Even in normal peace conditions biological and pathological science has been accomplishing results not popularly understood. Individual cures by surgery and medicine appeal to personal interests, but these are negligible compared to the prevention of plagues like smallpox, typhus and tuberculosis. If such diseases had not been successfully combated by science three out of four of the present civilized population would not be in existence at all. The organized and intensive application and developments of science, of preventive medicine, constitute the strictly neutral work in this war by which all humanity will profit for all time to come.
In passing it is interesting to note that the great power supplied by Niagara Falls is being utilized to produce some of the chemical marvels. One great industry there is making soda by the electrolytic process. That is, salt brine is pumped from the saline deposits in western New York and piped to the works. This is run into electric cells and through these a current of electricity is led. The salt, which is composed of chlorine and sodium, decomposes under the electric attack. The sodium goes to one pole and combines with water to form caustic soda, whereas the chlorine escapes at the other pole. Let us follow the chlorine, which is a yellowish-green gas, more than twice as heavy as air, and has found a new use as poison gas in the great war—for which all the world should be ashamed.
It is collected and compressed to a liquid form and shipped in containers under pressure for use in chemical works and bleacheries and for the purification of drinking water. It has been found above all things effective in destroying noxious bacilli. A surprisingly small amount of the gas dissolved in the water is enough. In New York city the water has been chlorinated and no single case of typhoid fever has been traced to the supply.
CHAPTER XXI.
OUR NEIGHBORING ALLY.
Canada's Recruiting—Raise 33,000 Troops in Two Months—First Expeditionary Force to Cross Atlantic—Bravery at Ypres and Lens—Meeting Difficult Problems—Quebec Aroused by Conscription.
The world has marvelled at the achievement of Canada at Valcartier camp near Quebec and the dispatch across the Atlantic Ocean of a fully equipped expeditionary force of 33,000 men within two months of the outbreak of war between Great Britain and Germany. But the magnitude of that feat cannot be appreciated properly until one considers that on August 4, 1914, Canada had a permanent force of only about 3500 men.
These soldiers, who for the most part were instructors and men on guard duty, provided a nucleus for a training organization. In addition to its "standing army," the Dominion had an active militia numbering approximately 60,000 men. Their training consisted of what has been aptly called "after-supper soldiering." Members of city regiments drilled for one night each week, participated in an annual church parade and spent two weeks every year in summer camp.
The training of the rural regiments consisted almost entirely of the two weeks in summer camp. Yet from these militia units were drawn a large proportion of the men in the first Canadian oversea contingent, while the militia regiments, to a large extent, formed the basis of Canada's recruiting organization after the outbreak of hostilities.