bucket of water in time may extinguish a fire that a whole fire brigade could not quell in another ten minutes.

The apparatus at the Field store consists of a Laidlaw-Dunn-Gordon duplex Underwriter pump connected by singlereduction gearing to a waterproof electric motor. The pump cylinders are 8 inches in diameter, with 12 inches' stroke, having a theoretical capacity of 700 gallons

per minute at 600 revolutions per minute against 140 pounds' water pressure. The motor is shunt-wound for 220 revolutions per minute at 230 volts, and is inclosed, all connections being carried through pipes screwed into the frame, so that the device may be flooded without affecting its action. The fields and armature coils are cooled by fans on the armature shaft.

T

HERE is an old saying that "fools rush in where angels fear to tread." This possibly accounts for these "lay excursions" into the field of science. At any rate, I am satisfied in my own mind that angels would fear to tread on microbes. Yet, here am I, although with many misgivings, venturing on this great subject of germs, little understood by myself or by anyone else.

One of the most astounding developments in the past remarkable decade is the rapid manner in which the microbe has come to the front. A few years ago he was practically unknown; he was not even given honorable mention in encyclopedia or dictionary. To-day every selfrespecting encyclopedia devotes pages to this most interesting organism; and there is not a dictionary in the land, of any age or experience whatever, which is not filled with a choice assortment of microbes from one cover to the other. That this, the smallest of organisms visible to the scrutiny of the microscope, should

become at a bound the most stupendous thing in nature, may well cause wonder.

Nor does the microbe's ambition know any limit. He works over-time, entering into human affairs with a persistence and success that is simply astonishing, not to say alarming. In a few short years he has achieved an international reputation, becoming the world's bugbear, the accepted scapegoat for all the sins of mankind. Ah, poor microbe! An ungrateful public, forgetting thy benefactions, wages relentless war for thy extermination. Weak and frail creatures that we are, were we not made a little lower than the angels? Yet, violating repeatedly half the laws in nature's category, physical and spiritual, we learn no wisdom, but attribute all our misfortunes to those invisible, inconceivable microbes.

Possibly these, the most feared, the most abused, and the least understood of living things, need not our pity, nor yet our defense. It must be confessed that the microbe has always shown an independence of action and an ability to take

care of himself under any and all circumstances which must command respect, even from bitterest foes. But the very stones, the dust of the earth, communion cups, and telephone receiversyea, the ruby lips of blushing maidenhood-cry out for justice. And shall we remain supinely by, refusing to see that justice is done, because, forsooth, public opinion is against us?

The microbe is nothing to me. I have no special interest in his welfare. Yet, when this creature, thing or monstrosity, is accused of going up and down the land burning haystacks and barns on top of all his other alleged outrages against humanity, is it not time to call a halt? According to a high authority, an incendiary microbe devotes himself to spontaneous combustion in the hay-mow, with disastrous results to the owner of the hay. How unfortunate that these interesting parasites are not visible to the naked eye, because there seems no possibility of dodging them. Like the poor, they are always with us, but give us more trouble than the latter.

The microbe was a wonderful discovery. We accuse him of causing our baldness, our fevers, our diseases of all kinds, until we fain would build a dust-proof, air-proof, microbe-proof house, and retire from mortal gaze, safe from the devastations of unscrupulous bacteria. But we forget the great part played by the microbe in nature. He gives us death, but so also does he bring us life. Our very digestion is said to be the result of his industry. He poisons our drinking water; but the toper owes his beer to the microbe; and the epicure, his wine. The commonest wine microbe, according to the late lamented Pasteur, is Saccharomyces ellipsoideus. I mention this fact that it may not be confounded in the pop

ular mind with the Cryptococcus vini, which has nothing to do with alcoholnever touches it, much to its credit.

Perhaps he does he does cause Our baldness and burns our barns, but he clears the surface of the earth of the refuse of life, and makes other life possible. Microbes float in the air we breathe, in the water we drink; not a day passes in which we do not come into contact with them both internally and externally; yet our very bread and butter and the flavor of our meats depend upon them. The effect of microbes in making bread digestible has long been known to housewives. Now it is claimed that bacilli are necessary in the manufacture of first-class butter. Many creameries inoculate their cream with the butter microbe, better known as "Bacillus No. 41," and produce June butter in January. It is said that the patient experimenters tried over one hundred different microbes before they could find one fit to eat.

The question naturally arises-What is this thing which worketh from life to destruction, and from destruction back to life again? What is this modern scapegoat of science of which we are all afraid? What in all creation is the microbe anyway, a thing which we never saw, yet accept with a faith that is truly sublime and, turned in the right direction, might remove mountains? The borderland between plant and animal life is the land of the microbe. Science at first accused him of being an animal. Now it is said that he is not an animal at all, but a plant. It does not matter. The microbe seems to have come to stay, regardless of consequences. Hats off to him! He is no more a mystery than is his would-be critic; for of all the mysteries of nature, man is himself the chief.

FIFTY MILLION DOLLARS are to be expended in giving to Chicago the ideal Chicago's tunnel system of America. Traction Leading Chicago and New Project York capitalists, headed by James Stillman, president of the National City Bank of New York City, are behind the project. Already tunnels have been dug under all the principal downtown streets of Chicago, presumably by the Illinois Tunnel Company, for the purpose of inaugurating an underground freight railway system. It is now believed that this same assemblage of wealthy capitalists, representing a financial power of eleven billion dollars, have been at the back of the scheme since its inception. Through the National City Bank's twenty-four directors, this institution is represented in the directories of 357 other important concerns, including railroads. and insurance companies, as well as banks and trusts. All four of the known promoters of the Chicago Subway company are directors of the National City Bank. Mr. Stillman has E. H. Harriman, Jacob H. Schiff, and P. A. Valentine as colleagues in that directory. This makes the Chicago Subway company a peculiarly National City Bank enterprise.

A two-story tunnel system will be the result when the ultimate plans are carried out. The scheme contemplates traffic arrangements that will succeed in solving Chicago's traction problems for all future time. Improvements and additions are to be made commensurate with the city's growth. For the present, efforts are to be concentrated on carrying out the plan already begun, of removing all heavy freight traffic to the underground thoroughfares. The loads now hauled to and from the depots in heavy, plodding, menacing freight-trucks, will be hauled in the subway by means of underground electric freight trains. This is another blow at the horse, whose sphere of usefulness in the Western metropolis will thereby be greatly diminished. At pres

The present arrangements plan for having all this kind of haulage done underground, and for reserving the light and air of the street surface for the people. Chicago will be the only city in the world to have this kind of arrangement, other great cities having deemed it advisable to haul the people underground, and to reserve the streets for hauling coal, provisions, and all kinds of heavy freight.

In a short time, however, with Chicago's rapid growth, the streets are destined to become over-congested from passenger and pedestrian traffic alone, even with the freight wagons removed. Then it will be that the second story to the subway-which probably will already have been built-will be brought into service. Then underground passenger cars will be run in addition to the surface cars, as in New York, Boston, London, Paris, and Berlin; but in addition to the passenger subway, Chicago will have the freight subway to alleviate the traction difficulties.

In this project, Chicago will undoubtedly have the ideal traction system of the world. For, in addition to the freight tunnels, passenger tunnels, and surface cars-three stories of traffic one above the other-there are the elevated trains, adding still another story, and the numerous suburban trains, which hurry passengers to and from nearly all sections of the city on schedules of from two to twenty minutes apart. The freight tunnel now being built is also to

be used for stringing telephone wires and laying tubes for the new pneumatic tube service that will take many delivery wagons from the streets.

THERE are several methods by which whole forests can be dug up if desired, and taken from their Transplanting original site to adorn

Trees parks and private grounds. In the vicinity of New York City can be seen grounds ornamented in this way, being not only covered with flower beds and flowering shrubs, but shaded with full-grown trees, where not long ago nothing in the way of vegetation existed except grass and weeds.

The apparatus used for taking up and transplanting trees is aptly termed the "tree mover." In operating with one form

TRANSPLANTING TREES.-CUTTING AROUND ROOTS.

of this apparatus, the tree is dug by starting a circular trench having a diameter of thirty or forty feet. An under-cut is made beneath the roots, and the soil picked out and caved down with a spading fork or picking rod, the points of which are rounded to avoid cutting off the roots. The loose dirt is shoveled out of the bottom of the trench, and the roots are uncovered, tied in bundles with lath yarn, and bent up out of the way of the diggers. If the roots are to be out of the ground even for one day in dry weather, the bundles are wrapped in clay mud,

damp moss, and straw or burlap. When the digging has progressed to within from four to eight feet from the center, the tree is slightly tipped over to loosen the central ball, which cleaves from the subsoil near the extremities of the downward roots. In the center is left a ball of earth five to twelve feet in diameter.

By

In loading for removal, the cradle of the mover, which is pivoted above or back of the axle, is swung over to the tree, the trunk first being wrapped with cushions and slats so that it can be clamped to the cradle by chains and screws without injuring the bark. means of a screw nine feet long, operated by a ratchet lever or hand-brake wheel, the cradle lifts the tree from the hole and swings it over in a horizontal position. Pulling in the same direction by tackle fastened in the top of the tree, aids the work of the screw. After the tree is loaded, the roots on the other side of the axle are tied up to the perches, and it is then ready to be taken away.

Another plan, devised by a Western inventor named Wilkens, is even more ingenious. The apparatus consists, first, of a steel platform from 41⁄2 to 6 feet in diameter, fitted around the tree and securely bolted. This is equipped with a properly arranged steel guide, through which the steel concave shovels are driven down around the platform by use of a maul. The shovels are sharp and have corrugated edges so that when driven down they cut off all roots that project beyond the circle desired to be taken up. When the shovels are all in place, they are secured to the platform by means of a steel ring and locks. The roots of the tree, together with the earth in which they grew, are thus confined in a sort of steel basket.

The transporter, which also plays an important part, is ingeniously constructed of steel and is circular in form, having an opening in the rear. After the machine is placed about the tree, the opening is securely closed; and, by means of properly arranged pulleys and ropes, two men can lift the basket with the tree and earth to the required height. Then, by the same power, the tree is laid back upon the cushion of the transporter, and is now ready for removal. No strain of

CARRYING TREE TO NEW LOCATION.

any kind is put upon the tree. The bark and fiber are not injured.

When the tree has been transported to the desired point, it is placed over the hole where it is to be planted, in such a manner as to plant it in exactly the position in which it grew as to the points of the compass. The tree is then placed in an upright position by means of the hoist, and the basket is lowered into the ground. While still held in proper position, rich soil is placed about the basket and properly tamped. The shovels are then removed, one at a time.

JUDGED by every standard that measures not only future possibilities, but Oklahoma's present attainments, OklaClaims to homa has to-day all the inStatehood dispensable requisites of Statehood. Though the development of the Territory since its organization in 1889. has been one of phenomenal, almost unexampled, rapidity, it bears every evidence of intelligent direction and permanent stability.

In 1890, when the first census was taken, the population was a bare,60,000. This has now increased to about 650,000. Thus, since the census of 1900, when the inhabitants numbered 398,331, the numbers of the population have nearly doubled; and even in that year Oklahoma had more inhabitants in proportion to area than twelve other Commonwealths included in the galaxy of established States. During the past five years the increase in any two-year period has been

not less than 35,000; and in one instance (1900-02) the increase was over 143,000. This rate of growth is unequaled in the history of any other Commonwealth covering a similar period of time.

The immigration into Oklahoma has been chiefly from the States lying to the east and north; and it has been of a class of people marked by indomitable energy and enterprise, who have been attracted by the records of success in establishing homes and acquiring competences that are in this land of rich resources the sure reward of honest effort.

The great bulk of the population are American-born, the foreign element up to the present time numbering not over five per cent. The percentage of illiteracy is still less, the educational system being of the most progressive and efficient stamp. The Indian population is only about 12,000, including children, and is gradually decreasing. The colored population is most population is most numerous in the southern and eastern portion, having immigrated from neighboring States, but is hardly in evidence in some counties, such as Kiowa, Woods, and Greer.

The social atmosphere is characteristically western in its spirit of open hospitality and good-fellowship, and is particularly noticeable to the stranger. It induces a cordiality of feeling and community of interests that foster business enterprise and the upbuilding of social and political institutions. The character of the citizenship is of the best, and crime and lawlessness are much less in this Territory than in many older members of the Union.

With its inexhaustible natural resources, its 650,000 of intelligent American citizens, its attained wealth of $400,000,000, its efficient colleges crowned by seven institutions of higher learning, its progressive spirit and persistent energy which within a wonderfully short period of time have transformed its sturdy childhood into the full stature of responsible manhood, and which contain the germs of still more brilliant promise, Oklahoma is even now de jure a full-grown member of the sisterhood of States, and is amply entitled to a de facto recognition of that status.-ALFRED S. JOHNSON in The Land of Now.