Mr. Edwin F. Field, of Lewiston, Me., has invented a substantial steam wagon for common roads. There is no reason why such wagons should not come into use. When first proposed in England they were put down by jealousy and opposition, but I have always contended that the steam engine should have superseded the horse fifty years ago.
Fruit Preserving.—About Christmas time in 1885 people in San Francisco were astonished to see fresh peaches, pears, and grapes, with all their natural bloom, and looking plump and juicy, on exhibition in the windows of confectionery stores on Kearny and Sutter streets. These fruits attracted great attention, and remained on exhibition several weeks, showing the preservative agent employed, whatever it might be, was singularly powerful in resisting the natural decay. When tasted or smelled of, the fruit showed no peculiarity that could lead to a discovery of the secret of the mysterious process.
It appears now that the invention is at last to be made a practical success on a large scale. The Allegretti Green Fruit Treatment and Storage System Company, with the main storehouse at West Berkeley, announce that they are now ready to store and treat all kinds of green articles, by the week or month, and for shipment East. I. Allegretti, the inventor of this system, stated that he had been experimenting with various processes for preserving green fruit for twenty-six years, and had succeeded in discovering this system, whose success has been demonstrated to the fruit-growers of this State.
The building in use at present is a frame structure, capable of storing some fifty tons of fruit. The inner lining of the walls is galvanized iron. There is no machinery used, and the only thing visible is a large tank, supposed to contain the chemical preparation. The arrangements are so made as to give an even temperature of 35 degrees.—Oakland Enquirer.
Napoleon’s Manuscript.—“A manuscript by Napoleon I. has been sold in Paris for five thousand five hundred francs. It was written by Napoleon at Ajaccio in 1790, and the language and orthography are said to be those of an uneducated person. In this manuscript he speaks with enthusiasm of Robespierre.”
Peace.—Long and impatiently have I waited for the dawning of true civilization and practical religion. It is coming now in the form of an international movement in favor of peace by arbitration. The British deputation which has visited this country to urge the necessity of a treaty for arbitration, was entertained, Nov. 10th, just before their return, by the Commercial Club at the Vendome Hotel, in Boston, and many appropriate remarks were made by the distinguished gentlemen present, including Gov. Ames, and Mayor O’Brien. The deputation consisted of W. R. Cremer, M.P., the most persistent advocate of arbitration, Sir George Campbell, M.P., Andrew Provard, M.P., Halley Stewart, M.P., Benj. Pickard and John Wilson, who represent the workingmen of Great Britain. William Whitman of the Club, who presided at the entertainment, remarked, “It is an inspiring fact, as well as indisputable evidence of social growth, that this appeal for arbitration as a permanent policy has come, not so much from kings, from rulers, or from statesmen, as from workingmen…. It would create an epoch in human history second only in influence to the birth of Christ, and be such a practical exemplification of religion as would awake the conscience and touch the heart of all peoples.”
Capital Punishment is a relic of barbarism which society has not yet outgrown. It tends to cultivate vindictive sentiments, and, at the same time, to generate a morbid sympathy for criminals. The execution of the Chicago Anarchists, as they are called, has had these effects. They were not properly Anarchists in any philosophic sense, but rather revolutionists, bent on destroying government and the republican rule of the majority by dynamite and assassination. Their death gives satisfaction to the vast majority of the people, but their incendiary language has done incalculable mischief, and greatly interfered with all rational and practicable measures of reform, as carried on by the Knights of Labor, co-operative banks and building societies, co-operative associations and schools of industrial education for both sexes. Just as we have a prospect of getting rid of international war, this revolutionary communism proposes to introduce a social war that has no definite purpose, but the indulgence of the angry passions which have been generated abroad by tyranny and poverty.
Antarctic Exploration.—The Australian colony of Victoria has appropriated $50,000 for two ships to make a voyage of scientific exploration in the Antarctic circle.
“The Desert shall Blossom as the Rose.“—“The ‘Great American Desert’ was long ago found out to be a myth; and now some of the remotest corners which were once supposed to be included in it are proving to offer the largest promises of value for agricultural and grazing purposes. In New Mexico, for example, it has long been thought that certain immense areas must always be comparatively useless because of their natural aridity. But engineers have just completed plans for tapping the Rio Grande with a canal and thus bringing under irrigation a tract some ten miles wide and a hundred and fifty long, containing nearly a million acres. The addition of so vast an area to the arable land of the Territory means, of course, a large increase in the productive resources of that section. Other canals may possibly do as much. The work of sinking artesian wells is also going on there extensively, while the project of constructing great storage reservoirs, in which the rainfall of the wet season may be collected and from thence gradually distributed through the dry season, is already in serious contemplation by private enterprise. Modern scientific irrigation has already accomplished wonders for the agriculture of Utah; it seems likely to do even more for New Mexico.”