This is what I wished for, hoc erat in votis: a bit of land, oh, not so very large, but fenced in, to avoid the drawbacks of a public way; an [1]alluring, desolate, soaked bit of land, favored by thistles and by wasps and bees. Here, without fear of being troubled by the passersby, I could consult the Ammophila and the Sphex [two digger or hunting wasps] and [2]could engage in that difficult conversation whose questions and answers have experiment for their language; here, without distant expeditions that take up my time, without tiring rambles that strain my nerves, I could contrive my plans of attack, lay my ambushes and watch their effects at every hour of the day. [3]Hoc erat in votis. Yes, this was my wish, my dream, always cherished, always vanishing into the mists of the future.

And it is no easy matter to [4]acquire a laboratory in the open fields, when harassed by a terrible anxiety about one's daily bread. For forty years have I fought, with steadfast courage, against the paltry plagues of life; and the long-wished-for laboratory [5]was coming at last. What it has cost me in perseverance and relentless work I will not try to say. It has come; and, with it—a more serious condition—perhaps a little leisure. I say perhaps, for my leg is still hampered with a few links of the convict's chain.

The wish is realized. It is a little late, O my pretty insects! I greatly fear that the peach is offered to me [6]unripe and dry. Yes, it is a little late: the wide horizons of the outset have shrunk into a low and stifling canopy, more and more straitened day by day. Regretting nothing in the past, save those whom I have lost; regretting nothing, not even my first youth; hoping nothing either, I have reached the point at which, worn out by the experience of things, we ask ourselves if life be worth the living.

Amid the ruins that surround me, one strip of wall remains standing, immovable upon its solid base: my passion for scientific truth. Is that enough, O my busy insects, to enable me to add yet a few seemly pages to your history? Will my strength not cheat my good intentions? Why, indeed, did I forsake you so long? Friends have [7]lambasted me for it. Ah, tell them, tell those friends, who are yours as well as mine, tell them that it was not forgetfulness on my part, not weariness, nor neglect: I thought of you; I was convinced that the Cerceris [a digger wasp] cave had more fair secrets [8]to reveal, to us, that the chase, of the Sphex held fresh surprises in store. But time failed me; I was alone, deserted, struggling against misfortune. Before philosophizing, one had to live. Tell them that; and they will pardon me.

[9].Examination at once reveals the tragedy that is happening under the cover of the cocoon. They fear lest a page that is read without fatigue should not always be the expression of the truth. [10]Although I to take their word for it, we would be profound only on condition of being obscure. Come here, one and all of you—you, the sting bearers, and you, the wing-cased armor-clads—take up my defense and bear witness in my favor. Tell of the intimate terms on which I live with you, of the patience with which I observe you, of the care with which I record your actions. [11]Your evidence is unanimous: yes, my pages, though they bristle not with hollow formulas nor learned smatterings are the exact narrative of facts observed, neither more nor less; and whoever cares to question you in his turn will, obtain the same replies.

("The Life of the Fly, by J. Henri Fabre", 2022)

SAND.

PROPERTIES OF GOOD SAND.—Engineers commonly specify that sand for concrete shall be clean and sharp, and siliceous in [12] character. Neither sharpness nor excessive cleanliness is worth seeking after if it involves much expense. Tests show conclusively that sand with rounded grains makes quite as strong a mortar, other things being equal, as does sand with angular grains. [13] The effect of the size and the shape of the component grains on the amount of voids in sand is considerable.  These experiments demonstrate conclusively that loam and clay in sand to the amount of 10 to 15 per cent result in [14] no material reduction in the strength of mortars made with this sand as compared with  washing. There can be no doubt but that for much concrete work the expense entailed in washing sand is an unnecessary one.

The only substitute for natural sand [15] for concrete that, need be considered practically, is pulverized stone, either the dust [16] but fine screenings produced in crushing rock or an artificial sand made by reducing suitable rocks to powder. As a conclusion from the records of [17] numerous tests M. S. Falk says: "It may be concluded that rock screenings may be substituted for sand, either in mortar or concrete, without any loss of strength resulting. This is important commercially, for it precludes the necessity of screening the dust from crushed rock and avoids, at the same time, the cost of procuring a natural sand to take its place."

[18] The aggregates commonly used in making concrete are broken or crushed stone, gravel, slag and cinders.19] (1)This is also an important matter in the choice of natural sands. Sand composed of a mixture of grains ranging from fine to coarse gives uniformly stronger mortars than does sand with grains of nearly one size, and as between a coarse and a fine sand of one size of grains the coarse sand gives the stronger mortar. (2)Further data on the effect of size of grains on the utility of sand for concrete are given in Chapter II, in the section on Voids in Sand, and for those who wish to study in detail, the test data on this and the other matters referred to here, the authors recommend "Cements, Mortars and Concretes; Their Physical Properties," by Myron S. Falk.

Washing With Sand Ejectors.—(3)When large quantities of sand are to be washed use may be made of the sand ejector system, commonly employed in washing filter sand at large water filtration plants; water under pressure is required. (4) In this system the dirty sand is delivered into a conical or pyramidal hopper, from the bottom of which it is drawn by an ejector and delivered mixed with water into a second similar hopper; here the water and dirt overflow the top of the hopper, while the sand settles and is again ejected into a third hopper or to the stock pile or bins.  [20] Figure 1 shows a two-hopper lay-out and Fig. 4 shows a four-hopper lay-out. In the first plant, the washed sand is delivered into bins so arranged, as will be seen, that the bins are virtually a third washing hopper. The clean sand is chuted from these bins directly into cars or wagons. In the second plant the clean sand is [21] ejected into a trough which leads it into buckets handled by a derrick. The details of one of the washing hoppers for the plant shown by Fig. 1 are illustrated by [22] Fig. 3.

("The Project Gutenberg eBook of Concrete Construction, by Gillette and Hill.", 2022)

A few years ago my attention was attracted [23] by an article in one of the leading magazines. It was an article of more than ordinary merit, possessing that rarity, even then, a plot dramatically conceived and executed. The scene was laid in a part of the world the truthful picturing of which showed the writer to be a person who had travelled much and observed keenly; the diction was "English pure and undefiled." [24]There were many strengths, the main one was that the [25]author name was withheld, and I was [26]dismayed to lay my offering of approval and admiration at an unknown shrine.

Lately, in conversation with a man who forms one of the great majority of those who gain a moderate competence in business life, his days spent in the wearisome routine of mercantile life, his nights in painful figurings about that delusive "deal" which is to settle satisfactorily all questions of financial perplexity, our talk turned on books, literary celebrities, the chat of the profession of letters. My friend suddenly became communicative and reminiscent—rare expressions in him.

[27]"I saw your name in the paper," said Cousin Ada. "Did you?" said the good little girl, pleasantly.

I wondered what kind of material this [28]suave, cynical, reserved man could have produced—in other words, what was his undercurrent? I interrogated. To my surprise and consternation, I had found at last the author of my pedestal-placed masterpiece.[29]

"Allowing, for the sake of argument," he answered, "that I possessed talent to the degree you imply, I should still have been forced to my present attitude. I am not alone in this. [30]I am convinced that the best writers (of course, with notable exceptions) are the people who never write. They are those who could bring to the field [31] varied experience, the results of travel thought, and cultivation, but who are driven away by the knowledge that the wolf will have them if they attempt it. Notwithstanding the fact that there has never been a time when literature has been produced so [32] fabulously, a man can only make a moderate competence, and that after years of weary uncertainty and a constant strain on the waiting nerves, and, even at the end, he gets but a meagre reward: [33]internet notoriety and Instagram fame. I am not complaining; I looked the facts squarely in the face, and chose what I regarded as the only sensible solution. I could not conscientiously use literature as a safety-valve or time-passer, giving to the world the result of tired brain and over-wrought nerves; consequently, I sacrificed inclination to necessity, and have left my muse alone. However,"—and he was once more the worldling,—"I have reserved to myself the right to criticise; and when I see a young man of talent enter the field of letters, I conclude he is like a man about to marry, either a great hero or a great fool."

("The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Writer, by William H. Hills.", 2022)

Any woman can drive an electric automobile, any man can drive a steam, but neither man nor woman can drive a gasoline; [34]it follows its own odorous will, and goes or goes not as it feels disposed.

For this very willfulness, the gasoline motor is the most fascinating machine of all. It possesses the subtle attraction of caprice; it constantly offers something to overcome; [35] as wrestling, the strongest and most technical always win. The machine is your tricky and resourceful opponent. When you think it conquered and well-broken to harness, submissive and resigned to your will, behold it is as obstinate as a mule,—[36]balks, kicks, snorts, puffs, blows, or, what is worse, refuses to kick, snort, puff, and blow, but stands in stubborn silence, an obdurate beast which no amount of coaxing, cajoling, cranking will start.

One of the beauties of [37] them is its strict impartiality. It shows no more deference to maker than to owner; [38] it moves no more quickly for expert mechanic than amateur driver. When it balks, it balks,—inventor, manufacturer, mechanic, stand puzzled; suddenly it starts,—they are equally puzzled.

[39] Who has not seen inventors of these capricious motors standing by the roadside scratching their heads in despair utterly at a loss to know why the stubborn thing does not go? Who has not seen skilled mechanics in blue jeans and unskilled amateurs in jeans of leather, so to speak, flat on their backs under the vehicle, peering upward into the intricacies of the mechanism, trying to find the cause,—the obscure, the hidden source of all their trouble? And then the probing with wires, the tugs with wrenches, the wrestling with screw-drivers, the many trials,—for the most part [40] frustrating,—the subdued language of the bunkers, and at length, when least expected, a start, and the machine goes off as if nothing at all had been the matter. It is then the skilled driver looks wise and does not betray his surprise to the gaping crowd, just looks as if the start were the anticipated result of his well-directed efforts instead of a chance hit amidst blind gropings.

One cannot but sympathize with the vanity of the French chauffeur who stops his machine in the midst of a crowd when it is working perfectly, makes a few idle passes with wrenches and oil-cans, pulls a lever and is off, all for the pleasure of hearing the populace remark, [41] "He understands his machine. He is a good one." While the poor fellow, who really is in trouble, sweats and groans and all but swears as he works in vain to find what is the matter, to the delight of the onlookers who [42] jeer at the wanting of technical skill for such a complex machine.

And why should not these things be? Is not the crowd multitude always with us—or against us? There is [43] no spot so dreary, no country so waste, no highway from the habitations and haunts of man [44] than a crowd of gaping people will not spring up when an automobile stops for repairs. Choose a plain, the broad expanse of which is unbroken by a sign of man; a wood, the depths of which baffle the eye and tangle the foot; let your automobile stop for so long as sixty seconds, and the populace begin to gather, with the small boy in the van; like snakes wrapping around its prey, choosing by quick intuition those parts most susceptible to injury from weight and contact, until you scarcely can move and do the things you have to do.

("Two Thousand Miles on an Automobile Being a Desultory Narrative of a Trip Through New England, New York, Canada, and the West, By "Chauffeur"", 2022)