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of resulting diseases. The people die and make no sign.

It is all so useless, the complications of trade and the suffering of humanity. New York City shivers and complains, with deposits of the best fuel known in two hours' reach, sufficient to keep its fires for two generations. New Jersey has enough to last a century; Chicago fumes over its coal famine with beds of the richest gas-fuel almost within the city limits; Wisconsin valleys are filled with it; Indiana might supply her neighboring States with firing and not feel it; St. Paul has fuel-beds to last her fires indefinitely. Of course this fuel is the despised, little-understood peat. Really, one might put in a cup of tea all that people know about one of Nature's best gifts, which will play no insignificant part in human affairs for the coming century. The wireless telegraph is of less impor

tance.

Peat is the deposit of dead swamp moss and other bog plants charged with carbon, often with bitumen. The swamp moss, one of the most enduring plants known, will hold two hundred times its own weight of water, and its earth holds eighty to ninety per cent. Dry the sods in the air and they burn so well that a ton and four-fifths equals a ton of coal for heating purposes. That is to say, it has about half the heating power of good coal and more than twice the heat of wood. If a measureless supply of wood existed within two hours of the city, to be had for cutting and hauling, we should feel easy on the fire question. Years since a careful State geologist estimated the peat along the Hudson River through Westchester and Rockland Counties at over two million cords, with better yield in the interior of those counties. New York City has dug out and thrown into the bay from its own subsoil peat enough to keep its fires going all this winter. The subway cuttings come upon it every little while, and the Irish workmen carry home sods of it to burn for the sake of the old country. The writer took a turf uptown from the cuttings at the Tombs Power Station, and it made incense in a bedroom grate for days. It was not dry, yet it burned and gave heat. But what was most curious and delightful was its aroma, like that of pines in the noonday sun. Its soft,

purifying effect on the air, due to its moist, antiseptic property, soothed irritable lungs and made breathing easy. Enough had been read and heard of the "glowing fires of peat," but the charm of its subtle odor and the soft purity of its air were a novelty.

Old men who remember the peat fires of the Civil War and after, when coal waxed high and scarce, are enthusiastic over the lasting, summer-like heat diffused by burning turf. Between 1860 and 1875 some forty-six firms began to cut peat in New York, New England, and Ohio. It was everywhere liked as a household fuel, and it raised steam admirably, but it was not understood that it needed different firing from coal or wood. Above all, the supply was not adequate for railway and factory purposes, with the few and scattered companies raising peat at any one time. It was as if twenty small mines had to furnish all the coal wanted for the country to-day, or as many country mills grind all its flour. So peat fell back into disuse, railways bought their own coalmines and worked or leased them, and every one else bought the fuel offered, wood or coal. Housekeepers would not look at coal as long as wood was five dollars a cord, and it took forty years to bring the public into the use of hard coal. It was held in the same contempt which peat now receives, as a makeshift for those who could afford nothing better. Let us learn the facts about this despised clod fuel.

That

The American Society of Mechanical Engineers, which will be recognized as sound authority, in its boiler tests rules one pound of dry wood equal to four-tenths of a pound of coal for making steam. That is, two and one-half tons of pine wood, a little over two and one-eighth cords, give the same heat as a ton of hard coal. Common air-dried peat gives the same heat with one and four-fifth tons. is, again, common dry peat turf throws out more heat than the same amount of best oak or beech cord-wood. The average heat given by the best soft coal is 13,600 thermal units, that of dry peat 9,400 units, per pound. But there is such a thing as prepared peat, ground to pulp like wood fiber for paper, the water extracted by ventilator fans, and the pulp pressed into blocks three by four inches,

hard as coal and clean as tile, yielding more heat than ordinary hard coal.

The Continent is far ahead of this country in the development of peat fuel. The Russian Government, aware that its oil wells in southern Russia cannot meet the service for ships and railways, has hundreds of excavators at work in the peat bogs along the railway between St. Petersburg and Moscow, raising and pressing fuel for the locomotives. Alert little Finland and the Caspian order vessels and locomotives to burn peat when in shed or harbor. Sweden outdoes the world in fuel enterprise, for not only are its briquettes the best made, but its Royal Peat Association held a Peat Exposition last year, which showed twenty-four varieties of native peat, besides briquettes from Russia, Germany, and Holland, and the turf grown by the Peat Cultivation Society. Peat can be grown from Sphagnum and Hypnum swamp mosses in twenty-four years, although the vast deposits existing in the world began when mammoths had the globe to themselves. The exposition also showed quantities of by-products from peat, which equaled in variety the derivatives from coal-paraffine, acetic acid, peat spirit, peat tar, and ammonia in the list. It is not out of the way to consider peat as an unfinished coal mixed more or less with petroleum, the villainous smell left out. According to master engineers, two million tons of prepared peat have been used yearly in Swedish works.

Few regions north of the Carolinas are without a plentiful peat supply within a radius of fifty miles, and where this is the case it is cheap and beneficial to use common air-dried peat for household fires. It has a hundred good qualities besides its heating property. It does not dry the air as coal fires parch it, and long experience shows that its antiseptic quality prevents consumption and relieves it, like the air of pine forests. Consumption is practically unknown in peat-burning districts, and the lovely complexions of Irish and Swede women are largely due to the moist pure air of peat fires. Peat charcoal is a notable disinfectant, and late researches of Continental chemists prove that the cholera bacillus cannot survive where it is used. The value of peat ashes in manufactures and as a fertilizer

equals its worth as a fuel. The ash discourages insect pests in orchard and garden; it nurtures the short, sweet pasture which feeds high-flavored mutton and fine wools, and makes the richest sward for lawns. Every inch and fiber of a peat bog has its value. The water from peat streams keeps sweet on shipboard round the world. The fibrous upper layers of turf, least considered for fuel, when ground with asphalt make the most enduring, elastic street pavement. Carefully burned, peat produces a charcoal worth five times as much as wood charcoal for the highest uses in manufactures and the arts.

If asked why this has not been known sooner, it is answered that the facts have been known for a hundred years, but the world is too taken up with what comes to hand to notice anything outside its immediate vision. Oppressive dispensations are needed to make nations recognize the resources of Nature. Starvation teaches the worth of maize and potatoes for food, and the coal famine brings to light the unsuspected values of a dozen fuels— coal-slack, lignites, briquettes, and native peat. It is said, by those who should know better, that the cost of manufacturing peat is too great to permit its use. But while this is said by those who should know better, we have it on the best authority of mechanical and civil engineers, of scientific institutes and trade reports, that it is made on the Continent, ground and pressed, at sixty cents a ton; and this side of the water an enterprising firm is turning out thousands of tons of finished peat weekly, at a cost of $1.75 a ton, including royalties. This is for the finished peat. which equals coal for heating, and exceeds it in other good qualities. It is nearly smokeless, it has no sulphurous gas, it does not burn out grates and boilers, and it is as clean to handle as so much flooring tile. The notable Holland housewives are willing to pay more for it than for coal, simply because it takes less room and is so clean to handle.

When it is added that peat can be successfully worked in winter as in summer, with the aid of mechanical devices, the last objection to its use would seem to be removed. The keen-witted manufacturers of Sweden and Denmark build their factories on the borders of peat bogs for

the convenience of the fuel. The peat turf in Minnesota and western New York is so bituminous as to take fire in the late summer and smolder slowly for monthsin the Northwest burning until the snows of December put it out. It would be as well to adopt the latest Continental enterprise-building power and light stations on the edge of bogs, and transmitting power and gas to neighboring towns. Peat

makes very brilliant gas, free from the malefic odors of coal-gas, at a much less expense. And the energy derived from the use of peat reduces the rate of power to one-ninth of a cent an hour for each horse-power-the computation given by a manufacturer who had installed his plant next to a peat bog. Is there nothing here to tempt the consideration of American business men?

The New International Encyclopædia'

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There are two distinct types of encyclopædia, represented severally by the · Encyclopædia Britannica" and by Brock haus's Conversations-Lexikon." The former is more suited to specialists than to the general reader. The latter, free from this limitation, is typically German in dry and monotonous indifference to literary form. Chambers's deservedly popular work embodies the merits without the defects of the German type, but, like the Britannica, retains too much of British insularity to be satisfactory to American needs. Several American cyclopædias, while aiming to supply its deficiencies, have made large drafts upon it.

But before the final volume of an encyclopædia is issued, its first volumes already lag behind the unresting advance of events and of learning. Not only are Revisions and supplements constantly quired, but new works are needed. Discovery and invention, new sciences, political and social changes, create new interests and open new outlooks upon the world of thought and the world of action. The projectors of the New International were not mistaken in judging

The New International Encyclopædia. Edited by Daniel Coit Gilman, LL.D., Harry Thurston Peck, Ph.D., L.H.D., and Frank Moore Colby, M.A. Vols. I, II, III. Dodd, Mead & Co., New York,

that the first decade of the twentieth century is a ripe time for their great undertaking.

It is planned on German rather than on British lines, studious of scientific accuracy, but written for the general reader. At the same time, its principal contributors have been selected on the ground not only, as in Germany, of their special knowledge, but also of their literary style as attractive and clear. The volumes before us are a pledge that, whatever its shortcomings, ponderosity and dullness will not be among them. Reference is here in point to the eight-page article on Architecture, with its four additional fullpage illustrations, Egyptian, Greek, Mexican, and American-the latter, quite fitly, being St. Paul's in New York, with its overlooking "sky-scrapers." This reference to illustrations justifies the further remark that the New International outranks in this line all its predecessors, both in quality and in quantity, while evincing a discriminating selection. Some of the colored plates, e. g., Apples, Cacti, Indian Baskets, Indian Blankets, are very fine. In its numerous maps, of course, the latest political changes are exhibited, as a glance at its Africa reveals; and one finds drawn in its Antilles all the mail steamer routes as well as the submarine telegraph lines of the present year.

The contributors announced in the first volume number a hundred, of whom three only are women, whose several topics are Biography, Consumers' League, etc., and Cookery. The fact of this disproportion must be mentioned; beneath the surface of it we leave it to Sorosis to inquire. Beyond this list no note of individual authorship appears. Those who prefer

signed articles must respect the solid reasons given against them, of which this one is enough that the number of revising hands through which many an article passes before it appears in the New International imparts to it a collective authorship in place of an individual.

A feature of this work convenient for the general reader, and not heretofore found in an encyclopædia, is its department of general intelligence, with a large variety of miscellaneous topics. Here occur titles and characters in literature, political nicknames, popular allusions, etc. This has been found a popular convenience in the Century Dictionary, in which, for instance, "Bondman " appears as "A tragedy by Massinger (1623);" to which the New International adds: "a minor opera by Balfe (1846); a novel by Hall Caine (1890), the scene of which is laid in the Isle of Man and Iceland." If one cannot find everything here—e. g., “Barnburner," the name of a political faction in New York fifty years ago-there is an eminently satisfying abundance of this small information.

The department of Biography is rich beyond all that has yet appeared in encyclopædias. Some forty members of the Brown tribe find place here, besides over a dozen who add to their patronymic the slightly distinctive e Not all of these may permanently remain above the encyclopædist's horizon; but none of them is here refracted from below it. The article on John Brown of Kansas must be pronounced deficient in the judicial impartiality shown his contemporary, President Buchanan. Brown is made the exponent of the "bloodiest and most unscrupulous type of frontier ruffianism." If such superlatives are his due, what words can be found for the atrocities that maddened him? In the copious illustrations that have been referred to, biography has its share in full-page portraits of illustrious characters, two or three in a volume.

Passing from general to particular, one finds a noteworthy article on Archæology, to which seventeen pages are devoted, with three full-page illustrations of Greek and American relics, besides many smaller ones-an admirable brief of an immense and expanding subject. Rather more is desirable at its close than the mere hint of the incomputable antiquity of man,

elsewhere than on the American continent. Another scientific article of great merit is that on Biology, to which five pages are devoted. Here one may think that the discussion of the rival theories of experience and of natural selection as influential in the survival of the fittest, and the verdict in favor of the latter, have failed to take due notice of the recent theory of "orthoplasy," indorsed by some eminent names, as combining and reconciling these rivals by assigning to experience transmitted by education its value in utilizing the opportunities given by natural selection.

Among articles on the mechanic arts, that on the Atlantic Telegraph, with its account of the sixteen cables working at this date, those on the Automobile, with its two full-page illustrations, and on the Bridge, with three such, besides smaller ones, are excellent specimens of a presentday account. This department is fully exhibited. Bricks, butter, the machinery for making them, and even that employed in bottling, have each its full-page illustration.

Large space is given to the department of Geography, both physical and political. The physical maps of Africa, North America, South America, and Asia deserve special mention. The eighteen pages given to Australia and related subjects illustrate the value of a work that exhibits. recent political changes, as in that newly organized commonwealth. The page and a half given to Australian Literature will be to many readers the revelation of a new field of interest.

Among religious subjects the Bible receives large treatment, embodying both common and curious facts to the extent of twenty-five pages. That but one page is given to Biblical Criticism may seem, in view of the appended bibliography, to be an instance of wise judgment in a subject at once so recondite and so hotly litigated. In this bibliography both sides are impartially represented. Throughout the entire work special students will find a good bibliography attached to every important article, with references to special monographs as well as to standard works.

It is not to be expected that a work involving innumerable particulars in the entire sphere of human knowledge shall be free of all slips and errors. Some

such occur. It is hardly a historical fact that Cæsar "out of love for Cleopatra entered on the Alexandrine war." The historian Merivale represents the outbreak of hostility as prior to the love affair. Of another kind is the inaccurate statement that "the original site of Boston included Beacon, Copp's, and Fort hills, all of which have been considerably cut down." This is true of Beacon hill, not of Copp's, while of Fort hill not a vestige remains. The State House at Boston, in the fine engraving presented of its front, erected, as the text states, in 1795, is termed "The New State House." What is new in the building is a large extension in the rear, not visible in the engraving.

More serious misrepresentation occurs in the biographical sketch of Henry Ward Beecher, viz.: "His theology was not in general accord with that of the Congregational denomination. In 1878 he formally renounced belief in the eternity of future punishment." The latter statement is correct; the former is not. Mr. Beecher was not in full accord with the then general belief of Congregationalists: the disavowal here cited is proof of that, but it proves no more. That he was in general accord is incontestably true. Less excusable than this is the injustice done to Mr. Beecher by the omission of material facts, which should balance the statement that a jury failed by a vote of nine to three to

acquit him of the charge of adultery, by a statement of his vindication by a remarkably large and representative church council after a searching investigation. Referring to this, the late President Porter, of Yale, in a public reply in England to insinuations against Mr. Beecher, expressed surprise that well-informed persons should regard Mr. Beecher's innocence as involved in any doubt. Yet the New International leaves it in doubt. The statements here criticised are taken over from the old International, and seem to have escaped that "searching criticism" which all matter from that source is stated to have undergone. Mr. Beecher's brothers, Charles, Edward, and Thomas, are severally termed a Congregational "divine," or "clergyman," but he is described as a "Protestant pulpit orator." The proper term for each is "Congregational minister," under which designation each appeared in the Congre gational Year-Book till his death.

It remains to be said that this really formidable undertaking gives promsie of achievement not only creditable but brilliant. It aims at the production, not merely of a work for reference, but of a condensed library, in whose many departments the best knowledge of the time, digested and arranged, is presented in accessible and convenient form. The educational value of such a work for the home as well as the school is unquestionably great.

Books of the Week

This report of current literature is supplemented by fuller reviews of such books as in the judgment of the editors are of special importance to our readers. Any of these books will be sent by the publishers of The Outlook, postpaid, to any address on receipt of the published price, with postage added when the price is marked “net.”

Aspects of the Jewish Question. By a Quarterly Reviewer. With Maps. E. P. Dutton & Co., New York. 51x6 in. 98 pages. $1, net.

Across Coveted Lands. By A. Henry Savage Landor. Illustrated. In 2 vols. Charles Scribner's Sons, New York. 54×9 in. $7.50. In all externals this book is prepossessing. The two large volumes are well printed and have many good reproduced photographs. The narrative tells of the author's adventures in Persia and Beluchistan, which countries he reached through Russia and Afghanistan. As a personal record of travel the book is entertaining in a moderate degree, but when one tries to find material of real value about the countries which are indeed "coveted " by nations richer and more powerful, the result is disappointing and unsatisfactory. Neither

the people nor the countries are brought out in strong relief.

Bairn Books (The): The Book of the Zoo. The Book of Shops. By Walter Copeland. Illustrated. E. P. Dutton & Co., New York. 3%×5 in. Per set, $1.25.

Black Prince and Other Poems (The). By Maurice Baring. John Lane, New York. 5×74 in. 144 pages.

Reserved for later notice.

Called of God (The). By A. B. Davidson, D.D., LL.D., Litt.D. Edited by J. A. Paterson, D.D. Charles Scribner's Sons, New York. 51⁄2 81⁄2 in. 336 pages. $2, net.

Under this title are included thirteen discourses by the late Professor Davidson, who for forty years held the chair of Hebrew and Old Testament Literature in the Free Church

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