quake is a Japanese invention whose adoption may be fairly said to mark the real beginning of seismology as a scientific study. The whole series of studies looking toward earthquake-proof buildings has been carried on in that country. There, for example, was evolved the "shaking table," a platform which can be made to repeat the characteristic movements of the earth surface during an earthquake shock and on which the Japanese have carried out their experiments to find the kinds of buildings best adapted to go through an earthquake and remain standing at the end of it. On their "shaking tables" Japanese engineers have erected various structures and then shaken them to pieces, taking seismographic records of the movements of this miniature earth and noting the behavior of their miniature buildings under all the different conditions. From these experiments, combined with the data obtained from the ruins of real earthquakes, they have established the limit of stable height for masonry walls and have discovered also that a wall whose outer surface is built in parabolic curves will resist earthquake disturbance. They have devised systems of safe construction for frame dwellings and have gone far in applying these principles, whose excellence is now recognized by students of earthquake engineering the world over, to their own. railways, bridges, and aqueducts. Whatever else may happen it is the belief of our own seismologists that the future study of earthquake phenomena must inevitably follow the lines laid down by these Japanese scientists and engineers; and that their precautionary measures should be now adapted to our own building operations in such parts of our own. country as are most liable to earthquakes.

In this country, however, we are so far not even provided with a sufficient number of seismographs in operation to make the study of their records much more than preliminary practice for real seismology and volcanology. The continual movements, vertical and horizontal, of the earth's surface; the relation between these movements and the changes in temperature, barometric pressure, electric and astronomical conditions and observed volcanic and seismic outbursts in

other parts of the world are not yet being systematically studied. The work of individuals-Professor Jaggar, for example, at the Institute of Technology, Professor Hobbs at the University of Michigan, Professor Woodworth at Harvard, Professor Tarr at Cornell, Professor Lawson at the University of California, and Dr. Gilbert of the United States Geological Survey-is the splendid pioneer work such as has usually preceded the establishment of any new department. of science. Broadly speaking, the same condition obtains in Europe.

Yet we have one especially large and striking example of the need of such investigation. In the Canal Zone hundreds of millions of dollars are being expended to unite two oceans by a great cut in the earth's surface comparable to the lines on Mars from which Professor Percival Lowell deduces human activity on that planet.

From the point of view of physical geology it is considered extremely probable that the crust of the earth is at this point subject to stresses of unknown intensity which an adequate development of the study of earth conditions should enable us to determine and measure. Here is knowledge that should be at the service of the engineers who are directing the work of the canal, yet we are unfortunately so ignorant of these forces, except in the knowledge that they exist and in the conviction that they will sooner or later be adequately studied. that the engineering work of the canal must necessarily go forward without this important assistance.

So in the recent flood at Paris, although the flood could not have been prevented, the expense of preparing for it and of minimizing its results would have been almost negligable in comparison with the vast sums that are now being expended in restoring normal conditions.

Meantime there is a practical certainty that within a few years a well equipped and financed observatory will be established under the direction of Professor Jaggar near the active crater of Kilaeua in Hawaii. The observatory will be financed by combined Boston and Hawaiian capital working in co-operation with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

According to Deputy Steinel, there are about 5,000 grocers and butchers in Milwaukee. If these establishments average a business of even twenty-five to fifty dollars a day, the aggregate daily purchases of the people must run up into

the hundreds of thousands of dollars. It thus appears probable that the people in the past have been robbed annually of many thousands of dollars in buying the bare necessities of life. Dishonesty certainly does not make for low prices.

T

HE manufacture of sheet steel piling is fast becoming an important industry in the United States. And in this statement the friends of forest conservation may find a huge grain of comfort, for the modern metal pile has almost superseded the wooden sheeting in all forms of permanent and temporary building and engineering work.

But perhaps the man on the street has but a vague idea of what this steel piling is. To clarify his mind in this respect it need only be explained that it consists simply of sections of sheet steel each one having an interlocking device so that it may be driven into the earth by a steam hammer or with a maul, wielded by hand, the piling thus forming a steel wall. The primary uses of piling are to hold up earth from caving in, and to prevent water from entering excavations. For the construction of coffer-dams the new piles are invaluable as the subaqueous contractor must have a set of tools that can be easily carried from place. to place and used over and over again: conditions perfectly met by the metal pile as it can be pulled and driven repeatedly. In fact it is on record that steel

piles have been re-drawn and used as many as eighty times.

The new sheeting is cheaper than wood, first, because it can be rolled in the mill and therefore placed on the open market in standard shapes and sizes, procurable at reasonable prices; and, second, for its greater strength and capability of repeated use. To be satisfactory, it must show sufficient strength to withstand lateral pressure of earth and water, possess a large radius of gyration, be easy to withdraw, and be reasonably water-tight. One of its

CLEVELAND.

greatest advantages is that it is proof against corrosion in water, a very important consideration in this class of work. It may be cut by hand with a hack-saw or by means of the oxy-acetylene blow-pipe which melts the metal along any desired line.

The principal uses of piling are: for the construction of buildings, especially large ones; for sub-aqueous work such as locks, dams, piers, reservoirs and coffer-dams; for sea-walls and loading slips, retaining walls, building caissons, core and curtain walls, in dams, circular construction, mine shafts, trench, sewer and similar work.

The first use of the modern steel pile for coffer-dam construction in this country was in 1901, when the piers of the Randolph Street bridge at Chicago were built. August Simon of Germany produced the first form of steel pile in 1891 as a result of the futility of attempting to use wooden sheeting and masonry tubes in the 122 foot shaft of the New Hope Coal Mine, in Magdeburg, Germany, where the great need was to seal against water. Although Simon was the

driving of the first steel pile in the United States.

It is said the first successful use of steel piles in large building operations was at the A. A. Pope building, Cleveland, Ohio, in 1908, where piles thirtyfive feet long were driven, wooden piling not proving available and a pneumatic caisson being too costly. Other notable examples of the use of piling along this line were in putting up the permanent walls of the New Brevoort Hotel, Chicago; the Tribune building and the new Hoffman House, New York, and the old Custom House in Wall Street, New York, when it was turned into quarters for the National City Bank. The Marshall Field warehouse at Chicago had building caissons of steel piling, the foundations of the huge structure passing through river silt and quicksand.

One of the largest and most important sub-aqueous works in the United States was the building of the giant ship-lock of concrete, 817 by 70 feet at Black Rock Harbor, Buffalo, New York, where the government used 7,000 tons of piling. Much steel is likewise used by the gov

ernment in reclamation projects, among which may be mentioned the gigantic work now being carried out in the

original inventor of the steel pile it remained for American engineers to bring it to its present perfected state. It may be stated also, that the people of Chicago, ever in the forefront in the field of engineering science, witnessed in 1899 the