date, for it was at such a date that priests began to have
recourse to tricks that were more or less ingenious for lighting their
sacred fireplaces in an apparently supernatural manner.--_A. De Rochas,
in La Nature_.

* * * * *

ST. BLAISE, THE WINNER OF THE DERBY.

St. Blaise, the property of Sir Frederick Johnstone, was bred by Lord
Alington, and is by Hermit from Fusee. This is an unexceptionable
pedigree, for Hermit is now as successful and fashionable a sire as was
even Stockwell in his palmiest days, while Fusee was far more than an
average performer on the turf, and won several Queen's Plates and other
races over a distance of ground. St. Blaise is by no means a big colt,
standing considerably under sixteen hands. His color is about his worst
point, as he is a light, washy chestnut, with a bald face and three
white heels. He has a good head and neck, and very powerful back and
muscular quarters, added to which his legs and feet are well shaped and
thoroughly sound. His first appearance was made in the Twenty-fourth
Stockbridge Biennial at the Bibury Club Meeting, when he won easily
enough; but there were only four moderate animals behind him. A
walk-over for the Troy Stakes followed, and then Macheath beat him
easily enough for the Hurstbourne Stakes, though he finished in front
of Adriana and Tyndrum. For the Molecomb Stakes at Goodwood, he ran a
dead-heat with Elzevir, to whom he was giving 7 lb.; and Bonny Jean,
in receipt of 10 lb., was unplaced. A 7 lb. penalty seemed to put him
completely out of the Dewhurst Plate; but he must then have been out
of form, as, on the following day, it took him all his time to defeat
Pebble by a neck in the Troy Stakes. This season he has only run twice.
His fourth in the Two Thousand was by no means a bad performance,
considering that he was palpably backward; and his victory of last week
is too recent to need further allusion. Porter, his trainer, can boast
of several other successes in the great race at Epsom; but Charles Wood
had never previously ridden a Derby winner. St. Blaise was unfortunately
omitted from the entries for the St. Leger, but has several valuable
engagements at Ascot next week, and appears to have the Grand Prize of
Paris, on Sunday, at his mercy.--_Illustrated London News_.

[Illustration: ST. BLAISE, THE WINNER OF THE DERBY.]

* * * * *

[NATURE.]

SCIENTIFIC PROGRESS IN CHINA AND JAPAN.

Various steps in the progress of China, and Japan in the adoption of
Western science and educational methods have from time to time been
noticed in these columns. To the popular mind the names of the two
countries are synonymous with rigid, unreasoning conservatism and with
rapid change, respectively. The grave, dignified Chinese, who maintains
his own dress and habits even when isolated among strangers, and whose
motto appears to be, _Stare super mas antiquas_, is popularly believed
to be animated by a sullen, obstinate hostility toward any introduction
from the West, however plain its value may be; while his gayer and more
mercurial neighbor, the Japanese, is regarded as the true child of the
old age of the West, following assiduously in its parent's footsteps,
and pursuing obediently the path marked out by European experience.
There is considerable misconception in this, as indeed there is at
all times in the English popular mind with regard to strange peoples.
Broadly speaking, it is no doubt correct to say that, Japan has adopted
Western inventions and scientific appliances with avidity; that she
has shown a desire for change which is abnormal, and a disposition to
destroy her charts and sail away into unsurveyed seas, while China
remains pretty much where she always was. She is now, with some
exceptions, what she was twenty, two hundred, perhaps two thousand years
ago, while a new Japan has been created in fifteen years. All this, we
say, is true, but it is not the whole truth. China also has had her
changes; not indeed so marked or rapid, not so much in the nature of a
_volte-face_ on all her past as those of her neighbor.

The radical difference between the two countries in this respect we take
to be this: that while Japan loves change for the sake of change, China
dislikes it, and will only adopt it when it is clearly demonstrated to
her that change is absolutely necessary. To the Japanese change appears
to be a delightful excitement, to the Chinese a distasteful necessity;
to the former whatever is must be wrong, to the latter whatever is is
right. As a consequence of this difference between the two peoples, when
China once makes a step forward it is generally after much deliberation,
and is never retraced. Japan is constantly undertaking new schemes
with little care or thought for the morrow, but with the applause of
injudicious foreign friends. In a short time she discovers that she has
underrated the expense or exaggerated the results, and her projects
are straightway abandoned as rapidly and thoughtlessly as they were
commenced. Swift suggested as a suitable subject for a philosophical
writer a history of human projects which were never carried out; the
historian of modern Japan finds these at every turn. Where, for example,
are the results of the great surveys, trigonometrical and others, which
were commenced in Yezo and the main island about ten years ago? A large,
expensive, but highly competent foreign staff was engaged, and worked
for a few years; but suddenly the whole survey department was swept
away, and the valuable instruments are, or were recently, lying rusting
in a warehouse in Tokio. The same story may be told of scores of other
scientific or educational undertakings in Japan. An able and careful
writer, Col. H.S. Palmer, R.E., who has recently, with a friendly and
sympathetic eye, examined the whole field of recent Japanese progress,
in the _British_ _Quarterly Review_ is forced to acknowledge this. "Once
having recognized," says this officer, "that progress is essential to
welfare, and having resolved, first among the nations of the East, to
throw off past traditions and mould their civilization after that of
Western countries, it was not in the nature of the lively and impulsive
Japanese to advance along the path of reform with the calmness and
circumspection that might have been possible to a people of less active
temperament. Without doubt many foreign institutions were at first
adopted rather too hastily, and the passing difficulties which now beset
Japan are to some extent the inevitable result." It would be blindness
to deny that the net result of the Japanese efforts is progress of a
very remarkable kind, but it is a progress which in many respects lacks
the firm and abiding characteristics of Chinese movements.

The proverb, _Chi va piano va sano_, which was recommended ten years ago
to Japanese attention by an eminent English official, and apparently
disregarded by them, has been adopted by their continental neighbors.
To the blandishments of pushing diplomatists or acute promoters, the
Chinese are deaf. However we may felicitate ourselves on our inventions,
scientific appliances, "the railway and the steamship and the thoughts
that shake mankind," our progress, the newspapers, the penny post, and
what not, China will not adopt them simply because _we_ have found
their value and are proud of them. But if, within the range of her own
experience, she finds the advantage of these things, she will employ
them with a rapidity and decision surpassing those of the Japanese. A
conspicuous instance of this will be found in her recent action with
respect to telegraphs. For years the Chinese steadily refused to have
anything to do with them; the small land line which connected the
foreign community of Shanghai with the outer world, was maintained
against the violent protests of the local authorities, and the cable
companies experienced some difficulty in getting permission to land
their cables. But during the winter of 1870-80, when war with Russia
was threatened, the value of telegraphs was demonstrated to the Peking
government. The Peiho at Tientsin was closed by ice against steamers,
and news could only be carried to the capital by overland couriers from
Shanghai. Before a year elapsed a land line of telegraph was being
constructed between this port and Tientsin; in a few months the line
was in working order, and the Chinese metropolis is now in telegraphic
communication with every capital in Europe.

This conservatism, respect for antiquity, conceit, prejudice, call it
what we will, has something in it that extorts our respect. Let us
imagine a dignified and cultivated Chinese official conversing with
a pushing Manchester or Birmingham manufacturer, who descants on the
benefits of our modern inventions. He would probably commune with
himself in this wise, whatever reply Oriental politeness would dictate
to his interviewer: "China has got on very well for some tens of
centuries without the curious things of which this foreigner speaks; she
has produced in this time statesmen, poets, philosophers, soldiers; her
people appear to have had their share of affliction, but not more than
those of Europe; why should we now turn round at the bidding of a
handful of strangers who know little of us or our country, and make
violent changes in our life and habits? A railway in a province will
throw thousands of coolies and boatmen out of employment and bring
on them misery and starvation. This foreigner says that railways and
telegraphs have been found beneficial in his country; good, let his
countrymen have them if they please, but let us rest as we are for the
present. Moreover, past events have not given us such faith in Europeans
that we should take all they say for wisdom and justice." A day will
undoubtedly come when China also will have her great mechanical and
scientific enterprises; but what we contend for here is that nothing
we can say or do will bring that time an hour nearer. European public
opinion is to China a dead letter; she refuses to plead before that
tribunal. Each step of her advance along our path must be the result of
her own reflection and experience; and our wisest policy would be to
leave her to herself to advance on it as she deems best. SINENSIS.

* * * * *

THE DIAMOND FIELDS OF SOUTH AFRICA.

At a recent meeting of the Institution of Civil Engineers, the paper
read was "On the Diamond Fields and Mines of South Africa," by Mr. James
N. Paxman, Asoc. M. Inst. C.E.

The author commenced by stating that Kimberley was situated in
Griqualand West, above 700 miles northeast from Table Bay, and 450 miles
inland from Port Elizabeth and Natal on the east coast. Lines of railway
were in course of construction from Table Bay and Port Elizabeth to
Kimberley, and were about half completed. In Griqualand there were
several diamond mines, the principal of which were Kimberley, De Beer's,
Du Toit's Pan, and Bultfontein.

In the Orange Free States there were also two mines, viz., Jagersfontein
and Koffeyfontein, the first of which produced fine white stones. The
mines were all divided into claims, the greatest number of which were to
be found in the Du Toit's Pan mine. Bultfontein came next.

The deepest and most regularly worked was the Kimberley mine. The next
deepest was De Beer's, which, however, was very unevenly worked. Then
followed Du Toit's Pan and Bultfontein. The Du Toit's Pan mine ranked
next in importance to Kimberley mine. Diamonds were first discovered in
1867 by Mr. O'Reilley, a trader and hunter, who visited a colonist named
van Niekirk, residing in Griqua. The first diamond, on being sent to the
authorities, was valued at 500_l_. Considerable excitement was caused
throughout the colony, and the natives commenced to look for diamonds,
and many were found, among which was one of eighty-three and a half
carats, valued at 15,000_l_. In 1868 many enterprising colonists made
their way up the Vaal River, and were successful in finding a good
number of diamonds. The center of the river diggings on the Transvaal
side was Klipdrift, and on the opposite side Pniel. In all there were
fourteen river diggings. Du Toit's Pan and Bultfontein mines were
discovered in 1870 at a distance of twenty-four miles from the river
diggings. The diggers took possession of these places. Licenses were
granted giving the first diggers a right to work. In 1871 De Beer's
and Kimberley mines were discovered, and in 1872, Mr. Spalding's great
diamond of 2821/2 carats was found at the river diggings.

The mines were of irregular shape, and were surrounded by reef. The top
reef was a loose shale, and had given great trouble from the frequent
slips. Below this were strata of trachitic breccia and augite; the
formation was then seamy to an unknown depth.

Within the reef, the surface soil was red, and of a sandy nature. The
next stratum was of a loose, yellow, gravelly lime, and the third blue,
of a hard, slaty nature. This last was the real diamantiferous soil.
Large stones had been found in the "yellow," but the working of this
generally did not pay. Kimberley mine, however, had paid very well all
through. The method of working in deep ground was determined by roadways
running north and south. The soil was hauled up to these roadways,
and taken to the sorting tables. The roadways decaying shortly after
exposure to the atmosphere, a system of hand windlass was adopted, which
worked very well for a time until horsewhims were adopted in 1873.
The depths of the mines increasing, horsewhims had to give way to
steam-engines in 1876.

The first diggers treated on an average ten loads per day each party. At
the present time the least taken out by any engine, when fully employed,
was 250 loads per day. The cost of working, with present appliances, the
first one hundred feet in depth, was 3s. 6d. per load; the second one
hundred feet (mostly blue) 5s.; the third one hundred feet 8s.; and
the fourth one hundred feet 11s. Through scarcity of water a system
of dry-sorting had to be resorted to for several years; but it was
superseded by the introduction of washing machinery, which was now
generally employed.

At the commencement, through inexperience, many serious mistakes were
made. When the first diggers reached the bottom of the red sand, they
thought no diamonds would be found in the next stratum. When, however,
diamonds were found in the second stratum, the diggers had again to
remove the debris, and so also when the "blue" was reached. Some of the
claims in the Du Toit's Pan and Bultfontein mines were irregular in
shape. The other mines, however, had been properly and regularly laid
out. One or two shafts had been connected with the mines by underground
galleries. These galleries were convenient in the case of falls of reef.
Labor, at first, was cheap; but from 20s. per month, wages rose to 30s.
per week, and food. The yellow soil offered no difficulty in working,
being loose and broken, but the blue soil required blasting.

Several methods were adopted for extracting the soil and carrying it
from the mine before steam was introduced. The cost of wood for heating
purposes was a serious item, but good coal had now been found at 160
miles from Kimberley, costing 13l. per ton; another serious item of
expense was the transport over natural roads only, costing from 18_l_.
to 30_l_. per ton.

The machinery designed by the author for this industry was described.
A sixteen horse-power direct-acting winding engine was introduced for
hauling up loads at the rate of about one thousand feet per minute, and
a twenty-five horse-power geared engine, for hauling up heavier loads at
the rate of from six hundred feet to seven hundred feet per minute.

Water was dear, and water-heaters were fitted to each engine, by which
thirty-three per cent. of the water was again used, thus saving one
third. The boilers were of the locomotive type, mostly of steel, to save
weight, and thus reduce the cost of transit. The fire-boxes were also
made of steel of very soft and ductile quality. A semi-portable engine
was made for driving the wash mill. The engine was so arranged that it
might be removed from the boiler and placed separately. The boiler was
made to work at a pressure of 140 pounds per square inch. Automatic cut
off gear was fixed to each engine, and the governors were provided with
a spiral spring for adjusting the speed. A screen, or cylinder wash mill
and elevator, were used for dealing with the diamantiferous soil, and
were described. Standing wires were fixed at the back of the machinery,
and passed over a frame fixed at the top of the mine, the end of the
mine being secured to strong wooden posts. After the blue soil had been
blasted and collected into trucks, it was placed in tubs, which ascended
the standing wires. It was then emptied into the depositing box. The
yellow soil might be put into the wash mill direct, also that portion of
the blue which had passed through the screen fixed over the depositing
box. The remainder of the blue, which was spread out to a thickness of
four inches or six inches on the depositing ground, some distance from
the mine to dry, was delivered into the upper part of the screen. The
return water from the elevator, with a portion of fresh water, was also
discharged at this point, and operations were thus greatly facilitated,
the soil becoming thoroughly saturated, and passing more easily down the
shoots. The large pieces which would not drop through the meshes of the
screen were discharged into trucks at the lower end and carried away.
The smaller pieces with water, in the form of sludge, fell through into
a shoot, and thus were conveyed into the wash mill pan, and there kept
in constant rotating motion by agitators. The diamonds and other pieces
of high specific gravity sank to the deepest part of the pan, and the
remainder of the sludge was forced over the inner ledge to the elevator.
The sludge was then lifted and thrown upon an inclined screen and down
the shoot over the side of the bank. The residue left in the pan at the
end of the day's work was passed through a pulsator, in which, by the
force of water, the mud and lighter particles were carried away, leaving
behind the diamonds, agates, garnets, and other heavy stones. It was the
practice occasionally to put a few inferior stones in the soil, to test
the efficiency of the machinery.

In 1881 the author paid a visit to Kimberley, and found the industry a
large one. The Post Office return showed the value of diamonds passed
through the office in one year to be 3,685,000_l_. Illicit diamond
traffic had hitherto been a source of great trouble at the fields. It
was a question whether this industry would ever cease; in any case there
was no doubt but that it would last for over a century. It was believed
that the main bed of diamonds had not yet been reached, and that the
mines in operation were merely shafts leading to it. Now that the water
works were finished, with a bountiful supply of water, coupled with
the great boon of railways to the Fields, and the advantage of a law
recently passed for the prevention of illicit buying, a great and
prosperous future was in store for the Diamond Fields.

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