SYDNEY MINES 



. 5668 



SYMBOL 



taining one of the finest organs in the world; 

 a handsome post office in Renaissance style; 

 and the Parliament houses and other govern- 

 ment buildings. Sydney possesses several beau- 

 tiful parks, the finest botanical gardens in 

 Australia, the National Art Gallery, a large 

 number of learned, educational and charitable 

 institutions, and one of the three mints of the 

 Commonwealth. 



Local transportation is provided by an ex- 

 cellent system of electric tramways, owned by 

 the government of New South Wales. The 

 waterworks and slaughterhouses are under city 

 control. The city is a center for the manufac- 

 ture of wagons, glass, pottery, stoves, liquor, 

 boots and shoes and other commodities. There 

 are twenty-three miles of wharves and quays 

 and several dry and floating docks. In 1911 

 the population was 112,921; including suburbs, 

 636,353; in 1917 it was estimated to be very 

 close to 752,500. 



SYDNEY MINES, a town in Nova Scotia, 

 on the northeast coast of Cape Breton Island. 

 It is in Cape Breton County, three miles north 

 of North Sydney and eighteen miles northwest 

 of Sydney, and is connected with these towns 

 by the Intercolonial Railway. The Nova Sco- 

 tia Steel & Coal Company also operates a rail- 

 way to North Sydney. Sydney Mines is one of 

 Nova Scotia's greatest coal-mining towns, the 

 annual output being about a million tons. Be- 

 tween 3,500 and 4,000 men are constantly em- 

 ployed in the collieries. There are also several 

 large, open-hearth, steel furnaces, foundries and 

 machine shops, a blast furnace and a steel 

 compression plant. The manufactures of the 

 town are worth approximately $3,000,000 a year. 

 Population in 1911, 7,470. 



SYMBOL, sim'bol, a sign by which one 

 knows or recognizes an object or an idea. In 

 one sense all words are symbols. Spoken words 

 are the symbols for objects and ideas. The 

 letters of the alphabet are symbols for particu- 

 lar sounds, and these symbols are combined to 

 form the written words which are the symbols 

 for spoken words. 



One of the most conspicuous and familiar 

 symbols is the flag. To every person the flag 

 of his nation means "my country." Colors 

 have a recognized and almost universal sym- 

 bolism, and so have animals. Black is almost 

 universally the symbol of grief; white, of inno- 

 cence; blue stands for sincerity and purple for 

 royalty. A lion is the symbol of courage; a 

 lamb of meekness; the dove and the olive 

 branch, of peace, 



Every religion has symbols, particularly pic- 

 tured ones. In all ages since the crucifixion of 

 Christ the Cross has been the recognized sym- 

 bol of Christianity throughout the civilized 

 world. The ship was an early Christian symbol 

 which represented the Church, in which "the 

 faithful are carried over the sea of life." The 

 gospel writers are represented by symbols; the 

 winged man is Saint Matthew; the winged lion 

 is Saint Mark, the winged ox is Saint Luke and 

 the eagle is Saint John. Other saints carry 

 symbolic emblems by which they may be rec- 

 ognized Saint Mary by a box or vase (for 

 ointment), Saint Paul by a sword, Saint An- 

 drew by a cross. 



In mythology there are innumerable symbols, 

 such as the trident, which is the symbol of 

 Neptune ; the peacock, of Juno ; and the mirror 

 or apple, of Venus. Neptune's trident is used 

 in astronomy to designate the planet which 

 bears his name. Another pictured symbol is 

 the skull and crossbones which, according to 

 the law, must be placed on all bottles and 

 boxes containing poison, to represent deadly 

 peril. It was once the emblem on the flag fly- 

 ing from the mast of pirate ships, white on a 

 black ground; then, as now, it symbolized 

 death. 



All of the sciences mathematics, chemistry, 

 astronomy, botany and biology have a special 

 set of symbols for representing the different ob- 

 jects, elements and operations involved, which 

 are used in place of language. Some of the 

 symbols in astronomy are so ancient that their 

 origin is unknown. The symbols for the prin- 

 cipal heavenly bodies are: 

 Sun <H Mercury 



Venus 9. Earth $ and 



Moon > Mars $ 



Ceres ? Pallas $ 



Juno Vesta fi 



Jupiter H Saturn J? 



Uranus *& Neptune tj? 



A star is represented thus, >|c. 



The phases of the moon are indicated in this 

 manner: new moon; D moon in first quar- 

 ter; full moon; C moon in last quarter. 



Mathematical symbols are numerous, and 

 most of them are very familiar. First there 

 are the symbols of value, the Arabic and Ro- 

 man numerals, and the letters of the alphabet ; 

 then there are the symbols of operations, such 

 as +, the sign of addition; , of subtraction; 

 X, of multiplication; -T-, of division. The 

 character n (pi) stands for the number 3.1416, 

 which is used in computing the area, circum- 



