Nature's Teachings: Human Invention Anticipated by NatureWood, J. G. (John George)
History
Nature's Teachings: Human Invention Anticipated by Nature
Wood, J. G. (John George)
Inventions; Natural history
I NEED hardly remark that on the right-hand side of the illustration is
shown a Laminated Stove, and that on the left are drawings of the gills
of the Shark tribe and the common Trout. If the reader would really like
to look into the subject for himself, I should suggest the purchase of a
cod’s head and shoulders and a lobster. The breathing apparatus can be
removed from each for examination, and the remainder will serve as a
first course for dinner.
RING AND STAPLE.
Humble, and apparently insignificant, as the principle of the Ring and
Staple may be, we owe no small amount of our domestic comfort to it. It
meets us in all kinds of ways, in the hinges of our boxes, in the
padlocks of our doors, in the innside fastenings for our horses, in the
seaside fastenings for ships’ cables, and in a thousand other ways too
many to enumerate.
* * * * *
ON the right-hand side of the next illustration is shown the Ring and
Staple as used for the purpose of mooring ships and boats, it being
absolutely necessary that the machinery, simple as it is, must be
capable of working in any direction, and with some latitude as to the
extent.
[Illustration: HEAD-BONES OF ANGLER-FISH.]
[Illustration: STAPLE AND RING.]
On the left hand are shown two of the wonderful bones which are found in
the head of the Fishing-frog or Angler-fish (_Lophius_), and which serve
as decoys, by means of which the smaller fish are entrapped into the
vast jaws of the Angler-fish.
It is clearly necessary that these singular appendages should be capable
of movement in every direction, and this object is attained by the
structure which is here shown, and which is almost equal to the
ball-and-socket joint for its freedom of movement. It will even allow of
partial rotation, so as to cause the little strip of skin at its end to
assume the aspect of a living worm, and entice the smaller fish into the
jaws of the dread trap that lies open before them.
A figure of this fish may be seen on page 92.
THE FAN.
Except in permanently cold countries, a Fan of some kind seems to be an
absolute necessity. Sometimes, as in the greater part of Europe, it is
used only by the softer sex. The harder sex would often be only too glad
to use it if they dared, and the same observation is equally true with
regard to the parasol.
But, in such lands as Japan and China, the Fan is an absolute necessity
of existence. Men, women, and children alike carry their Fan, and almost
perpetually use it. I remember, when the troupe of Japanese acrobats
were in England, that one of them exhibited the national use of the Fan
in an excessively ludicrous manner.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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