Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 89.djvu/198

 184

��Popular Scifncr Monthly

���The skirt is guided by the two hands and the machine operated by treadle, to obviate all danger

War is more terrible, more devastat

��Soldier of Today Better Off Amid New Horrors

THOSE who argue that the horrors of applied science exceed its blessings are ignorant of the soldier's life. The soldier in to-day's war is infinitely better off amid all his new horrors than was the soldier of yesterday. The man in the trench is "the darling of time." Death stares him in the face, but a thousand hands are stretched forth by science to snatch him from those jaws.

In the words of Sir William Osier: "What shall be our final judgment — for or against science?

��At Last! a Machine Which Irons Skirts Without a Murmur AMONG the latest of labor saving l\. devices is a skirt ironing-machine invented by a Troy, New York, man. The skirt to be ironed is placed over a big conical roller. The ironing member is a hollow structure that fits over the conical roller and is supplied with steam to do the ironing. The conical roller over which the skirt is placed is opera- tively connected with a treadle, which- when depressed raises the roller so that the ironer presses the garment.

��An Air-Tight Compartment for Canoe Campers

FOR the convenience and safety of ca- noeists an improved form of air and water-tight compartment or locker has been invented. It not only affords a storage place for food and sufficient equipment for a small camping trip, but also jirovides a buoyant means for the canoe sliouUl it upset.

The metallic locker fits snugly into the forward end of the canoe. All seams are inade water and air- tight, and a circular opening, fit- ted with a water-tight cap, is provided through which food, clolhing, anununition or other supplies may be placed without fear of them getting wet. The locker is bolted to the canoe frame, and a padlock and chain prevents the cap from being re- moved.

��ing, more brutal, and the organization of the forces of Nature has enabled man to wage it on a titanic scale. More men will be engaged and more will be killed and wounded in a couple of years than in all the wars of the previous century.

"To humanity in the gross she seems a monster; but on the other side is a great credit balance — the enormous number spared the misery of sickness, the un- speakable tortures saved by anesthesia, the more prompt care of the wounded, the better surgical technique, the les- sened time in convalescence, the whole organization of nursing:

"The wounded soldier would throw his sword into the scale for science — and he is right."

���The ;ni iij;lit loc k( r is a storage place for a camping equipiiienl anil also prevents the canoe from sinlcing

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