NOTES AND COMMENTS.

Colonist, Volume LI, Issue 12408, 25 November 1908, Page 2

NOTES AND COMMENTS.

''■;.■ ' ". ■ — ."..*■ — ' Tha W(|reless-Teiephone. A cable -'meSsago published a few days ago -stated that .a wireless telephone was in operation at> Paris. In 1897 the greatest ; distance to . which , wireless telegraphy has sent a mes-. sage was ten miles. ; Wireless telephony, though 'still in Us initial stages,* is much more advanced than "wireless" - -was then, . for its latest record is 200 miles and its theory 'is also much more complete. The * earlier groups of experiments in wireless telephony took advantage of the sensibility of selenium to light; Bell in rack, made a practical application t of this method as long ago as 1878. A; -more promising effort was Simon' s 1 discovery in 1897, that an electric :• arc may be made to serve as atelef' phonic receiver. This device of the "speaking-a rc* carried out. with a " strong searchlight enables speech to. be tfansmtted a mile or two. Such speech, moreover, can be literally photographed and reproduced by a suitable phonograph. Such lighttelephony was shown by Ruhmer to bo quite practicable over short distances,'aYid readily" adaptable to warships carrying strong searchlights.' The future, however, belongs "to elcct/rical methods. Soon after Marconi's earlier ..successes attempts were made at : waj^teiephony. Promising ex- - periments have been made along scv--1 eral lines, the technology of which is ' too complex to explain here. ■ Such men as Fessenden and Tesla, however,- --■ have aftxll fai-fcK -that, it -will -soon lac as easy to speak across an ocean as across a table. „ Twenty-eight sets of wireless telephones have been 1 orderedVfor the United States navy, and some of these have transmitted 1 speech' 25 miles. . Poulsen has talked across 50 miles of apace at Berlin. This is enough to show that these applications of wave-telephony have come to 'stay,; and rapid development may be" looked for.. - Safety in Railway Travel Ting. The. yearly report published by the British Board; of Trade upon the accidents that have, occurred on the. railways of the United Eingdow emphasises thd safety of railway travelling. During the 30 'years ended with 1906 one passenger in every 40,300,00? : journeys' was killed, and one: in every 1,300>000 journeys injured; but the. figures for 19.07 are far batter, only one in 70,000,000 being killed, and one in 2,30(j,000 . injured. The risk is even- less than this, since these figures take no account of the journeys of season ticket, holders,' upon the numbem of which there ia no check. In thfe 1 class of accidents caused by the movement of trains and railway vehicles/ exclusive of train accidents, passengers were killed' and 2132 injured for 1907. The corresponding averages for the 10 years previous to 1907 were 121 and 1702 respectively. Of servants of railway companies and contractors, 441 were killed and 5577 were injured in this 'class of accidents; '/The average for the previous 10 years was 452 killed and 3972 injured. ;■"-' '■■':'■ While an improvement, is shown in the fatal cases, the non-fatal cases show a large apparent increase. This is no doubt due to' a' considerable extent to the operation of the order of the Board of Trade, of December ," 21st, 1906, which requires. -non-fatal railway accidents -to railway servants 'Lio be reported whenever they are . c 'such as -tb cause any person injured ''; to be absent from his ordinary work for a whole day at- a time. „.. -