SCIENCE, INVENTION, DISCOVERY. 



347 



as unmanly, and were consequently treated by 

 soldiers with great scorn. The old German 

 races despised the Roman cavalry for riding 

 on such ett'eminate contrivances. Saddles of 

 the kind now used appear to have been in use 

 in 385. Side-saddles were first used in 1380. 

 Previous to their introduction women always 

 rode astride. 



Salt, Sources of. At one time nearly 

 the whole of the salt used as food and for in- 

 dustrial purposes was obtained from sea-water, 

 and in -many countries where the climate is 

 dry and warm and there is a convenient sea- 

 board, large quantities are still so obtained. 

 In Portugal more than 250,000 tons are an- 

 nually produced, and about the same quan- 

 tity is obtained on the Atlantic and Mediter- 

 ranean coasts of France. Spain has salt-works 

 in the Balearic Islands, the Bay of Cadiz, and 

 elsewhere, which turn out annually 300,000 

 tons ; and even the small Adriatic seaboard 

 of Austria produces every year from 70,000 to 

 100,000 tons. The peninsula and islands of 

 Italy yield about 165,000 tons, and there are 

 still a few establishments in England and Scot- 

 land ; but in these latter countries the indus- 

 try has been almost entirely driven out by the 

 rock-salt works. The salt obtained from this 

 source is called " sea " or " bay " salt. The 

 works are generally called salt gardens salina 

 (Spanish) salz garten, in Austria. They 

 consist of a series of large, shallow evaporat- 

 ing reservoirs. The sea water is admitted, and 

 flows slowly from one to another, all the while 

 evaporating under the heat of the sun, until 

 finally the dry salt remains in crystalline crusts 

 on the salting-tables in the final basins. These 

 reservoirs vary from ten to sixteen inches in 

 depth, the sediment and many of the impuri- 

 ties being deposited in the earlier and deeper 

 basins in the first stages of evaporation. Be- 

 tween the temperatures of 25 and 26 degrees 

 (Baum6) pure salt is deposited, equal to about 

 twenty-five per cent, of the whole. This is 

 kept pure by conducting the brine to separate 

 salting-tables at this temperature, and, after it 

 reaches 26 degrees, carrying it on to other 

 basins, where a second quality, equal to about 

 sixty per cent, of the whole, is formed. After 

 the brine reaches 28.5 degrees it is led into 

 still other basins, where the remainder of the 

 salt is deposited. The salt is raked up and 

 sold just as it is formed, with the slight puri- 

 fication resulting from a few months' exposure 

 to the. weather, which is customary. The 

 evaporating surface of these shallow basins 

 covers, in many establishments, hundreds of 

 acres. Those at Berre, on the Mediterranean, 

 have an area of 815 acres. Sea-salt has been 

 obtained in this way in many of the seaboard 



States of the United States, but not to any ex- 

 tent. The other great source of common salt 

 is the vast mineral deposits. Salt also occurs 

 as a mineral in an almost pure state, and asso- 

 ciated with the rocks of almost every geologic 

 period. Many of the deposits are of vast'ex- 

 tent, and are another great commercial source 

 of this substance. This mineral deposit is 

 called rock-salt, and is evidently the result of 

 the evaporation of great shallow bodies of salt- 

 water in remote ages, as is proved by its gen- 

 erally stratified nature, with beds of clay in- 

 tervening, and the occurrence of marine shells 

 and fossils in the surrounding rock formation. 

 Large mines are worked in P^ngland and all 

 the European countries, and in many places 

 throughout the world. The most famous of 

 all is the mine at Williczka, nine miles from 

 Cracow, in Galicia, which has been worked 

 continuously for upward of six hundred years. 

 It is stopped-out in longitudinal and trans- 

 verse galleries, with frequent large vaulted 

 chambers supported by massive pillars. These 

 extend on four different levels, and have a to- 

 tal length of 30 miles, the mine being 1 mile 

 1,279 yards long by 830 yards wide and 284 

 yards deep. The lower levels contain streets 

 and houses, constituting a complete village ; 

 and many of the miners, of whom there are 

 800 to 1,000, rarely come above ground. The 

 salt is sold just as it is dug out of the mine, 

 and 55,067 tons are annually extracted. The 

 total extent of this deposit is 500 by 200 miles, 

 with an average depth of 1,200 feet. Salt is 

 also obtained in many localities from mineral 

 deposits by means of salt-wells. In some cases 

 the water occurs naturally in the salt strata, 

 and the saturated brine is reached by deep 

 borings (sometimes 1,500 feet) ; in other cases 

 water is introduced into the borings and then 

 pumped out again, two concentric tubes being 

 employed. After the brine is secured it is 

 evaporated by artificial heat in large iron vats. 

 The salt- wells in Onondaga County, New York, 

 near Syracuse and Salina, are a large and im- 

 portant industry. Michigan has the largest 

 output next to New York, and many other 

 States produce it to some extent ; but the 

 home supply is not equal to the demand, and 

 there is a large annual importation into the 

 United States. 



Saw. Invented by Daedalus. Talus, it is 

 said, having found the jaw bone of a snake, 

 employed it to cut through a piece of wood, 

 and then formed an instrument of iron like it. 

 Sawmills were erected in Madeira in 1420 ; 

 at Breslau in 1427. Norway had the first 

 sawmill in 1530. The attempts to introduce 

 sawmills in England were violently opposed, 

 and one erected by a Dutchman in 1663 was 



