The purpose of this little book is to give a general idea of a few of the great achievements of our time. Within such a limited space it was impossible to even mention thousands more of the great inventions and triumphs which mark the rushing progress of the world in the present century; therefore, only those subjects have been treated which appeal with more than passing interest to all. For instance, the flying machine is engaging the attention of the old, the young and the middle-aged, and soon the whole world will be on the wing. Radium, "the revealer," is opening the door to possibilities almost beyond human conception. Wireless Telegraphy is crossing thousands of miles of space with invisible feet and making the nations of the earth as one. 'Tis the same with the other subjects,--one and all are of vital, human interest, and are extremely attractive on account of their importance in the civilization of today. Mighty, sublime, wonderful, as have been the achievements of past science, as yet we are but on the verge of the continents of discovery. Where is the wizard who can tell what lies in the womb of time? Just as our conceptions of many things have been revolutionized in the past, those which we hold to-day of the cosmic processes may have to be remodeled in the future. The men of fifty years hence may laugh at the circumscribed knowledge of the present and shake their wise heads in contemplation of what they will term our crudities, and which we now call _progress_. Science is ever on the march and what is new to-day will be old to-morrow. We cannot go back, we must go forward, and although we can never reach finality in aught, we can improve on the _past_ to enrich the _future_. If this volume creates an interest and arouses an enthusiasm in the ordinary men and women into whose hands it may come, and stimulates them to a study of the great events making for the enlightenment, progress and elevation of the race, it shall have fulfilled its mission and serve the purpose for which it was written. CHAPTER I FLYING MACHINES Early Attempts at Flight--The Dirigible--Professor Langley's Experiment--The Wright Brothers--Count Zeppelin--Recent Aeroplane Records. It is hard to determine when men first essayed the attempt to fly. In myth, legend and tradition we find allusions to aerial flight and from the very dawn of authentic history, philosophers, poets, and writers have made allusion to the subject, showing that the idea must have early taken root in the restless human heart. Aeschylus exclaims: "Oh, might I sit, sublime in air Where watery clouds the freezing snows prepare!" Ariosto in his "Orlando Furioso" makes an English knight, whom he names Astolpho, fly to the banks of the Nile; nowadays the authors are trying to make their heroes fly to the North Pole.