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About The Loup City northwestern. (Loup City, Neb.) 189?-1917 | View Entire Issue (April 18, 1912)
HARNESSING GLACIER STREAMS Houj .Sujitxerland Capitalises Its Barrenness [3 ^Gregory Underhill R *£ ' o^roc'T.V C&’sf WHii bus not known Switzer land me past live rears knows not tbe Switzerland ot today. Tbe rawades, the totTents. and river.-- run there still, but f are controlled and utll i«ed Tbe aMBMte* tear tbelr lofty bead-. but not as of old They are conquered and harnessed The early summer of 1911 indicated that tbe teal was to he unusual In Italy, and mat we must leave our riila on me h,. -itots near S M • ato for some coot retreat, i-nd Switzerland was de .ded -upon. Our ap proach thither was hr I age <!i Como, plan t g remain a lew days at Tramezzo, where the summer preced.ng we had enjoyed for ■early two wee-..-, the companionship of sev eral A meric as f Mends Krorr TrStnezzo we look steamer tor Menag -f - -ed by the railroad to Porlezza on l<ake (. ... oi-r wh: it we sal.ed. past Lugano to t -j. »di Lago and by the "rack and pinion rail ed to Monte Gc-neroso. conceded to offer tbe wide*. moot varied, and beautiful expanse of ctery in Switzerland. its only rival Use Goraev Grat. I a our approach down the Lake of Lucerne the historic polir where Tell jumped a- >ore |cast the Ktgl. and the many summits t it c»e from the shores e! that historic lake. «c Lf uaa to Obsc-ve the wonderful results of -wi-s er-egy and ability. The rack and pinion > ail road takes one to the summit of Pilatus. .bout «.<«•* feet altitude, where the night may • - pas-ed in a 'urge omfortable hotel, and returns you to Lucerne next morning for the moderate charge of twenty five francs, cov ering *. charges for the excursion. The rack and pirn--n also ascends the Ktgl some 5.WO feet, ot whose cutauits are several good ho tels The general impression made by such accent was well voiced. 1 think, by an Amerl a* girl, whom I overheard saying: "I was really disappointed with the Kigi. but 1 am glad I went up. for I should always have (hough' I had missed much if I had not gone. " The funicular railroad takes one to Rurgen '<"c« Stan-rnlwm. and also Sonnenberg and <; A*. even In ml* age of travel, not every «f-c goe* to S»ltzi r land, or has observed the <JilT*-r«r - la priori pie ot construction between the rack and pinion and the funicular, I may •up he-e that the termer has a middle rail on the roadbed, set with teeth deep and broad, nd tne motor car usually has four cylinders with »ia*!lar teeth, each cylinder so succes »i»el* retiring as to reciprocally insert Its 'eetb between the teeth of the middle rail, and so force the car up It usually descends by gravity, ontrolled by brakes, in either w*e KKiag at very slow ppce. rarely six mile* an hoir. It Is obviously much saler 'ban the funicular, having so much more bold tug surface, and nowhere depending upon a ■tegie support. The funicular is run by a •ingle cable on the principle of the elevator. It bms the advantage of being usable on niucn •toeper grades than the rack and pinion can be rue on. even at an angle over 60 per cent, while the rack and pinion seldom exceeds 2» per cent, and usually run* at shout tin per u Moth *jstems are armed with very ef •cieet t.rales. tint in case of mishap I should prefer to be on the “rack and pinion." The astern of tte Wetterhorn Is made by a car suspended from a cable dangling In mid air The ride across the S. Got hard from Lugano to Lucerne had been Interesting. We were now to attempt an even wilder pass, the Itrunig. ow our way to Interlaken, mainly tak • n over by the "rack and pinion." The de . opn.eet In the rural region is remarkable, tad particularly in recent years The view of ;»e Jungfrau from the park at Interlaken was not nearly as attractive as It was last year, when In the very cool summer It was com pie«-ty covered with glistening snow and Ice. The courage and shrewdness of the Swiss t* shown in renrhlng out from the old estab lished centers to new Helds, selected because of their favorable exposures; sometimes ap proached by the funicular, or rack and pinion, sometimes only over a donkey path, end even for miles on foot. Saas-Kee. for example, at CjMi lee* altitude Is so approached lrom the VUp to Zermatt. We met a gray hatred rector o' be Church of KngUnd and bts grown daughters, who were nil to walk for Dir hours, mostly up grarfe. 'rim th<- station to Sans Cec. The Kngiieh are particularly fond at such ptetur raoue cjuiet mountain resorts. But I must re*urn to our ride to the Jungfrau. The last six iui'es and over were through a tunnel cut la tbt s>.id rock, and the present terminus Is In it- ioiia n hundreds of feet below the surla e The only light, air. and outlook are through wide apertures cut through the solid rank at the mountainside. Standing in the 'Xvzjgf <rr rmr/rr large open restaurant, salotto, and entrance room containing even post oSce facilities (ex cept for the open spaces in the mountain side) you are completely entombed in solid roc-, beneath great bodies of snow and ice in the very heart of the Swiss mountains. It is the loftiest tunnel in Europe, prob ably in the world, measuring ten feet wide and fourteen feet three Inches in height, cut through limestone so hard and tenacious that a lining of masonry is unnecessary. The gradient is one in four, the track is three feet four inches wide: the last stretch starts from Kleine Scheidegg, on which only a score of years ago not a single house stood. Now sev eral large buildings have been erected, hotels, shops, sheds, etc., and they are the center of great animation; the cries of railway and ho tel porters, and the ringing of bells, mingled with the conversations carried on in every known tongue by tourists, are heard on every hand. Over U.OOO persons are carried to the Kleine Scheidegg in a single day. The Jung frau railway is worked by electricity, and its engines are the finest mountain engines in the world. ' - The Wegen alps and the Jungfrau railway is not worked after October. Because of the heavy snowfalls, water is difficult to procure. From November to May, fresh water is en tirely lacking, every drop required for drink ing. washing, etc., and for the drills, is ob tained from snow, melted by electricity. Four teen quarts of snow make one quart of water. Incredible quantities of snow fall here, the entire lower story of the houses Is buried in snow, and a thick wall of it rises in front of the windows. The worst foe of the colonists is the south wind, or "Fohn." Under its im part the buildings tremble to their very base. In the open air it is impossible to make head against the “Fohn,” the only thing to do is to lie down Hat on the ground and to hold on to whatever one can grasp, taking advantage of the lulls to advance a few yards. The first station after entering the great tunnel is Eigerwand, excavated in the rock. Nowhere except on the Jungfrau railway is there a station blasted out of the interior or a mountain and yet commanding a magnificent view in the evening an electric searchlight of 94.000,000 candle-power throws its beams far and wide. It is said that by its light a newspaper can be read in the streets of Thun, sixty miles distant. At last we reach Eismeer, the present terminus, 10,370 feet above sea level. The station is a marvel of constructive ingenuity. A large hall, excavated, pierced with several openings on the south side, twen ty feet wide, forms a comfortable room which can be heated, with parquet floor and glass windows. On one side are the apartments ot the stationmaster, with a poet office, the loftiest in Europe; on the other, the Kitchen of the restaurant and the larders. No wood or coal is used. Electricity does the cooking and heating. Soon the railway will be carried to a point near the summit, where an elevator, a genu ine perpendicular lift, will take the tourist 240 feet to the very summit of the Jungfrau (13,428 feet). A two days' drive over the Grlmsel Pass took us through tunnels, under overhanging arches, by leaping cascades, roaring brooks and rivers, and endless chains of pines and firs, broken occasionally by a small holding of cleared land. A level bit of land is always cultivated, and chalets ar$ raised here and there, the goats crossing our track, the cows, with their bells keeping time with the foot falls of our horses, and always in ever-shift ing lines the everlasting hijls, rising higher and higher. Who knows how they came there? * All along I have been impressed with the sagacity and energy with which the Swiss ex ploit their rugged country, whose chief as sets are mountains and glaciers, ordinarily the most profitless. And, yet, in doing so, they kill the romance of mountaineering. The imagination that kindles the courage that dares, the glory of being one of the elect few to achieve such ascents, the fine ecstasy of conquest, the exhilaration of the hardly won far-distant reaches, all are to disappear before mechanism and finance. In about two years any gouty old gentleman and delicate, gray haired (never old) lady on the summit of the Jungfrau, at 13,670 feet altitude, can look sympathizingly down upon the toilers below. Mont Blanc, the highest summit of the entire range, is being rapidly harnessed clear to its summit, with its equipment of rack and pin ion. Even the Matterhorn Is partially equip ped with fixed ropes, and some attempts at paths have been made. On can reach the summit of the Kigi and return in a few hours, or remain In a comfortable hotel. I have alluded to the exploiting of the mountains. The glaciers are being similarly utilized. All the mountain railways are run by electricity, so are the cars in passing through the Simplon Tunnel. Soon the S. Gothard line will be electrified, and in turn the other railroads will follow. The only hindrance is the delay and first cost in substi tuting electric motors for steam. As 1 drove by the fierce rushing torrents, mainly fed by snow and glaciers and apparently unfailing. I estimated that at no distant day Switzerland would supply electricity profitably not only for its own requirements, but also for nearly all Germany. In time those snows and gla ciers are to pay the entire expenses or the re public, averting the necessity of taxation. A gold mine will give out; those mountain sum mits and glaciers will not. The Italians were shrewd and able in util izing, capitalizing the forestiert. but the Swiss are far in the lead, the most highly organized, scientific absorbers (another word nearly es caped me), I think, on the face ot the earth. When 1 found myself taxed for the band 1 protested. I had not asked for any band, or agreed to pay for one; I would pay something if they would not play. Of course, It ended in my paying. A Kursaal tax is levied on tourists, through the landlords. A friend of mine protested that her mother, past eighty V/ ' (dP077Z> jm/Tapt on. “£tl& icXzw3r&av jsvzh&y never entered it. The official replied th*re is no requiring such payments, but your land lord Trill have to pay if you do not; she paid it The railroads are practically all owned by the government, and the rates are high; the mountain rates, very high. Of course, as they are expensive, and the season is short, they should charge accordingly; but 1 have paid 50 cents a .mile for each of my family. All trunks are weighed and charged for at high rates. On the mountain railroads even the hand pieces are so charged. Not every one, these tunnel-days, has crossed the Passes, and noted the admirable road-engineering in which the Swiss, as well as the Italians, are past masters. And they protect their roads; auto mobiles being allowed only on certain roads and passes, and at certain hours. We might well take lessons from them. Automobiles, like the railroad cars, should have their spe cial roads, and be restricted to them. In the season Switzerland is a mob. The extreme tunnel road to Eslmeer, only six miles long, is carrying three thousand pas sengers a day, running trams in three sec tions, at fourteen cents a mile. The income is easily reckoned. I should advise all Ameri cans to time their visit to Switzerland for June or September, unless they are fond ol “winter sports” and are strong enough to bear them. Every winter sees a decided Increase of vis itors who come to slide down hill, skate, and revel in the snow and ice. Toboggan slides of three to four miles, run with proper safe guards, are arranged; the return ascent is made by railroad or other similar contrivance Artificial ice ponds, if natural ones are not near, are cleared of snow for the skater. Switzerland is to be as much of a winter resort as a summer one—perhaps more in short, the canny Swiss are likely to coin money out of snow and ice. People of Large Appetites Korean* Are Ranked as the Most Vo racious Eaters of Any in the Known World. Tbe Koreans appear to be the great Hit eaters in the world. To this the laponeoe French. English. Dutch and all bear witness. All re port* concerning the Korean capacity (dr food seem to agree. In this re epect there Is not the least difference between the rich and the poor, the noble and the plebeian. To eat much is an honor in Korea, and the merit of a feast, it would seem, consists not so much in the quality as in the quan tity of the food served. Little conver sation occurs during the Korean meal, for each sentence might lose a mouth ful. A Korean is always ready to eat; he attacks whatever he meets with, and rarely cries “Enough." Even be tween meals he will help himself to anything edible that is offered . The ordinary portion of a laborer Is about a quart of rice, which, when cooked, makes a good bulk. This, how ever, Is no serious hindrance to his devouring double or treble the quan tity when he can get it. Eating matches are common. Whe nan ox is slaughter ed and the beef is served up, a heap ing bowl of the steaming mass does not alarm any guest When fruits, such as peaches or small melons, are served, it is said that they are de voured without peeling. Twenty or thirty peaches are demed an ordinary allowance per person and rapidly dis appear. Such prodigality in food Is, however, not common, and for one feast there are many fastings. The Koreans are neither fastidious in their eating nor painstaking in their cook ing. Nothing goes to waste. All is grist that comes to the mill in their mouths. Ltfjt Trade In Charcoal. Charcoal is used to a considerable extent in Sheffield, England, one .wholesale firm dealing In it estimat ing the aggregate amount handled at $150,000 yearly, with a considerable quantity purchased by large firms di rect from the local burners. The Oreadful Age. Don’t yon dread to reach that age when you will begin to consider a holiday a day of rest?—Atchison Globe. The Little Professor * * * By DOROTHY DOUGLAS (Copyright, 1912, by Associated Literary Press.) The little professor’s eyes scanned the row of girls whose right hands beat time to the movement of his baton while they sang an exercise in solfeggio. “Miss Vance, you are ont sing ing," he said without stopping the rhythm. Nadine Vance looked at him and a dull red crept up even to the line of her softly waving hair; her eyes were brooding and somber. She made an effort to sing, but no sound issued from the lips that were trem bling. When the exercise was finished the little professor still kept his eyes on the girl. "Why do you not sing?” he asked in his kindly manner. Nadine's heavy eyes were again raised to his and the hunted look of a deer at bay sent an expression of graeity into the professor’s face. “I cannot sing today,” Nadine said in a hard, Jerky voice. "It doesn't matter, anyway—I— am giving up the class this week.” A. swiftly hidden emotion swept across the professor's eyes; then he went on with the rhythmical move ment exercise. But the large class of girls, who one and all adored the little professor, felt strangely .antagonistic toward Nadine Vance. In some way she had turned harmony Into discord. It was with a certain sense of relief that the hour ended and the little profesosr dismissed his class with a kindly, paternal smile for each girl as she left the studio. Nadine Vance would have slipped out, too, but she found her escape blocked by his detaining hand. "Miss Vance,” the professor’s voice and eyes were serious, even grave, “I want to talk to yon. Can you come here at about 4 o’clock this after noon?” “No.” Nadine put in swiftly. The girl’s usually sweet, caressing voice was hard and strained. The profes sor's searching eyes did not leave her “I Want to Talk to You This* After noon at 4." face. "It will do no good to talk.” she continued jerkily. ”1 have deter mined to give up this branch of music.” The professor’s voice- took on a compelling note. “I want to talk to you this after noon at 4.” he took tier hand as he often did when parting from his pu pils. "You will come?” t The color came fitfully into Nadine’s cheeks, then it left her with a sudden ly tense whiteness. - * ' "Yes. I will come. But you are I compelling me to <\o something for which I know you will be sorry.” She turned-and was gone' The professor Vrent ‘slowly and thoughtfully back hi the piano. • “She is unstrung—somp love affair.” He communed with'himself over the keys. "What strange vhgaries the feminine temperament indulges in!” The professor’s fingers werp playing the rhapsody of his own mind gad he was not quite conscious that the inner man was seeking to forget the hours between the present and . the hour of 4. . . ; Nadine dressed with unusual taste. She had sufficient of the feminine -weakness' struggling with tempera ment to realize the value of becoming clothes. Her costume was ravishing. “He will probably not even notice whether I have on heliotrope or burnt orange.” A wistful little smile played about her lips. But in truth she knew that nothing escaped the professor's keen eyes, not even the gradually in creasing turmoil in her own heart. “And now he is going to drag my se cret away from me—I know he is." A blush tingled over Nadine's entire being and she dropped her lids over the shamed eyes reflected in the mir ror. When she entered the studio at 4 o'clock she still felt an utter lack of control over herself. “Now, Miss Vance,” the hint of an eternal smile in his eyes, and which was a part of the professor, mingled oddly with the gravity of his voice “you and I are going to have a good talk." He seated her on the wide couch and dropped into his big arm chair. He looked steadily into het great brooding eyes for a moment and said tenderly, "My nightingale's eyes are shadowed, her song is silenced and”—the little professor put in his usual portion of the lighter vein—“her features are extraordinar ily beautiful.’’ A fleeting smile spent itself quick ly in Nadine’s eyes. Then she looked at him in mute appeal, but she re mained silent. “Come, tell your old teacher all about it. You are fighting something out in your own heart little girl— and it doesn't pay. Something is bound to give way." As the words “give way” left his lips Nadine felt the click of a key open the door of her heart. She cart a quick glance at the professor and slipped over and onto the wide arm of his chair. «• And because the little .professor was a strong man and of well-controlled emotions he in no way showed sur prise, but only looked at her writh his paternal smile in his eyes. He could feel the vibrations from her slender body and wondered at the pent-up struggle within her. He was not pre pared for the dry huskiness which spoke of deep feeling when after a moment she found voice. “Call me childish, unstrung—any thing you like.” She burled her head in her arms on the back of his chair and drew a few spasmodic breaths. “But I'm not. I have struggled and fought against this thing called love. But it is obsession, tyrrany—a dom ineering master. And I am utterly weary trying to escape it." Nadine glanced shyly up. Her eyes were no longer brooding, but lumin ous and wonderful. The little profes sor felt a subtle warmth stealing over him. Unconsciously he drew in a deeper breath of her fragrance. He j wondered, a trifle apprehensively, just • what the faint stirring within the depths of his being might portend. Nadine's voice continued in low pitched, emotional cadence. She dropped her head again on her arms and spoke almost to herself. “Per haps if I unburden my thoughts tc you I may in a measure escape the bondage if not the obsession. It may be that in sharing my secret I may gain back the power of song, of laugh ter. and win a few moments’ respite from this unutterable longing, this pent up love that is shadowing every gleam of happiness in life." She ceased speaking, but the little professor was looking with unseeing eyes at the white hand that lay idle on her lap; he had scarcely been heeding her words, for the realization had stolen over him that something big and desperately necessary to his happiness was being dragged out of his reach. Suddenly, and with a force un dreamed of, he turned and swept Na dine off the arm of his chair and into his arms. “Stop! Don’t tell me anything more about this love of yours—I cannot, stand it!” The little professor was trembling and bis voice was even more husky than Nadine’s own. “You have breathed your low tones Into my ear and the scent of your hair in my nostrils and now your heart is pound-, ing against my own—and when you have s.e*. my soul quivering with love’ for you do you think.I am going to stand by and let you talk of love for some other man? You can struggle all you like, but I am going to hold you for my own!” As suddenly as he had taken her he let go his clasp, with a contrite realization of what he had done "Forgive me, Nadine; it all came over me so suddenly—just how dear you are to me.” The little professor made a brave attempt at his kindly, paternal smile. “Can you forgive me now and leave me—” But with a long-drawn sigh of con tentment Nadine crept back Into his arms and twined her arms about him. “Whom did you think I loved?” she asked him. AND THE AUDIENCE LAUGHED Woman’s Explanation of Moving Pic tures More Amusing Than the Exhibit on the Stage. It was an uptown moving picture theater in which smoking is allowed only in the boxes. The show was fairly started when a family party came in, two women of considerable weight and a man with his hair parted in the middle. Up to that time the in voluntary box party had been peace ful, but the heavier of the women re cently arrived took it upon herself to explain to the two other members of the party Just what the pictures were about. She and they were evidently Germans, and the heavier woman was the only one who could read English, so the task devolved-upon her of read ing the announcements on the screen, first in English then translating them into low German for the benefit of her companions. .She had a great deal of difficulty with the thrilling picture drhma of “Arragh-na-pough," for she thought the “pough” had some relation to the word “plough” and insisted on pro nouncing It “pow.” With great dis crimination she gave a free lecture on a series of pictures showing cowboy life in the west, a lecture that was full of beautiful errors, but in the nest picture, a love story, the girl wrote a note to her sweetheart. Which note was thrown on the screen thus: “Dear Jack: We are out in th woods and father won’t let me leav* the camp. Do come out and help m« with my scheme. Yours, Molly." With fine unction and an eviden pride in her scholarship, the heavy woman read the portentous message to her friends, all the people in the vicinity listening, but she read It: “Dear Jack: Ve are in the voods out Papa vill not letten me go. Kom men sie heir und hel-ep me mit chame.” It was at this point that the pic-. ture evoked laughter from a portion of the audience.—New York Herald,