The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, May 10, 1896, Page 26

THE SAN FRANCISCO CALL, SUNDAY, MAY 10, 1896. / == = S i CHVARDS = il = — 1 UE HE failure of Congress to pass ap- | propriations for the construction | of a Government dockyard on the | Pacific Coast, of greater extent | than that of Mare Jsland, has| awakened the curiosity of many people as to why these institutions should reauire so much money and take such a long time | to complete. A modern steamship is un- | doubtedly the highest point of man’s mechanical excellence and skill, and of all steamships, the modern man-of-war is the most costly and complicated. Tt is | necessarily complicated since it is built to | fight with, and to fight successfully against | masses of animated iron and steel, and it must also insure the safety of the men who are within it. And to make it a pro- | tection against the armor piercing projec- | tiles thrown out from guns with immense velocity and power requires that it should | be covered itseli with an armor of materiai %0 hard and firm and elastic that the steel | of the Toledo or Damascus swords are as | nothing to it. Then this immense mass must be swift- Iy propelled and made to stop quickly and | to turn about very short, to move in every direction, and it must have within itself the means of generating all the necessary power. It must for safety be divided into many partitions, and yet so arranged that while the apertures between apartments can be quickly opened, they may be as quickly closed in danger. There must be | perfect communication between all parts of this wonderful machine, so that like the | arms or feet on the body obeying the will the various members of the ship answer | instantaneously to the brain of the com- mander. And within itself must be the means of seif-sustenance for a considerable time, while added to all the foregoing requisites is the most important of all, | that of being able to fight by every means, with either guns, torpedoes or its own im- } pact. | To manufacture such a wonder requires | | many machines and very costly ones, many buildings for making the various parts, much land for the storage of material and much space to build the | monster itself in. A brief description of | the principal dockyards of Europe will throw some light on this question of e pense. It must be remembered thatin the ship-building establishments in America it 1s impossible to build a modern battle- ship short of two years, and when there- fore it 1s asked of Congress that money shall be given for eight or ten such vessels it will regunire with our present facilities four or five years to complete the work. H OI course, at the head of all powers | England stands with her dockyards as with her navy. Not only has she the greatest number, but she has the largest, the best equipped, and can turn out the | greatest number of warships and in the | quickest time. Some of them are situated abroad in her colonial possessions, but | they are for the purpose of repair, while | the great ones for building are all in Great Britain. They are at Pembroke, Devon- port and Keyham, Portsmouth, Chatham.| und Sheern, On these dockyards there | bas been an immense amount of money spent—many times over the value of them as they stand, which is estimated at $140,- 000,000. In building them much of the “sbor has been done by convicts, so that Jhe cost might be put down as low as pos- rible. Here are employed as many men as greatest and finest of Britain’s ships were built. This gregt yard is considered the head- quarters or general rendezvousof the Brit- ish_tleet. It was founded by Henry VII, and was a very important naval station even in the early Plantagenet times. In 1212 the Sheriff of Southampton was ordered to cause the docks ar Portsmouth to be inclosed with a strong wall, in the manner in which the archdeacon of Taun- ton would point out, for the preservation ur. W R HAMILTON, U.SA. are themselves splendid docks, capable of receiving the heaviest warships from the tidal basin. They lead to the repairing ba- sin, which is an artificial pond or lake with twenty-two acres and thirty-five feet of water at high tide. This depth of water can be made permanent by the closing of the lock gates. From this basin lead out four other basins or docks with a depth of thirty feet of water. There is a rigging basin of fourteen acres and a pentagon- shaped fitting-out basin of fourteen acres, on one side of which is an immense coal- ing station. There are other basins and docks, and around all are immense for¢ifications. In- side are the many storehouses and various shops and mills, while a complete network of railways connects all parts of the yard with the docks and basins, and the whole are in Devonport, while the shops and fit- ting-out basins are in the Keyham yard. A curiosity to be seen in Devonport is a huge floating platform in the drydock and intended to submerged and used to float oug vessels while under repair. All the other dockyards in Great Britain are secondary to those mentioned, except- ing, of course, several belonging to private firms. = The principal dockyards beloneing to foreign powers are as follows: Germany— Kiel, Dantzic, Wilheimshafen. Russia_— Cronstadt, St. Petersburg, Nicholaieff and Sebastopol. Austria—Polaand Trieste. Denmark—&menhagen France — Cher- bourg, Brest, L'Orient, Toulon and Roche- fort. ~ Spain—Cadiz, Cartagera. Italy— Naples, Spezzia and Castellamare. | The yard at Wilhelmshafen is on the North Sea, while Kiel and Dantzic are on the Baltic. Thatof Kiel is the most im- portant, and most of Germany’s great ships haye been built there. Over $24,000,- has been spent on this yard, with its basins, locks and docks. The great North Sea canal, the magnificent harbor of Kiel, ten miles long and very deep, and the splendid fortifications surrounding the yards. make this one of the best located and best adapted yards in the world. In Russia the aockyardsof St. reters- burg and Cronstadt are on the Baltic, the others on the Black Sea. A new yard is being built which promise$ ta eclipse all the others. Tt is in the province of Circas- sia and fifty miles from the Black Sea, on Xw ?lruits joining that body to the sea of zol. The most important of the French dock- | yards is that of L'Orient, in the northern vart of the Bay of Biscay. Itsenvirol ment resembles that of Portsmouth, H. There is also a large military station here, and the entire yard is about 120 acresin extent. 5 Cherbourg is the most imposing of the o 0= Cherbowrg- France DOCKYARD AT CHERBOURG, THE DOCKYARD AT PORTSMOUTH, ENGLAN [From a plan drawn by a Government Engineer.] 1, 6, 15—Offices_ 2" Armor Plate § rthwest Building. ol rtheast Building. 9. 10—Saw Pits. 14—Timber-sheds. . Southwest Building. ‘outheast Building ontractor's Yard 17—Deal Yard 18—Rope Hous: 19, 20, 21, 22— 23—Mast Workshop. 24, 25—Boathouses 26—R. N. Colleg 27—Main Gate.. 29, 30—Officers’ Houses. in the entire United States army—26,000— and these men are paid over $5,000,000 a year in wages. The greatest of all thedockyards belong- ing to the Government is that of Ports- mouth. It contains 300 acres, has over 6000 employes, five building slips for ves- sels of the largest size and fifteen dry- docks of varying sizes from the largest to the smallest. 'fhese drydocks and basins are all connected with wide and deep canals and basins in which many vessels may be laid for repairs. The dockyard at | Chatham is_thbe second 1n the Kingdom, has about employes and covers over 100 acres. The map on this page of ThE CaLy gives in detail the Portsmouth yards with their various buildings, basins and docks. It was at this yard that the Col- lingwood, the Camperdown, the Colossus, of the King’s ships and gallevs. In 1540 the area of the yard seems to bave been about eight acres and fronted on_the har- bor on a portion of what is now known as the !uu%’u Stairs. Cromwell added two acres to it and Charles II added eighteen. Between 1667 and 1710 thirty acres were reclaimed from mud flats and additional ground bought from the town, so that by 1712 it comprised ninety acres, but about 1840 the growth of a steam navy occa- sioned additional land, and from that time to this there has been a steady growth in size and capacity. At present the system of docks and ba- sins begins with a tidal basin, entered from the harbor by an ning 100 yards wide and having a depth at low tide of thirty feet. There is a deep dock and two locks at the head of this basin with twenty- the Edinburgh and many other of the eight feet of water at low tide. The locks with the neighboring railroads to all ts of the kingdom, so that iron or coal can be taken from the mills and furnaces close to the mines and in the course of a few hours brought without change to the side of the ship in which it is to be used. The Pembroke dockyard is the best adapted for building operations. It com- prises some seventy-seven mcres and has eleven building-slips, which are covered by substantial shfvhouul. It has, however, but one dock and no basins, and but few shops and stores, and cannot be used as a fitting-out station. The dockyards at Key- ham and Devonport are really one. They contain in the aggregate 140 acres and a connected by a tunnel, through which railway has been laid, and locomotives be- longing to the yards transfer men and ma- terial from one yara to the other. The building-slips and most of the drydocks FRANCE. [From a drawing made by a Government Engineer.] French dockyards. It has a number of basins and drydocks, but it is an artiticial port and has a very exposed sitnation. A very extensive breakwater with strong | fortifications protects it from the sea, | | while it is also fortified by land ap- | proaches. The yard possesses no natural | situation or advantages, and owes its | | origin to Napoleon 1, under whose direc- | tion many of the present works were begun and prosecuted in the face of enor- mous difficuities. The yard contains 260 acres, has eleven slips, eight drydocks and three basins, besides numerous shops and buildings, The basins are excavated from solid rock, and are faced and coped with massive granite. The slips have perma- nent shiphouses. The quays, basins and slips which characterize the French yaras are all of such permanent and massive character that if duplicated in the United States would cost us not less than $300,- 000,000. It will thus be seen from the foregoing details the value the powers of Europe place on their dockyards. Yet in our| country, outside of several private yards, the entire cost of our dockyards may be placed at $10,000,000. There is in all the world no place more fit by natural advan- tages than the harbor and surroundings of San Francisco for a dockyard. And it would pay the Government over and over again to erect drydocks of the largest size, with basins and bulding SliPl at Mare Island, which can be absolutely protected from any outside enemy. The coal of Wel- lington and Puget Sound, and the iron of California, with the timber, are all so con- venient that without a change it can be brought right to this yard and converted into ships of war. A large Government foundry for supplying both army and navy with high-power guns should be erected under the same conditions at Benicia Ar- senal, and there is but little doubt that the first real war we have will see the accom- plishment of these two projects. HE I8 139 YEARS OLD. Lived Fifty Years in Siberia and Has Just Ended a Pilgrimage on ¥oot. The 8t. Petersburg Gazette says Russia has the oldest man on earth. Its Moscow correspondent tells of him thus: There appeared this week in the office of the police surgeon an aged man who wished to have his injured band bandaged. The surgeon bound up the wound and then began talking with the patient. He learned eventually, from document- ary evidence, that the man was born AST week I began a series of arti- cles oa athletics. There I spoke on athletic honor and preiim- nary work. The next thing to be considered is Diet. 1t is impossible to overestimate the im- portance of proper eating and drinking. Most people eat too fast; in fact, it is the one great characteristic of Americans. It must be remembered that the food, even milk, must be thoroughly mixed with the saliva before it is swallowed, or the gastric juice in the stomach may not be able to perform the duty assigned to it. It must be kept strictly in mind that a man has not a stomach like a boa-con- strictor; he cannot swallow his food whole and expect it to take care of itself. My dentist recently stated that my teeth showed unmistakable signs of hard usage, especially the molars, and to that cause I ascribe my excellent digestion, for I grind everything fine before I swallow. More- over, I eat slowly, even at the risk of being the last to finish 1n company. In this connection two things should be borne in mind: First, that the food is de- signed to nourish the body, not to tickle the appetite; second, care should be taken that it does not cause trouble after it is down. Suppose you build *a fire and it smokes, what does it mean? there is imperfect combustion—that the fuel is smoldering, not blazing and giving out heat as it should. Now there is a sense in which the stomach can smoke—that is, you can take a great deal of food in the system that will pass along without nourishing the blood. Tins is a serious matter, and tne subject of dieting should be carefully studied by the ambitious athlete. Perhaps 1 cannot take a better time than the present to impress a principle upon lllxlu aspiring athlete and to say person- ally: S bt atndy) Sowtilt sy Ba: member that while physiciansand trainers can do a great deal in pointing out your weaknesses and help you remedy them, it is impossible to ~know how you feel, and physicians will tell you that feel- ing is everything in diagnosing a case— that is, to analyze it. Great athletes know themselves as no doctor or trainer can possibly know them. In this respect the first year is always hardest on the racer because he has symp- toms, aches and pains that he does not understand. into guick consumption. To-day he will have Bright's disease, and to-morrow it will be white swelling in the knee. But never mind all these things; pursue the even tenor of your way and do not be dis- turbed by trifles. I would strongly sug- gest that physiology and hygiene be studied, until all the muscles and vitals | are understood, their functions and their | weaknesses thoroughly known. | | You would like to know how soon after | | eating you may exercise. Now that de- | pends a great deal upon the person. Some people can actually race for a mile or so | within an hour after a good meal, but I, could not; it was necessary for me to have two hours and a half at the least before 1 | would be fit for a race. This is a matter | each athlete should decide for himself. You would like to know how much you should eat. That depends largely on the individual, also. Some people suffer greatly if they eat too much, or even if they have what is generally known as a sTmre meal. It is necessary for such peo- ple to be very careful, and stop eating before they feel that they have had enough. On the contrary, there are some who can eat a great deal and not mind it. One | person of my acquaintance can eat in such | a way as to gauge pretty accurately when | he will be hungry again. If hehasa mod- erate meal he knows that it will be five hours before he will be hungry. If he eats quite heartily it will be six hours be- | fore he will feel the necessity of food. But if he eats until he begins to feel uncom- fortable he can go for seven hours without being distressed by hunger. This is ac- Simply that | Perhaps he will imagine he | has heart disease; or dream he is going | !co;\;ted for by perfect assimilation of the 0od. ““What shall I eat?'’ is a question that is frequently asked by the beginner; but it is a large question and not easily answered in | the space at my command, Perhaps I can | give a satisfactory substitute in a few words. Eat that which is wholesome and | use your own good sense in the matter. Fried and greasy articles should be avoided. There was in my acquaintance a young man who was going to take part in a very important race. A friend observed him | at dinner and was struck with astonish- | ment at his diet so close to the contest. | On questicning the young athlete the friend discovered that he ate pretty much what was placed before him at the table. This upset all the friend’s theories on | the subject of dieting in training. It is a fact, however, that home cook- ing is about as good dieting as one could wish, if the digestion is in good order and the aspirant is careful to study the sub- | ject. - This does not mean that it is ad- | missible to eat all sorts of stuff that any- body with common-sense would know is would not be surprising w see the racer quit at three-quarters of a mile. Some. times, however, a man struggles along, either in great pain or at a slower pace. The difficulty is very easily explained; it merely demonstrates the presence of an u necessary amount of liquid in the bow This liquid may be tea, coffee, beer or even water, according to the habits of the sub- ject. Any one is liable to be affected in this way; and as far as water is concerned for one who does not take violent exercise a considerable quantity aets as a cl to the system, much as the rain flushes and cleans out the sewers in a ci But for one who takes violent ex: and preparing for a race it is a diff thing; the system does not need the cleansing because there is more perspr: tion and far heavier breathing—both of which have a tendency to throw off the worn-out properties of the blood. Conse. quentl; quids should be avoided as much as possible. I have found that three cups full of liquia eack day is sufficient to sup- port life comfortably, especially in this climate. In regard to the question whether al coholic liquors of any kind are necessa oreven admissible in an athlete’s bill of I wish to say that it is my decided opinion that no liquor of any kind s! be indulged in. The use of liquor in tr ing had ifs origin among English prc sionals of years gone by. When not preparation for a contest they were generally self-indulgent and perate, the effect of which was when it became necessary for them train down for a race they absolutely cc not get along without liquor of some k so ales and wines were used, not be: of any merit of their own, but simply be- | | | | “EVERY ATHLETE HAS SOME IMAGINARY [Drawn by a “Call” staff artist.] COMPLAINT.” wrong, such as mince pie, plnm pudding, | lobster salad, Welsh rarebit, etc.; but it | does mean that roast beef, mashed pota- | toes, stewed tomatoes and fruit is not | going to hurt anybody except those whose constitutions do not bapYen to agree with any particular article. It sometimes oc- curs that one thing or another will not as- similate with a person’s ‘system, although | he may be perfectly healthy in other re- | spects. | Another thing: Do not suppose that you | must confine yourself to any particular kind of provisiony, as it is most desirable to nave a constant change of diet, not only because we need a great many ingredients in the system, but also because it takes the edge off a person’s appetite to live on about the same bill of fare continually. | But care should be exercised in this mat- ter by all, particularly by those running | any distance. Moreover, diet should be | more closely observed within two days of a race. One of the great troubles that racers are afflicted with is known as “kinks.”” This means that after a man has ron a half mile or so he begins to feel a pain in_his side beneath his lower ribs; some call it a “stitch.” If the race is a hard one it| | language of the track, “‘the wind.” cause they tcok the place of stronger drinks that would prove extremely harm- ful. No, young man! touch neither beer, ale, wine, mixed drinks nor liquor of any kind; they are entirely unnecessary and positively harmful. Smoking is another habit that an ath- lete shoula never indulge in. It is bad for the nerves, bad for the blood and is injuri- ous to the respiratory organs; or in the Smok- ing is a babit usnally contracted in youth when the young idea imagines thatitis manly. When it once gets its hold upon a man it is seldom abandoned, no matter how damaging it may be to the health of the victim. of good sound sleep is essential to the well-being of an athlete. While there is no necessity of his denying him- self the pleasures of society he should not allow social :laims to keep him out late at night or prevent his regular exercise on the cinder path. rom seven to eight hours’ sleep is the proper amount for a healthy man in training. D. BArrp, There is one firm in Birmingham put- ting out 1000 flint guns every week for the African trade. 3E il i i ATHLETE SHOULD NEVER SM [Sketched by a “Call” artist.] i i WISV i i l’ i 1757, during the reign of Em- press Elizabeth, and therefore is 139 years old. The old man, whose name is Kusmin, said he was a native of Mos- ( cow, and from his twentieth to his eighty- sixth year had been a coachman. In his eighty-sixth year, however, he had upset his master, a Count, and the Count's brother, had hurt both seriously and had been sent to Siberia, where he ‘had lived until 1893. In that year he decided to re- turn home, and he arrived in Moscow in 1894. He at once started for Kieff on a gilgrimuge. from which he had just come ack. He was much grieved to find that all the friends of his youth were dead. “Kusmin’s eyesight is undimmed, his hearing "is good and he is a splendid walker, as his pilgrimages have shown. Up to his one hundred and tbirty-fourth year he never tasted whisky, but now he allows himself an occasionsldrink.” 1 I OKE.” e, o