Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 88.djvu/930

 902

��Popular Science Monthly

���In the National Museum at Washington is a model of the Island of Trinidad, showing the topographical details on a scale of one inch to sixty feet

��A Model of Trinidad's Famous Asphalt Lake

THERE are several places in which natural asphalt in one form or another exists with but few impurities, the best known and largest being located on the Island of Trinidad, a British pos- session lying off the northeast coast of Venezuela. The island includes about one thousand seven hundred and fifty square miles of rather barren land. Near its center is a lake of natural asphalt about one hundred and thirty acres in extent, which furnishes over two hundred thou- sand tons of material each year. Nearly one half of this total is sent to the United States.

Nature seems to have endowed this remarkable lake with miraculous powers. The supply never decreases appreciably, in spite of the great number of tons of asphalt removed annually. From some eternal pitch-spring located far beneath the surface there continues to flow a steady stream of this fine road-building substance. Naturally it is not like water in consistency; it flows very slowly like cold molasses or tar. It is not unlike the asphalt seen in the carts in your own home town, but it is not boiling or even hot, except for the heat of the tropical sun which renders the work on the sur- face very uncomfortable. Since the lake is fairly solid, the men and teams go out on its surface to dig and haul the asphalt to the refining plant on shore. Although not molten, this lake has a perceptible motion, which pre- vents the construction of buildings for refining or a railway for transmission on its surface.

��In the highest part of the model and near the center the black asphalt lake glistens. On the shore near at hand stands the re- fining plant, and the little tram-way which conveys the material ready for shipping down to the pier at the water's edge. Scattered about the island are many fine residences and rows of houses where dwell the working men and their families, as well as a club house built to accommodate the visitors, since the island has been converted into a very good winter health resort.

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��An Improvised Flour Bin N the absence

��of a kitchen cabinet a con- venient flour sifter can be made by using an ordinary bag and placing a sifter in the opening, after securely fasten- ing it with heavy string. The bag is inverted and hung from a nail, conveniently placed above the work t a b 1 e by running a heavy string through the bottom. At first the flour will sift out

as it shifts into position, but it Will soon settle in the bowl of the sifter.

���A flour sack is also a flour bin

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