sintegrated.

The quest now is, and has been, to find some material of a purely
metallic character, which will have a very high fusing point, and which
will, therefore, dispense with the cost of the exhausted bulb. Some
metals, as for instance, osmium, tantalum, thorium, and others, have
been used, and others, also, with great success, so that the march of
improvements is now going forward with rapid strides.

VAPOR LAMPS.--One of the directions in which considerable energy has
been directed in the past, was to produce light from vapors. The Cooper
Hewitt mercury vapor lamp is a tube filled with the vapor of mercury,
and a current is sent through the vapor which produces a greenish
light, and owing to that peculiar color, has not met with much success.

It is merely cited to show that there are other directions than the use
of metallic conductors and filaments which will produce light, and the
day is no doubt close at hand when we may expect some important
developments in the production of light by means of the Hertzian waves.

DIRECTIONS FOR IMPROVEMENTS.--Electricity, however, is not a cheap
method of illumination. The enormous heat developed is largely wasted.
The quest of the inventor is to find a means whereby light can be
produced without the generation of the immense heat necessary.

Man has not yet found a means whereby he can make a heat without
increasing the temperature, as nature does it in the glow worm, or in
the firefly. A certain electric energy will produce both light and heat,
but it is found that much more of this energy is used in the heat than
in the light.

What wonderful possibilities are in store for the inventor who can make
a heatless light! It is a direction for the exercise of ingenuity that
will well repay any efforts.

_Curious Superstitions Concerning Electricity_

Electricity, as exhibited in light, has been the great marvel of all
times. The word electricity itself comes from the thunderbolt of the
ancient God Zeus, which is known to be synonymous with the thunderbolt
and the lightning.

Magnetism, which we know to be only another form of electricity, was not
regarded the same as electricity by the ancients. Iron which had the
property to attract, was first found near the town of Magnesia, in
Lydia, and for that reason was called magnetism.

Later on, a glimmer of the truth seemed to dawn on the early scientists,
when they saw the resemblance between the actions of the amber a