I

T is a sultry spring afternoon. The earth holds its breath as if awaiting some mighty event. Black clouds roll up along the horizon. Scattered at first, they swiftly roll into a solid advancing phalanx. Thunder crashes like big guns. Lightning streaks the sky. Hailstones rattle like machine gun bullets.

A cloud blacker and angrier than the rest comes rolling and tumbling madly. With an ugly whirl it extends a giant, mile-long arm toward the earth. A strange writhing whip of wind, it lashes its tip here and there along the ground, annihilating whatever it touches.

Trees are stripped of branches and flung high into the air. Houses burst apart like bombshells, strewing roofs and rafters far and wide. Human beings, animals and fowls soar through the air like birds, to be dashed to death perhaps a mile away. The terrible monster passes, leaving destruction and death behind it.

That is a tornado, most vicious and terrifying of all storms, exceeding in violence even the dread tropical hurricane. And spring is tornado season. Their playground is the Mississippi Valley; seldom do they visit other parts of the world. Only on rare occasions do they cross the Allegheny mountains into the eastern states, or go west of Denver.

Every year, on the average, 100 tornadoes visit the United States. They kill an average of 250 persons a year and cause $8,000,000 damage. Fortunately these monsters blow their deadly breath over prairies and farm lands where homes are scattered; but about twice in a decade densely populated towns chance to lie in their path.

In March, 1925, a swath of destruction 200 miles long was cut through Missouri, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky and Tennessee, wrecking 36 towns, killing more than 800 people, injuring nearly 3000 and damaging property to the extent of $18,000,000.

Exactly what causes "twisters" and their amazing pranks is a riddle that has long baffled scientists. According to the latest theory they spring from the clashing of two great streams of air. On the one hand are cold winds draining southward from Canada and deflected by the Rocky Mountains toward the Gulf of Mexico. Opposed to them are warm, humid trade winds from the Gulf, proceeding northward. Where the two meet, they join in a mad whirligig of death, a mile up in the sky. From a spinning cloud the commotion beats downward to earth in a long funnel-like arm, a mighty whirlpool in an ocean of air. At the center of the funnel is a partial vacuum produced by the centrifugal force of rotation.

This vacuum is responsible for the strangest whim of the tornado-the explosion of buildings in its path. As the vortex of the whirl passes, the pressure of air outside the walls of a building suddenly is reduced to almost zero. But the air inside the building is at normal atmospheric pressure. In its rush to escape it acts like exploding dynamite, bursting walls and shattering windows. By the same process tornadoes have been known to uncork empty bottles and split empty kegs wide open.

During the five-minute tornado in St. Louis last summer, a mechanic looking through his garage window, saw the walls of a baker's shop across the street split

wide open and tumble outward. A three-year-old baby girl sailed out through one of the cracks. Riding the wind, she soared high over the street to be deposited, unharmed, in a vacant lot several blocks away. Meanwhile the garage and the astounded witness both remained unscathed.

Most of the "freak" happenings which once led people to regard tornadoes with superstitious awe now are known to be caused by the terrific velocity of the rotating air. No one has

yet devised measuring instruments capable of escaping destruction in such storms, but estimates of the speed range from 500 to 1000 miles an hour. Even the lower figure is at least four times the velocity of the tropical hurricane that devastated parts of Florida two years ago.

The forces let loose in a "twister" are titanic almost beyond belief. The wind has been known to drive one wooden beam straight through another, to lift heavy steel bridges from their foundations, to roll boulders weighing many tons along the ground, to pull bricks out of the walls of buildings. Chickens have been stripped of their feathers and people of their clothing. Straws have been driven into tree trunks. In the recent St. Louis storm a freight train was hurled from its tracks; automobiles were flung through plate glass windows. There is recorded one tornado in which a horse flew two miles through the air.

At Murphysboro, Ill., 100 business and residential blocks were razed and 11 locomotives were wrecked. In many cases, the crushed bodies of victims were found pierced with wind-driven sand, pebbles, and splinters.

A freakish prank common to most tornadoes is that the destroying tip skips on its course, rising at intervals to descend again farther on. Witnesses say it seems to single out certain buildings for especial vengeance. In one instance it carried off two horses, leaving a wagon-load of bricks untouched.

Almost everyone who has lived through a tornado tells of its frightful roar. An army chaplain said that the tornado at De Soto, Ill., sounded like nothing so much as the war zone in France. Most of the fearful uproar is undoubtedly the bellowing of the wind, swelled by the crashing of trees and buildings.

Tornadoes in the United States invariably rotate in a counter-clockwise direction a fact which apparently bears a direct relation to the rotation of the earth. The storms move across the country at speeds of 30 to 75 miles an hour. Almost always they travel from southwest to northeast. Over the prairies the approach of a tornado may be seen at such a distance that people have time to flee or to seek refuge in cyclone cellars." Every community in the tornado belt has these caves of refuge.

Since tornadoes seldom damage an area larger than a quarter of a mile wide and 20 miles long, the chance that you will be caught in one is quite remote. Weather Bureau statistics show that the likelihood of any certain building being damaged by a "twister" is less than its chance of being destroyed by lightning or fire, even in the regions where tornadoes are most frequent.

Kansas leads in the frequency of tornadoes, with an average of six and a half a year. Illinois is second with five. Texas, Missouri, Oklahoma, Nebraska, Mississippi, Alabama, Iowa, the Dakotas, Minnesota and Indiana all experience the storms in lesser numbers.

"Twisters" do occasionally visit the eastern seaboard in comparatively mild form. In 25 years Pennsylvania has experienced more than 40, New York State more than 30, and Massachusetts 10. Should a tornado ever hurl itself upon a densely crowded city like New York or Chicago, experts say, buildings like the Woolworth tower might not be blown over, yet their walls of masonry might be blasted away from their steel skeletons.

E

NGLISH-SPEAKING

peoples

have for the first time a history of their language, not a single book, but a dictionary of more than 15,000 pages, treating the development of nearly a half-million words through 750 years of their literature. Begun in 1857, Murray's "New English Dictionary" was, 40 years later, far enough advanced to be dedicated to Queen Victoria of England. Its presentation to King George on April 19, 1928, marks the completion of what is probably the greatest lexicographical work ever attempted in any language.

Over it editors have labored and died. Of the leaders among them-Herbert Coleridge, Dr. Frederick J. Furnivall, Sir James A. H. Murray, Dr. Henry Bradley, Dr. William A. Craigie and Charles T. Onions-only the last two survive. Sir James Murray did more of the work than any of the others, and himself contributed approximately half of the 15,000 pages, over a period of 33

years.

"The aim of this Dictionary," wrote Sir James, "is to show the meaning, origin, and history of English words now in general use, or known to have been in use at any time during the last 700 years. It endeavours (1) to show of each word, when, how, in what shape, and with what signification, it became English; how it has developed; which of its uses have become obsolete, and which still survive, and what new uses have arisen: (2) to illustrate these facts by a series of quotations ranging from the first known occurrence of the word to the latest, or down to the present day; the word being thus made to exhibit its own history and meaning:

and (3) to treat the etymology of each word strictly on the basis of historical fact, and in accordance with the methods of modern philological science."

This great work had its inception in a resolution of the Philological Society of London. Herbert Coleridge, the first editor, began to amass quotations, devoting special attention to obsolete words from books of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries.

Upon his death in 1861 Dr. Furnivall was appointed editor, and divided the letters of the alphabet among volunteer sub-editors, who were to arrange the quotations and classify them for final editing. Much work was done, but somehow there was no unifying scheme for continuance of the dictionary. The enthusiasm of the readers waned.

And

when no publisher could be found to undertake a task of such magnitude, the work practically ceased for a number of years.

It was then that the matter was laid before the Oxford University Press, which finally decided to undertake it if Professor Murray, then president of the Philological Society, would do the editing. In 1897 he began work, and arranged in alphabetical sequence the quotations collected. Then he prepared lists of works to be read. Eight hundred volunteers in all parts of the world responded to a call for readers. Within three years a million quotations were added to those already gathered, making a total of more than 3,500,000, taken from the writings of 5000 authors of all periods, arranged by about 30 sub-editors who offered their services gratuitously.

As new material arrived daily-Dr.

Furnivall had already sent in "some ton and three-quarters of materials which had accumulated under his roof" -the question of storage-room arose. Murray thought that he might convert his drawing-room into a warehouse, but Mrs. Murray quite reasonably objected. Thereupon, he built in his garden a house of iron, the "tin shed," later transferred from London to Oxford where it became one of the leading institutions of the university city. It served as the chief work-shop until, in recent years, quarters were taken in the old Ashmolean Museum Building, conveniently close to The Bodleian Library.

Printing commenced in 1882; the first instalment, a part of "A", was published in 1884; and the first volume, "A" and "B", was completed in 1888. As the work went on, younger men were engaged to assist in the editing. Henry Bradley was chosen as a co-editor in 1896, and immediately removed to Oxford to begin the independent editing of "E". Dr. William Craigie in 1901 undertook the preparation of "Q". Charles T. Onions in 1913 started with parts of "S".

After issuance of the first completed volume in 1888, separate parts were published when ready. The section comprising "Wise-Wy" completes the dictionary, the material from "V" to "Z" having been previously printed.

The total cost of the dictionary was more than £300,000. The Press bore the entire expense, with the single exception of a donation of £5000. Upon publication of the sixth volume, Murray was knighted in recognition of his labors and scholarly attainments. At his death, in 1915, less than one-tenth of the dictionary remained unfinished.

Since 1858 more than 5,000,000 quotations had been collected, of which about 2,000,000 were embodied in the dictionary. Under some entries, page after page was required for treatment. "Set", in its different senses, was given 23 pages, or 69 columns; "see", over 16 columns; "make", 35; and “lie", more than 15.

The editors were unable to trace

some words, mostly colloquialisms, to any ancient roots; nevertheless, they treated these historically, as "bamboozle", which they accompanied with the notation, "Appears about 1700; mentioned in the Tatler." They included many such words, which had passed through conversational, epistolary and journalistic to general literary usage. Many curious facts were also brought to light: for instance, that "I guess" in the American sense of "I think" is not far from the original meaning of the word given by Chaucer, although this meaning is now regarded as an Americanism.

It is barely possible that Murray's preferred spellings may, before many years, be generally accepted both in England and the United States; for, while there are often marked differences between American and English wordforms, the "New English Dictionary" sometimes gives preference to what are considered the American spellings. To be sure, it prefers the English "-our" terminations in words like "labour" and "honour"; the "-re" terminations in "theatre", "sceptre" and their like; and such English forms of "gasolene", "traveller" and "jewellery". On the other hand, it prefers the "-ize" terminations rather than "-ise" in words pronounced with a "z" sound, such as "organize" and "scandalize", which is the spelling commonly used in the United States, but not in England.

The

One might look for flaws in the "New English Dictionary," or lament that it does not include proper names; but its scholarship is so monumental as to make fault-finding seem petty. Oxford University Press has recently engaged Dr. Craigie to edit a supplement which will modernize in every detail the earlier parts, published more than 40 years ago. Material consisting of millions of quotations that have been coming in throughout the last several decades are on hand to make possible this work. Further supplements from time to time will be all that is necessary to keep the whole story of the language always up-to-date.

W

THEN the big armor-plate door snaps closed behind a new prisoner, he comes first before the record clerk. In connection with the record he receives a number that is thereafter used in connection with his name the name is not dropped, as most people assume.

Next he is "dressed in," and changes into a prison-made suit of rough grey cloth. (Stripes are no longer the mode in Sing Sing.) He is marched to the hospital for an initial examination, and thence is locked in an individual cell on No. 13 Gallery. The first turn of the lock in the heavy, steel cell door is one of the greatest tragedies that can come in the life of any man. Now, if ever, a man, no matter how hardened and stolid he may be, will shed tears.

The cell dimensions are 7 ft. long, 3 ft., 3 ins. wide, and 6 ft. 7 ins. high. No sunlight has reached these cells in the hundred years of their existence, and there is practically no ventilation. Each cell contains an iron cot, straw mattress, pillow, and blankets; an electric light; a tin drinking cup; and the prisoner's iron slop bucket-nothing

more.

During the reception period, new prisoners remain locked in these cells, except for meals and for brief intervals when they go for further examinations: physical, mental, and educational; to the prison chaplain for an interview; and to the Bertillon department, for a picture and finger prints. Prisoners agree that this period of reception segregation, that approximates solitary confinement, is the worst part of the "bit." The only privilege of the entire period is a Sunday letter.

Few men's minds could stand the strain of such confinement for more than a short time, as was definitely proved by an experiment in solitary confinement in Auburn Prison in 1821. It was as a result of this experiment, in which a number of men became raving maniacs, that New York State established what is now known as the Auburn system. Under this plan, which has always been used at Sing Sing, the prisoners are locked in solitary cells at night, but work together in groups during the day. Formerly, the prisoners were not allowed to speak to each other, but the "silent system" has not been in effect in Sing Sing for nearly 15 years.

At the end of the reception period, the new prisoners are transferred from No. 13 Gallery to the main cell block, and put to work shoveling coal and performing other heavy tasks. Every new prisoner has this rough and dirty work, unless he is ill or physically unfit. No favoritism is shown to any prisoner, either at this or at any other time. No influence, political or otherwise, gets inside of Sing Sing's walls. To me and to the other officers of Sing Sing, the prisoners are just so many units, so much raw product, to be put through the mill. We are engaged in running a prison in a businesslike manner-not to make dollars out of crime, but to make, if possible (and it is often possible), law-abiding men out of lawbreakers.

Sing Sing in its operation takes on the aspects of a community. Composed of about 1650 prisoners, it makes and repairs its own clothing and shoes; cooks and serves its own food; produces its own light and power; makes its own ice; bakes its own bread; conducts its butcher