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Show H Human Hands SIR Frederick Trevis, in the Nineteenth Century, Cen-tury, has a very interesting article on the H thdme of "Are We Losing the Use of Our M Hands?" He declares that the man of today is inferior in certain points to the savage who made B the flint implements. He thinks that machinery B ' is encroaching more and more upon the natural H reserve force in man, and that man is relying so M much upon artificial help that he is not bringing H out everything that is in himself. H And we suspect that is true; in fact, we know H it is. He points to the perfection of the sewing H machine and shows how in making gloves that M has encroached so much that there is no one who H can make gloves as perfectly as they were made H before that was invented. H There is one point, however, that he leaves out. m How about the man's hands who invented the m sewing machine and made the patterns for the B first electric motor and who created all the splen- H did machinery? We suspect that his answer Hr would be: "There are individuals who have ab- m solutely perfect use of their hands, but they are B growing less and less, because machinery is B usurping so many of the functions that formerly 1 were relied upon simply by the work of the hand." M And that is true, and we do not see how it m can be changed. There is an advantage about it, B however. Colonel Roosevelt last month spent a H week or two in Egypt and if he saw any of the fl hands that did the work there in the long ago B they were merely mummy hands. But'if he could H have run across a steam engine or an electric B motor or a genuine hoist, such as might have H lifted the blocks into place in the pyramids, those B tilings would have interested him more than mum- m mies, because the hands of men only work a little H while at best and then lose their hold. |