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About Omaha daily bee. (Omaha [Neb.]) 187?-1922 | View Entire Issue (Oct. 11, 1914)
Tm. Omaha Sunday Bee Magazine Pag E i W8$BmWiM Ills ; (iiilivS&fWiif $ft MllMil win ut uie last great war in .vyV-7.:.V,.; - ' V- V'' i ; f'jtJ11 -.3. ". V-.w . 1 I 1 X I A.ur t;J.'-..W ' u 'i' ' : 'VYVr'! .. - sPri&J . fes . mi in -ms. ii is proDODie tnat tnis 111 V - . . . ' win uo uie ibbi great war in which we Bhall see gunpowder used," Bald Lewis Nixon, the noted shipbuilder and designer of war ships. "The possibility of using other forces Infinitely more powerful haa Deen shown In this conflict and there will be a great effort to secure the most efficient employment of them before another struggle occurs." Conspicuous amoug the novel weap ons that have been used in the pres ent war Is the petrol bomb. This has the effect not only of killing all persons within immediate range of Its explosion, but of setting flro to everything combustible which it touches. It is thrown with a fuse and explodes with & blinding storm of flam ing gasoline. It Is much lighter than bombs o the same elze containing dyna mite," and is, therefore, very suitable for use by aeroplanes. Sir John French, the British . commander, mentioned in an official report that one of bis avia tors dropped a petrol bomb on a Oer , man ammunition train, killing fifteen nitn and destroying the whole train. It has been stated that many Belgian and French towns have been set on fire and destroyed by. petrol bombs. Even London has been In fear of de struction from this cause. The use of poisonous gases Is un doubtedly planned by military engi neers. We have positive evidence that a gun designed to discharge such gases among the enemy has been pat ented by the Krupp firm, of Essen, and we may hear at any moment that It Is In action. It Is a question whether such a weapon does not come under the clause of The Hague Convention which prohibits the use of poisons, explosive bullets and other excessive ly cruel weapons. The events of the present war seem' to Indicate, how ever, that not much attention will be paid to the humanitarian provisions of The Hague Convention. It may be argued that the .use of poisons was forbidden for the protection of civil ians and neutrals, and that the pro vision does not apply to a gun throw ing poisonous gases at the enemy's soldiers. The poison gun has been patented In the United States by Karl Wieserj a German subject residing at Bre deney, Germany. He states in his ap- plication that he has assigned hla rights to the Krupp company. The shell containing the poisonous gases Is a great globe, which remains outside the muzzle of the gun. A shaft attached to the globe enters the gun and separates from the globe when It is fired. The globe is said to be capable of suffocating a thousand men by the gases which it emits when It explodes. The technical de scription of the invention says: "The object is, in the present In-. ventlon, reached by giving the part of the shaft whereon the weight slides a smaller dimension than that of the bore of the gun, and by supplying tine shaft with an abutment or stop at the rear of this small diameter, which stop Will conform with the di ameter of the bore of the gun. And the smaller part of the shaft passed through a hole of the same diameter in the weight, so that, with the as sistance of centring faces on the weight and on the gun, the former will be in such a position that its axis will coincide with that of the bofe of the gun." The invention is a three-piece de vice the shaft, which goes into the bore of the gun; the shell, and a weight which is attached both to the shaft and the gun and Joins them together. When the shaft Is fired, the weight retards its progress, and through that means detaches itself aud the shaft from the shell, which continues in Its flight One great object of the military in .ventors is the direct use of the power of the sun for purposes of destruc tion. They are planning to furnish airships with lenses and mirrors, by means of which the sun's rays may be concentrated on the opponent's forts, magazines and encampments. Imagine the effect of such a titanic force burning, withering, annihilating everything over which it passes! No gun can reach it, no defence is pos sible. Fortresses explode, cities burn up aud men shrivel into nothingness. Such a triumph of destruction is an ancient dream of mankind, Just as flying' was. According to tradi tion, Archimedes, the Greek inventor, destroyed the ships of Marcellus which were attacking Syracuse in 214 B. C. by turning the sun's rays on them by means of concentric mirrors. SIgnor Ulivl, an Italian Inventor, claims to have discovered a method of controlling the infra-red rays of the spectrum so that they will ignite ny explosive or combustible in a metul case. He baa given demonstra- The New Gun That Discharges Poisonous Gates, Patented by the Krupps, of Germany. "Airships will carry vast lenses tHatfwiirconcentrat'e the rays of the sun, withering and destroying everything beneath them." I, , ,, . , sr i , u earth, as described by H. G. Wells. These monstrous, octopus-like creatures con trolled heat rays with which they with ered and devastated everything that op posed them. They were not stopped until an earthly inventor infected them with disease 'microbes which they had nevoi known on Mars. This use of microbes, by the way, would be contrary to the rules of The Hague Convention, but probably the Martians would be counted outside the pale of humanity. Wells has suggested another scientific weapon which would cause world-wide devastation and so make war impossible. He assumes thnt we shall discover the secret of atomic energy, a force which we can see at work in radium. The atomic bomb releases the energy of matter and causes everything it touches to explode. Science is Now Creating Weapons Far More Deadly, That Will Annihilate Life Throughout Whole Counfries in Future In the words of Wells: "Never before in the history ol wnrfare had titers been a continuing explosive: lndeod. up to the middle of the twentieth century the only ex-' plosives known were combustibles' wlmso explosivcness was due entirely to their instautaneousness; and these alojulc bombs which science burst upon tho world that night wero Bt range even to the men who used them. Those used by the Allies were lumps of puro carollnum. painted on the outside with unoxldlzed cydona tor inducive enclosed hermetically la a case of membra uluin. A little cel luloid stud between the handles by which the bomb was lifted was ar ranged so bh to be easily torn off and admit nlr to tho Inducive, which at once became active and set up radio-activity in the outer layer of the carollnum sphere. This liberated fresh Inducive, and so In a few min utes the whole bomb was blazing con tinual explosion. "Such was the crowning triumph of military science, the ultimate ex plosive, that was to give the 'decisive touch' to war. . . ." It is certain that thero are Infinite powers of destruction In the wireless waves with which we are partly fa miliar. A wireless generating plant ralBed to several thousand times the power now employed will be able' to destroy life and-property at a dis tance of a thousand miles or more. Another novel implemeut of de struction will be an enormous fly wliecl armed with scythe-like blades, whloii will cut down every human being In their path. Everybody fa miliar with machinery knows tho ter- , rifle power of a heavy flywheel In motion. It is proposed that the wheels shall be carried In large aero planes and dirigible balloons. The cutting blades will be arranged at an angle so that they will Increase the revolutions of the wheel as It falls brough the air. The man in the machine will drop the wheel over a force of the enemy and then, after, gaining terrlflo momentum, ft will go churning through their bodies with its long, curved knives. In this way a ( trench could be cleared of life or a whole encampment swept away. All these methods of slaughter will. It 1a hoped, hasten the day when no nation will dare to go to war because it will threatea the very existence of the human race. Growing Pains" and "Tennis Elbow" Due to Decayed Teeth R .ECENT medical discoveries showing the close relation ship between decayed teeth and rheumatism, through the medium of germs and toxins flowing into the di gestive tract from pus sacs In the diseased teeth and gums, are familiar to readers of this newspaper. The further medi cal science inquires Into the matter the more it Is Inclined to attribute many other stubborn ills of the human body to the same cause defective teeth and polBon-dlscharging pustules In the gums. These discoveries have added new terrors to pyorrhoea, commonly called Illgg's Disease, In which the gums fall away from the roots of the teeth and the whole area becomes a breeding ground of germs seriously affecting the general health, owing to the impossibility of keeping them out of the stomach and intestines. In an article contributed to the London lancet, of recent date, the writer a laboratory experimentor along these lines attributes that mystery of childhood called "growing pains," to this same cause. These pains Id the bones of the arms and legs, he explains, are always associated with an infected con dition jf the Intestines, as is rheumatism. But the germs stre'ococcl which are responsible for this condition do 'These bomb3 will spread poisonous gases over an area of many square miles, in which no human being can live." tlons before the British Admlrslty and the Italian army authorities. There is some doubt about the effi cacy of his invention, but there is no doubt that it is based on a scientific idea. L'livi is said to have exploded a submarine mine under tine Itlver Arno from a distance of five miles. He grinds out the rays from what ap pears to be a static electric machine and holds a wireless telephone to his ear, which tells him when bis rays have struck a distant metallic object. He asserts that his Inven tion will cause the explosion of all ammunition, torpedoes, bombs, war ships, gasometers, etc. It will wreck all iron steamships, railroad locomo tives and cars, iron brliljjes and all other metallic constructions. SiKnor Ullvl's Invention bears a re semblance to the methods used by the Martians In tbelr Invasion of the V. ' i i -wv v , J ' s ' . - rfy a Or Heavy revolving fly. wheels armed with curved blades will cut an irresistible path through whole. Regiments. Copyright, 1811, by the Star Company. Great Britain Rights Reserved. not originate in the intestines, as formerly7 was the theory, but In the decayed teeth and diseased gums of the victim. "Growing pains" ocour in cases where the physiological out put of young people, to meet the tyrannical demands of growth, is at its highest Their resistance to these germs is therefore at Its lowest. Stubborn pains In the bony structure aro manifestations of those germ-toxins In the circulation. It was natural that formerly this class of disturbances following the general acceptance of the germ theory of disease should be attributed to the activity of germs originating In the Intestines the waste pipes of the body where all sorts of microbes and poisons are naturally expected to exist. Sus picion that this theory was erroneous grew out of the fact that sterilization of the entire alimentary canal only temporarily allayed rheumatic and other symptoms. Experiments proved that these germs bad a source higher up, and this source was finally discovered in the mouth that supplied a steady flow of them from tooth cavities and pus sacs In the gums. So it was useless to continue drastic anti septic treatment-of the intestines while the mouth kept up its supply of the poisonous material. Among the many diseases for which bad teeth are now held responsible are: Chronic inflamation of the pharynx, disease of the middle ear, mastoiditis, gastritis, gastric ulcer, anaemia, gout, neuritis, even "tennis elbow" and writers' and telegraphers' cramp. Medical reports show that "tennis el bow" disappeared when the fangs of a dead tootb were rendered abcptic. The explanation is that the poisons generated In the di gestive tract by these germs of dental origin set up chronic inflamation of the connective tissues between the bundles of nerve cells In the overworked area Just as they cause in flammations resulting in children's "growing pains' when the child's nutritive processes are overworked to build up a larger frame. Tho disquieting feature of the whole matter is that teeth and gums which appear to be perfectly healthy yet may be breeders of this mischievous germ. On this tpoc the Lancet writer says: "Not once but many times recently I have found this or ganism about the fangs of teeth which, apparently sound, showed on extraction denuded periosteum and sepsis of the alveolar cavity communicating with pockets about the neck of tne tooth. "It is not. however, to this particular class of dental cases that I wish to draw the attention of your readers, but rather to a series of cases of less evident virulence which ought to be the study of every practitioner those cases where it ind about the tips of the teeth, themselves frequently healthy In appearance, often stopped or crowned, - the streptococcus salivarius is actively secreting a toxin which it pours In a steady stream into the area around the fangs. This organism does not cause pus formation. It Is found In small fibrous sacs attached to the periodontal membrane, and its action seems to be formative rather than destructive. The effects of Its growth are shown wherever connective or fibrous tissues, are in a state of enhanced activity or where such structures have been Injured or overstrained."