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THE INDUSTRIAL MUSEUM
be enabled by a guide-book or manual, both to refresh his memory and to extend his knowledge. Thus, in the matter of food, it can be shown; M. Soyer and all the other culinary authorities concurring; that the nutritious value of every edible vegetable, root, fruit, seed, or stem, can be ascertained sufficiently well for all great practical purposes, by resolving it, as it always can be resolved, into one class of substances represented by starch, gum, sugar; and into another represented by the curd-like body called albumen or fibrin which gives to wetted flour or dough its stickiness. Had this simple test been trusted and applied, Ireland would not have been decimated by the potato famine; nor, were it believed in at home, would unwise mothers tantalise hungry infants with meagre arrowroot, or unwise farmers, attracted by its cheapness, diet their horses upon sago; neither would mysterious noblemen advertise their restoration to health through assimilation of costly packets of Revalenta Arabica.
Again as to fuel. No doubt it is a nice question, What is coal? and somewhat hard to answer; but there is no difficulty in ascertaining whether a strange body is combustible, and if so, whether it is easily kindled, burns long, burns brightly, gives off much or little smoke, yields a large cinder, and leaves little ash.
AND COMMERCIAL ENTERPRISE,
31
As for clothing materials, if they are of vegetable origin, the strength, tenacity, softness, lustre, colour, and durability of the textile fibres can be tested by simple and decisive means; and the hair, wool, or fur of animals is not more difficult to gauge, so far as its textile and felting characters are concerned. The essentials of a good building-stone may be counted on the fingers of one hand, and although prolonged trial often reverses summary judgments upon mineral masses, we can always at least distinguish a bad from a very good stone, and appraise with some nicety the blocks from every quarry.
The qualities of timber are not recondite or mysterious. As for the metals, the most valuable are the most easily detected. The softness, yellow lustre, abiding splendour, and insolubility of gold; the quickly tarnished paleness of silver; the liquid silveriness of mercury; the obtrusive density of platina; the magnetic characters of iron ore; the striking colour of ores of copper; the prominent crystals of ores of lead, forbid their escape from keen eyes. Each, indeed, of the great classes of industrial materials has qualities with which any moderately sagacious, and sufficiently patient observer may soon become familiar.
In proof of this, look at the astonishing amount of information concerning the resources of a strange
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E.
EL
30
THE INDUSTRIAL MUSEUM
be enabled by a guide-book or manual, both to refresh his memory and to extend his knowledge. Thus, in the matter of food, it can be shown; M. Soyer and all the other culinary authorities concurring; that the nutritious value of every edible vegetable, root, fruit, seed, or stem, cat: be ascertained sufficiently well for all great practical purposes, by resolving it, as it always can be resolved, into one class of substances represented by starch, gum, sugar; and into another represented by the curd-like body called albumen or fibrin which gives to wetted flour or dough its sticki- ness. Had this simple test been trusted and applied, Ireland would not have been decimated by the potato famine; nor, were it believed in at home, would unwise mothers tantalise hungry infants with meagre arrowroot, or unwise farmers, attracted by its cheapness, diet their horses upon sago; neither would mysterious noblemen advertise their restoration to health through assimilation of costly packets of Revalenta Arabica.
Again as to fuel. No doubt it is a nice question, What is coal and somewhat hard to answer; but there is no difficulty in ascertaining whether a strange body is combustible, and if so, whether it is easily kindled, burns long, burns brightly, gives off much or little smoke, yields a large cinder, and leaves little ash.
AND COMMERCIAL ENTERPRISE,
31
As for clothing materials, if they are of vegetable origin, the strength, tenacity, softness, lustre, colour, and durability of the textile fibres can be tested by simple and decisive means; and the hair, wool, or fur of animals is not more difficult to gauge, so far as its textile and felting characters are concerned. The essentials of a good building-stone may be counted on the fingers of one hand, and although prolonged trial often reverses summary judgments upon mineral masses, we can always at least distinguish a bad from a very good stone, and appraise with some nicety the blocks from every quarry.
The qualities of timber are not recondite or mysterious. As for the metals, the most valuable are the most casily detected. The softness, yellow lustre, abiding splendour, and insolubility of gold; the quickly tarnished paleness of silver; the liquid silveri- ness of mercury; the obtrusive density of platina; the magnetic characters of iron ore; the striking colour of ores of copper; the prominent crystals of ores of lead, forbid their escape from keen eyes. Each, indeed, of the great classes of industrial materials has qualities with which any moderately sagacious, and sufficiently patient observer may soon become familiar.
In proof of this, look at the astonishing amount of information concerning the resources of a strange
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