The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, December 13, 1896, Page 28

THE SAN FRA Silver Spoons Thrust In Hapless The Most Remarkabl Babies' Mouths e Mart in the World. Babies Purchased for Christmas Presents i Wiiliam T. Stead, reformer, agitator and philanthropist, hasjust furnished the | world a new sen:ation by establishing in London a baby market. So novel is the! idea that the big, conservative city has gone into ecstacies over the plan sug- guested and the man whom once forced, because of his charitable deeds, | into cthe Old Bailey. Mr. Stead’s latest | suggestion is that there is no better Christ- | mas present than a pretty baby, and he declares he knows there are many couples | who would be only too delighted to make | their family three instead of two if they | knew where to go 10 secure an acceptable third. The scene of Mr. Stead’s baby markert, ar, as some term it, baby exchange, 15 a prettily furnished suite of apartments in one of the eminently respectable portions of the English metropolis. The object of attempting .this. experiment was, in a nutshell, to create an institution that would prove a medium for finding chil- n for married couples entirely without f iy but who felt the desire to fill up the blank in their hearts and homes by lopting as their own some of the home- less among the little ones. In every large city there isa very great number of children who have entered the world under circumstances, tbat make their retention by motheror father a mat- ter unpleasantand difficult. The children | are in every respect desirable, as a rule, for, judging from the qualities of their | progenitors, there is no reason why, if | d placed -in proper environment, they should not become worthy men and| women. The principal trouble has been | for couples desirous of adopting children to find rome place where they could pur- sue their quest without danger of suffer- ing from deceit, or bitterly repenting a y bargain when it was too late to e the consequences. It is just exactly this want that the | baby market fiis. To the comfortably | furnished rooms where the babies who | may be adopted together with absolutely ccrrect information concerning them are 10 be :ound many women, younyg and old charming and ug! wend their way ev day to see just what specimens of juve beauty are canaidates for home hon There are plenty of them, and like men, 11 sorts and conditions, except that in every instance when they are placed on view in the market they are absolutely M that cleanliness is not only next to god- | liness, but an absolute requisite prelimi- | nary to adoption. j So the baby races shine under the| benignant influences of soap and water, | and if chubby | Stead and his confreres hold | bands undo the work of | the washing apparatus, why, the serubbing | process is repeated. The picture that ac- companies this article graphically por- trays the scene that is daily witnessed in the visitors’ room of the baby market. | One cay’s experience in this place is n[ whole wolume in the stady of human na- e. Women whose faces are snarled frowns and wrinkles change counte- as soon as tuey catch a glimpse of the healthful, lusty contents | of the visitors’ room. Pretty women grow pretiier at the sights they see. Of course, the babies are like all other humanity, both bad and good. But the | well-treated, well-fed and weil-washed baby is not inclined to be ill natured, and so all look their prettiest and smile their sweetest at the teader-hearted women who come to view them on adoption bent. The babies vary in age from six months to three years, but the tenderer age pre- dominates. These are some of the entries in ihe baby book, no names being given: GIRL 22—Born m May, 1 n London. 13—Born in April, 1896, in Sunderland. 20—Born in ‘April, 1896, at Bridzton. —Born in April, 1896, in Yeovil. —Born in June, 1896, in London. 8—Born in July, 1896, in ks. —Born in July, 1896, London 30—Born in March, 1896, London, S. E. 21—Born in March, 189, father suffering from reverse in business. 35—Born in July. 1896, Scotland. 37—Born in Septemper, 1896, London; father a widower. BOYS. 7—Born in January, 1896, near London. | 13—Born in January, 1896, in Banbury; twin 16—Born in February, 1896, Manchester. 18—Born in February, 189. London. 20—Born in April, 1896, Burton-on- Trent. 24—Born in April, 1896, London, N. —Born in February, 1806, Isle of! ht. _Born in April, 1896, London, W. | 36—Born ir July, 189, Cheshire. 39—Born in July, 1896, Surrey. 3—Bora in August, 1896, London, 8. W. Tue numbers given with the entries are those by which the babies are known, as | th=y have no names. These poor young- | sters start in life as guiltless of identity as the convict in the Spanish prison Inferno | at Ceuta, that portion of Africa which is | given over to Hades. . Sometimes it happens that childre; yond the customary age of those who make up tae bulk of the market’s stock in trade seek parents and hope for would-be parents to scek them. For instance, the mother of two littls boys, 8 and 5 years old respectively, recently wrote to Mr. Stead, asking him to find a home for her children. Thedeath of her husband had Jeft her almost destitute. These two little fellows are grandsons of one of the best- known Judges of India. As a rule. the antecedents of a child are not revealed, owing to the fact that inno- cence would frequenily be forced to suffer for the guilt of others. Buch instances as | the one guotel are by no means rare, for in England as in no other country it is the case that good blood and poverty often dwell together. While it is not always the case and per- haps not in the majority of instances that a baby is sold as if it were an infantile specimen of the pug dog, it is true that it not infrequently happens that a mother receives a cash consideration for parting with ber little one. Generally it occurs that persons who are desirous of procuring ready-made children are plentifully sup- - ‘plied with this world’s goods. Therefore it is quite natural thai they should offer no objection to and generally prefer giv- ing a reasonable compensation to the lorn other. mlu::netimes happens, however, that the foster parents reverse this order of things, | well behaved. n Liondon inquire how much they are to be paid for taking it. This class of persons are frowned upon by Mr. Stead, and he has justnow formally notitied them that their presence at the baby market is not de- sired and will be promptly dispensed with if avoidable in no other fashion. The scenes at the baby market are like unto those of a big nursery. Prettily gowned and capped nurses exhibit their charges to the persons who come to view, | and occasionally a sad-faced woman is seen sitting in a chair in the visitors’ room, hoping for the opporturity that will make her grief-stricken. Such a one holds her baby as close to her as possible, undergoing 1n her 1magination the agony of parting over and over again. Then when the prospective foster-mother finally appears the contrasting feelings are almost pitiful. It is a mingling of tears and smiles. The tears of the mother contrast with the smiles of the newcomer, while the baby tries first one and then the other emotion, unknowing whether its mother’s grief or the visitor’s joy mean the most to it. There is only one other institution in the world so far as known like unto that which Mr. Stead has established. It is not really a prototype after all. The same principle, however, actuates both—that of caring for little ones and providing them with good homes. This second institu- tion is in the United States, and is pre- sided over by Dr. J. H. Kellogg at Battle | Creek, Mich., a town that is famous for the lost health that is found there and re- turned to the owners, This haven of 1est and hope for young persons has no restriction, so far as age is concerned, regarding the children it aids. In the eyes of the institution the girl of 1615 still a child and requires infinitely more care in some ways than the tot of 6. This institution is known as the Haskell Home, but it is a home only temporarily, as the children are placed with the per- sons desirous of adopting them as soon as possible. The/class of children that are received by the home is indicated by the following description of several home- se kers furnished by the officials: No. 366 is a girl 10 years of age with blue eyes and dark hair. She is said to bave an amiable disposition'and has had good training. Her father is dead and her mother having to work away from Meteoric Iron and Diamond. home all day the child is thus left alone. The mother is anxious to have her placed in a good Christian home where she will have proper care and trainins. She is at present liying in Pennsylvania. Nos. 276 and 377 are two little girls, aged 12 and 9 years respectively, with black eyes and hair. The mother has tried to keep the family togetler. But as she is in very poor health she can no longer sup- port them. These children are said to be easily controlled, and no doubt would brighten and cheer some home. They are now living in Nebraska. Nos. 378 and 879 are two bright, father- less little boys, aged 6 and 3 vears respect- ively, living in Wisconsin. Their mother is so situated that she cannot possibly care for them and support them, and is anxious to have them placed in good Cnristian homes. They have blue eyes and light hsir. No. 380 is an orphan girl, 10 years of age, living in Massachusetts. She has blue eyes and brown hair and is large and strong for her age. She hasa very affec- tionate disposition, being very fond of children and pets. She has been living with anelderly lady, who has cared for ber | since ber mother's death, but she is not able to provide for her longer. No doubt with a kind but firm hand to guide her and the surroundings of a Christian- home shie will grow up to be a useful woman. No. 381 is a little girl nearly 6 years old, living in Wisconsin, Her mother is dead and her father has deserted her. Her aunt, with whom she has been staying, is not situated so that she can keep her longer, and thus she is in need of an im- mediate home. S e has blue eyes and lignt bair, and is said to be bright and Is there not some home that will open its doors and give this poor child a mother’s love and care? The homeless baby is everywhere, and s0 is the household where childish voices are never heard. It seems a pity, the humanitarians say, that the composite parts of a delightiul whole should be so oftén separated. - The baby market is likely to become an American institution, Diamonds in Stars. It was only recently discovered that the most valued of all minerals, the diamond,is sometimes enshrined in the falling star. The illustration is an enlarged picture of a perfect cctahedral gem, minute but briltiant and colorless, taken from a speci- men of the meteoric iron found in 1891 near Canyon Diablo, Arizona. Though as early as 1846, and also in 1886 and 1887 evidenge of diamond formation wasde!l tected in meteorites, it was not until 1879, and after selecting a desirable youngster, and afterward in 1891, that coloriessgrains with adamantine properties were found, and only in 1893 the diamond cutting capacity of this white powder was satis- factorily tested by Oliver Whipple Hunt- ington, Ph.D., of Harvard. Asin thecut- ting and polishing of the meteoric iron of Canyon Diablo hard particles were en- countered that destroyed several of thein- struments used, it was conjectured that the diamond was one of the ingredients, and on examining the cut section small black diamonds were found, and one white gem 1-50 of an inch in diameter. The Harvard mneralogist, having ob- tained specimens from the same locality, dissolved the iron by the aid of a battery in a solution of acid, and succeeded in | separating from the other meteoric constit- uents several small but perfect diamonds and also a small quantity of dust resem- bling white beach sand, which was pre- served for a diamond-cutting experiment. Itis well known that while several sub- stances cut ruby and sapphire among natural minerat products only the dia- mond cuts the diamond, though a new chemical combination called boron car- bide is now coming into use for the same purpose. When a terrestrial diamond was placed in position for being cut and the revolving wheel was charged with the supposed diamond dust'a characteristic ISCO CALL, SUNDAY, -DECEMBER ‘13, 1896. nissing sound soon announced that the adamantine surface was yielding, and in a few minutes the ground and polishea fuce proved that it had met its peerin the white powder of the meteorite. This skilled experimenter was of the opinion that further analysis might even disclose gems of size and value or give some clew as to their formation, for which the past career of the meteorite may have afforded special facilities. Of the true origin of both, however, much more mustbe known before the shooting star is recognized as diamond-pbearing soil cast up from the depths of some distant world. ' Rose O'HALLORAN. STEAD’S UNIQUE BABY MARKET. Sonoma The Indians of Sonoma County form an interesting and picturesque element of life in the valley of the Russian River. All told they number at the present day barely 300 sonls, the remnant of the once powerful ‘tribe’ of the Callagomanns, which, at the time of the Spanish occupa- tion, numbered 50,000 individuals, Dis- ease, exposure and change of habit have eliminated the once powerful people, and it is hardly possible for them to exist for another generation. In a few years the tribe will become extinct. The term “Digger,”” by which all the tribes of Northern California were distine guished, was app'ied to them from their habit of digging into the earth for food. They were promiscuous in their choice of eatables, and rabbits, snakes, earthworms and snails were esteemed the most deli- cious elements wherewith to grace a feast. Like their forefathers, the race in Sonoma County is neither warlike nor enterprising. The country before the arrival of the whiies afforded ail that was necessary to gratify their narrow wants without labor upon their part. They knew nothing of the chase and caught their game by stratagem or snare, conse- quently they grew up an inconceivably lazy and utterly worthless people, without a conception of a future state and only intent on the gratification of degraded appetites. When the whites possessed the lands and covered them with droves of cattle and sheep the Indians imagined they had a right to appropriate what they required, and did so until the stronger race arose in their wrath and wiped out a few hundred of them, more or less, when the flocks and herds were left in peace. Around Hepland the largest number of this remnant live. In pity the church un- dertook the work of civilizing the few that were left, and devoted missionaries have passed their lives trying to instill into the minds of these people hopes of better things. Instruction has been given in ag- riculture, and the Indians have been en- couraged in habits of self-dependence 2nd industry. In a measure these effortsto civilize have b-en successful. They are nearly all members of the church and re- gard their priest with great veneration, but their minds can only grasp the rudi- ments of the principles of Christianity. In their chapel they are the most devout of worshipers. The school where the younger minds are taught to develop ac- complishes something for their improve- l County's Picturesque Indians Will Extinct Before the Glose of Another Generation ment, but it is difficult to arouse that am- bition without which any considerable progress is impossible. The females of the tribe are more tract- able than the men and more easily taught. Some of them make notable housewives and needlewomen. They have been encouraged to build homes of their own after the manner of those of their white neighbors, and many have done so, but there are those who are The Last of the Famous Tribe of the Yukiahs Have Become They are a people fond of amusement, and a circus occasions them unspeakable delight. A procession of Indians bound to a circus is a signt that would please a cynic. The most dilapidated horses and harness hitched to a cart of ancient lineage and filled with a stoical group of Indians, old and young, is a spectacle worth a long journey to see. By heredity, the legacy of centuries of shiftless ancestors, the Yuxiah Indians “| the note C upon the pisno. Is a Shorthand System For Music a Possibility ? Some New and Startl Stenography of ng Propositions on the Music and the Function of Hearing Among the inquiries I have received from readers of THE CALL are 1wo that asks: “Is it possible to devise a system of shorthand for music so that one may be able to report an aria similar to the way in which a speech is reported ?” Theother one asks: “Is the X ray applicable to deafness. Can a deafperson be made to hear by the application of the X ray ?” The human senses are few, and may be said to consist of five only—sight, hear- ing, taste, smeil and touch. Of them, hearing is much theucutest. Taste, smell and touch involve but the simplest of natural phenomena. Sight is more com- plex, as it necessitates the adaptation of the optic nerve to changes in distance and color of the object. Hearing necessitates a far greater power of discrimination. The variety of sounds is infinite. In addition to tone, in its fundamental character, are also pitch, quality, intensity and har- mony. We hear a note of music, and un- less a study has been made ot the sclence of harmonic sounds, we infer that the word “musical note’’ expresses fully all that there is to it. Such is far from the fact. Each note isa composite of many sounds. Probably a thousand composite sounds are combined to form the single note. Science has to some extent an- alyzed the so-called. “‘note.” Strike, say, It contains, in addition to the fundamental tone C, the C an octave above, the twelith above, C two octaves above, the major third two octaves above, the fifth two octaves above, and so on ad infinitum. Every regular musical tone is resolvable into a definite number of simple tones whose relative pitch follows the law of the partial tone series. These extra tones are termed the “harmonies,” aud a tone without harmon- ies is destitute of penetrating qualities. Each tone has -a definite rate of vibra- tion, and each tone’s vibration bears a fixed relationship to the vibration of the fundamental note. So calling the vibra- tion of the fundamental note 1, the sec- ond note of the scale will have a rate of vibration expressed by the fraction 9-8, the minor third 8-5, the major third 54, the fourth 43 the fifth 3-2, the minor sixth 8-5, the major sixth 5-3, the minor seventh 16-9, the major seventh 15-8 and the octave 2-1. In addition to the sound of the note it- selt there are accompanying shades of quality, loudness, softness, force, timbre, ete., all of which go to making the expres- sion of thenote. The musical sten.graph- er would, therefore, require to be the pos- sessor of an extremely acute ear capable of instantly distinguishing each separate shade and color of every individual note. He would require a separate symbol for each, and as the compass of an ordinary piano of seven and a quarter octaves em- braces eighty-eight notes the number of symbols necessary to express these notes would prove too many for practical use. 5. S YUV Alterd | Harman FORMS OF SOUND WAVES. so inert that they cannot be induced to make any effort at improving themselves or their estate. They adhere to customs of their forefathers and live as their an- cestors did before the white man came to disturb their dreams and make them work. The little that the Indians raise from their land is supplemented by the wages they earn on the neighboring farms. Hop- picking is a favorite occupation of theirs, and whole families engaze in that task when the time for gaihbering the crop ar- rives. As fruit-pickers they are also a success, but in other branches of work, SONOMA COUNTY where judgment or some intellectual ef- fort is required, they are a failure. are lazy. The traitisinnate and part of their being. Only the sternest necessity will persuade them to depart from the habit. Their ruling passion is for drink, and for this they will part with the last of their possessions. Their conception of bliss begins and ends with the bottle and potations innumerable. The law against supplying the Indians with intoxicants is severe, but is constantly evaded. Charles Weidner of this City, who recently made a visit to the tribe for artistic studies, describes them as being on the whole a people worthy of preservation, whose vir- tues are many and whose uncultured hos- pi:ality is conspicuously sincere. INDIANS’ e \“g:\\'n _\‘\ A PR HUT. ; Itis, however, extremely easy with suit- able apparatus to cause any sound to give a visual expression of itself. If we adjust a tuning fork having a small mirror fixed to the extremity of one of its arms so that a ray of light coming from a lamp shall be projected from the mirror upon a screen then it will be seen that as the fork vibrates the reflected ray will have an undulatory, wave-like motion, which will be characteristic and distinct for the same note. The accompanying shows some of these lines. It might be and complex mechanism to obtain in such lines a record of a piece of music being performed. The action of the phonograph is the practical application of such principle. The phonograph is not a very modern in- vention, There has been lying upon the shelves of the Smithsonian Institution at ‘Washington, D. C., a queer-shaped instru- ment called a phonautograph, the device of M. Leon Scott. It has been there since 1855 and was known to numberless experi- menters long previous. It consists ofa wooden cylinder about a foot long and six inches thick, baving an iron axle, one end of which is cut with a coarse-thread screw, and the other end having a crank handle. The screw end of the axle works in a fixed nut, so that when the cylinder is turned by its handle it has, in addition to its mo- tion of rotation, a motion of translation. There is & large funnel mounted upon a stand, the apex of the funnel being closed by a piece of parchment to which is af- fixed a quill. . The phonautograph isem- ployed for making sound visible. To op- erate it the cylinder is covered with a piece of paper and then rotated over a lamp burning turpentine, so that the cyl- black. Then, the funnel is placed in posi- tion so thau the quill is resting against the periphery of the soot-covered cylinder. If now a note of music is soundey into the be rotated, the vibration of the air in the funnel will cause the quill to trace upon the revolving cylinder a sinuous line, typical of thenote. To preserve the record the cylinaer is dipped into a solu- tion of shellac in alcobol, which fixes the lampblack, and the paper may then be 1 removed. bear upon the same subject. One reader | illustration , possible by the employment of delicate | inder receives a heavy coating of lamp-. large end of the funnel and the eylinder’ This is the original of the present pho- nograph. It was simply necessary to barden the tracing made by the quill in the lampblack and then to reverse the revolution of the cylinder while the quill was pressing against it to reproduce the nole originally-sounded into the funnel. Now, while such a machine will faithfully produce a mechanical expression of what- ever musical'sounds may be confided to if, yet it cannot be classed as a stenographic recorder, in the sense of the word “steno- graphic” as applied to the art of recording in shorthand. A reporter would find ex- treme difficulty in reporting stenograph- ically any musical composition. The dis~ tance of the hearer from the source of sound has a very important bearing upon the sound as heard. If we take two tele= graphic sounders and by clockwork arrange to break the electric circuit ten times per second we shall hear the sounds of ‘the two instruments as one, provided they are placed upon the table by which we stand. But If one sounder be removed, say twenty-five feet distant, then the sounds they emit fail to coincide, owing to the slowness with which sound travels, and in this position we shall hear twenty strokes per second instead of ten. Re- move the sounder to a distance of 112 feet, and now the strokes are in unison, ten per second. The pitch of a souna in- creases as the sound approaches us and diminishes as it receeds. Leibnitz defines music as “‘an occult exercise of the mind unconsciously performing arithmetical calculations.” In the basilar membrane of the human ear are seyeral thousand aelicate fibers each of which is set in sympathetic vibra- tion by a vibratory motion of a certain RESONATORS. definite period. These fibersare connected with the constituent filaments of the au- ditory nerve, anda by them the simple pen- dutar motions which are singled out from the complex vibratory motions, excited by most sonorous bodies, are transmitted to the brain, where they are translated into the sensations we call sound. And here begins the unsolvable mystery. We are utterly ignorant of the nature of the action of the brain in translating mechani- cal motion—vibration—into what appeals to our senses as sound, light or heat. Various devices have been produced for the purpose of re-enforcing sound. They are called resonators. Some of these are 80 simple and produce such marveious re- sults that I deemed it interesting to the readers of THE CALL to make brief men- tion of them. They are simple trumpets. 1 One of them is constructed with a sliaing tube by means of which thelength may be increased. By putting the small end of the tube of thisresonator, known as Daugins’, to the ear and adjustins the slide, the sounds of the waterfail will be resolved into their elementary tones. The whist- ling of the wind, the rumbling of a car- riage over the street and the confused mur- mur of. the city’s multitude will be heard with every variety of pitch and quality. During the still hours of ‘the night the at. mosphere, quiescent as it seems, is always more or less vocal, and with this instrue ment one may hear every sound. By the use of the other resonator one may hear a melody that does not exist by means of an instrument that emits no sound. When the apex of the instrument is placed to the ear and the three holes successively covered and uncovered the length of the aerial column in the resonator is changed, causing it to corre- spond with some notes in the confused maze of very feeble sounds, which unceas- ngly keep the air in a state of greater or less perturbation. ‘Where deafness is the result of a failure of the auditory nerve or the destruction of the whole or a portion of the basilar membrane, I do not believe it possible to restore the sense of hearing. Where such membrane and nerve is intact, but atrophied, it may be possible by the intel- ligent use of the so-called X ray to assist the sense of hearing. I say 1t may be. We as yet know very little about the qualities and power of the new-found ray. I bave repeatedly held, in previous papers in THE CALy, that ligbt, heat, sound and electricity were one and the same thing, differing only in the rate of the primal substance vibratien. The subtle action of the brain, which converts the sonorous vibrations into recognized sound, is, in my belief, an electrical operation, and I see no good reason why it will not be possible to at least aid hearing by the use of arefined current of electrical energy so soon as we have learned how to prop- erly apply it. F. M. Crosg, D.Sec. Professor Parker at Bull Run. The late Professor Henry E. Parker of Dartmouth College was chapiain of the Second New Hampshire Volunteer Regi- ment in the War of the Rebellion. An in- cident of his service is thus aescribed by a correspondent. of the Springfieid (Mass.) Republican: “In the midst of the wild rout and panic at the first battie of Bull Run I was stricken down with a grievous wound. ‘While'the tide of fugitives swept past and the victorions. enemy bore down relent- lessly. upon us, a few comrades struggled to bear me away to some place of safety. ‘Wiih them was Chaplain Parker. He had _been mounted ail through the pattle, und to reacih me he had ridden into a verfect hailstorm of bullets. It seemed certain death to one so conspicuously exnosed, but be came out unharmed, while those around him went down or fled in dismay. Among the innumerable acts of heroism which I witnessed during the war, noth- ing so impressed me asthe calm courage with which this was d: ne.”” ——————— In certain towns of Germany the telee phone is introduced by tobacconists as an additional attraction fo customers. Any one who buys & cigar may, if he desires, speak over the tobacconist’s instrument to a subscriber to the telephone service.