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Show ROAD TO EASE. A black-skinned Algonquin Indian canoes down to the Hudson Bay poBt at Bear Island, Ontario. He brings a story about an Eskimo in the far north who has tamed polar bears and trained them to do his heavy team- fjljfi ,ns- Big game hunters will doubt it, for the polar bear has a body about as large as a piano box and is one of the most ferocious and cunning of iHB all animals The Incident, however, sots you thinking about the tremendous amount of work that man has passed off on domesticated animals. He baa made slaves of horses, cattle, chickens, Eskimo dogs, camels, elephants ele-phants and a host of others Of all these, horses are the most In telllgent. Elephants come second. In India they are trained to work all da on such tasks as moving and piling logs. Any old man can recall when farmers used dogs, running on a' treadmill, to churn butter. Horses J were similarly used to operate threshing machines Man Ik a parasite. Until the Invention of tho steam J engine, his existence depended al-' 1 most entirely on his parasitic use of unlmal and vegetable life The steam engine ushered in a new era of power Previously, there were few instances of man usinn power not generated by animals such as wind molng sailing ships and water power turning the prayer wheel r.f India Gradually we are shifting from our position as a parasite on animal and vegetable life The auto Is removing the horse. So are railroads and fly lug machines. There Is talk of food being produced synthetically in laboratories labor-atories instead of by growing and killing plant life. Where wo once preyed exclusively on trees, a form of plant life, for our dwellings, wo now turn to brick, concrete and met als like iron. In school, you studied about the three kingdoms of nature animal, vegetable and mineral. Man rose to his present state by being a parasite on the animal and! vegetable kingdoms. Slowly but sure ly he is relaxing his grip on these, and fastening hlmselt aa a parasite on the mineral kingdom. A good lllus- J tration la taking oil ont of the ground instead of getting it by killing whalee and hogs. It is a peculiar change, taking place without much attention. But it Is. vastly Important In tho history of I mankind, a definite and separate step I higher In the cycle of man's existence. exist-ence. rn |