TOPICAL READING.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 9562, 7 August 1909, Page 4

TOPICAL READING.

AERIAL NAVIGATION. 3ermany, whose naval ambitions already throw so dark a shadow athwart the peace of the world, probably eads in the efficiency of her aerial equipment lor war, as she does in hei land equipment, and is aiming to on the sea. Within a mpnth.or two she will have a fleet of four ( Zeppelin airships, three Parsevals, , and three Grosses. All are vessels depenairg on inflation with gasses ' for their suspension, but they differ, in that the Zeppelin has an absolutely rigid gasholder, an aluminium shell surrounding the inflated receptacle, while the Gross is only semi-rigid in that respect, and the Parseval not so at all. Remarkable as have been the successful flights with Count Zeppelin's inventions, there is information that the second airship of the Gross type, which was constructed especially for military purposes, promises to excel it in efficiency. Two months ago the British Government recognised the seriousness of the aeronautic factor in war, by announcing that a State Department was to be created solely to prosecute and encourage research jin that direction. It is through the spectacles of the soldier that the practical world looks at all this contriving to overcome the laws of gravitation. The astonishing successes of the inventors are rewarded, not so much by the acclaim of a race emancipated from its earthly restrains, and allowed to navigate tht upper air, as by the ever watchful war offices. But no sooner does one war office protege succeed in producing a machine of buiran devastation, than another is on his track to counteract its possibilities, by an invention of still more diabolical intent. : rhre'again Germany leads the way. While the scientists whom she has fostered have studied and wrought to perfect the aerial ship, artillerists have been equally encouraged to devise means whereby those slips fen be destroyed when they are used for tie one great purpose to which society as applying them.

THENF.W CHINA.

The extei t to which China is following the method* of Europe is shown by the air.ivail in London the oih*:r day from Hankow of a shipment of 4,663 frozen -pigs These, with consignments'- c£ beef, poultry, deer, egg 3, and game, mark the beginning of a new Chinese export experiment. The consignments were stringently ii'impC'ted prior to shipment. China "is never likely to become a large exporter of meat, but she is coiri'i»g to the front as a supplier of metaili. Fifteen hundred tors of pig iron from the iron and ste.l works at Hanyang travelled (500 males down . the Yangste Rivir. and 14;00.0 miles by sea, and wire laid down iin Brooklyn, New Yoik, last year. Thus did commercial competition come knocking at America's doors to serve notice that the new Cbiaa was >no longer-a surmise, but a fact. Under semi-official management 3,500 at Hanyang turn out daiily 500 tons of pig iron, and 250 tons of steel. They made the rails and .much other constructive ! ma'erinl for the 750 miles of Pekin- ! Hankow railroad, and for most of the other Chinese Jines since then, besides exporiine over 40,000,t0ns last year. They are putting up another plant for the. maoufacture of cars, ste-.l bridges and other structural material. That is a partial expression of the new China, and in such language theve i-s no equivocation. ! They may not I ave learned to love the foreigner any better for his instruction, but they have discovered that the only,-China that can resist his encroachments is a unified China, a China of railroads and telegraphs, a China of well-drilled soldier and modern rifles, a China that exploit its mines and pushes its manufactures, and, above all, a China with a natiunal spirit and a thoroughgoing education