The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, November 28, 1903, Page 8

THE SAN FRANCISCO CALL, SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 28, 1903 D) In the Panama Cut. BY LYMAN E. COOLEY. [Promoter and former Chief Engineer Chicago Dra ge Canal.]) by Joseph B. Bowles.) walk I ever took was| Copyright, 190 The hottest twelve es in the Culebra cut of the Panama canal. Culebra is Spanish for snake, but it is not employed to de- scribe the cut, which is reasonably straight; nor did we se any snakes or other reptiles in the cut. The Cule- bra cut runs northeastward from Pan- ama, on the westward side of the isth- mus, where the Paclfic terminal of the canal is designed to be made. In the party who footed it through the cut were the luckless number of T ENGINEER WHO ’ OF CONDITIONS ANAMA. 1, and by the rules of maleficent ntold disasters should have But nothing in the way d, and this im- | even now. INSTRUCTIVE STUDIE-S / ME N A 3 These mosquetaires intensify the heat. R I Starting from Panama one morning in January, 1888, we made preparatfons for our walk through the Culebra cut. There is at least one extraordinary ad- vantage in starting out on a tramp in the troplcs—one doesn’t have to carry any wraps. Therefore we had no lug- gage. The Culebra canal cut practically parallels the transisthmian railroad, so that a train was sent along with us to pick up any prostrated by the heat or from other cause. “Mucho malo,” commented the man as if to himself who took care of some of my belongings when we were about to leave the hotel. “What's that?” I asked. “La Culebra es mucho malo (very bad).” he explained, shaking his head deprecatingly. “Muy salor—enfirmar’—very hot and sickly—he insisted, laying his head over to one side and gasping as if cvercome. not tipped him handsomely? The na- is immune. At Panama I learned that several ship loads of negroes from Slerra Leone was brought to work on the canal, but that they died so fast from Chagres fever—just as white men do—that the British Government inter- posed to save the remnant that sur- vived and had them sent back to Af- rica. Pt Finally we began our journey in this cut, which in itself is not remarkable, except for its magnitude—or, rather, contemplated magnitude. We found a trench 160 feet deep cut 300 feet wide into a dark reddish clay formed from degenerated volcanic matter. This ma- terial is not exceptionally hard to handle, and but for the vast amount which has to be moved, away and hundreds of feet high, its re- moval would rot be formidable. The bottom of the Culebra cut was then and is yet 160 feet above sea level. At some points the work was being done In ter- races or benches running parallel with the line of the canal. levels was a raflway with tram cars. These cars were filled by dredging ma- chinery, then run to low places and dumped. The cars themselves were design. The devices for moving the earth employved by the Panama Canal Company are much inferior to those that were used on the Chicago drainage channel. At the outset of our tramp the French canal construction officials were not en- thusiastic. They wanted us to see the work, but they evinced a dread of the fever. General Royer, who had charge of the constructicn work, sald as we were leaving Panama: gentlemen to see the cut at all points would prompt me to go with you. I cannot refrain from «discouraging you The undertaking is hazard- ous in the extreme.” We Americans laughed. But we learned afterward that there was a dark background to the general's apprehension. Not long before only f the predictions | | f our F voyageurs, who fe ut ine before we had half fin-‘l sh us tha were sure | ising a few days . | Our party left New York just before ho 3 three men, the remmant of a corps of fifty engineers, superintendents and clerks, had been sent back to Franct. In the cut-we were between. walls of earth hundreds of feet high in places, | with the tropical, almost meridian, sun beating down upon us. Our pathway was not particularly bad for footmen, He did not want to lose me, for had I tives have a Worror of the fever, and it | | is erroneous to suppose that the negro lifted and | .hauh'd to spoil banks hundreds of feet | On each of these iron dumy cars and were of ordinary | wholesome | “Nothing but my desire to enable you | the and consisted of | but was up and down at times 2nd | an ver of world famous contractors, | Sometimes devious. The temperature some of whom had done extensive work | Was somewhere in the 90s, but the tem- | n the ge channel, There | perature as indicated by the thermom- som THE SAN FRANCISCO CALL ... .. .Address All Communications to JOHN McNAUGHT, Manager Publication Office.......cceeeecosese sessosscsanes 0............. +«s...Third and Market Streets, S. F. SATURDAY +..NOVEMBER 228, 1903 THE WATER SUPPLY. HE Mayor of Oakland is studying the question of T water supply with great energy in response to the sen- timent of his city in the direction of getting more in- dependent conditions. He reports on the supply under pub- lic ownership in Portland and Seattle. It must be remem- bered, however, that the physical conditions in the moist north are widely different from ours. Much error has been propagated by treating the Glasgow supply as analogous in | all things to a supply in California. The Glasgow water- shed has an annual rainfall of fiity inches and it is not con- fined to one season as here, but is distributed through the year. From the Mayor's report it appears that some of the sup- plies he has investigated are conveyed through wooden pipes. It is doubtiul whether such a method is safe or tol- erable, though the cost is much cheapened by it. The cost of water to the rate payer in the case of these public sup- plies does not convey as clear an idea as it would if the plant were compelled to bear its whole cost by basing the bonds on it alone. Granting that any city makes a profit on a pubiic supply or that it keeps even, the argument for making the plant carry its own bonds is strengthened. | It is not the part of wisdom to mortgage the credit of a growing city for the purchase of public utilities. The needs of such a city in its schools, parks, streets, sewers and public improvements, which may properly depend upon its credit, should cause everywhere the demand that public utilities carry themselves and be supported by income derived from those who use them. This policy has been twice indorsed in San Francisco by the refusal of the taxpayers to make a street railrcad system a burden on the taxable property of the city. Cleveland, Ohio, has just voted down decisively a | proposition to mortgage the public credit to create a' munici- pal plant to supply electrical power and light. Of course in the event of failure of a public plant to pay interest on its bonds a city can at any time impose its credit between the p!aht and loss. But correct husiness principles require that the business shall carry itself. S Another element seems to us to dominate the whole issue of public ownership. The experiment of mixing business aad political government in every considerable city in this country has reswyjted in loss, due to inexpert and oftentimes corrupt administration, which is not easily detccted nor known at all until the loss has occurred. Every clear- headed advocate of municipal ownership agrees with us that that policy is to be finally vindicated as superior to private ownership by making every plant carry its own credit. In the trail of all experiments involving the public credit and mortgaging the taxpayers rise regrets that the city did not start right. Recently a decided reaction against public [ ownership has been apparent in the East. Toledo and other | cities have been left with a public debt on their hands and } vith no plant nor property to represent it. It is likely that | the example of Cleveland will be generally followed until | the advocates of public ownership everywhere consent to | make every plant carry itself and depend upon the income de- | rived from the rate payvers. This is a mutter in which it i | easy tc make a mistake, but difficult to remedy it. | It is seen clearly now that Oakland made a mistake by se- ‘;curing a second water company, as all business foresight clearly indicated that the result would be combination'to re- place competition and the city would have to carry an unne- cessary increment of capital. If the existing plant is left in the field aiter a public plant is acquired the difficulty is in- creased instead of being removed. At present a very large part uf the population of Oakland is independent of the ex- istingg water supply, finding what it wants in th¢ abundant artesian supply that underlies the city. Those taxpayers will continue to be independent of the public supply when it is introduced, but their property will be mortgaged to create it if the bonds be made a lien on the city instead of on the plant. When the question is ccasidered, as a business propo- sition should be, without prejudice, it will be found that. there is not a single valid argument against making the credit of a public plaut carry its cost and putting its support upon the rate payers who desire to use it. We regard this as of such importance to the future wel- fare of these cities that it is worth while even to wait until promote: myself as engineer. The design of the | expedition was to investigate the Pan- | ama and also the Nicaragua canal routes in order to determine as to their relative feasibility, economy and con- | venience for.commerce and to secure | construction work. The result of our investigation led up to the contention as to the two routes—Nicaragua and Panama—which I belleve was not wise- ly decided in favor of the latter. At least our advocacy of the Nicaragua route and the offer of our contractors to build a ship canal at that crossing forced the French company to terms. On our voyage outward from New York we were overtaken just below Cape Hatteras by the ever memorable blizzard that froze the orange trees in Florida and made a new record of tem- peratures south of Mason and Dixon’s line. I mention this storm because in spite of the faet that we were almost wrecked by it it was probably the agency which made it possible to com- plete our walk through the Culebra cut without incurring the fever. The steamers that ply the tropic seas are not constructed lMke the transat- lantic liners. Our vessel's staterooms opened on the deck and not in g saloon. The result was that when the storm came on our beds and clothing were saturated and our shoes washed over- board. Our cargo was shifted by the rolling of the vessel and we got into the Bahamas with our ship listed to one side “ke a racing yacht in a high wind. were and others, and | €ter cannct be determined in its effects on men and animals unless the humid- ity be considered. Thus “ninety de- grees moist” is a severe heat even in the tropics and is enervating in the extreme. On the contrary, ninety de- grees in the dry altitudes of Arizona and New Mexico is bracing and not un- pleasant. » Ll . . The banks of the cut, on which the sun shone down from the peculiarly white sky of the low tropics, reflected eand confined the heat. At times we rested, but the slight shade we found pauses. with perspiration and our flannel cloth- ing was wringing wet. Owing to the burden of moisture in the atmosphere there was no evaporation and our clothes were as if dipped in water. This produces an exceedingly uncomfortable, suffocating sensation. After five miles of the cut had been travessed General Royer and his French subordinates boarded the train, urging us to do so also. They remained on it, keeping pace with us. The Amer- icans kept moving steadily forward. At points where the French officials on the train could communicate with us they would urge us to come aboard. But we were unwilling to give up. I cannot say but that there was an ele- ment of Anglo-Saxon pride and stub- bornness in the determination with which we held to the fiery path in Culebra cut. Hours passed and we plodded on. Our Fremeh consorts in the train waited and we walked, Arriving at Colon (which name is BSpanish for Columbus), on the Atlantic side of the isthmus, we crossed to the Pacific side by rail and put up at the Hotel Grand, where they serve most excellent two-hour seven-course din- ners. This is accomplished by serving one dish as a course, and while you are cating it preparing the dish that is to follow it. Incidentally it may be re- inarked that the diner should be well advised as to how long it requires to cook the several courses, so that he may not eat so rapidly that he will treate an uncomfortable hiatus between ccurses. The Hotel Grand's walls were tben cracked from bottom to top by carthquakes, agd some of them have since been thrown down. Inside the bhotels of the tropics the rooms open on an interior court, orpatio, with balco- hies for each floor, the doors and parti- tions often being made only of jalousies —or what we call shutters—having fixed slats. No provision is made to ex- clude mosquitoes from the rooms. The beds have “mosquetaires,” made of close-meshed tarleton—the mosquitoes being small—wiich canory the beds. walked, walked. It grew hotter and hotter. At first we had talked with a good deal of hilarity, but there was less talk now, and finally none. We watched each other and cautioned against too great exertion. Some went to the train. The rest moved steadily forward over the hot red earth. ‘We were all much exhausted when we reached Obispo at the end of the cut, where we boarded the train and were hauled quickly back to Panama. I think our walk and our escape from fever were commented on by the na- tives and the French canal builders more than any other event in our visit to the Panama, canal. Recurring to the fever, I will say that there is no overestimating its deadly charpacter. While I have not made a scientific study of the subject of tropic fevers, I am advised that the general characteristics of the fevers are the same throughout the West Indies and the Panama country. In rds, the same fever exists in different grees, with slight variation, at the sey- eral portions of the American tropics. was not of the sort to encourage long | By noon we were saturated | any legal impediments are removed if such be in the way. It | is easy to see that if enthusiasm and prejudice are permitted | to raise the doodgates of inconsiderate public ownership now instead of relieving us of any ills we have the policy of mort- gaging the taxpayer will bring greater. Oakland enjoys the opportunity of setting the pace which other cities will follow when its superior utility is demonstrated and should not be content to imitate experiments of doubtful utility and take a path that is strewn with failures and vain regrets, 1 A few days since the local yellow sheet ‘published what purported to be the full text of the canal treaty between the United States and Panama. The report was dishonest in every particular and the imposition upon the public was ex- posed. The ondy element of interest in connection with this mendacity is that the saffron kid has since been forced to print several other lies to support the first, and to the public this procedure is no novelty. IT\ IS TIME TO DISARM. E are accustomed to the discussion of national dis- W armament and to dreams of universal peace, when nation shall not lift up the sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more. Some progress in that direction has been made and there is no doubt but The Hague tribunal will be the means of averting war in many cases. But suppose that we begin a peace policy by agree- ing to disarm as individuals. o California has suffered from her reputation as a gun fight- ing State. Several years ago when the National Teachers’ Association met here it was found that many visiting teach- ers had prepared themselves for the journey by buying re- volvers. One unfortunate high school teacher on his way to the Yosemite while sleeping on his arms was killed by his own pistol. We who live here know that there is no need to carry arms in California any more than there is to wear guns in Grace Church, New York, or in meetings of the Women's Christian Temperance Union. But unfortunately there are exceptions among‘us and these are wrongly used to establish an undesirable reputation for the State. Even in our pioneer days the carrying of pistols was not a habit. Yet every time art deals with the early California miner, either in painting or sculpture, he is made to wear a beard like 2 horse tail and have two pistols in holsters on his hips and gird with a cartridge belt. It is a misrepresentatione The pistol habit is a vice that should be discouraged by severe punishment. It has caused a homicide in the Palace Hotel that brings sorrow to many and inflicts injury upon the State. If the slayer in this case had been without a pistol no casualty could have occurred. But he was “in the habit” of carrying a pistol, and so what would have been only a scuffle was turned into a tragedy. Another sprig has recently been enforcing hospitality at public bars by compelling unwilling gentlemen to drink when they were not dry by threatening them with his gun and we | Venezuela for sympathy and assistance. have not heard that he was disarmed. No one in this State can carry concealed weapons without a permit. That is the law. Under it if a man can prove to the proper public au- thority that he is reasonably apprehensive of personal danger he can get a permit to carry arms. Those who go armed without such permit are guilty of a misdemeanor and should be punished. . When a man threatens another with violence he should be reported to the police, arrested and searcl..d for weapons, to be disarmed if he have them and then fined or put in jail for carrying them. No man has a right to carry arms to protect himself against the consequences of his own truculence or habitual bullying of others. It is time for California to purge her reputation in this respect, and this last instance of wanton slaughter should serve as the inducement of a crusade that will part the fool and hijs gun. ——— A woman was sentenced by a Virginia Judge a few days sirice to serve an imprisonment of ten years for planning a railroad wreck in which several lives were lost and much property was destroyed. This verdict presents two distress- ing phases. It is criminal in its inadequacy- if the woman is guilty and horrifying if she is innocent. She should have been hanged or set free. The next railroad wreck in Vir- ginia will probably prove it. T hunt for a Democratic candidate for the Presidency, and is employing its leisure in finding a Republican candidete. With great' unanimity it has selected Senator Hanna as Republican standard bearer. There may be in this an element of gratitude. The Democracy may well warm up to the Ohio Senator for the great favor he did it in besoming Tom Johuson from the political face of the earth Johnson made the issue personal to himself and Senator Hanna. It was a square and definite test of their leader- shig ¢id popularity, and of the principles they reoresent. The result was a victory for Hanna by the largest majority ever given by Ohio in 4 State election. Johnson has not béen heard ¢f since. His breath was so completely knocked out that he did not have enough leit for an interview ex- plaratory, ,of how it happened. It was not one of those close finishes, after which, the loser could sit down and figure that a,change of a fraction’ of a vote in each precinct would have changed the result. Quite otherwise, it was a solid impact of adverse votes, that came in tens of thou- sands, until the majority far outran the hundred thousand mark. It is of inferest to see the profound respect now felt for FINDING A CANDIDATE. $ 1 ¢ HE Democratic press of the country has ceased to Senator Hanna by the Democracy. That party's press | sees in him the logizal Republican candidate and is practi- cally unanimous for him. This is very kind and is no doubt appreciated by Mr. Hanna. It is such a change from the mud-slinging which has assailed him ever since 1%6. Even the Hearst papers have ceased to cartoon him frescoed with dollar marks, and in“the exceeding peace that has overcome the spirit of scandal it would seem as if he were assured of the support of the Democracy, and that | another golden age of American politics were standing in the wings, ready for its‘cue to appear in the glare of the footlights, But these gentlemen who appear as next friend of the Republican party omit a few factors from their calculation. The Ohio Republican convention unanimously indorsed President Roosevelt for the nomination. It is no justifiable criticism to say that Senmator Himina was not friendly to that indorsement, when "t was proposed by his colleague, Foraker But when his acute political sense saw clearly that. being proposed, to turn it down would be construed into a rebuke of the President, he made it ©nanimous. So the Ohio election did three things. It sent Tom Johnson into obscurity, gave Hanna the greatest personal indorse- nient ever enjoyed by an American leader in his own State, and committed Ohio to President Roosevelt. It is tne habit of the opposition press to see grave con- flicts between Hanna and the President. Every few days | they carpet the ground with their ears and hear the sound | of quarreling between the President and the Senator. Now the fact is that they do have differences. To entertain dif- ferences of opinion on matters of policy is no new thing with them. Senator Hanna does not hesitate to take his stand and abide by it, to a finish. But this has caused no alignation between him and the President. Those who understand President Roosevelt long ago knew that he does not want disciples. He enjoys fair and frank opposition in his own party, and in the issues that | have arisen between him and its leaders he cheerfully sub-i mits the matter to Congress and abides by the result, as do they. We have an illustration of this in the controversy that has arisen over the confirmation of General Wood. The general is the President’s friend, and he stands by his friends. But Major Rathbone, who claims that he was misused by Wood in Cuba, is Hanna's friend, and the Sen- ator stuck to him in adversity and now pushes his vindi- cation by secking the defeat of Wood. In this Hanna is joined by Teller, one of the Senate leaders of the minority. It is a fair fight, open and above board, and when it is over everybody will have had a day in court, American fashion, and there will be no resentment left after it is finished. We will admit that this is something new in American politics, for in the past such independence has too often : degenerated into personal hatred. It was so between Cal- houn and Jackson, and between Buchanan and Douglas. In those controversies it was the habit to permit no dif- ferences, and to treat personal independence as party treason. But that practice is past, and the country sees the President and the chairman of the national committee dif- fering, fighting it out in all vigor and fairness, and their personal relations remaining unstrained. So the Demo- | cracy may as well withdraw the nomination of Mr. Hanna, and conclude that it must meet President Roosevelt next year, the leader of a united party and backed by no one stronger than by Mr. Hanna. S, Neeley, the enterprising rascal who escaped punishment in the amnesty granted to all offenders convicted during the reconstruction period of Cuban affairs, had the impudence recently to ask the return of $20,000 deposited as bail. In refusing the demand the Judge deelared that he could not see the propriety of transferring property from its rightful owners to the thief that stole it. Mr. Neeley is clearly entitled to a Tammany nomination for Alderman of New York. e St i) The United States of Colombia has made overtures to While there is nothing unusual in this plea of one dishonest petty state to another of the same kind, it is more than likely that Venezu-< ela will not care to be spukcd\beulu_e Colombia is being disciplined. Castro has acquired the gentle art of making ies too well to seek for opportunities beyond the bor- of the country he misrules, | TALK O F THE TOWN Comparative Values. By association with danger sailormen | become toughened and hardened '‘to | those incidents in the daily grind that ! mean risk to if not loss of human life. It is a part and parcel ¢f the mariner's ! occupation to fight for existence. So it | is that those who go down to the sea in | ships sometimes become calloused to | the mere snuffing out of a mortal being. | In testimony whereof this story: Bluff and gruff old “limejuicer” that | he was, a strong, sturd; character was | | the veteran Captain an, for many | years port captain ;?l’he Occidental | | and Oriental Steams| Company. He | | was known the length and breadth of | the water front as a typical British sea- | | dog. For forty vears he had sailed the | | oceans and when he abandoned the | winds'and waves it was to take a post | |ashore that should keep him in close | touch with his former duties on the | Poop. | As port captain the veteran skipper had the important duty, among many | others, of superintending the discharge of the “O. and O.” China and Japan | liners. Onme of these, the Gaelic, was | being emptied of her valuable cargo of | i silks, rice, tea and other Oriental wares one night at the Mail Deck. Captain | Bryan was busy as a beaver directing | the job. They were working at the moment on silk, transferring the valu- able stuff to freight cars for a hurry i trip across the continent. A bale ol {silk is a bale of silk, and Captain Bryan { knew well its value. In the midst of the bustle there was a splash alongside the dock. The excited rush of men to the pier's edge and a cry for ropes attracted Bryan. The “old man” ambled over to the scene with a: “What's doing here?” | “Man overbeoard,” was the response from a dozen throu.s. | “Huh,” grunted Bryan quickly turn- ing on his heel and yelling for the stevedores to get at work, “I thought | it was a bale of silk.” | A Deseri Hermit. I was fifty miles from the nearest { camp and as far frum water. Suddenly | on rounding a little hill I came upon a | | prospector’s camp. The sight was not | an unusual one for me, as I ran across | these gold-seekers in all parts of the desert. My horse seeing the camp in- | lann(-ll\'sly headed for it. Wrapped up | in a piece of canvas tenting, alone on| the ground, lay an old gray-haired |man. As I approached he stuck his { head out from the covering. The cold wind blowing drove back from his| | sharply featured face a mass of long, | wavy hair. | | “You nhaven't got a little whisky | { about you, have you?’ he queriec. In | answer to his question T drew from my | | pocket a flask of the desired liquid and | handed it to him. “T've got a touch of rheumatism,fhe | said. “Ketches me every once in a while | { this way. It looks like snow, eh? I| | really ought to be back in town. but I | promised my daughter that if 1 got| | around by the old turquoise mine near | ! Crows Springs before the snow came on I'd fetch her one of the blue s mes | !for a Christmas present. Poor little | girl; she won't get much else this year. | I've been sinking my assessment holes lon a group a few miles east o' heve, and was on my way to the old mine when this danged rheumatism caught me.” | I saw that the old fellow was pretty could hardly himself a great deal. come on to camp with me, but he pro tested that he would be all right. “Why,” he sald, “I've traveled this | stretch of sand and sagebrush for over :(orty years. I love the life, and am as | safe here¢ as I'd ‘be in a horspital | Soon’s I get the girl a stone I'll come in | and beat the snows.” i But the old desert hermit didn't beat | | the snows. The next day the flakes be- gan to fall, and with each fluffy parti- icle there was being covered up an- other tragedy of the desert. Turn of the 1Wheel. You all have seen her—all you who | daily get into the hurry and rysh of | business in the wholesale district. She | |is the little bent old woman who hob- | | bles along on two canes carrying a | satchel In her hands. If she knows | you she will limp up to your office win- dow and ask you, “Will you take a chance at the tickets to-day; drawing | is on Friday.” In the gcod old roaring 'i0s, when | stocks were booming and the Comstock kings were building themselves palaces | along the goat tracks of Nob Hill, a man and his wife—a distinguished pair —Kkept regal apartments at the Occi- | dental Hotel. Drives behind spirited horses in the afternoons, suppers at nights, a season’s box at the old Bush- street theater—theirs was the portion of the rich. But the husband died. The great block of stocks in the Mount Diablo coal mires was stolen from the widow ( by scheeming speculgtors. Now she drags her poor old body along the . crowded streets of the wholesale dis- trict selling ‘‘chances.” Be the law what it may, let charity be your inter- preter of justice. ‘A Step Forward. Now that civilization has waxed so strong that the bodies of panpers are thrown into a nameless hole in the ground instead of beirg allowed ta rot outside of the city gates it is pleasing 1o read that Paris has a dog ceme(a.-:y' on an island in the Seine. A plain grave without a headstone may be had for $1, and the body is remcved on a| little wagonr for a similar sum. The graves are leased, not s51d. The charge for five years' lease is $5, for ten $10, for twenty $15 and for thirty $20. Very stringent rules forbid the use of cere- | monies or decorations such as are used at funerals. No cross may be erected over an animal or bird, for all peis may € be interred here. The inscriptions are of a curious and | exaggerated sentimentality. Tola Du- rian, the author, says on her pets’ tombstone that if she “cannot accom- pany the dear and noble animais she move without paining :weak. He couldn't eat anything and | | | | back-breaking packages. I wanted him to | » does not wish iir heaven,” and on Fol= lette’s grave a mourner has placed these words: “My dear Follette, thou who wert always faithful and intelli- gent, we regi¢t thee much. Repose in peace.” Near the entrance to the ceme- tery stands a row of battered stones from graves the leases of wkich have expired. L College Manners. The kind president of Randolph-Ma-" con College announced a reception at his house for the freshmen. All of them put on their best clothes; some of them even appeared on the street in real clawhammers and white waist- coats dazzled the eyes of the beholders. Upper classmen lay in wait for the freshmen, pounced on them as they en tered the gate, corraled them in prexy’'s front yard, stripped them of their coats, waistcoats and trousers, mocked at their grief, and then went away, carry- ing with them the c¢aptured raiment. The Washington Times is justly indig- nant. “If,” it says, “the president does not use his best endeavors to discover and punish the young cads who figured in this affair—he would be quite within | his rights by expelling them—he will justify the supposition that he is will- ing to permit the establishment of a standard of manners among his stu- dents which would scarcely do credit to a lot of cornfield hands.” Postmen in England. Mail carriers in England start at sal- aries equivalent only to $4 a week in our currenc,, and after long and faith- fu. service are advanced gradually to a maximuns of less than $6 a week. Not extravagar® p surely. But they are not required to work more than eight hours daily, and no one of them is weighted with a burden of more than thirty-five pounds in any circumstance. In the United States, especially in holi- day times, our faithful friends in gray are often too heavily laden with bulky, Bicycles ars employed extensively by the British Postoffice Department. They might be used much more freely in this republic of long distances. Goats of Columbia. There are nine goats in the Dis- trict of Columbia. That is one of the interesting and, perhaps, —aluable facts unearthed by the Bureau of Animal In- dustry of the United States Department of Agriculture. The District is at the bottom of the list; the Washingtonians may rejoice that they run no risk of eating goat for mutton. Listen to the language of the report- “In the environ- ment of all the larger cities are found many kids, and it is evident that only & | few of them grow to maturity.” { Yes, but many of those who do reach maturity in a tough state. ANSWERS TO QUERIES CLEVELAND—A. N. G, City. Grover Cleveland was born March 18, 1837. TILLMAN—A. E. A, City. The full name of Senator Tillman of South Carolina is Benjamin Ryan Tillman. ARITHMETIC—R. H. B, City. The question asked is a simple one in arithmetic and of the class that this | department does not answer. PILOT—J. C., City. When a pilot takes charge of a vessel he is in charge to the extent of taking the vessel to | safe anchorage and the captain will not interfare with him except it ap- pears that the pilot is in that condi- tion that he is unfit to discharge the duties expected of him. WARTS—W. B, City. Warts are cured or removed from the hands by the use of glacial acetic aeid, which | may be either dropped upon them or painted with a soft brush, care being taken in the applying of the same to apply a little oil around the wart so as to prevent the skin from blistering. Lunar caustic and tincture of per- chloride of iron are also used for the purpose. UNITED STATES MINISTERS-S. N. N., Rio Vista, Cal. During the term of Martin Van Buren as President of the United States, 1837-1841, the Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Pleni- potentiary from the United States to France was Lewis Cass of Ohio. who filled that station from 1336 to 1342, and the one to the court of St. James was Andrew Stevenson of Virginia, who was in office from 1836 to 1841 —_— SOCIALISTIC VOTE—G. A. F., Berkeley, Cal. The vote for the candi- date for Governor named by the So- cl}lst party cast in San Francisco in 1902 was 1977. The total vote for the Socialist pa~ty in the same ecity cast at the municinal election November I, 1903, had not been canvassed at the date of the letter of inquiry, November 11. The canvass of the votg of that date will appear in The Cail on the day after the Election Commisisoners shall close the canvass. i Townsend's California glace fruits and candles. 3¢ a pound, In artistic fire- et boxes. A nice present for Eastern friends. 715 Market st., above Cal! bidg. * Special information supplied daily to fornia street.