The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, June 26, 1898, Page 6

THE SAN FRANCISCO CALL, SUNDAY, JUNE 26, 1898 = ....JUNE 26, 1808 JOHN D. SPRECKELS, Proprietor. Address All Communications to W. S. LEAKE, Manager. PUBLICATION OFFICE.. ~.Market and Third Sts., S. F. Telephone Main 1868. EDITORIAL ROOMS.. ....217 to 22 Stevenson Street Telephone Main 1874, THE 6AN FRANCISCO CALL (DAILY AND SUNDAY) Is served by carriers In this city and surrounding towns. for 15 cents a week. By mall $6 per year; per month €5 cents. THE WEEKLY CALL. OAKLAND OFFICE... NEW YORK OFFICE.... DAVID ALLEN, Advertising Representative, WASHINGTON (D. C.) OFFICE.. ......Riggs House C. C. CARLTON, Correspondent. CHICAGO OFFICE.... «.....Marquette Building C.GEORGE KROGNESS, Advertising Representative. One year, by mall, $1.50 vees2.-908 Broadway JRANCH OFFICES—527 Montgomery street, corner Clay, open until 9:30 o'clock. 387 Hayes street, open until 9:30 o'clook. 621 McAllister street, open until 9:30 o'clock. 615 Larkin street, open until 9:30 o'clock. 1941 Mission street, open untll 10 o'clock. 2991 Market street, corner Sixteenth, open until 9 o'clock. 2518 Misslon street, open until 9 o'clock. 106 Eleventh street, open untli 9 o'clock. 1505 Polk street, open untll 9:30 o'clock. NW. corner Twenty-second ana | until 9 o'clock. Kentucky streets, o AMUSEMENTS, Columba—* Aristocracy.” Baldwin—*The Passion Play' Alcazar—+A Celebrated Case. * Morosco’s—“After Dark." Tivoll—Ali Baba.” Orpheum —Vandeville s ligcbantos’ Pavillon—Red Cross Benefit, Tuesday evening une The Chutes—Z0o, Vaudevills and Cannon, the 613-pound Man. Olympia—Corner Mason and Eddy streets, Specialues. Sutro's Baths—Swimming. El Campo—Music, dancing,boating, fishing, every Sunday. Recreation Park—Baseball this afternoon. Coursing—At Unton Coursing Park. Coursing—Ingleside Coursing Park. Oakland Racetrack—Races 10-mOrTow. AUCTION SALES. By Geo. F. Lamson—Monday, June 37, immense Library, at ocorner Market and Seventh streets, at 2 and 7:80 P. M. @ BRITISH VIEW OF BRYANISM. S the organ of the bimetallists of Great Britain fl the London National Review has looked with favor upon the free silver party in this country and cherished the hope that Bryan would yet be Presi- dent and silver receive a boom. That hope has now faded. Maurice Low, who acts as correspondent at Washington for the Review, has no longer any faith in the immediate future of either the silver party or its champion. ber he virtually gives up the fight and predicts not only a Republican victory this fall, but the retirement of Bryan from the position of a Presidential candi- date. The argument of Mr. Low is simple but effective. “Times in the United States,” he says, “are improv- | ing; no one can question that assertion. Business shows marked vigor. War, instead of causing stag- nation, is stimulating many lines of trade, and the ex- penditures of the Government are putting millions | of pounds into circulation.” He then draws the con- | “All these things militate against Mr. | Bryan’s hopes of again receiving the nomination. Be- | lieving, as I do, that the silver agitation of two years | ago was more social than economic and was the ex- pression of discontent due to depressed industrial conditions, it follows that with these conditions re- versed the silver movement loses much of its force.” Summing up the situation the reviewer says: “Mr. Bryan is too closely identified with silver to make it possible for him to take up any other issue or to sub- ordinate silver to any other cause. Provided condi- tions remain as they are, that trade continues to im- prove and America finds a ready market for her sur- plus wheat, the Democratic party two years hence must make its campaign on something else than sil- ver, and some one else than William J. Bryan must be its standard-bearer.” These can hardly be called the views of an impar- tial student of our politics, for the National Review * has been as partial to Mr. Bryan as could be expected clusion: of a foreign publication having no affiliation with | American parties. They are to be considered the opinions of a critic accepted from a study of the situa- tion, who would have preferred the situation to be different. “Bryan and Bryanism in this country is not confined to Republicans and gold Democrats. all intelligent observers of the politics of to-day and is amply confirmed by the result of the election Oregon and the extreme uncasiness In the Demo- cratic ranks since that result was made known. At present all shades of Democrats are hunting for a new platform, or perhaps since the Congressional | elections are approaching and the party is all at sea | they are hunting for any sort of planks that are not too waterlogged to make a raft. In their eagerness to get hold of something to keep them from drowning in the coming tidal wave they are reaching for every straw in sight. There will probably be a different Democratic declaration of principles in every State in the Union. In the language of Alex Stephens, every candidate will “tote his own skillet.” As for Mr. Bryan, he will make a campaign outside the country and “tote” nothing but a red sash and a sense of dis- appointment. e — For an assurance so nearly flawless as to excite the admiration of the observer a certain Santiago paper certainly excels the best heretofore recordsd. In a recent issue it failed to so much as hint at war, while by land and sea were approaching forces destined to cause its fall. On the contrarg, the merry editor wrote of the plan for placing I;*ectric lights in the plaza, discussed the current church fair and devoted his space to personal gossip. He may not be a great journalist, but he has the finest nerve in Cuba. AN O R While the dedication of a church was in progress in North Dakota lightning struck the building, knocked an end out of it and killed two people. The item was so briefly mentioned in the telegraph that it may have been overlooked by some one who would be glad to draw a moral from it. Since the Standard Oil people are trying to get a monopoly of the copper product there may be danger that the metal in a cent will become more valuable than the metal in a dollar, a circumstance certain to demoralize the financial system. Only the other day reports came that Kansas farm- ers could not find men to harvest the crops. Now comes a report that the State is overrun with unem- ployed. There is always something to be said about Kansas. In only one instance has any affront been offered the soldiers from Tennessee, and it is cheering to be able to record that the aggressors on this occasion got soundly thumped. = ...Room 188, World Building | In his contribution to the June num- | They show that the belief in the decline of | It is shared by‘ in | MAGUIRE AS A DODGER. E have referred to Maguire’s lightning changes W and his ability as a protean politician. In 1887 he played his farewell engagement as a Dem- ocrat because the party was not in favor of putting all taxes on land. Early in 1888 he was roasting the Pope in a book published from the office of his weekly organ, the Star. Later in 1888 he vaulted back into the Democratic party, though it had not changed its attitude upon the issue on which he left it, and now | he is advertised to lecture to various church so- cieties of that communion whose head is the Pope, | whom he called “the serpent of the Vatican.” | When he concluded to want to be Governor his ngle tax views appeared as an impediment. Farmers {.and land-owners felt that they were paying about as much tax now as they can stand. They felt that to leave all personal property, money, pictures, statuary, | jewelry, manufacturing plants, steam and street rail- | property except land free of tax and put all the bur- | den on land would destroy them. Aware of this, Judge | Maguire proceeded to abjure his single tax views. Through his daily organ, the Examiner, he announced | that the single tax is a theory that is not yet within i the domain of practical politics. ! Yet in a recent letter, written and signed by him and printed in the Seattle Times, he says: | The effect of so simple a change In our fiscal sys- | tem as the adoption of the single tax would thus pro- duce a marvelous revolution in social and industrial conditions, and present to mankind such an example | of universal and uninterrupted prosperity and hap- | piness as would make all the nations of the world | pure democracies within a decade. * * * I trust that the State of Washington may lead the vanguard of civilization in this great advance. I can imagine no place in the history of civilization or of the world that would crown a State with more imperisbéable glory. | Now here we have the protean artist. A fiscal policy that is going to find everybody fat and turn all America, Europe, Asia and Africa into pure dem- ocracies within ten years is so much within the do- | main of practical politics in the State of Washington | that Judge Maguire urges that State to “lead the van- | guard” in that reform. But in California he declares | that the same reform is not within the domain of | practical politics at all. In the State of Washington he is a single taxer. In California he is, as usual, a | candidate for an office. He is in the habit of diverting | public attention from these shiits and contortions by | yelling “railroad” at every critic of his demagogy. | A recent issue of his weekly organ, the Star, does | this for him with great noise. He and the Star pur- sue the same policy. It called the Pennsylvania militia “rattlesnakes” and said it was no crime to kill | them in any way, by poison or burning their quar- | ters while they slept, or derailing trains on which | they traveled. But when the same regiment which | the Judge's organ wanted murdered came to San | Francisco it dared not repeat in their presence what | it said when they were 3000 miles away. The editor | of the Judge's weekly organ does his mouth valiant business to perfection, but drops the heroic to gave his | skin, just as the Judge drops his principles to get an office. This editor, Barry,announced not long ago that a certain person in this city had no rights under the law and ought to be shot and should be shot by any one who chose to use ammunition in that way. The next day the man so denounced met Barry on Mont- gomery street and spat in his face three times and then blew his nose in his face, and Judge Maguire's editor stood and took it without resistance, and in the | next issue of the Judge's organ praised.his own “pres- | ence of mind” for not resisting, because if he had he i might have been more seriously injured than merely | serving as a sort of combination spittoon and pocket 1 handkerchief. The Judge and his editor are truly well paired. One could respect them even in their errors if, having written and printed that the Pope is “the serpent of | the Vatican” and Cardinal McCabe “a red-capped | hound,” they would stand by it and take the conse- j quences. Men respect those who show the courage | of their convictions, though the convictions may be | erroneous. When Maguire said that taking Spanish | prizes was piracy and his organ said the Pennsylvania [ militia were rattlesnakes, if they had stood by it their courage would have been creditable. But they don’t stand by anything. If Judge Maguire were a leader of men instead of a demagogue he would announce himself a single tax candidate for Governor and show | the strength of that party in this State. But the de- sire for office exceeds any devotion of principle, and | will send the single tax to the rear with the Pope as a “serpent,” the militia as “rattlesnakes” and his | editor’s “outlaw” who could be shot on sight, to re- main while he gets in the middle of the street with a | brass band, so that an office that may be out seeking the man will be sure and see him. THE FORTUNES OF WAR. HILE the war is but two months old, it has al- | W ready done a good deal of that shuffling of men for which all wars have been noted. Citizens of all classes have been taken out of the order they held in peace and arranged in new grada- tions. Some have risen and some have fallen, accord- ing as the chances of the new shuffle have brought it about. An obscure seaman, a man of few friends and no prestige, plays the part of a stowaway on the Merri- mac and shares in the glory of Hobson and his com- rades, winning reputation, promotion and an in- crease of pay. The son of one of the oldest and wealthiest families in New York, bearing a name il- lustrious in our history as well as foremost in social | circles, enlists as a sergeant in the Rough Riders, gets killed in his first skirmish and receives hardly so much as mention from the crowds that shout applause of the stowaway. From Cleveland comes the story that a private in an Ohio regiment is now serving under a captain who before the war broke out served him in the capacity of coachman. The private was a man of wealth and of patriotism. He enlisted among the first to fight for the flag, but he was not fitted for command, so he went to the ranks. The coachman was poor, but he had not only patriotism but a military aptitude which he had developed in the National Guard, and he received the shoulder straps and the sword. On May 10 in the city of St. Louis there was a young man serving as a cigar counter salesman in a hotel who felt and responded to the impulse of war. On May 11 he was a soldier in the ranks. Two days later he was made corporal, and five days later he re- ceived his commission as a lieutenant in the Missouri volunteers. Within two weeks he had shown such a capacity for military affairs that he was made bat- talion adjutant and in that position is winning praise on all sides. About the time the cigar counter man was arrang- ing to enlist in the ranks the son of ex-President Har- rison, the son of Vice-President Hobart and the grandson of President Grant were exerting their in- fluence at Washington - to obtain assignments to showy positions on the staff of General Lee. They were successful. The cigar-man has been promoted | | | roads, stock of goods and every conceivable form cf Russell Harrison, Major Hobart and Lieutenant Al- This rough shuffling of personal fortunes by the chance determine and will be dealt out in new com- Blue, have won the hearts of the people by their conflict new heroes will come forth, and when the war ADMIRAL DEllEY'S STATUE. l;\Iarket streets it is to be hoped they will not en- hero of Manila would be in the nature of municipal us from being blown up by Spanish warships—let us pering trees, it may present some of the attributes of to dismantle the Cogswell fountain at the junction [sides, in its treatment of Dr. Cogswell’s donations should be obliterated as soon as possible. The Super- one now proposed to be removed to be knocked ing these fountains to the city his donations might of Turk and Market streets when his official term ex- made upon art. No statue of Admiral Dewey should his death they should shrink from the eaterprise now boxes in transit, and subjected to the vulgar hum of | shock the artistic sense of a Zulu chief. No such dese- he will in the near future—the .ight of himself in such We are heartily in favor of honoring the naval won- Key, Douglas Tilden's ball-player and the others. who contemplate him with something of the poetic It gives one a chill to think of Admiral Dewey’s Dr. Cogswell's fountain ought to be removed, but for creations anyhow, and we should aim to give posterity /E\ cussed business as well as other things, one of selling by measure. He is quoted by the Philadel- desirable thing,,in the interest of sobriety, was not There is no froth in that argument. It is as full of people, an extension of trade and a revenue for the beer in keg or stein or glass corrupts the nation, but The argument advanced at this banquet under the all classes of producers whose stock in trade is sub- in the flour. By so doing he will give the people a ticles., thus preventing many forms of disease and the tendency to an excessive use of tobacco among injurious to ladies, and will readily act as temperance grades. Bankers will perceive thas high rates of inter- hold. Being friends of morality they will gladly act and part of it out of the borrowers. perate phrase, “Not that people should drink more Morality is going to be practiced and the burden of One class of tax-burdened people alone cannot means for getting rid of the tax and at the same time expectant heirs can do is to coax their rich relatives and intrusted with important dutf;a, while Major gernon Sartoris at last reports were detailed by Gen- eral Lee to inspect potatoes at Tampa. * rude hand of war has just begun. It will go on from month to month. The cards will fall as time and binations. At present Dewey is the national hero and three young Southerners, Bagley, Hobson and courage and made their names familiar in men’s mouths as household words. In the course of the is over many an old star will have faded out of the horizon and a new galaxy will be in the ascendant. F the Supervisors shall finally decide to remove the Cogswell fountain at the junction of Pine and courage anybody to erect a statue of Admiral Dewey in its place. To locate in such a spot the figure of the blasphemy. If we are to honor the old sea dog— which seems to be highly appropriate, since he saved erect a monument in Golden Gate Park, where, sur- rounded by fragrant flowers, green lawns and whis- a work of art. Undoubtedly the time has arrived when it is proper of Market and Pine streets. That affair has long since ceased to be even an artistic nightmare. Be- the municipality has disgraced itself, and it is emi- nently proper that the evidences of its ingratitude visors have allowed the Cogswell fountains stored at the City Hall to fall into decay and have permitted the into pieces by small boys. If Dr. Cogswell had had the sense to get himself elected Mayor before present- have fared betier. Yet there is no telling what will happen to Mayor Phelan’s fountain at the junction pires. But to return to the assault which is about to be ever be erected in this city upon a business street. If his admirers hereabouts desire to honor him prior to proposed as from a pestilence. At the junction of Market and Pine streets, suriounded by drays and streetcar cables and jolting cobbles, the hero of Man- ila in bronze would present a sight calculated to cration should be considered for a moment. If Ad- miral Dewey were ever to visit San Francisco—which a spot might prove more disaftrous than a Spanish shell. der of the century, but let us by all means place him in' Golden Gate Park along with Garfield, Halleck, In that beautiful place the trees, the flowers, the grasses, the sunshine and the birds will inspire those grandeur that ought to surround the figure of so great an American. statue at the intersection of Pine and Market streets, amid the drays, the cobbles and the boxes in transit. Heaven’s sake do not let us put Dewey’s in his place. Future generations will mob some of our artistic as little offense as possible. DISTRIBUTING THE BURDENS. T a recent banquet of brewers in Philadelphia, where it seems the convivial company dis- the speakers declared the best way to meet the ‘war tax on beer is for the dealers to be less prodigal in phia Record as saying that a too large measure tempted the people to indulge to excess, and that the that people should drink more beer, but that more people should be converted to beer drinking. meat as a fresh egg from a Petaluma hen. It pro-» poses a saving for the brewers, temperance for the nation. There is economy, morality, prosperity and patriotism in one sentence. He that puts too much he that pours out the beer in moderation is a public benefactor. inspiration of Gambrinus is of advantage to more peo- ple than brewers. There is instruction in it for ject to the war tax. The maker of mixed flour will find in it an argument for putting more of the mixture greater variety of ingredients in their food and will encourage abstemiousness in the use of starchy ar- promoting public health. Tobacco men will readily see how they can check the people by putting more cabbage leaves in their stock. Tea men know that over indulgence in tea is agents on this subject by putting mure dust in their cheap-teas and more willow leaves in the better est paid depositors or low rates allowed to borrowers tend to cause extravagance in the American house- together to check that tendency by taking part of the war tax on the banking business out of the depositors In short, we are about to become a nation of people devoted to the welfare of our neighbors. The tem- beer, but that more people should drink beer,” will serve as a motto for all lines of war-taxed industry. taxation is going to be distributed, in the names of economy, temperance and patriotism. share in this movement. The man who has an in- heritance tax to pay will find it hard to devise a improvinghisneighbor’s morals. To inherit a millionis going to be a purely selfish business. The best thing not to die until the war is over and the inheritance war tax repealed. It is time to revive a once popular statement to the effect that the colored troops fought nobly. 2 2 8 e 2 2 Information clearly designed to harass and subdue reaches me that I have been roasted for having made ob- Jjection to the custom of killing tame pigeons loosed from a box, or even breaking their wings and legs, and terming the unrefined cruelty ‘“sport.” The news is cheering. Sometimes hu- man endeavor meets with scant reward. If I have succeeded in incurring the disregard of anybody who joys in the maiming and slaughter of harmless birds I hope a feeling of elation is ex- cusable. . Perhaps the commander of the Astor Battery is the celebrated Forward March, who has done excellent service in campaigns without number. Siel ra It seems that some readers failed to identify the poetry published last week, and desire to know the language in which it was so beautifully expressed. ‘What are our public schools for, any- how? The language was Basque. I may add that Basque is a province somewhere or other. P About the process of being jilted there seems to be something which arouses all the heroism latent in a man. No sooner does a soldier by sea or land attain to fame than uprises the plenteous sweetheart averrin~ that under such and such circumstances in the dear dead past she gave him the mitten. Already we are made glad by an array of women who had a chance to be Dewey. There is a Merritt set of these, too, of whom a roster is being prepared, while the Hobson list is re- ceiving daily additions and : retching to an imposing magnitude. It would appear that the chief occupation of a military or naval man when not on the warpath is to go about by night and by day casting his heart and fortune at the feet of beauty. It is a circum- stance worth considering that revela- tions concerning these sentimental af- fairs come from the ladies themselves. The heroes are apt to be busy men. Possibly they forget about them. e . There comes to me a letter from Mrs. Mary Smith of 2029 Virginia street, Berkeley, which I read with attention and respect, congratulating the lady upon having an opinion to express, as well as the ability to express it. That her view seems to me to be narrow and her conclusions all wrong is a circum- stance of trifling Iimportance. The writing of the letter was incited by a recent editorial in this paper under the caption, “The Essence of Treason.” I remember the editorial well and agree with it fully. It was a rebuke to Presi- dent Eliot and others who denounce the present war as unpatriotic and un- necessary. Mrs. Smith upholds Eliot and believes that millions of others do. Possibly she is correct. If there are such millions they fail grievously in their duty, as citizens, care little for national honor, and see in the flag nothing but a show of cheap bunting. They are governed by a rule of selfish- ness, and while they descant upon the horrors of war have not the perspicu- ity to look beyond the smoke and flame of hattle to grander achievements of peace, impossible save when the armed strength of civilization rises to beat back oppression and ignorance. Mrs. Smith draws a picture of war, a famil- iar picture, a terrible picture. Then she peremptorily reaches the verdict that war ought not to be—a kindly verdict, but one sweeping justice aside and leaving the downtrodden calling vainly for help, placing a smirch upon our name, and the brand of cowardice over us all. Mrs. Smith had not thought of these things, and I ask her to consider them. She utterly ignores all the beneficent effect of war. She says nothing of great wrongs to be righted, of integrity to be upheld, of assassination to be rebuked and check- ed. She seems to regard war, declared after mature deliberation, after our dignity as a people had been assailed, our men murdered, as occupying the moral plane of a fight between ruffians in a ring. She takes no note of the hundreds of thousands slain by Span- ish cruelty, the millions held in practi- cal serfdom. Had this nation declined to take up the gauntlet thrown down by Spain it would have been despised, and the stain washed out only in a tor- rent of blood far more appalling “an can possibly mark the present struggle. The war has awakened Europe to the fact that we are here, and to be con- sidered in the affairs of the world. The spirit of aggression had been gaining force. Had we not shown our strength now, sooner or later it would have had to be displayed against a mightier power, and many nations in all likeli- hood been involved. So the present war makes for ultimate peace. I do not be- lieve in turning the other cheek, and a people should be as manly collectively as individually. If Mrs. Smith’s coun- sel were to prevail, a few generations and the United States would be elim- inated from the map, the nation re- membered as one that died because not fit to live. Such are my views as op- posed to those of Mrs. Smith. I ex- press them with the utmost venera- tion for her sex and her years. She is a woman of three score, the mother of half a dozen men. My hat is off to her, and I think she is mistaken. wiie e On the stage Richard Mansfield is one of the most finished of actors. Off the stage he is an insufferable, snarling, overbearing, ridiculous snob. One ad- mires him in the play and wants to kick him when the curtain rings down. Therefore the report that Mansfield is to leave the United States causes mixed emotions. We will try to get along. There are other actors who are fairly competent and yet who in private life are not ashamed to be civil. ¥ il As a rule Magee's Circular portraying the latest features of realty does not contain matter of general interest, but the current number has an article which strikes my fancy as affording opportunity for debate, The Circular laments that so many large and ex- pensive houses have been built in this city, and declares that every one cost- ing more than $50,000 is a mistake. It bewalls the outlay essential to the maintaining of such establishments, and as to the money put into mansions now standing empty it fairly moans. “Think,” it says, “of that sum forever lost.” All of which, with the wisdom of the mansionless, I regard as non- sense. When a man employs money in the construction of a palace, the money is not lost. It passes.from the pocket of the builder, but the community galns. The Circular seems to look upon ‘| this money as though instead of going RURRIVRIIRU{RIVERI@IRR{IQLEIILIQLL WITH ENTIRE FRANKNESS. By HENRY JAMES. . RURRRRURUULRRIRRIRRIIRUREULRINLLY 288 8 ® into the channels of trade it had been dropped into the sewer. The money helps the designer, the artisan, the contractor and the laborer. Far from being lost, it keeps on its course, buy- ing luxuries for the well-to-do and necessaries for the poor. Architecture is a beautiful art, worthy of all en- couragement. The capitalist with mil- lions to spare may live in a shanty if he choose and count over his gold, or put it out at interest, and be called a miser: If a man elect to own a palace and pay for the making of one he has done a substantial as well as an ethical good. If to dwell therein with comfort | he keep an array of servants, so much the better. But he: can close up the | place and go to Europe, or even die, | without taking from the city the bene- fit of his liberality. However, I am not advocating extravagance. For the or- dinary journalist the $50,000 domicile is good enough. But the man of many millions could not be extravagant in | expenditure, for in expenditure lies his opportunity to do good. PR . Among the things I freely confess an inability to understand is why certain papers that praise Roosevelt for going into the army condemn Bryan for hav- ing done the same thing. I do not doubt that they are both good citizens | and will both make good soldiers, but | there is no reason for supposing the New Yorker in the matter of patriotism to be in any manner superior to the Nebraskan. Doubtless the sentencing to the peni- | tentiary for life of a young hoodlum of 19 will strike many people as too harsh. He had been found guilty of | robbery by violence that might well have been murder. Every day there is in the courts melancholy demonstra- tion of the fact that imprisonment does | not reform this class of offenders. If | they do not devote life to serving one long term they merely break it into a series of shorter ‘terms, the intervals being given over to the commission of crimes whereby society is troubled. it . | Perhaps enough has been said about | the wretched trick of the Examiner in printing the bogus Hobson letter, but to allude to it cannot be amiss. It shows the disreputable character of that paper under its present manage- ment so clearly as to be useful as a warning. There are other shects, un- happily, which fail to draw the line at | fakes, but they would demur at an ab- solute stupidity. It appears that the Examiner lacks both character and in- | telligence. . e An Eastern paper remarks sagely that a good soldier has nothing to do with politics. If this is true the con- clusion is inevitable that the army con- tains many officers of recent creation who are not good soldiers. Siote e ‘While the introduction of an auto- matic “hello” machine into the tele- phone business is doubtless an indica- tion of progress, there will be a nat- ural pang of regret at the vanishing of the animate charmer who for years has been helloing from central. Many times she is an irritation.” She is per- haps deliberate, and when a subscriber betrays the fact that he is tn a hurry, goes into a state of torpor from which she is with difficuity aroused. She pro- vokes to profanity, and objects to be- ing sworn at. She demands a nickel for a “‘switch” and then calmly informs the waiting patron that the line he wants is busy, and invites him to call again, which he can do at the expense of another nickel. Yet the girl at | central is apt to have a pleasing voice, possibly a lisp. Her tones suggest | beauty. So long as she is reasonably | prompt, to get angry at her would be a repellant idea. It is easy to imagine that she is young and fascinating, the | only support of a widowed mother, and | to strike up a long distance acquain- tance with her. Perhaps the romance would be spoiled but for the interven- ing wire. It may be that she-is her- self a widowed mother. Anyhow she will soon be succeeded by a mechanical contrivance no more alluring than the wheels of a six-bit alarm clock. This is a practical age. s e I humbly trust that to take excep- tion to a sentence In a late letter of Richard Harding Davis will be deemed no irreverence. I would not go so far as to pronounce the sentence faulty, and yet it lacks the power to soothe or awe: “It was a historical moment in the history of Cuba.” Perhaps it was; indeed, in all likelihood it was, and vet, and yet—If history be -carefully scanned it will be found to be made up largely of moments of the sort. How- ever, I never expected Mr. Davis to go to the trouble of specifying the char- acteristics of one of them in just the way he did. The thought occurs that he intended to say hysterical instead of historical. e The German papers are funny. They view with horror the prospect that the United States may one day own the Philippines. The plan seems to them wicked. A great nation absorb those defenseless islands? Never, if the Teu- | tonic editor can help it, and he as- suages his wrath in measures of cool- ing beer. Having assuaged he returns to his work and by a few strokes of his pen makes beautifully clear the fact that for Germany to take the islands is nothing less than a sacred duty. And meantime that man Dewey acts as though he did not care a ration what the journalists of Berlin were instruct- ing him to do. . Far be it from me to say that Peter B. Cox is a lar. I limit myself to the privilege of thinking him one, and both picturesque and colossal. His claim that when he went from Arctic wilds to London there was placed in the bank there to his credit the sum of $3,000,000 fails to enlist the approval of the judg- ment. With such a sum at command he would have whooped things up in England until the overflow of enthusi- asm had reached and made radiant the Continent. He would have shared at- tention with the Kaiser and the war- cloud. Yet Pete was never heard of until he appeared here, wholly devoid of inclination to hide his light under a bushel. Among his modest assertions is that he was reared to opulence by a seal hunting papa who made his head- quarters 600 miles north of the north pole. I do not profess to be a geograph- ical sharp, and would be glad of expert | ritory there is hope of reaching. To climb the pole would of course be to get be- yond this limitation, and yet there is no reason to believe, that the pole is so constituted that a nimble Pete could shin it. Assuredly the pole is not 600 miles high, even if it has proportions such as may be measured, and if it were of this imposing length the diffi- culty of scaling it would be almost in- surmountable. It is for these reasons I deem Peter adrift from the mooring of veracity and floating on a sea of guff. The last word is not elegant, but it seems to fit Peter’ THE TORPEDO BOAT. She's a floating boiler crammed with am, with dainty work: g, weaving bi cam and 1 lash <, She’s a dashing, steal, A headstrong, beast— A long, lean oc A bucking bronc She can rear and t Your_body from kicking, the her A tremb Watch her g breath! s See her dodge the wakeful crui; s sweeping g! coming ’s the sound migh! at home —Hear the rattling M See her loom out afoam! “will wish 1 nd fleas m Then some (They'd be A pent volcano and She is death and swift destruc Not seen, but the sight). The Dread that must be halted wh She's a concentrated, fragile form She's a daring vicious thing, With a rending, deadly sting— And she asks no 0dds nor quarter in the fight —McClure's Maga UNCLE SAM'S EMPIRE. Editor San Francisco Call: The state- ment has been made—assuming that the exigencies of war have extended the own- ership of the United States over the Span- ish colonial possessions now under mili- tary occupation—that ‘“‘the sun never sets on Uncle Sam’s dominions.” A careful study of this subject shows that the east- ern limit of the United States is at longi- tude 66 deg. 56 min. west from Greenwich, and that the western limit of the Philip- pine Islands is at longitude 11§ deg. 4 min. east, approximately. ~The extreme of ter- vy embraced within these limits 1s 176 deg. 24 min., or nearly so, which is 3 deg. 36 min. less than a hemisphere. As the sun’s rays do not embrace more than a hemisphere in the tropics, it follows that from the last glint of sunshine up the remotest islands of the Palaw: pelago till the first blink on the eastern slopes of Maine will embrace a period of night of 14 minutes and 24 seconds dura- tion. Hence, the ambitious patriot long- ing for perpetual sunshine will have to wait_till the borders of empire embrace the Canaries. D. M. SMITH. —_—————————— ANSWERS TO CORRESPONDENTS. PHILIPPINE ISLANDS — Questioner, City. An article on the Philippine Islands giving statistics was published in the San Francisco Call May 19, page 5. THE SELLING PRICE—G. J. C., Sau- salito, Cal. There is no market for a 10- cent plece of 1830, but the same may be purchased at from 25 to 50 cents. ILLINOIS VOLUNTEERS-N. N., City. If Illinois volunteers are to be sent to Ma- nila via San Francisco no arrangements to that end have yet been reached. ~ PEKING AND CHINA—J. H. M., City. The measurements of the City of Peking are: Gross tonnage, 5079; net, 3128; lengtn, 408 feet; breadth, 47 feet; depth, 19 feet. The measurements of the China are: Gross, 1239 tons; net, 931 tons; length, 210 feet; breadth, 32 feet; depth, 14 feet. DRUMMER IN THE ARMY—S. A. M.; City. The drummer boy in the army wi discontinued upon a revision of the tac- tics a few years since, and the reason for that was that the drum was not re- lable in extended order, and it was found to be useless In rainy weather. The bugle was adopted, and bugle calls have taken the place of the drum taps. TELEGRAPHER IN THE ARMY—W,, Fort Bragg, Cal. To join the army of the United States as a telegrapher make application to Major Thompson, signal corps, army headquarters, Phelan build- ing, San Francisco. \The corps needs ex- g{:rt telegraphers to send on to Manila. equirements: To be over the age of minority and under the age of 45, and to be an operator of such aptitude that he could secure employment as such in the office of the Western Union. —_———— THE REAL COST OF WAR. In the great struggle between France and Prussia the former lost as many as 130,000 men, ~f whom some 80,000 died of wounds received in battle, 36,000 by sickness, accident, suicide, etc.,, and 20,000 in German prisons. A French statistician estimates that his countrymen who were wounded, but who survived, numbered 138,000, those injured on the march or by accident 11,421, those who recovered from illness 328,000, making a total of 477,421 direct sufferers. The Germans killed numbered 40,877; 17,255 died ou the fleld, and 21,023 in the ambulances, making 79,155 in all. The wounded who survived numbered 18,543 men. From first to last the German field artillery fired 840,000 shots, and the in- fantry 20,000,000. The booty or war con- sisted of 5526 fortress guns, 1915 field guns and rapid-firing cannon, 107 eagles and flags and 855,000 rifles, exclusive of what was captured at leisure on aban- doned flelds. The monetary loss to France was 12,656,487,622 francs, includ- ing the war indemnity paid to Germany of 5,742,938,814 francs. A survey of the powers of Turope shows that from the beginning of the century to .ne end of 1896 Turkey had experienced thirty-seven years of war and fifty-nine of peace; Spain comes next with thirty-one years of war and sixty-five of peace; France, with twen- | ty-seven years of war and sixty-nine of peace; Russia, twenty-four years of war and seventy-two of peace; Italy, twenty-three years of war and seventy- three. of peace; .ingland, twenty-one years of war and seventy-five of peace; Austria-Hungary, seventeen and seven- ty-nine; Germany (exclusive of Prus- sia), thirteen and eighty-three; Sweden, ten and eighty-six; Portugal, twelve and eighty-four, and Denmark, nine and - eighty-seven. -Tid-Bits. —_——— : TrleatG:ly'our friends to Townsend’s Cali- ornia Glace Fruits; 50c Ib; in fire-etche boxes. 627 Market, Palace Hotel bldé‘.‘h'd —_———————— Bpecial information supplied daily to business houses and public men by the Press Clipping Burcau (Allen's), 510 Monts gomery street. Telephone Main 1042. * “I Hkes to see er man take interest in country,” said Uncle Eben, “but 1 kahgz approve ob ’'is neglectin’ ’is own patch while he worries 'bout whut we %vlnte'r do wif dem Philippine Islands.”— ashington Star. x —_—— Excursion to the Yellowstone Park. A personally conducted excursion will leave this city July 12 for the Yellowstone Park, via the “'Shasta Route” and Northern Pacific Rall- way. Tourists will be accommodated in first- class Pullman cars; tickets will be sold, in- cluding berths, meals and trip through the Park. Send for circular giving rate and itiner- ary to T. K. STATELER, General Agent Northern Pacific Rallway, 638 Market st., S. F. ———— The Santa Fe Route sells cut rate tickets to all points East. St Paul, $31; Kansas City, $31; Chicago, 382 50; New York and Boston, testimony in this matter. How could a man get north of the north pole without being south of it? According to my somewhat vague idea the base of the north pole is as northerly as #2 55. Get full particulars at No. 644 Market st. ACKER'S DYSPEPSIA TABLETS ARH sold on itive guaraniee. Cures heart! ralsing of the food, distress Afer eatins. of eating or One little tablet sives any form of dys, a. immediate nth"D-At No Percentage Phar