GEOGRAPHIC MISCELLANEA 



247 



The loss of life from lightning in the United States was greater in 1899 than 

 in any other year for which statistics have been compiled. Prof. A. J. Henr}^ 

 in the current number of the Monthly Weather Heviev, states that 562 persons 

 were killed outright or suffered fatal injuries, and 820 persons received injuries 

 varying from a slight shock to painful burns and temporary paralysis of some 

 part of the body. In fatal cases death was usually instantaneous. The mo.st 

 common form of disability resulting from lightning stroke was a partial paralysis 

 of arms and legs. The zone of danger from a stroke of lightning is apparently 

 larger than the common belief, namely, that in a single discharge from cloud 

 to earth or earth to cloud the zone of danger does not exceed a few inches. But 

 several instances of death by a lightning bolt would seem to show that the 

 influence of a single bolt is not so confined. Professor Henry cites an accident 

 where a span of horses attached to a wagon and a man in the rear of the wagon 

 were killed by a single bolt, while the driver in front was not seriously injured. 



Mecca, the sacred city of the Mo- 

 hammedan world, where for centuries 

 no Christian has entered except by 

 stealth, will soon hear the whistle of 

 an American locomotive. A railway 

 from Mecca to Damascus is now be- 

 ing surveyed by a commission of en- 

 gineers appointed by the Sultan, and 

 a railway battalion is to be specially 

 created by the war oflice to take 

 charge of the woik of construction. 

 The significance of the road is not so 

 much in its commercial importance as 

 in the revolution it means to Ottoman 

 traditions, and in the fact that the 

 Sultan has not been com])eiled by for- 

 eign powers to agree to the construc- 

 tion, l)ut is himself its originator and 

 promotci'. 



Two thousand five hundred miles of telegraph and cable lines are now 

 in operation in the Philippines, every mile of which has been laid or recon- 

 structed by the IJ. S. Signal Corps since the battle of Manila Bay, two years ago. 

 Six thousand five hundred message.s are flashed over these lines daily, all on 

 government business, civil or military. Because of the vast volume of ollicial 

 business the lines cannot be used commercially, but such use is hoped fi)r in a 

 few months. Many of the lines have had to be rebuilt several times, as in the 

 mountainous di^-tricts the insurgents cut them down when they raid tlie valleys. 

 A network of wires covers Luzon, with only two gaps. One of these is stra- 

 tegically important, as it prevents tin; southern half of the island from cominu- 

 nicating witii Manila. The i)asses through which the line would pass are iiehl 

 l>y the insurgents. I'anay, Negrf)s, and ('el>u also liav*^ tln^ beginnings of a 

 siniilai' net work, and the first cnble in t lie syslciii to connect all the islamls has 



