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mimiLS How VERTICAL 1 WRITING Causes uURVATURE of the SPINE VERTICAL writing must go! It produces curvature of the spine. Efforts have teen made for many years to trace with extreme care every detail of the child’s comfort while in school. Experts have been railed in to determine the question of the re lation of the children to large window spaces, desks and seats have been graded by frac tions of an Inch so that each child should neither have his feet dangling above the floor nor his knees higher than ease requires, di '""j •nd gymnastic exercises of many kinds have, been devised, and yet all the time thousands of American children have been forced to sit for hours in a position that is a great strain to the system and which threatens serious hodlly distortion, owing to the craze for vertical writing. The French Association for the Advance ment of Science —a most practical body—has been investigating the question of sitting positions In writing; it haw found the attitude necessarily assumed in vertical writing causes ? compression on the upper and the lower Why COPPER Gan- j not Be SCIENCE and even the ordinary progress ( (n (he arts and crafts an each icono-) clasts In their way-that is, they tear j <iow'. and destroy ideals long possessed and \ generally cherished by man Just now It is that delightful old claim that the ancients kuev how to temper copper to the of steel. . l ot year* this has been a general belief.) anti man, a story and not a few serious ar-, relet have been written describing how the i in-i. o< the period just following the stout J agit- tr od to mine copper and by a secret ■ process t rnper it and nrik<* wondorfiil knives) nnd other weapons and tools from it. It was ( called a "lost art. But now not only scientists, but skilled t craiuotnen tn ntetal.-t. conn forward and! declare th. gneients never tempered cop-} per and their reason for making this declara- J non is that copper does not possess tho prop-) •rites tha’ will enable it to b” hardened by l any process whatever ) '■< safe to declare,’ states one expert, I writing i»r a mining publication, that cop- J pel lice never been tempered at any time by) any cn.-, as it does not possess the necessary ’ properties Copper can be hardened in a) toimlwi of ways, the easiest being to plunge) the finished article into molten antimony or< arsetiii,; the n suiting alley formed on the< su.-taee Is exceedingly bard and brittle. He- ( i.eni research in Mexico has shown that the) tools there supposed to be made of hard cop-) I't wei-«. mnd< b. smelting mixed ores of’ copter, nickel and cobalt; the resulting a l-! Icy was naturally hard. None of these old i tools are of a quail” equal tn those which { <ai > u-v be made " ( Trn ' it ' i S'. Ai -' i * —v r - r Le Lneigy in the Daily Kaiiuna of th® Average man C< nvertrd to Me chanical Work Would Rai*r 3.FGO 1 on», or a Gunboat. One Foot High. Whv ENGINEERS Run Past DANGER SIGNALS-the New Disease “PSYCHIC EPILEPSY” Revealed by Scientists (Continued from Preceding Page.) two d.stingo -hed medlril aii'iio’-’l ties* oxpi..in this new disease In addition to the different ex|>er!- ments i.lonff -e line- of psychic epi lepsy, mother nnd separate mass <ff facts has been collected tn recent researches into the effects of over work, tony: bout’s and fatigue. In view of the abundant material row known to science which ostub ibas tUi_ new disease, psychic epl lc; y, and also sho'"- bow fatigue groups of vertebrae, boxring out the spine to the left The curvature of the spine which is thus brought in Is quite charasterlstlc, the line being a greater arc than that which 18 commonly seen In children who were born with this defect or who have acquired ft during babyhood. A number of French school children were photographed with the Roetgen ray appara tus. while sitting at their desks In school during the writing lesson, and In almost everyone of these X-ray plates the compres sion of some of the small bones of the back and the extension of others could be clearly seen. In some cases, when the child sat up straight, it was seen that the survature of the spine had already become fixed, as a twig tied in a certain direction long enough grows at that angle. Indeed, many children who as yet showed no effect of 111 health from this bone distortion, none the less had so strong a curvature that a photograph taken of them while writing presented as bad a picture of the spine as that of a clyonlo invalid, save that in the first case the curve had not be come permanent, in the second it was almost beyond remedy. There Is no portion of the human frame of more Importance than the backbone, not only because It is the main part of the frame, on which all else depends, but because (with the brain) it is the centre of the nervous system. Since the spinal cord is * canal running through the Inside of the backbone, It is easv to see that the curvature has a most danger ous effect on the nerves. More than that, the spinal cord is one of the chief sources of that particular cell which the body produeg to resist disease when the child or person is smitten with Illness. This function also is WllllAM LEE HOWARD. M. IX IT a girl has reached her eighteenth year and finds she is losing flesh instead of gaining, ft is time to look into the cause. Os course you must keep many little things upon your mind when you weigh yourself and find that you have lost three or four pounds since you last went upon the scales' The first thing to remember is that al! the scales in public places, the slot-weighing ma chines and others, arc by no means exact. No two of them will give you the same weight. Just to point out the necessity of remembering these and other little matters, hero is the story of a girl "just scared to death.” She had been worrying about her lack of plumpness she was only seventeen and was still growing. She started away from homo to visit in the country during the hot weather. For several days she had not slept well, and. of course, had eaten lightly. About a week before the onset of the depressing weather she had weighed herself. Her journey lasted all night, and, tired and exhausted, she stepped out of the train at a junction to wait for her friends. There was a slot machine on the platform, and, of course, she at once stepped upon it. Then came the shock—she bad lost seven pounds In a week! She was worried to the point of Illness and really commenced to lose flesh through this worry. Os course, she bad not lost any such weight. First, the scalcS were wrong; next, she had forgotten that she wore fewer and lighter clothes than when last weighed. Then the loss of sleep and the usual slight loss of weight due to the hot weather all had rheir effect. The best sign of good health is when a girl keeps about the same weight if she has stopped growing in every way that is, if she has reached full development. She will vafry two pounds or so every day if all the or- Man’s Marvelous ENERGY no energry to-day*’ Is a com- I I mon remark Many people feeling ■ * out of sorts and weary have an idea , they lack energy, but they do not. Rather, j they possess a marvelous amount of energy. , If they did not they would die. for it takes u great amount of energy to live. The average norma) man requires 2,500 calories of energy each day. A calorie is a definite amount or a degree of heat. Just as a thermal unit is that amount of heat necessary to raise one pint of water one degree Fahrenheit, one calorie is that degree cf heat necessary to raise one kilogram one degree centigrade in temperature. Trans lated to Fahrenheit again, this moans one calorie is that amount of heat necessary to raise four pints of water, or two quarts, four degrees in temperature Fahrenheit One calorie is. therefore, four times as great in energy, as a thermal unit. Just tc maintain the necessary heat of the impairs efficiency, we are able to tin -rstand that engineers who see and ru. [>ast danger signals do so not use they are heedless or fool ar ■ luat entire, but because they are victims of a momentary dis ease. i .10 engineer d islies on to tils death because his mental faculties hnve failed him at a critical moment and it was beyo.nl bis power at that vmeut to . ? J >< lining of the danger signal which he plainly saw or to act upon the significance of the Children Forced to Sit in Position That May Bring on PERMANENT DEFORMITY What THIN GIRLS SLmU D« tn GAIN WEIGHT warning which he perfectly well knew. Fatigue is caused by the accumu lation of waste matter in the blood, which by being thus deteriorated carries a lessened ’upply of nour ishment to the brain. There are two processes going on all the time In the living body. One is the building of tissue, tbe other the breaking up of tissue into simpler chemical forms. These chemical wastes are P<> sotinis impurities, which, under L iW, ! fob JjL' L :l TC : Os i -J i u . jtljiM »» ira f \ Mot. luMA ' MM! iBIbI mI > I fflMr « WM I IMS M I s 1 hI 1 I. 13 HlmliUF 99 wIiMF I flfflin h! Hmr ‘"lm E hlk i'l ill 111 IImB 1 lifeJiy e IHh Hiwri % Willi fflW flEHfc -Aik W MR ®;ww 1111l 1 11 wSi,* whSII S• ; WSi BSWffl Bl |l | MlilM 11l i fin-■ ! f 1 ' il ■r ■ fife ft 1111 ‘I I fiii <!■ Sil ■ ■ MIRi iiMv i'v ; '-iifi Bill M iil q W 1 X-Ray Photograph* oi Children a* They Were Writing the Vertical System, Made by French Scientists, Showed Their Spines to Be Badly Twisted, as Indicated by the Arrow ■ in This Picture. gans are in perfect condition, and she can only be cer tain of these facts by using the same scales and being dressed in the same weight of clothing. Also the time of day must be taken into account, for she will weigh a pound or so less after a day’s work than she did in the morning. The girl who* Is angular and needs those beautiful curves the poets write about rntrnt study herself and find the cause. A girl may be perfectly healthy yet fee some what thin. If she comes from old New England stock she will inherit this thinness. However, if he will ob serve certain rules much of this may be overcome. It must be accomplished by nature’s methods and not through drugs or any of the so-called “fat foods." The teeth are often at the bettom of the cause for being thin. No matter how well you take care of the teeth there may be little hidden pus cavities which during sleep pour out their injurious material which gets into th© stomach. This interferes with digestion without your knowing it and prevents the food from distributing the fat under your skin—which is the way nature produces her womanly curves. See to this mat ter by consulting a dentist. Starchy foods make fat, but before this starch can be mixed with the saliva which prepares it in the mouth so that the digestive appartus can distribute it where it belongs, it must be well chewed and turned around in the mouth. This is the real valuable factor in the chewing fad. Fruits, green vegetables, lean meats, do not need all this preparation by mixing with the saliva. Now, you can exhaust the saliva in the glands by constant chewing; so the girl who habitually chews gum will have when she eats but little, and that weak ened, saliva to prepare her food for digestion. Hence a gum-chewing girl cannot get those curves so eagerly desired. body and support its various activities the ) average man needs 10.000 thermal units ot ? energy each day. This amount of energy \ is sufficient to raise one' ton of water five) degrees in temperature or to raise the tern- ( perature of a man weighing 125 pounds from > 72 degrees to 115 degrees. t The energy represented In the daily ration ' ot the average man, converted into mechani-/ cal work, would raise 3.560 tons one foot' high. The same amount of energy would be used by a man weighing 125 pounds in , walking 190 miles at the rate of three miles, an hour. The same energy would carry a man on a bicycle 570 miles farther, or 760 ; miles. It must be remembered, however, 1 , that only a small part of this enormous en ergy which is introduced into the body by the food is actually convertible for use in muscular work At least four-fifths of all the food fuel taken into the body, and assimi lated. is consumed to maintain animal heat. A Penny SPEEDOMETER CURIOSITY has frequently been turned into capital. P. T. Barnum built up his success through whetting public curiosity rather than by furnishing plain amusement, .and to-day people will spend money more readily to satisfy their curios ity than for anything else outside the bar* i necessities. With this fact in view, an English invent -1 or has perfected a little device whereby , tiny one riding upon a train who says, “I I wonder how fast we are going?” can satisfy ' that curiosity for a penny. In other words, i the Englishman has invented a little slot machine whereby one may learn the speed ! at which he is traveling in a steam train 1 merely by inserting a penny in the slot and J pressing the button. The penny releases a catch which makes it possible to press this ' button, and the pressing of the button con- normal conditions, are burned up by the oxygen brought in by the blood. During activity the production of tissue waste is greatly accelerated because of the increase.; demands upon the tissues, and the amount of oxygen taken in by the blood is not sufficient to burn tp a.I of the poi son. which accumulates rapidly as. the activity continues A period of rest throws the balance in the other ot ctlon. and the diminished de mands upon tin tissues ename the whJHEEARTI/ endangered by even a light curvtura of the' spine. This Is too big a price to pay for the doubt ful advantage of vertical writing. The old slanting system, In use since the sixteenth century, permits the use of a naural sitting position when using the pen, and to that we must return. The public schols of France have mended their ways, the public schools of America should not lag behind. Any teacher who Is forcing her class to learn vertical writing is making cripples of her children and preparing them so- defeat in is battle of life. While the vertical system of penmanship is not being taught in this country as exten sively as It was a few years ago. the fact re mains that it had such wide favor when it was finally inaugurated that it spread throughout nearly all the schools In the coun try and the school authorities have been much slower in dropping this system than they were tn adopting it. There Is not a Board of Education in the country but what, If its members knew how this verticalu system of penmanship actually deforms the tender spines of the children, would order the system changed without a da The d great trouble seems to ba that the knowledge of the harm this system is working to school children has not been sufficiently circulated. If school teachers could see some 0 the twisted spines that have resulted from tblß vertical writing they would refuse to |“’h U. Jus. .. the, would retuse to do «W «■« ?’.’“rluee should he mad. evenstvel, “’au country. a. ootblos would <»»«!»» •» ninmo or keep your weight by eat- Don’t try to ge V p P Tho lntestinal tract Ing condensed p and heavy ma terial to give it stimulation. These materials are always in natural foods. anything, j t other elim along with the care rcaUy } hungry. Stuffing when you do not feel like eating makes , matters much worse. i Milk is very productive of fat in some cases. The , majority of young women do not like milk. Now, Its Is your case, drinking it will be of no benefit It Is the ( same with eggs; eat them if you enjoy them but ; do_not j force yourself just because you have heatd that they make fat. With young men it is vastly different 1 ey like eggs and milk and it will increase their weight. ( Plenty of water with meals and between meals will do ( much for girls and women in keeping a plump body ana i fresh skin. All cereals eaten for breakfast will Increase . your weight if all the other details are observed. But < what will do the most for you is a happy disposition, release from unnecessary worry, avoidance of all anger and jealousy, and a sense of humor and the merry laugh ter which always accompany this joyful disposition. Did you ever see a laughing man or woman who had dyspepsia? You say that they are happy because they are not cursed with the nagging fangs of dyspepsia. Not at all; they keep always in such a happy frame of mind that dyspepsia can find no place in their system. To the thing girl T should say. Avoid worry, do not chew gum, keep your teeth clean, keep your feet dry, allow frsh air to circulate in your sleeping room, eat regularly and be merry at all times. There is nothing else that will give you the rounded form and good com plexion, the bright eyes and elastic step so much de sired by every girl whos duty it is to become as at tractive as possible and like happily. blood to bring in more than suffl- I "mt oxygen to eliminate the amount 1 of waste being produced at the time, and the surplus of oxygen is used by the body to attack and throw oft the lai .■ accumulated starj of poi son. The blame for railroad accidents must in maiy eases !__■ p' cn the shoulders of those who are respon sible for the conditions which force weary and exhausted men to work at times when they should be in bed ! nects the mechanism with a pulley belted to > the axle and a dial indicates tho miles per ; hour. i Thousands of people every day are won- I dering how fast they are traveling. Some try to count telegraph poles or the number > of clicks per minute of the car passing over rail joints, but both ate decidedly unsatis factory. , With one of these penny-in-the-slot ma [ chines handy, the irritated passenger who r thinks he will not reach his destination in time w-ill spend as many pennies to "find i out” as the other sort of passenger who be- I holds the landscape flitting past and says i “Whew! We must be doing a mile a mia- I ute-’’ and drops in his penny also to “find k out." The clever inventor in this manner , plans to profit by people’s natural cu- riosity. getting rest. But an engineer who has taken his "day off” or rest hours to carouse or tn other ways fatigue himself is, of course, the guilty one. The human machine cannot be taxed beyond endurance without great danger. One of the first requirements of the engineer is that he should be able to keep his mind on his work. He must be always alert to eaten aui' interpret the many signals that flash by in rapid succession. The school authorities so quickly of the danger* of vertical writing as a series of such photo graphs showing the actually twisted spine< and, in some Instances, little spines that 5 :n to have been permenently twisted. The teachers who began teaching this wern naturally not affected with twisted spines, for the reason that their spines had reached m.i ture growth and the bones were no longer pliable and susceptible to twisting. But pho. tographs made In France by X-ray of adds while writing the vertical hand show that even their mature, strong backbones are twisted while they are sitting in the position necessary for thia work. Not only does the position necessary »<w vertical writing twist the spiue, but other in juries follow as a natural result As has been explained briefly, the spinal cord, the " channel," in fact, runs through the backbon ■, and any Injury to the spine Injures the c -1. which affects nerves, blood and brain. Tho circulation of the blood is Impaired, the ner vous system Is terribly unstrung, the brain i Anally affected, and the little student n • only acquires a twisted spine, but general I health, which, if continued, will make him i Incvalid, at least, and unfit for the hard ba • tie of life that must come to at least nine tenths of the children when they reach n i turity. Vertical writing is no easier to read, ex cept, perhaps, to the very small child, and this is because It resembles printed letters to a considerable degree and the child team a printed letters first. But to adults the slant ing penmanship is read quite as easily, it is much handsomer, and lends Itself to more ornamental penmanship. Again, vertical writ ing is no more natural than it is for iue>; children to write with their left hand. Does Man Know HOWTO FEED? ACCORDING to Professor Gautier. ot Paris, man must go to the ape, tb« babboon, the orang-outang and even to his closest animal friend, the dog, to learn how to feed. Professor Gautier explains this view with the following declaration: ”We do not know how to feed—that is, man. Animals do kuo > how to feed, and in this respect, at least, w are lower than the animals. Man has lost t! instinct of properly nourishing himself, whi> all the lower animals have an innate know* edge of their proper food. “Take, for instance, the dog,” explained th* professor in a recent lecture “This anitni left wild. In the deep country, can provide f - himself. But take him Into civilization ar, force upon him foil quite a period exactly same diet a man adopts and it will kill dog. That Is, make the dog eat exactly th same things, truffles, fried meats, salad acids, condiments, astnngments and snet things, and in time it will prove fatal. Tost’ the dog chunks of bread, some bones to mas cate, a few tough pieces of meat and be >vi I thrive, but force him to eat the mixtures tin i concoctions mankind has invented and called food and he cannot live through it. “The same can be said of apps and mon keys and other animals. Take the extrema savage races and there are no dyspeptics, n > appendicitis victims. The men of these races the aborigines, die from practically only three causes—ln battle, through accidents and of old age. The writer,” laughed the professor, “who declared man could live without sermons or books, but could not live without cooks, sai l something rather epigrammatic, but it was not quite true As a matter of fact, man has lived longer without cooks than without either ser mons or books.” KI I f I l L-J By Putting a Penny in I ni» ' * Speedmeter the Paaaenger Can Learn the Exact Speed H'« Itjjl tjj 1» Mailing at That Moment. least lessening of his attention cm bring disaster It Is no e;is> '■ ■>. even for n mind hut Is fre-ti I strong, to keep the though ■> wandering. One ot ttie most - > Ing illustrations ol fatigue psychic epilepsy ri'cetitly hai on a Western railroad. An eu.- who haa been up all night al . - - tailed to heed the frantic «-■ - signals of bis own wife as in- -1 bis engine past his ©vn Uom rutl over uue us Dis owu •*