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About The Sunday Oregonian. (Portland, Ore.) 1881-current | View Entire Issue (June 21, 1908)
THE SUNDAY OREGONIAN, PORTLAJfD. JUNE 21, 1908. "l, f Jt ' MET.flODsTtlAT'AE. StrIcTLY SciENTiric And Othebs StbIctly Fbaodulest i; Gabbon Prom Burning. Sugar The rv a DASIS OFT IAN 5- ,1-"ii v - St " It BY JOHN ELFRETH ,WATKIXS. p UK man who learns to manu- - S fncture diamonds fit for the - trade will take advantage of the De Beers proposition and hold them in re serve, letting them out gradually," said Mr. Wirt Tassln, gem expert ot the United States National Museum, in an swer to my question yEterday as to whether a full realization of the alleged scheme ' of Henry Lemoine-now in the Paris limelight would reduce the cost of diamonds to a (ew dollars a carat, as has been predicted. "Do you believe that Lemoine's propo sition to artificially manufacture a cylin drical diamonds, six centimeters long by three centimeters In diameter and above the average density, can ever be realized by the most skillful scientists?" I further asked Mr. Tassln. "I am not disputing! a single assertion In this particular line of research," said he. "Diamonds are now being manu factured artificially, their chemical and physical properties being the same as those of mined stones. As to the size which such artificial diamonds can at tain, I will only say that today all things are possible." "How are diamonds now manufac tured?" Two Ways of Making Diamonds. "There are several methods. Moisson of Paris dissolves carbon In molten steel at an enormous temperature and pres sure, and then suddenly chills the mass, which reveals microscopic diamonds, also diamond dust in more or less abundance. "Artificial diamonds are not infre quently formed by accident in ordinary cast iron, and it is more than likely that an examination of the residue of ordinary Iron castings would result in the discov ery of many of these gems. "I lately discovered some artificial dia monds in a peculiar manner. I was machining' the fragment of an old sugar kettle, which developed exceptional hard ness, and when I dissolved a fraprment It yielded two minute diamonds. Bos.se! of Uermany has treated ordinary steel for diamonds and has secured several transparent crystal fragments, together with quite a number of minute, well formed, elsht-faced crystals the charac teristic form of the diamond crystal. These have been indisputably proved to be diamonds. He has carried on a num ber of investigations along tnis line, and has found that hard steels produced un der high temperatures "and cooled under great pressures usually yield diamonds; also that unhammered and unrolled mild ? 1 B i yS-w- ill tMm f r A- j'Vk r . h I 1 . 11 rr 411 m$$m L T "h r --ri i ft ill j,v,-f4 t:S 1 '11 '4 . : rV 1 ?r--r'dS 15 -Wtr tAj . - ii jbtfryx m y &WrS55? - jiii tva - - v 11 N liL-',-.- - -A r---""- -y ii MERITS OF CABBAGES ANDONIONS MY cabbage patch is the pride of my garden. A cabbage head Is such a comfortable thing, just the right color, not the raw, vivid hue of the lettuce, nor the fussy mottle of the po tato, but a clear, soft, green, lightly veilod with sliver network or blanched to ivory whiteness In the center. And the Bhape, so perfectly rounded, resting upon a rosette of curled leaves, upborne by strong, firm stem. We call the cab bage .."a common plant," but It belongs to a noble family; it is a cousin of the aristocratic palm . and one of the great cruclferae, or cross-bearing family, that has no poisonous or hurtful members. It Is found wild on the rocks by the sea shore, in the Island of Laland, in Den mark, the Island of Heligoland, the south of England and Ireland and in the Chan nel Isles and on the shores of the Med iterranean. It was a food-plant and carefully cultivated before the dawn of history, aid we- read that the intellec tual Greeks ate it to make them strong In mind as well as body. This is a day for pleasant thoughts and vagrant fancies, and as I look at my cabbage patch I am once more In, the little French village on the gray Breton coast. It is a land of gardens, of fruits and vegetables, enough to feed all the great cities, and every man you meet is a gardener. And as we walk along the white road we see tall palm trees and little children playing in their shade. And far on the bright sea glitters be tween the tapering stems and the sun light changes the foam into countless little rainbows, rising and falling all the while. It Is a scene from fairyland, a memory of the Arabian Nights, with their beautiful but Impossible pictures. For these graceful palm trees ara but - MADE Di IAMONDS . ' , . ' t- It ! - 1 II, &r,- steels yield . well-formed. eight-faced crystals of this class. The higher the temperature at which the steel is made the greater is the quantity of the dia monds formed. "Another German method yielding even better results is to melt olivin, or chrysolite, and to stir it with a graphite rod, after which it is allowed to cool. The mass is then dissolved and the residue is found to contain dia monds. In all of these cases the dia monds thus far manufactured are very minute. As yet there is no published account from reliable sources of the manufacture of such a gem which by any stretch of the imagination would be regarded as a commercial proposi tion. Here is a phial containing 1000 of such artificial diamonds as have been obtained to date. They look like fine' powder and scarcely cover the bottom of the phial. cabbages, and their waving tufts merely the exaggerated cabbage heads of our everyday gardens. In this, paradise of vegetables, the cabbage, for once, be comes a thing of beauty. Tall and slen der, with their loose gray-green leaves springing in tufts a-top of six-foot stems, the sea breeze tossing them, the sunlight dancing in checkers along the alleys, the songs and calls of the sunburnt chil dren flitting in and out what a pictur esque scene for a cabbage patch? , Land of Kitchen Gardens. Everywhere we find unexpected beau ties in this land of kitchen gardens. We forget flowers, for the time, when we see the scarlet carrots and .the red beets, the smooth golden rind and warmer flesh of the pumpkins; the cauliflowers, creamy and globular. In their encircling fringe of tender green,-the purple tur nips, the mottled radish. We linger In the field or before the market corners, full of wonder at the loveliness of these useful foods and at their perfection of form and color. But the cabbages are too fine and beautiful for market or shop. They are a part of the great outdoor picture as they toss their plumed heads In the green groves of the hillsides, with the sun of the south full on their loose, frilled leaves, and the sea glittering be tween and beyond their long, pale stems. If the cabbage patch is the pride of my garden, the long, straight rows of onions are Its ornament. Some one has said that the onion Is one of those strenuous vegetables about which one cannot be indifferent. One either loves It with a passionate devotion or else utter ly repudiates it, and everybody who has any trafficking with it. So long as victuals and drink continue to be the chief of our diet, the onlpn will keep on being glori 4?2Z MDj?r2rZ. '.'The public has r.ct fully awakened to the fact that iran has already learned to manufacture the world's most costly gem of all the ruby. The best Oriental rubies were worth twice to six times the price of big diamonds of equal weight before the artificial ruby was discoiered. The manufacture of artificial rubies has gone beyond the experimental stage, and many hun dreds of carats of these stone's are now on the market under the name of "manufactured," 'scientific,' 'artificial' and "reconstructed" rubles. "In France- they are manufactured in this way: Powder rich in alumina (oxid .of aluminum) is. dropped upon platinum wire suspended in the center of an oxyacctaline or oxhydrogen flame. The tine powder fuses and the fused globule is gradually built up, by addition of more powder and a fied by some and despised by others. In a clever book, Mrs. Fennel! recently glorifies the onion as "the rose among roots, without which there would be no gastronomic art. Its presence lends color and enchantment to the most mod est dish; its absence reduces the rarest dainty to hopeless Insipidity and the diner to despair." In this book she em ploys all the aid of adjectives and "apt alliteration" to set forth her favorite dainties. She writes about the magnificent mush room, the triumphant tomato, the simple sole, the subtle sandwich, and In like fashion until she comes to "the incom parable onion," and calls It "the climax of the feast-" Its fragrance abounds In associations glad ana picturesque. All of glorious Italy Is in (the fine, penetrating smell, and ail Provence and all Spain. It is In the atmosphere breathed by the Latin, people, so that, ever It must sug gest blue skies and endless sunshine, cypress grove's and olive orchards. It Is interwoven with memories of the golden canvases of Titian, the songs of Dante, the music of Mascagnl. Spanish Onions the Best. According to Mrs. Pennell some rank the onion as a root sacred to Venus, a food for lovers. The ancient Greeks and Romans had several varieties, and in Egypt it received divine honors. In the Far South the onion is more opulent, like the beauty of its women. It gains In fla vor by losing in strength. Our onion is strong to the point of rankness; there fore the Spanish onion Is the best, and in India the onion is but' a pale parody of the English one. As for the garlic, which Is a sort of cousin of the onion, the verses of all Southern poets smell sweet of Its piquant delights. The rhymes of Mistral recall It. It is the little coloring oxide, into a button or bead of good color, which, like a mined ruby, is finally cut for the trade. "These artificial rubies are selling for varying prices, and to the untrained eye are like the mined ruby in both color and brilliancy. But when put un der a magnifying glass even of low power they are found to have numerous 'striae,' or lines, and minute bubbles, which at once distinguish them from the mined stones. "Another method of manufacturing rubies is to fuse chemically prepared alumina mixed with a flux containing coloring oxides, chiefly chromic oxide, in an electric furnace. The mixture is slowly brought to the melting point, kept there for a time and then quickly cooled on the outside, the interior be ing cooled as slowly as possible. When properly cooled the mass, on being essence of bullfights and farandoles. All through the adventures of Don Quixote it floats, a real perfume, and in the salads of the Old Testament it holds first place. The earliest people of Europe and Western Asia cultivated garlic from Tartary to Spain, and it has always been a part of Chinese diet. The shal lot Is to the onion as the sketch to the finished picture. It never attains to the untempered voluptuousness of the onion, and does not assert itself with the fury of garlic. Shallots for Summer use, olives and garlic for Spring. In all the gardens of colonial days there were quaint borders of chives, with fine grass like leaves and purple blossoms. We seldom see them nowadays, for they are a delicate 'little second cousin of the onion and cannot live through our cold Winters. All of these high-flavored plants have rare medicinal value. And one critic de clares "the secret of good cooking lies In -the discreet and sympathetic treatment of the onion. It gives vivacity to soups, it is the poetic soul of the salad bowl, the touch of romance in the well-cooked vegetable. All of the old-time salad makers had some secrets of their own as to how much or how little onion should be mingled with the other herbs. Many of our well-known diners out were proud er of their salad-making than of their wit or wisdom. We read of Dumas that he pinned his hopes for fame on his recipe for onion soup rather than on his many novels, and of Sydney Smith, called In his day "the wittiest man in England," it was said that he gloried in the fact that he alone of all the literary circle knew just how much onion to mix In a bowl of salad. A witty writer has had much to say about people who are Bromides and people who are Sul phides. Perhaps we may call the cab bage a bromide among plants and the onion a sulphide. The one so comforta ble looking, stolid and tasteless, the other so straight, so spikey. so fiery. E. A. Matthews In the St. Louis Globe-DemocraL broken open, Is found to contain clear, glassy, red nodules (knots or lumps) standing out in sharp contrast against a dull red brick-colored ground mass. "These glassy lumps are then cut for the market and generally have a richer color than the artificial rubles produced by the French method. The invention Is that of an American who is as yet withholding his name. Here s one of his artificial rubies weigh ing 16 carats. Its color and luster is as great as that of the mfned ruby, and its chemical and physical properties are the same. It will scratch glass with ease. It is worth about $240. If a mined stone of the same color, it would be priceless. In both of these methods it is possible to carry the color, and the best pigeonblood red is fixed by the amount of chromic oxide added to the original melts. Artificial Emeralds, Sapphires and Topazes. "A blue color is produced by the addition of cobalt, and thus are ob tained artificial sapphires, whllo green is obtained by adding another me tallic oxide, and thus are produced emeralds. But with the exception of rubies practically nothing Is as yet being done in the manufacture of arti ficial' gems, what as yet are hardly more than scientific curiosities are the spinels and chrysoberyls lately pro duced by a German, who has similarly produced topazes of a fairly good size. "But -when it comes down to the diamond, those who now are really making any progress are keeping quiet. If they succeed they are not going to knock the bottom out of the diamond market." "What raw material do they use?" TO NATIONALIZE ENGLISH RAILWAYS RAILWAY nationalization is fast be coming one of the questions of prac tical politics in England. Within a very short time it probably will become part of the recognized programme of the Liberal party. Two of the most influential ministers already have declared for it. They are Lloyd George, the new chancellor of the exchequer and the man who has the un disputed reversion of the premiership after Mr. Asquith, aifd Winston Chur chill, the brilliant son of an American mother and the rising young man of the Liberal party, who recently has Ueen promoted to the important cabinet office of president of the Board of Trade. The latest recruit to the policy is Sir John Brunner, a great Liberal business man, who told the party plain ly at its first meeting after Mr. As quith's appointment as prime minister that it was doomed unless it adopted a "construction trade policy" and aban doned the historic doctrine of laisse falre in trade matters. At first this declaration was hailed by the Unionist press as a warning by Sir John in the cause of free trade, but he since has explained that what he means is not the adoption of protection against foreign imports, but -nationalization of railways and canals and their manage ment in the interest of the traders and the country. Strange to say there is little differ ence of opinion among the people at large on the subject- Even those who are afraid of the very name of So cialism are In favor of state railways. The railway shareholders themselves, who have seen their profits dwindling and disappearing year after . year, would be delighted to have government "Chiefly sugar carbon carbon made from burning sugar." "Sophisticated Gems." "Great progress is also being made in turning out 'sophisticated gems.' Thl enterprise, laTgely fraudulent, consists of the substitution of cheaper colorless stones for diamonds, green garnets for emeralds, and so on. Cer tain stones are treated with chemicals or with heat to heighten or change their colors and Increase their bril liancy. The wine yellow topaz is changed to pink, and a white one ren dered whiter or more' brilliant by treating becomes a sophisticated dia mond. A hole Is drilled in an off-color stone, which is then improved by fill ing the cavity with a transparent enamel: or the Inside of a setting may be backed, painted or enameled. These sophisticated gems are of far less value than the artificial geni, whose substance is identical or nearly iden tical with that of the natural. "'A lot of trade secrets have been opened up by Investigations of these sophisticated gems, many of which I have reproduced in the laboratory. Kor example, T have taken a wine-yellow Brazilian topaz and by properly pack ing it in magnesia and then carefully heating it have changed its color to a very beautiful rose pink. I thus increased its value about twenty time. Similarly a banded agate, with poor contrast of color, when treated with dyes and chemicals shows marked con trasts and becomes beautiful. I have soaked such agates in olive oil until tliis has penetrated the more porous parts, and then have boiled it in sul phuric acid, which, in combination with the oil. has turned the porous parts to a rich velvety brown or black. bonds bearing 4 per cent interest as a substitute for their stock, which now pays an average of only 3' per cent. The fact is that the English railways are amazingly overcapitalized. Ac customed as the American is to the watering of railway stock he would be astonished at comparing the- real value of some of the leading English railways with their capital value. The total capitalization of the railways of the United Kingdom is about $6,500, 000,000, and it is estimated that at least 1.000,000,000 of this is water. The water has been put in with no fraudulent in tention, but is the natural result of the slipshod methods of management which grew up with the English railway sys tem and never have been altered. England was the pioneer in railway building and the railways had to pay heavily at the beginning to acquire the necessary land for their lines and to overcome the opposition and the preju dices of the landowners. Furthermore, it never has been the custom of the English railway to set aside a part of the profits for upkeep and Improve ments. When improvements have had to be made they have been paid for by new stock issues. It is estimated that, taking into ac count the extra sum which would be demanded by investors ,for "disturb ance." and the natural premium that is to be expected in such a transaction, the railways would cost the govern ment about JIO.000,000,000, and the ad vocates declare that they not only could be made helpful to the trade of the country, but a valuable government as set at that price. A demand for Immediate railway re form is made by every class of trader In the community. The question of rates is a great scandal, and the preference the non-porous portions becoming whiter by contrast. This Is done in the manufacture of onyx cameos. In deed, the porous portions of many agates are, for the trade, artificially dyed red, brown, blue and other colors, as desired. "A ne.w Atone now on the market as "harlequin," the luster of whose blues and reds changes like a cat's eye In the dark, is merely crocldollte. or "blue asbestos." whose fibers have been treat ed with aniline dyes. Most of the common' chalcedony seals worn as watch charms have been artificially colored, and a large amount of the so called jade In our market Is merely chalcedony dyed green. Most agate is counterfeited by painting the natural, colorless chalcedony with moss-like patterns. I have done this for experi mental purposes, and have found that they fade in two or three years. In deed, this same chalcedony a clouded, milk-colored variety of quarts is used in making eophlsticated turquoises and carnelians. Ki urinous Trade in Imitation Gems. ""Over a million gross of imitation diamonds are being imported by this country per year. By "imitation" I mean an article which must not be confused with the "artificial" gem which, as I have said, is Identical or nearly Identical with .the gem of na ture. The cheapest form of the imitation diamond is of glass: simply pressed into the "brilliant' form and having none of Its facets polished. The next higher product is backed with 'pinch beck.' a gilt made of copper, which In creases the brilliancy about five fold. The next grade Is the backed brilliant, with every other faet of the top pol ished, and a still higher product has alternate facets, both top and bottom, polished, t lie hack then being coated with full silver foil. A better grade still has all facets polished, top and bottom, and the highest type of all is of selected glass, free from coloring matter, and whose inherent brilliancy is such that no backing Is necessary. AH of the facets of these are carefully polished. "These imitation gems are given ft wide tange of hue by adding coloring matter to the original melt of the glass. In the better imitations the glass Is made of powdered quartz, red lead and potassium carbonate, or me tallic oxide, etc.. In varying propor tions according to the desired color. Some Imitations Cost Jlore Than ' Orlgnals. "A new imitation .emerald now on the market displays flaws such as commonly characterize the mined em erald. Indeed, some imitation gems cost more than do originals, two good examples being the imitation rose quartz and moonstone, and so far as beauty Is concerned they are often more attractive than the natural, ex hibiting a very wide range of color. But they are more easily scratched than the natitral etones, and exposure to foul air usually dims their bril liancy. In fact, nearly all of the finest grades of Imitation gems can be read ily detected by their yielding to the file and their inability to scratch glass. "Quite the newest and most inter esting thing in this line, however, is a very high - grade imitation gem which actually does scratch glass readily and does not yield to the file. I have obtained four of these thus far, one green and the others a delicate pink. I have not yet obtained a suf ficient quantity of this material to de termine its character, but I suspect that It Is largely powdered quartz mixed with a small amount of alkali in the fiux. These are very durable, having the hardness sufficient for or dinary wear, besides a fire and bril liancy far superior to those of other imitation stones. "Beautiful and expensive imitation pearls are made by coating glass beads with a product made from the scales of the "bleak,' a fish of the Bal tic Sea, the desired color being finally Imparted by the delicate use of dyes. "The very latest product is the Teckla pearl, made by a secret process which I have not yet fathomed, and which reproduces the twirls and bumps of the baroque pearl." Washington, D. C, June 13. given by railways to foreigners has aroused the traders. For instance, it costs $10 to ship a ton of British meat from Liverpool to London, but on ac count of the rate agreements between the railways and the steamship lines it costs $6.25 to ship a ton of foreign meat between the same two points. A case quoted extensively in the British press recently was that of a manufac turer in Sheffield who was asked to bid on an order for a large- quantity of goods delivered in London in competi tion with a German firm. He found that the freight rate between Sheffield and London would prevent him from obtain ing the contract, and he had almost de cided to give up the attempt to gain it, when he learned that if he sent his goods by rail to Hull, shipped them to Germany and brought them back to Hull and then sent them by train to London the cost would be so much lower that he could compete with the German manufacturers. He based his price on these rates and obtained the contract. It is estimated that if the govern ment took over the railways and ran them for the benefit of the whole peo ple, money enough could be saved on management to reduce the freight and passenger rates substantially, and at the same time Insure a better service. A railway manager has declared that 100,000 of the 600,000 men employed on the British railways are totally un necessary and are only employed De cause of the useless duplication of fa cilities caused by competition. The ex pense of 250 separate boards of direc tors and of a host of higher officials also could be saved. Ribbons and passementeries to th vahll ok SH',.000.000 were produced in 1901 at St. JJUenns, prance.
