MIRACLES OF SCIENCE 



industries, involving tens of millions of dollars of in- 

 vested capital. 



Suffice it for the moment to name among the ac- 

 complishments of these practical chemists in recent 

 years: (1) the synthesis from coal-tar products of 

 artificial dyes, pigments, and perfumes in endless 

 profusion, revolutionizing the indigo and madder in- 

 dustries; (2) the manufacture of synthetic pearls 

 and rubies and allied gems, forecasting a readjust- 

 ment of the profession of the jeweler; (3) the mak- 

 ing of carborundum, harder than any natural abra- 

 sive but the diamond, and of graphite purer than any 

 ever mined; (4) the transformation of vegetable 

 fibre into an artificial silk in some respects outrival- 

 ing the natural, 15,000,000 pounds of which are now 

 annually put on the market; (5) the taking of nitro- 

 gen from the inexhaustible storehouse of the air, to 

 form ammonia and nitric acid, the basis of number- 

 less industrial compounds, including fertilizers indis- 

 pensable to our agricultural fields; and (6) the very 

 recent synthesis of pure rubber out of starch, an ac- 

 complishment the industrial importance 1 of which 

 will probably be manifest in the near future. 



Scarcely had the papers ceased to chronicle the 

 doings of the Industrial Chemists when they were 

 called upon to record the proceedings of another 

 body of practical scientists, the Fifteenth Interna- 

 tional Congress on Hygiene and Demography, meet- 

 ing in Washington. President Taft remarked face- 

 tiously, in an address of welcome, that he had been 

 too busy to learn the meaning of the word demog- 

 raphy, but that we all know what hygiene means 



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