The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, July 10, 1898, Page 25

THE SAN FRANCI CO CALL, SUNDAY, JULY 10, 1898. 25 e al & ] Tie DLEA LT s and chiffons of the plain white nd cap that are the in in the service of thesic becom: iren’s Hospital. has taken this d t step hout the usual blazoning and her- a that generally accompanies such a re on the part of a society girl. Or r family m intimate e fact. Only iends are ac- 1 with her ) the al with ros al i as to the dut a trained nurse. time past Miss McKinstry a director of the Children’ She knows the thousand 1 to the lot of a nurse— on to € giving ¢ plans. colored s and icines, look- ice, chang- with ‘e band- reports of everything h pin 1 regu ikes pla Knows r the wea and the sleeple ghts, of berless dis forts must ne uniunchingly; of the steady the quick eye, tireless feet be rea rve and owing things has gone into the f and tne hunt, n is gol h s determined. patriotism before pleasure, suf- f She refused to than ot..er wo- ged that the matter be training. experience for the Red vhy that would she met all » break the ripple tement that stirred nurse vs that they can- nor without due Red h st, the of banner. Stry move: about doing « ly xactly as they 2 special ing to her 1 promi- ition as one of the ¢ > institutic She te. Most of t rectors of ready a great favo; a know her simply They do not kno dignified young woman with the kindly eyes and sweet smile, ever prompt and efficient in ‘her. duties, is Miss Laura that the rful, WA 1) 1 , i o ' SURE OF GAY .l.umllllfl" ' ISS LAURA McKINSTRY has o trained | She has not | nt of the | 11 A H McKinstry, erstwhile society belle. The gayety of other times has given way. She has found something serious nd engrossing to do. But M Kinstry has never given up time to the demands of soci:ty. She 5 % to be an enthusiastic in charitable organizations and e of the directors of the Children’s Hospital she did much to make that in- stitution the great suc it i; An “all-round girl” her friends called her—ready for work and ready for play. But these are the times that call upon one to give up the pleasures of life entirely and work. And Miss McKins- try is one of those who has answered e call. Her friends who are a-pleas- uring, who are enjoying a round of fashionable watering places, a succes- sion of house parties, at ccantry villas, 11 the delights t summer. offers, talk about M McKinstry and wonder | at her choice. But they are ~roud of her, too. Proud that one of their number willing to | give up everything that is dear to the | heart of a girl brought up in luxury and willingly exchanges it for the sake of helping the cause. If she is sent to the seat of war by the Red Cross it means to live on board a hospital ship in a confined cabin. sur- rounded by the sick and the dying, with a burning sky overhead and a waste of water around. But it also means a chance to nurse | the soldier boys back to health again. And what are physical discomforts compared to the joy of doing this? In the East other society belles. are resolutely following the same path that A Mec has marked out for herself. Amy Phipps, daughter of Henry Andrew Carnegie’'s Sister Miss Phipps, partner, has been detailed to j« Bettina Lesser at Tampa and board the State of Texas, which will follow the transports everywhere, ready to take on its load of sick and wounded. When the war broke out Miss Phipps was just preparing to go to England with her family. A round of plez had been arranged for her. She w be presented to the Queen. gown had been ord willing to receive th can heiress with op But th> war disar She went to New Yor guments and pleadings of family, aid work to the took a course in first sick and wourded and departed to the front. The same day that she left for Tampa her “amily, including her | brother, Jay Phipps. who i at Har- sailed for FEurope. Another strange antithesis. The man g a- | pleasuring; the woman goes to Helen Lon~ caughter of ex-Governor | Long of Massachusetts and Secretary of the Navy, is a volunteer nurse in the hospital at the Brooklyn navy yar | She, too, prefers th sick room ar night lamp to the comforts of her Washington heme and the delights of ociety at the capital. None of these yoang women have gone into the work | blinded by girlish enthusiasm and the desire to be thought martyrs and hero- ines. They object to having it thrust | upon them. Miss McKinstry's reticence, her ab- solute refusal to discuss the matte are but natural to one who desir little notoriety about her step as thou she were plain Miss Smith, without so- cial prestige and position. She has chosen between %serving society and serving the sick. She is satisfied that I she has chosen well. L R TRTETRER XL L2 R WOULD NOT WARLK ON THE AMERICAN FLAG HIS war has served to bring forth all the latent patriotism that has been slumbering in many women's breasts. Some women there be, howe who even before the war was thought of possessed the celestial spark called patriotism, which needed | but such times as these to cause it to burst forth into a glorious blaze. Of these Miss Mary Bates, now Mrs. llan, is one. With her artistic s and brain, for many years she s been the chief decorator where any ell function has been given. time ago she was called upon ate for a large reception. She € several flags, which, the ned, were to be laid upon 1ding up to the room in entertainment was to be the given. With an inward rage, such as a woman s when her religion has been tac or her finer sensibilities yutraged, Miss Bates turned and anded of the woman if she had no more reverence for her flag than to place it where it would be trampled de-. | upon by many feet. { The woman being formed of coarser clay, failed to see the fine point of the argument and insisted upon her wishes being carried out. Whereupon Miss Bates stepped quietly out and gave | Place to some one eise less conscien- ious, | Many officers had been bidden to the | reception, and upon their arrival they | refused, each and every one of them, | to mount the stairs. Miss Bates also decorated for a wed- | ding that occurred in this city a short { ll_mo since. An American girl was mar- ried to an Englishman, and it was not without a protest that Miss Bates in her decorations draped together the flags. 1 s as these must the American woman at the present time show her loyalty. Given but the op- portunity and she will show the world that she is made of such stuff as hero- ines are made of, and that in her veins courses the self same blood as that that surges through those of her father or her son, who has the chance to go into the fight, do battle for his country and to emerge an American hero. Epernay, in France, is a vast subter- = city, the streets for miles and mile being’ hewn out of solid chalk flanked with piles of champagne of all blends 3 d qualit! There is no light vrinth of streets, crossings and vhat the sputtering can- dark, dank and damp, :ter down about zero. gne manufacturers in E nderground cellars fewer than forty-five ain 5,000,000 bottles of wine. —_———————— The greatest density of population in the world is claimed for Bombay, and is only disputed by Agra. The population of Bombay amounts 1o 760 persons per acre in certain areas, and in these sections the street area only occupies one-fourth of the whole. If the entire population massed in the streets for any purpose, the density would equal 3040 persons per acre. —————— Photographers, in thelr constant study of the face, find that the left side makes the more pleasant picture, and that the profile as seen from the left gi correct likeness than when vie the right. —_———— In the West Indies a lemon bath s al- most a daily luxury. Three or four limes or lemons are sliced into the water and allowed to lie for half an hour, in order that the juice may be extracted. A re- markable sense of freshness and cleanli- ness is given to the skin. —— In certain parts of Norway when a per- son is drowned a cock is put in a boat, which is rowed about the scene of the disaster, the belief being that the bird will crow when the boat passes over the body. A _new “lover's aiarm clock” strikes loudly at 10 o’clock, and two little doors opening reveai the figure of a man in a dressinj ywn, holding in his hand a card bearing the words “Good-night’ | i 1‘ ’“ ’". are almost worthless. they can find them. his power. By J. R. Elliotf, Special Correspondent of The Call. EY WEST, Fla., June 30.—Ru- mors of all sorts as to the con- dition of affairs in the blockaded port, Havana, have frequently reached us, but now comes an authenticated story of the true situation. It is told by one who has spent several weeks there, and by one who should, from the nature of his sels wert on guard before the harbor. INSIDE HAVANA DURING THE BLOCKADE Captain Aidillo, of the Honduras brig Amalpa, captured a few daysago by the Vicksburg while trying to run the blockade, tells a very interesting story of life in Havana since the American naval ves- Provisions have gone up to fabulous prices, and securities People of ordinary means are starving, and the soldiers seize cattle wherever Governor General Blanco is encouraging blockade running by every means in p 7 business, be well posted as to prices |the port. He stayed on until the scar- of articles of fogd, and who has had an insight into the state of trade gen- erally as well. The story is told by Captain Ardillo of the Honduras brig Amapala, which was captured a few davs ago by the Vicksburg while trying to run the blockade out of Havana. The Amapala entered Havana before the blockade and her captain neglected to take ad- vantage of the time notice and leave city of provisions drgve him to taking desperate chances in an effort to es- cape. As the result his ship will prob- ably be sold as a prize, but even this he thinks it is better than starving in Havana. On the Amapala were ten men, fifteen women and twenty chil- dren, whom the captain had been per- suaded to help in their efforts to leave Havana. They now state that it is much better to be a well fed prisoner of Uncle Sam than starving in freedom in Havana. According to Captain Ar- dillo Havana is in great misery and people are dying daily for want of food. Of the reconcentrados who were living at the time when General Lee left Cuba, not more than one in ten is now alive, and besides these thou- sands of the poor people of the city have died as well and from sheer star- vation. Captain Ardillo tells his story as fol- lows: “I could easily have left Ha- vana before the blockade was on, but to tell the truth I did not think it would amount to much. The firms with which I did business convinced me that the blockade would not last but a few days or a week or two at the most. As I did not have a char- ter out I concluded to remain, but see my mistake now. Things went from bad to worse until I had to do some- thing, or at the price of provisions my crew and I would have eaten up my ship in another few weeks. Again, I began to see that I had been mis- guided, and in case of bombardment stood a chance of losing my ship any- way. With all these things staring me in the face I concluded to make an effort to get away. When it became known that I intended to sail any number of people begged me to take them with me. As I did not have pro- visions on my brig for one-half of those who wanted to leave, I conclud- ed to give the preference, so far as possible, to women and children, and this accounts for the large percentage of them on my passenger list. “For the first few days after the blockade began business went on as usual. No change was noticeable in prices for the first week, then securities began to sag and the Spanish bank stock and street railway stocks and bonds were offered in alarming quanti- ties and quotations began to go down with a rush. As the price of securi- ties went down, premium on gold went up, and then the price of provisions be- gan to climb. Paper money dropped from 40 per cent to 25, and later to 15. This gave the storekeepers the looked for excuse to advance prices. It had been claimed all along that there was an ample supply of all ki ds of goods. Then the storekeepers began to com- plain that they could not get provi- sions from the wholesale houses. “When it became known that the warehouses * were practically bare of goods then the panic began. The wealthy began buying up provisions at any price and storing them away. From 10 cents a pound meat went up to 25 cents, then to 40 and 60, and later to $1 a pound. Mind you, that is in gold, which would equal about $6 60 in paper—the money of the people. At these prices there was little meat for the rich and none at all for the poor. “Then General Blanco took a hand and an edict was issued to the effect that no butcher should charge over 50 cents a pound. The butchers, however, got around this by refusing to sell at that price in less than 100 pound Ilots. That was the condition of affairs as to meats when I left Havana on the night of June 23. The poor were practically shut out from buying meat, for what peon had $50 to invest in a lump sum in meat, or any other kind of provi- sions. It is said that there are plenty of cattle at Cayocoto, but-if so they must he held in reserve for the Spanish army, for none of them are being of- fered for sale in Havana. Surely the high prices should tempt the stockmen to sell their cattle if they had not been enjoined not to do so by the authori- ties, particularly as they eannot now be holding their cattle for higher prices, as the edict prohibits that. “As to flour, there is no market price on it, for there is none for sale at any figure. The last flour sold was by a man who had stored about 500 sacks in some old buildings about five miles from the city. When the price got up to $10 a sack the dealer began to sell. He had not sold much when one day a lot of Blanco's inen came down on him and selzed a whole lot. They took it in the name of the King It little Al- fonso could know of some of the things that have recently been done in Cuba in his name he would want to go out and play hide and seek with him- self from shame. “One example in this line will suffice. The leading shoe manufacturer of Ha- vana received a_ big order for army shoes and at a liberal price. He thought his time had come to get rich. His fac- tory was operated by a double crew working day and aight, the shoes were piled up by the thousand pairs. order was filled in due time and the goods ready to deliver on the specified date. When this time came General Blanco suddenl discovered »Hme tech- nical irregularity in the payment of the duty on the thread. As it had all been used in the manufacture of the shoes the only thing tc do was to seize the entire lot. TLat the thr.ad had not been properly entered at the Custom House did not prevent the shoes from being distributed among the soldiers the very day afier they were seized. God knows they needed shoes badly enough, but it left the shoe manufact- urer bankrupt. True he has his claim against the Spanish Government, but what will that amount to a few weeks from now, or even at this time for that matter. ‘“When paper currency or yellow fever money, as your American tourists term it, had fallen to 15 cent on the dollar there was a panic all along the line. Flour was not to b had at any price and rice was up to 30 cents a pound and potat es sold at 25 cents a pound. De lers are not allowed tn sell more th~n a pound at a time to any one person. The only article of food that is cheap in Havana is he pine- apple, which, as they cannot be ex- ported, are :.1d ot 1 cent e~ch and in many cases given away. They are de- The'| 'MISS LAURA MK NSTRY TRAINING 10 BECOME A RED CROSS NURSE. WHAT SHE WILL GRS, licious eating, but one cannot live ex- clusively on pineapples. There are other fruits but they are eate. by the beons a_ fast as ripe. General Blanco now sees his mistake in having con- centrated his people in the cities in- stead of allowng them to work their little ranches and raise what fruit and vegetables they could. If the same amount of land in Cuba was under cul- tivation to-day that was one year ago the poor people would be infinitely bet- ter off for they would at least have something to sustain life, not only for themselves but could be fe~ding the town's people. “Blanco is making every effo - courage blockade runn(nrg}". Henhfiosell;- sued an edict forbidding the exporta- tion of sugar or tobacco, excepting in ships that have run the blockade and brought provisions to the soldiers. All port charges, such as anchorage, pilot fees, etc., etc., are remitted to blockade runners and again goods brought in in that way are not included in the edicts llm{ting the price. This is done to make business more profitable and therefore more attractive, but so far as I know very little blockade running has been attempted. There was a report that one ship had arrived at a small port down the coast with fifty hogsheads of codfish, 4000 barrels and 10,000 sacks of flour, 500 bags of rice and a lot of beansg and other provisions. It might have been true, but I saw no signs of any of these goods having reached the Havana market. “Over one million dollars has been raised by popular subscription to be used in strengthening the defenses around Havana. With this money about three thousand men are to he put at work. The Havana papers gave Geheral Blanco and General Ar- oles great creditfor this, and called them benefactors of mankind in thus nobly giving poor men without food and work a chance to earn something to keep their families from starving. The Military Governor, General Ar- oles, has conferred with a committee of citizens to devise other means of giving employment, and relief commit- tees are now being organized to raise funds. Block & Co., Havana’s biggest cigar manufacturers, have opened most of their factories, giving employment to a large number of men, women and children. The cigar factories now opened include the Henry Clay, La Espanola, Aquilo d’Oro, Casuncho, Port Arronaga and others. “It is the people of the two extremes of society, the rich and the poor, who fare best under the present condition of affairs; that is, so far as eating is con- cerned. The rich have money to buy at any price and the extremely poor of Havana are so used to deprivation that they are sort of hardened to it. It is on the middle classes that the blockade is most severe. Men of small means, who live by contracting, small stores, etc., have been drained of their last cent. Their little business, or store closed and they will have to be- gin life all over again, and that in Cuba means hardships of a kind you Americans know nothing about. “I knew one man who kept a dairy. He had five cows, and they turned in a nice living, and he was able to save a little money each year besides. In Havana a milkman does not deliver his milk from a wagon and by cans, as is dome in this country. No, indeed. The Spanish will not have their milk served that way; they want to see it milked right from the cow. As they will not go to the dairy the dairy must come to them. The milkman starts out with his cows in the morning and drives them around to his customers. He stops at the door, asks how much is wanted and milks it from the cow while the servant waits. By this method the milkman and his drove are out all day long. As it is too far te return for feed during the day a Cue ban jackass, which is a brother to your Arizona burro, goes along loaded with sugar tops. When they start out the jackass is piled lLigh with sugar tops, even his head is invisible, and he is muzzled to keep him from eating more than his portion. As the day ad- vances the drove halts by the roadside and the cows are watered and fed. This is repeated several times during the day. “Of my friend's drove the first to go was the jackacs, and the children took its place by carrying loads of sugar tops on their little backs; one cow was sold and then another, and the re- maining three were bought by the com- missary department. My friend holds a due bill on the Spanish Government for his cows at 20 cents a pound, live weight, but it might as well be a dol- lar a poumdfor all that he will ever get and he knows it. One article after another has been sold until the man is stripped of everything he had and his family are livine on rice bought with the proceeds of the sale of the second cow. When that is gone they have nothing but pineapples. Captain Aridillo has with him a copy of La Union Constitutional of the date of June 23, and in view of recent events in the neighborhood of Santiago'con- tains some ‘‘mighty interesting” read- ing. An editorial under the headline, “One Page More of Glory,” says: “The Yankees sent to Santiago de Cuba 15,000 mercenaries to conquer laurels at so much a yard. The on- slaught of so many day laborers with arms, the guns of so many ships with- out a soul, the efforts of an enterprise without noble feeling, will break harm- less against the strength of the illus- trious sons of Spanish warriors, who gave Spain everlasting glory. At San- tiago shall be raised a glorious monu- ment to the memory of our, brave and gallant army, navy and volunteers, who will rival their fathers In bravery and patriotism.”