When- Man is Strongest. American Life-saving Devices. How the Nations Carry Their Money.

Otago Witness, Issue 2362, 1 June 1899, Page 61

When- Man is Strongest.

American Life-saving Devices.

How the Nations Carry Their Money.

Tho muscles, ir common with all the organs of the body, havo their stages of development and decline; our physical strength increases up to a certain p.ge, and then decreases. Tests of strength of several thousands of people have been made by means of a dynamometer (strength measure), and the following are given as the average figmes for the white' race.

The " lifting power " of a yoath of 17 years is 2801b ; in his twentieth this increases to 3201b, and in tho thirtieth and thirty-first yearß it reaches its height, 3561b. At the end of the thirty-first year .the strength begins to decline, very slowly at first.

By the fortieth year it has decreafed 81b, and this diminution continues at a slightly increasing rate until the fiftieth year is reached, when the figure is 3301b.

After this period the strength fails more and more rapidly until the weakness of old age is reached. It is not possible to ghe statistics of the decline of strength after the fiftieth year, as it varies to a large extent in different individuals.

Writing from New York a correspondent send} us the following interesting account of life-saving devices in the United Stales. Ho says : —

"Your British firemen are splendid fellows, but they are not so well equipped as our«. Of course, our tremendously high buildings havo necessitated certain special appliances. Foi- instance, to rescue people who may happen to be imprisoned in tho higher storeys by a fire beneath them, our men have a gun jfor firing a projectile to

which ia attached a thin wire line (aa in the little sketch I send). To this a stouter cable is attached, and this is hauled up when, the thin line has been secured. By this means a communication is established with the ground, aftei which the work of rescue is much simplified.

"Another useful contrivance is tho scalingladder, consisting of a stout polo with short cross-pieces. By means of this the firemen can climb from storey to storey, and can. descend with people who are in danger of perishing in the flames.

"For encountering smoke or nauseous fumes our firemen now use an apparatus which I do not think your fire brigades posses*. It is a. portable reservoir of compressed air, sufficient to last a man for two hours. Thus equipped a fireman, can ko in safety where

formerly he would have been suffocated in a few noments." — Cassell's Saturday Journal.

It is rather amusing," remarked the head of thp biggest bureau of change in London to the writer, " to notice the various methods in which men of different nationalities carry their 'worldly wealth. The Englishman, carries his all loose in his right-Hand trousers pocket —gold, silver, and copper all mixed up together. He pulls a handful of the mixture out of his pocket in a large, opulent way, and selects the coins he. has need of. The American carries his ' wad of bills' in a peculiar long, narrow pocket-book, in whioh the greenbacks lie flat; the Frenchman makes use of a leather purse with no distinguishing chalacteristics ; while the German uses one gaily embroidered in silks by the fair hands of some Lottchen or Minn.

*' The half-civilised capitalist from some torrid South American city carries his dollars in a belt, with cunningly-devised pocket 3to baffle the gentlemen with the light fingers. Some of these belts are very expensive. The Italian of the poorer classes ties up This little fortune in a gaily-coloured handkerchief secured with many knots, which he secretes in some ' mysterious manner about his clothes. A similar course has charms for the Spaniard; while the lower-class Russian exhibits a preference for his boots or the lining of his clothes as a hiding place for his savings."