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LEFT ASPIDIUM 304 ASQUITH shooting large caliber shells at the same instant, the firing being produced by an electrical current that set the guns off simultaneously, thus producing a power- ful concentration on their target. The adoption of gas made necessary the addition of new units to the army organization. A Chemical Warfare Service was made an important branch of the American and other armies. Its functions consisted in the "operation and maintaining or supervising the operation and maintaining of all plants engaged in the investigation, manufacture or pro- duction of toxic gases and proving grounds used in connection therewith, gas defense appliances, the filling of gas shells, and the necesary research con- nected with gas warfare." The organi- zation provided for various units, each with its special work. The most im- portant of these were the Gas Defense Production, which supervised the making of gas masks; the Gas Offense Produc- tion, which concerned itself with the making of gas for the purpose of attack; and the Training Section, which taught to officers and men the approved methods of gas warfare. On the battle fronts the utmost care was taken by means of signs and sounds to protect the troops. Sirens, horns, and bells were sounded to warn of an im- pending attack. Signs were posted bear- ing the legend "Gas Alert On" and "Gas Alert Off," the former meaning that the ground was dangerous and that masks must be carried in front for instant use, while the latter permitted less caution. Special training was given in rapidity of adjustment, and the regulations required that the mask be put on in six seconds or less. The mask itself became more effective, especially in the case of the American mask by the use of "soda lime" produced by a secret process. Constant drill and warning proved so effectual that the casualties were greatly diminished, and toward the end of the war it be- came almost a maxim that a soldier who was "gassed" owed his misfortune to his own carelessness. See World War. ASPIDIUM, a genus of ferns belong- ' ing to the order polypodiacese. There are 10 British species. Some have^ orbicular •eniform involucres fixed by their sinuses, while others have orbicular and peltate involucres. To the former, sometimes called lastrea, belong the A. filix ifnas, or blunt; the A. spiculoswm, or prickly toothed; the A. oreopteris, or heath; and the A. thelypteris, or marsh shield fern, with other species more rare; and to the latter, the A. lonchitis, or rough al- pine; the A. lobatum, or close-leaved prickly; the A. aculeatum, or soft prickly; the A. angulare, or angular-leaved shield fern. ASPINWALL. See Colon. ASPIRATOR, an instrument used In chemistry to draw gases through bottles or other receptacles. It is a tight vessel containing water; a tube with a stop cock extends from the upper end and another tube also with a stop cock from the lower end. The first tube is fastened to the receptacle from which gas is to be drawn; both stop cocks are opened, and the water flowing from the lower tube acts as a suction and draws the gas. ASPLENIUM, a genus of ferns, of the natural order polypodiacese. Several are natives of the United States. The dwarf spleenwort is a very beautiful little fern. ASPROMONTE, a mountain of Italy, in the S. W. of Calabria, where Garibaldi was wounded and taken prisoner with the greater part of his army, in August, 1862. ASQUITH, HERBERT HENRY, an English statesman and lawyer, bom in Morley, Yorkshire, on Sept. 12, 1852, He was educated at Oxford and shortly I HERBERT HENRY ASQUITH after his graduation was admitted to the bar. In 1887 he appeared in the defense of John Burns, labor leader, during the latter's trial for his participation in the so-called riot in Trafalgar Square, in London. Two years later he was one of the counsel of the Irish Nationalists be- fore the Parnell Commission. He was