Show how music saves life I 1 it is a olet fact which needs now but the briefest mention that iu in the cases of the unfortunate schiller and the atlantic any pound that could have pierced the fog and warned the i captains 0 of f those ill ehte fated db boats oats thit th it they were nearing a rockbound rock reek bound shore would have avci hundreds hund hundl eds of human lives it a sound as this which theio herc lighthouses are useless amid dense fogs shall override the thunder cf the waves and the howl of the tempest and carry its warning carout far out to sea that governments have havo been seeking for this many a belai year yean we propose briefly to tell how through the progress of the science of music they have found that which was so sorely needed it is hardly necessary to dwell upon the fact that the penetrative power of a sound bear bears a very close relation to its shrillness that is to say to the height of its pitch ev ery alpine traveller knows that tim high falsetto of the jodd jodel or rather squeaky soprano of the we swiss girl may be heard ove over r mighty chasms that the great lungs of the bail bali baritone tone are unable to send a sound across abrass but what every traveler does docs not know is this that soend I 1 is s caused bythe by the vibrations of a body and carried by corresponding vibrations tio ns of the atmosphere and that the sounds shrillness intensity pi ica ich is directly proportioned to the number of aerial vibrations executed in a given time eor for instance tile the lowest sound known to music sd so low indeed that it is questionable whether it be v a musical sound at all is the lowest note on the argest largest modern organs and ana anu ana which is caused by aerial vibrations of sixteen and one half to the second we get in fact no satisfactory musical leal leai bound sound unta we reach the lowest note of the double bass baes which vibrates forty one and a half times per second on the other hand that of height there is absolutely no limit except one of pain to the ear i ear ar the highest note of any known soprano produces about 1500 vibrations per second the piccolo the shrillest shrill est sound considered attainable in pleasure giving music reaches a pitch whose vibration number is to the second in this thiis study of the physics of musie music it speedily became very desirable to measure with absolute accuracy the number of vibrations represented by any given iven sound F for eor or that purpose a wona wonderful erful little instrument was invented called the gli sirene alrene sl rene 11 conceive a thin circular disc of tin revolving perpendicularly on an axis and lind with eight equidistant equi distant holes near its p periphery the disc is made to revolve at any desired speed by means of clockwork clock work which also registers the number of revolutions per second the end of a small tube comes close toone of the holes and of course on an a line with all of them and through this a steady current of air is forced As the wheel turns round the air passes through each hole as it passes the tube creating a throb a vibration As the the rapidity of the wheel increases a musical sound is created which rises continuously in pitch its vibration number being just equal al to the number of holes that pass the tube in a second to determine teri terl nine nino the vibration number of an instrumental note I 1 therefore you have only to increase the rapidity pi city of the sirene until the pitch of the two is equal then note the registered number of revolutions per second and multiply it by 8 the number of holes r fer fen J or an ex ample the sound of the middle 0 of the piano forte makes aerial vibrations to the second such is the 11 sirene sireno and after studying it an american inventor in jumped aped of a sudden to the discovery of if that grand lifesaving life saving invention the fo fog siren 13 he saw that with this machine there was absolutely no limit to the increase of pitch and therefore of intensity save in the fluidity of the particles of air and the requirements of volume itis it is unnecessary to follow tile the steps of his pro progress ress sufficient lent to say that his perfected machine has been tested by the leading scientists of both continents and is rapidly being put u up p in such places place sas us those where the schiller and Atlantic tife went to their ruin its mechanism may be briefly described there are two discs clos close 0 together with twelve holes in each the holes of course corresponding exactly in position one disc is nixed fixed in the end of a conducting trumpet twenty feet long I 1 which is pointed by machinery toward that portion of the sea where the sound is to be sent bent the ime ise leeond second corid disc is kept revolving at the rate of 2800 times a second highly compressed air being forced through the holes at the same time As there are twelve holes the 2800 revolutions raise the total vibrations per second to the enormous number of and this makes a demoniac shriek that is not much like the voice of the tho sirens who sang to ulysses but which can be heard from three to sixteen miles at sea and so music contributes to the saving of ilfe life cincinnati times |