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National Geographic : 1904 May
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LESSONS FROM JAPAN gives of the Vincennes on the i7th, this line will go straight to the " Hohes Eisbedecktes Land." The direction tal lies exactly. Now, as to distance, the western coast of the "Hohes Eisbe decktes Land," the one which Dr von Drygalski saw, is about 150 miles from the position of Wilkes on the i7th, and as this land must have some eastward extension and an eastern coast, it is ob vious that this eastern side can not be very far from where Wilkes placed Ter mination Land. Besides, this " eisbe decktes"' is also " hohes'" land; that is, it is a high, mountainous land, and there fore it must be visible at a long distance. Sir James Clarke Ross states that he LESSONS F ONE of the assignments of David G. Fairchild, agricultural ex plorer of the Department of Agriculture, during 1903 was to visit Japan with the third Barbour Lathrop Expedition toseeif some agricultural les sons might not be learned from a people who are such ingenious farmers that their 45,000,000 people live almost en tirely on the productions of a cultivated area about one-third the area of Illinois. As a result of this visit, two interesting reports by Mr Fairchild have been pub lished by the Department.* A number of new plants of commercial value have also been introduced, which promise a material addition to the wealth of our country and new crops of value for the South-among them, mitsumata, a Jap anese paper plant, and new varieties of bamboo. From the bark of trees and shrubs the Japanese make scores of papers, which are far ahead of ours. * " Japanese Bamboos and their Introduction into America," and "Three new Plant Intro ductions from Japan " by David G. Fairchild. Bulls. 43 and 42, Bur. Plant Ind. Dep't of Agric. sighted Victoria Land at over one hun dred miles distance by the land blink, and Wilkes was certainly as near as that to the eastern coast of Termination Land. Thanks to the voyage of the Gauss, therefore, the world now knows posi tively that Termination Land exists, per haps a few miles more to the west, but otherwise just about where Admiral Wilkes charted it; and, far from discred iting Admiral Wilkes, the observations of Dr von Drygalski simply show once more what a remarkably acute and ac curate geographical observer Admiral Wilkes was. EDWIN SWIFT BALCH. ROM JAPAN The walls of the Japanese houses are wooden frames covered with thin paper, which keeps out the wind but lets in the light, and when one compares these paper-walled "doll houses" with the gloomy bamboo cabins of the inhab itants of the island of Java or the small windowed huts of our forefathers, one realizes that, without glass and in a rainy climate, these ingenious people have solved in a remarkable way the problem of lighting their dwellings and, at least in a measure, of keeping out the cold. Their oiled papers are astonishingly cheap and durable. As a cover for his load of tea when a rainstorm overtakes him, the Japanese farmer spreads over it a tough, pliable cover of oiled paper, which is almost as impervious as tar paulin and as light as gossamer. He has doubtless carried this cover for years, neatly packed away somewhere about his cart. The " rikisha"' coolies in the large cities wear rain mantles of this oiled paper, which cost less than 18 cents and last for a year or more with constant use. 221
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