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Show THIS METALLIC AGE. Again there comes the prophecy that electricity is about to push every locomotive in the United States from the track and send it to the scrap pile. The last prophet thinks this will practically be accomplished ac-complished in the next five years. The change, when it comes, will be welcome on many accounts, but the great saving will be in fuel, and on that account it looks as though some overruling power is keeping watch and making all needed things possible to mankind. There are over 200,000 miles of steam railway in operation in the United States. This means at least 20,000 locomotives that are consuming 80,000 cords of wood daily or the equivalent in coal and oil. And this is but a small proportion of the fuel used daily. The forests of the old north are well nigh consumed; the south and the west coast are being drawn upon at a rate which points to absolute extinguishment in the next few years. The use of wood for fuel must in great part very s66h: cease, and" its use in building must be greatly reduced. Already in great structures in i I the cities, in bridges, in great manufacturing ;H plants, it is almost entirely discarded. The beams, , H the roofing, the studding, everything but the . H doors, are now made of one or another metal. 3 H The doors will go next, for aluminum costs no H more than clear, hardwood lumber now costs in j I this city. Then for heating, the cars on the street I cars in this city that are warmed by electricity H are better and' more evenly warmed than those I that use coal, while the difference in cleanliness 9 is as great as the difference between a ransomed ; soul and a sin-stained body. It is a beautiful ' ll thought that cars are heated in this city by the icy waters running in a canyon fourteen and forty :fl miles awayv When invention goes a little farther, I I the houses will be warmed in the same way, the J I breakfast cooked and the clothes of the weekly I washing will be ironed. This is the metallic age I sure enough. Even the horse is greatly prescribed. H He is not passing, as many predict, but limitations I are being put upon him which threaten to reduce him to the work in the army and in agriculture. We have been looking for the past two years for I petitions to forbid' his use in the ultra fashionable I fl residence portions of our great cities. At first the blowing up of steam boilers was frequent. This ,3 .1 never happens now except through criminal igno- jifl ranee or carelessness. In the same way automo- . cl biles will become safe and cheap, and then the 1 horse will disappear from the cities. He is already jfl gone from the street cars, and in part from de- ! I livery wagons. The wagons themselves are dis- 1 fl carding wood, some already have no wood except j the tongue; steel axletrees, steel wheels, steel 1 1 bolsters and hounds, steel everything. The study yfl is to discard wood. It is a needed study, too,, for j'fl the forests are swiftly passing and as they dis- H appear the rivers shrink in volume except in ?;H times of freshets, and then, as if to punish men. Bj for destroying the foliage around their sources,- IB they come all in a rush and spread destruction H everywhere along their courses. H And the hearts of men are taking on more and H more of a metallic nature. A story came from I New York a few days since of a man who always kept a fine team. He has wont to go driving by I himself; he wanted no companion save his team. I He and the team were in accord. He talked to I them and they understood him; they were I partners, and when one began to grow old, or his joints lost their suppleness, the owner pro- fl vided that he should be sent to a horse sanitar- ium and be kindly cared for as long as he lived. I That was a sharp business man, but even in his I business the thought of his horses kept his heart humane. Some years ago there was an old logger in the redwoods of Mendicino county, California, I His team was five yoke of Devonshire cattle, all jfl deep red and beautiful. He would pile up a great I load of logs on his trucks and start for camp. I He would stride along some ten feet in front of I his leaders, and with many an anathema would de- clare that if Buck did not pull steadier he would I take off his new shoes and put them on Reddy I or Brigham, or that he would give Red Duke's I supper to Ruby if the ox with the title did not do I better work. And the oxen knew him. Now they. 1 I do their logging with steam wagons, and the. H hearts of the lumbermen even are growing me- II tallic. " ill |