44 



Among the many lesser inventions of which he 

 makes use, we notice a simple device to protect 

 some favorite trees from the invasion of caterpillars. 

 The trunks of the trees have two narrow bands of 

 copper around them at short distances apart. 

 These bands are connected by wires with the poles 

 of a battery capable of delivering a very strong 

 current. When a caterpillar crawls up one of these 

 trees and crosses the metallic bands, it is in the 

 same unpleasant situation as the murderer in the 

 4 electrocution chair ' at Sing Sing. Its body 

 makes the connection between the terminals of the 

 battery, and it goes no farther. If the current is 

 powerful enough a diminutive arc-light is the result, 

 and a cinder all that is left of the caterpillar. In- 

 deed he is tempted to use this method, with some 

 modifications, in dealing with the chicken thief, 

 the burglar, and even the ubiquitous tramp. 



" See the huge earth-batteries and tall geomag- 

 netifers he uses in forcing his crops ; how he spreads 

 electricity, as it were, through the soil, and keeps 

 large arc-lamps burning at night to still further 

 assist in hastening the growth of his farm products. 

 With the heat generated by these lamps, or by 

 means of special resistance coils, generating it more 

 abundantly, he is able to prevent frosts doing 

 damage to his earlier and more tender fruits and 

 vegetables. 



"Had the late rain-producing experiments been 

 successful, we might even picture this fortunate 

 farmer calling down the refreshing showers when- 

 ever he thought his crops needed them. And if he 

 believed, with Jean Paul Richter, that the thunder- 

 storm-bath was as refreshing and invigorating to 

 the human system as to the trees and flowers, he 

 would invoke the storm with his bombs when he 

 thought his grain needed rain, regardless of the fact 

 that there was a picnic in the wood or a farmers' 

 encampment in the grove indeed, he would take 



