cut into uniform "tables" of three and one-half feet long by one and one-half feet wide. This cutting is performed by skilled workers, known as rajadores.

As soon as the flattening and splitting has been done, the crude cork is conveyed to various points in the forest convenient for removal afterwards and stacked in large piles, where it is left lying for ten or twelve days, sometimes less, so that some of the moisture may evaporate in the heat of the sun. This, of course, reduces the weight considerably and renders transport to stores or factories less difficult.

Owing to the nature of the surroundings, transport is mostly accomplished by

contrast to the enormous burden with which they are laden. However, that burden is not so heavy as it looks and the donkey corps makes great headwayand footway too in the more difficult parts of the route-to their destination, covering an astonishing distance upon each journey.

Next come the various processes by which the crude cork is made ready for its various uses-and they are legion. In cork-growing countries the material does. duty in many responsible positions: as pavements, sometimes as buttresses for churches, and even as coffins for the dead!

For the moment, however, we are in

terested in the future of the "tables" of cork as stoppers for bottles and other vessels. From the forest, they have been transported to the store yards of a mighty cork factory in the town of Algeciras, where hundreds upon hundreds of stacks of crude cork are always to be seen waiting their turn for manipulation and transformation into the common cork of commerce so largely in demand.

An important process necessary for that purpose is the effectual closing of its pores, otherwise it would be of little use.

The most common method of filling up cavities in crude cork is by placing the "table" before a hot fire to char or singe it, the heating being conducted with great care, the sides changed constantly. Objection to this process was taken because it causes a secretion of oil, which is apt to make its presence felt at inconvenient moments. The much better plan now generally adopted is to boil the "tables," scrape the surface and then dry in the sun. The pores are more effectually closed by sun than by fire-heat, and the sun-dried material does not show any of the darkness visible in that dried by artificial heat. Having been extracted from the huge tanks of boiling water, the bales of corkwood are unroped and dried, and the scraping process ensues in due time. Skilful workers are employed at this process, as a good deal depends on the proper scraping of the material. A small, hoe-shaped instrument is used, and in the hands of a clever workman the cork assumes a clean, smooth appearance to which it has previously been a stranger. The next process is the "trimming." This means the cleaning of the ends and

sides of the "tables" of cork, which gives them a clean, bright appearance. In this way they are ready for pressing and tying by iron bands, in which condition they are exported to factories in other countries for further manipulation.

But when not intended for export the "tables" are subjected to further processes until they become "corks."

"Slicing" is the cutting of the corkwood into various sizes according to the purpose for which they are intended, or the size of the bottle or other vessel to which they will act as stoppers.

The "squares" are then washed by the primitive means of a tub filled with water and a boy with a stick, the latter being used to stir up the pieces of cork to make the cleansing effective. They are then ready for cutting into corks. It will come as news to most readers that even in this age of machinery corks are mostly cut by hand. Invention after invention for the mechanical shaping of corks has come and gone. The fact is, cork blunts the sharpest instrument almost directly, and a blunt knife won't cut cork. It is found, however, that a man with a specially prepared sharpening board before him can keep his knife constantly in good condition, and though many machines have failed at this point, latterly some cork-cutting machinery has come into use and has proved fairly successful for the purpose.

In many factories, however, the cut cork is still the work of a knife manipulated by a man. He works with marvelous rapidity, and it does take long for a large heap to lie beside him. Then comes sorting and a final cleansing, and the cork is ready for packing and a customer.

hitherto studied, but with indifferent results. He has succeeded in photographing the back of the eye and in obtaining good photographic reproductions.

His invention is a large improvement upon the Helmholtz eye speculum, which has permitted only of examining the back of the eye, while now an image of it can be fixed. Owing to this invention the delicate art of the oculist is destined to enter a new phase which will doubtless be the starting point of interesting discoveries in the domain of ocular science.

The failure of all attempts made up to the present to photograph the interior,

PHOTOGRAPH OF WHAT IS COMMONLY CALLED THE "YELLOW SPOT," THE MOST SENSITIVE PLACE IN THE EYE.

Before

accompanying photographs. coming to this fine improved apparatus, Dr. Thorner in the first place constructed a trial apparatus by means of which he succeeded in photographing the eyes of certain animals, and principally those of cats. As the back of the eye is darker in the man than in the cat, it was necessary to modify the apparatus before it was possible to photograph the back of the eye of the man. Then, starting from good principles, Dr. Thorner, after patient researches, finally obtained complete success.

The following gives a good idea of his

manner of operating with the newly perfected machine:

The wide-open eye illuminated by the soft light of a kerosene lamp, is placed at the entrance of the apparatus. A lens reproduces an exact image of the interior of the eye on a plate of ground glass. After an accurate focusing has been secured, the shutter is closed and set and the ground glass is replaced by a sensitized plate. A simple pressure operates the shutter, and, at the same moment, an electric spark ignites a quantity of flash-light powder. The illumi

nation lasts for a sufficient length of time to allow the back of the eye to be reproduced upon the photographic plate. The images thus formed are slightly imperfect, and it is necessary in developing them to exercise particular care in order that good negatives may be obtained, which shall permit of making positives such as are represented in the photographs herewith.

Among these images may be seen a healthy eye and diseased ones. Here we observe the ramifications of the delicate vessels of the retina, the heavy lines representing the veins and the less conspicuous ones the arteries. It is through the observation of such details that healthy eyes are distinguished from diseased ones. Very short-sighted eyes, for example, are characterized by a peculiar aureola around the center which emits a very light radiation after the manner of a sun. It is therefore now possible gradually to follow the progress of an eye disease through its successive periods, and likewise to photograph each of the parts of the interior of the eye separately.

HE automatic cutting and cleaning of fish at the rate of two hundred to three hundred per minute is a newly successful application of machinery. Heretofore all down the ages this work has been a hand operation and, although fishermen often remarked about the revolution that would come to the industry with automatic cutting and dressing, they little dreamed of its accomplishment.

The feeding table of the new machine is equipped with pockets upon an endless belt. These pockets are arranged in rows side by side and each one is made to hold a fish. From a large box or bin at the rear of the machine the fish are taken and laid in the respective pockets by two

feeders, boys or girls, the row of pockets moving forward as rapidly as filled and another row coming up promptly to take its place and likewise be filled.

In these pockets the fish are carried forward and deposited in a chute where they are clamped and held firmly, all lined up in a perfect row with their noses against a shutter. After they have been clamped, the shutter opens and allows the fish to pass on to the knife which is to cut them, still held in the grasp of the clamps which are attached to a revolving drum. The knife is thirty inches long and travels in two paths or motions governed by sliding cams. The knife moves endwise as it is pressed through the fish's body. the fish's body. It first passes downward through the fish entering just back of the gills, and then gradually makes a curve and passes back through the tail of the