The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, December 27, 1903, Page 7

NEW AMERICAN NAVY Ex-Secretary Long Gives Thrilling History. HE New American Navy,” by 13 ex-Secretary, of the Navy John D. Long, is one of the books astin sortance of the year. This comprehensive work, in two volumes, which from the p ing Compansy the authoritati part played our sea power in the Spanish war, written by one who was the emecutive head and chief director of that power during the momentous period of preparati: and the briet struggie in Cuban w There have been other w laid but wh expressed w has just appeared of the Outlook Publish- h value of being upon the ss e statement ters. » have the being ative, read by every the support of the Governmen position of the plicated beaureau trol which div ernment’s m peace and a minute ex- of that co! system of co rtion of the G navy. Up t e t mbrogl received er at t or the great w their wort roes of our themselves thor- ts of the growth ness our Rew book with a of the new fewing the ef- sea ironclads in Civil War, Lo at a low ebb of that struggle. g power on the a forty- lowest stration the first- the Chicago, Dolphin. L Arthur nas new a and marked actions of granting niggardly boon to the feeble navy In a detailed account of the organi- provinces of the this Congress zation and several neval boerds, which divide bureaus and committees the stupendous task 1 branch of the ser- Mr e policy of having civillans at ad of naval offices, which is so unsparingly at- tacked by the English Lord Wolsel He says: “Ours is a civil and not a military government. The heads of the army and navy departments are civilians. The fundamental principle of our con- stitution is that the military is sub- ordinate to the civil function. Then, too, as & matter of expediency as well as of principle, it is better that the head of each department should enter upon his duties with an open mind and without the possible bias of prejudice or favoritism which might come from having been himself a lifelong member of the body over which he is placed.” Although admitting that friction be- tween the various bureaus often arises on account of the overlapping of their jurisdictions, the ex-Secretary would have no general staff for the navy such as was provided for the army by the ngress. He maintains that such a board would Have a tendency to ar- rogate powers tnglem!olves at the ex- of the Seffetary of the Navy. he present system of administration is oc t and yet elastic enough to secu he most effective co-operation, according to Long, and he would have it that the Government let well enough alone In reviewing the nerve racking per- jod of tension just preceding the dec- jaration of hostilities against Spain, ssertions ahout the of President Roose- then Assistant Secretary of the which e been construed by ; pewspapers as a sharp criticism Long makes some over-zealous ve e cond of the then energetic Secretary. Writing of Roosevelt's part in the councils of the secretary’'s of- fice, Long says ‘§iis activity was characteristic. He was zealous in the work of putting the nevy in eondition for the apprehended struggle. His ardor sometimes went faster than the President or the de- partment approved. Just before the war he, as well as some naval officers, was anxious to send a squadron across the ocean to sink the ships and tor- pedo-boat destroyers of the Spanish fieet while we were yet at peace with Spain. After some of these comments had sppeared, Mr. Long was interviewed by 2 representative of the New York Sun, and said: “It was a very pressing time in Washington, those weeks just before war was deciared. War was inevitable. It was almost upon us. The Spanish fieet, with its torpedo boats, was on its weay to Cuba, and, although war had Dot been formally declared, a large oF 7vE NAVY. i e | — ot number of the foremost naval officers thought best, in self-defense, to meet the approaching fleet and dispose of it Among the aumber was Mr. Roosevelt Mr. Roosevelt was eager to leave noth- g undone that was necessary to in- sure our thorough preparation. I have the highest respect for Mr. Roosevelt as a man and a statesman. All his actions during the time mentioned was in the line of patriotism. In regard to the at- tack on the fleet, it was simply a dif- ference of opinion between Mr. Roose- velt and President McKinley. That the Secretary of the Navy had a gh opinion of the ability of Roosevelt uring that official's connection with the Navy Department is shown in the following encomium: “Indeed, nothing could be pleasanter than our relations. He was heart and soul in his work. His typewriters had no rest. He, too, lacks the rare knack of brevity. He was es- pecialiy stimulating to the younger of- ficers who gathered about him and made his office as busy as a hive. He was especially helpful in the purchas- ing of ships and in every line where he could push on the work of preparation for war. Almost as soon, however, as it was declared, he resigned the Assist- ant Secretaryship of the Navy to ac- cept the leutenant colonelcy of the Rough Rider Regiment in the army. Together with many of his friends, 1 urged him strenuously to remain in the f, erguing that he would there make a signal reputation, and that to go into the army would be only to fight mos- iuitoes oh the Florida sands or fret in camp at Chickamsuga. How right he was in his prognosis and how wrong we were in ours the result has shown. He took the straight course to fame, to the Governorship of New York and to the Presidency of the United States.” Of the crowded events in the few months” naval fighting with Spain, Long tells with accuracy and careful attéention to details. The battle of Ma- nila Bay draws from him an exhaust- ive summary of the respectiv strengths of Montojo's and Dewey's fleet, their armament, the weights of their broadsides, the complement of their erews. To the American com- mander he gives unstinted praise; to the valor of the Spanish seamen he pays respectful tribute. Dewey’s vic- tory is not to be minimized, says Long, on the score of the rottenness of the Spanish defenses. That they had and in fact used modern guns of power sufficient to sink Dewey’s fleet is borne out by the subsequent investigations of the conquerors. It is to the blockade of Cuba, the bat- tle of Sanitago and the lJamentable con- troversy between Schley and Sampson arising out of the events of these two movements that Long devotes a large portion of his work. As is to be ex- pected, he supports the administration in the trouble between the command- ers, but his rebuke to Schley has none of the outrageous venom which char-' acterizes the first edition of Maclay's history. He contents himself with pointing out in detail Schley’s manifest disobedience of orders in his dilatory movement from Cienfuegos to San- tiago, and commenting upon it thus: “It was the lack not of personal cour- age, but of that unswerving steadiness of purpose und nerve which is the es- sence of supreme command, and of which Fafragut is an example. Un- doubtedly it is a fair criticism on the department that Schley was not re- lieved at once and an inquiry ordered.” Upon the subsequent appeal of Ad- miral Schley for a court of inquiry and the unfortunate effect of the Schley- Sampson controversy, Long writes thus: “The unhappy controversy which afterward grew out of the rival claims of the friends of these respective officers is the only incident of any mo- ment that mars the otherwise univer- sally applauded record of the navy during the Spanish War. Political and partisan interests fanned the flame of it. It raged more in the press and in public discussion than in naval circles. * * * The Navy Department, its head and some of its bureau officers were without the slightest ground ac- cused of persecuting Admiral Schley. In fact, the department had treated him with a leniency that with an ear- lier knowledge of the retrograde move- ment in May (the dilatory advance on Santiago) would have been inexcusa- ble.” ' (The Outlook Publishing Company, New York; illustrated; price $5.) FX— SECRE TR THE SA AGITATOR’S STORY Joseph R. Buchanan Tells Unpvarnished Trutbs. HE Story of a Labor Agitator” 66 —that is the bald, unblushing title of a book by Joseph R. Buchanan, than whom no champion of the rights c«f labor was more before the public eye fifteen vears ago. Perchance Mr. Buchanan hesitated over the title of his work. “Confessions” would not have been amiss in the place of “story,” for the author is as ingenuous about laying bare the stock in trade of a professicnal agitator as he is earnest in setting_ forth the rightful province of such an individual in modern economic condi- tions. : 3 To state that Buchanan's book is tfmely would be but giving expression to the obvious. So much has been writ- ten in the “dismal science” of econom- ics, as Carlyle was pleased to call it, about the theory of capital and labor and go little there is of all that which has real common sense application to present day ccnditions that to have the momentous crux of the modern indus- trial question approached from the other point of view—even the radical point—is undoubtedly a valuable accre- tion to the mass of opinion which has been heaped up against the great rid- dle. The work of this labor agitator cannot be considered in any light as a deliberate and dispassionate attempt to harmonize the hostile pretensions of employer and employe~the tone of ev- ery Mne indicates that such a mission was far from the author's mind; what Buchanan aims to do and what he has admirably succeeded in doing is to present the business of a labor cham- pion, his aims and his methods. Whether deliberately or unwittingly the author of these confessions or this autoblography, whichever you choose to call it, has uncovered to the uninitiated many of the primal weaknesses of such as he which indubitably make for the ultimate failure of his efforts. Chief among these is the constant tendency toward the radical in lctjfln-—flm a near approach to the red flag. one of his chapters Buchanan frankly re- lates how, at a monster mass meeting neld 1 San Francisco in 1886, when the passions of his listeners. were ;aroused to the pitch ef frenzy and he himself was lashed into a fury by his own words—hew at that crucial moment he urged the audience to rise en masse, confiscate a train to carry them to Washington, and there “hurl the whole treacherous swarm (Ccngressy into the Potomac.” Buchanan's narrative !s not brought down to present day incidents, for it is to be surmised -that his sway as a la- bor leader was on the wane shortly after the decline of the Knights of Labor anovement. The storr opens with the author a typesetter upon a gountry paper in Missouri and later a member of the Typographical Union in Denver. the rights of labor seeped into the head of young Buchanan when the Lealiville Miners' Union *went ‘on strike. The novitiate in the labor world léaped into fame from the sum- mit of a packing box situated in the middle of the main street, which served as his nightly rostrum in the harangues to which he gave voice. As a result of bis ardor Buehanan was lauded to the skies by the labor element and threat- ened with lynching by the Law and Order League. Somewhat lacking in modesty though it may be, the recountal of the author’s famine years while editing a paper in the interests of labor bears the stamp of sincerity. Living in a single room behind his press shop, “'setting up” his editorials direct from the case without precious time being spent in writing them first, starving for months at a time, Buchanan certainly proved him- self a self-sacrificing servant of the laborer. Bitterly does the author com- plain upon the heartless lack of sup- port which his paper received from the people in whose interests it was pub- lished. That this attitude drove the harassed editor to pessimistic thoughts occasionally i3 evidenced by his reflec- tions upon those dark days. “More than once I logt hope,” says he, “that the wrongs of labor would ever be righted by peaceable means. The workingmen could not be made to appreciate the power the ballot gave them; they were, it seemed to me, slow to take advantage of the opportunities opened to them by labor organizations, and T sometimes thought that the ma- jority of them were not only too stupid to raise themselves, but too weak to stand if raised by others.” This com- mentary upon the status of-the Tahar. ing man twenty years ago is instruct- ive in the light of ‘present day labor conditions. | $ . i The writer's narrative waxes dra- matic in the recountal of the critical time of the great Rlo Grande strile of Hardly had the principles of “Hall, beautecus Night! fons FRANCISCO SUNDAY CALL. PCruris CoPYRIGH T BY Oz, 00K PUBLISIIAF €0. ey - < | ~ = 1884. Denver was the stormcenter and Joseph R. Buchanan was evident- ly in the vortex of the whirlwind. Vividly the author pictures the climax of affairs which brought to him daily threats of lynching, how he had to barricade himself in his printing office and have a coampany of riflemen ready to render aid at an instant’s warning. Buchanan the agitator had become Buchanan the rioter. The narrative contains further some interesting inside history of the rise of the Knights of Labor, its temporary success and final overthrow by the federated trades and labor unions. That fanatical, “semissocialistic, semi- anarachical society known as the In- ternational, which flourished at about the same time as the Haymarket bomb-throwing episode in Chicago, and of which Buchanan. was a mem- ber, ;is made the subjéct of the few confldential disclosures on his part. All in all, Buchanan's book falls short of the more sober and broader work on “Organized Labor” by John Mitchell. It should be read together with Mitchell's book, however, so that the whole history of the trades union movement may be presented chrono- logically. (The Outlook Company, New York; illustrated; price $1 25.) POEMS OF DEPT Some Excellent Verse by John G. Jury. LITTLE bock of poems of more than ordinary worth has just come from the pen of John G. Jury, a young barrister of local reputation. So unusual is it to find Blackstone and poesy hand in hand that Jury's verse will be read with curious interest. “Omar and FitzGerald,” the most pre- tentious verse of the collection and the one from which the booklet de- rives its title, is unfortunately not the best between the covers. In his pref- ace the lawyer gets the better of the poet and a brief argument is advanced to demonstrate the causus vivendi of “Omar, and FitzGerald.” Jury under- takes to explain that he takes excep- tion to old Omar’s pessimistic views of life and that his lines seek to read into the secret of the Persian philoso- pher-poet a little optimism. Were one to read the poem without the prefatory key to the meaning he would feel very much like the sick man who thought that his brain had weakened because he could not understand Browning. The thought in this poem is clouded by an overweening desire to imitate the verse form and diction of the Ru- baiyat. . But it is when the verse writer al- lows himself to be natural and does not follow after chosen gods that his poetic power is manifested most ad- vantageously. A strong faith and sin- cere belief that ““God’s in his heaven: All's right with the world—" these are the dominant thoughts . in Jury’s verse. They lend to his poems a simple strength which compels ad- miration. For example, the following ode on “Night” rings true: een of Eterdity! Before whose mansions ail the white stars lie el ot ik o depthe: T where I walk, in s, I see The lights and temples of Infinity. Most Mighty Father, what in truth am I That thou in glory shouldst approach so nigh, And with Omnipotence encompass me? E'en as the wayside flower, whose tiny hands Outstretch and lock the day in their embrace, So, rapturously. do I Ib;:ln hour . ~TWhere Bély night revealeth Grace Though the majority of the verses <which-Jury has collected into this, his first book, are didactic in tone, ' there dre a few which voice the love passion in a remarkably sweet tone < b N AN, supports. _ment with - -~ = and which will bear reading many more - times than the first casual glanc They are not at all Byron- esque, nor of the bombastic blather of the rejuvenescent Joaquin Miller, but light little thoughts, ocunningly chiseled. One in particular, “When Love Looks Through Her Tears at Me,” well merits citation: I've wandered oft o'er vale and hill, And through earth’s forests grandly fair; I've paused where sings the crystal rill, Close to the mountain-lion’ Hath filled my heart with ecsta Yet that is joy beyond compare, When love looks through her tears at me. And when day's fading hours instill Sweet restfulness in every care— When all the chords of nature thrill With one melodious, squlful air— When lifts the weary hedrt in prayer, Ah, holier joy there cannot be Than that which grief cannot Impair— When love looks through her tears at me! When time’s stern winter winds so chill Sweep round us ere we are aware, And scatter years like leaves until he tree of life is thin and bare— Then would I fly from drear Despair, nd take my place, dear ome, With thes, For naught of joy can I forswear, When love looks through her tears at me. L'ENVOL Then all Heaven's tents, O Prince, prepare, For Rapture speedeth unto thee! And fain would I attend her there, When love looks through her tears at me. (Whitaker & Ray Company, San Francisco.) PSR s NEW CULTURE IDEA An Attempt to Corre- late Soul and Beauty. OWADAYS there is a very nar- row line between what is pop- ularly styled “freak” literature and ' legitimate expositions of abstruse by-paths of thought. Works upon psychic phenomena, the gela- tion of mind to matter, of the bedy to the spirit, etc., are looked upon with a well-founded caution by well-bal- anced readers. They savor too much of the medium's cabinet and spirit whisperings to recommend themselves. Either that, or they are too often found to be without cause for exist- ence; merely ponderous arguments which lead you back to the starting point after dizzy ramifications. Therefore it will be with a par- donable suspicion that the reader ap- proaches ““Builders of the Beautiful,” by H. L. Piner. This gentleman, however, has not produced a book of charlatanism or a reference reader for spirit mediums, but has made a worthy attempt to read into the flesh- ly form of human kind the workings of the soul. He would have a beau- tiful body the abiding place of a beau- tiful soul. He would teach an ethical physical culture. According to the theory of Mr. Piner man is the only creature of culture, and evolution of mind is also evolution of body. Since Plato’s day it has been recognized that a beautiful and cul- tured mind seeks always and only an equally beautiful body, or in other words a thoughtful, introspective mind manifests itself in a beautiful face and form. The Dbullders and leaders of every country have been among the most beautiful and cultured types, just as the destroyers and criminals have been among the ugliest and most degrading specimens. These are mat- ters of common:knowledge and are in ccmplete accordance with the teach- ings of physiognomy. Mr. Piner'’s aim has been to stimu- late thought and seif-examination and to illustrate by well chosen methods the connection between mental char- acteristics and emotions and the exter- nal bodily appearances. Incidentally he wishes to inculcate spiritual estheti- cism and better ideals in life. A person’s character is always de- picted in his face, which is a simple book for those who can interpret it. Mr. Piner amplifies this in the follow- ing manner: “Your body is the dramatization of ‘your soul. It holds the tragedies and the comedies of life. “An evil spirit chooses ugly external forms. A beautiful spirit seeks always and only to illumine the organism it inhabits. “Form cannot be the form of noth- ing. Your visible appearance is but an outward actualization of your in- ner life. - “The canon of correspondence of the physical with the spiritual is a statute of being, unchanged and unchangeable, and {llustrated wherever mind weds it- self to matter. “When the psychic forces are out of harmony with the sources nf thair power and the laws of their existence tHey invariably deform their physical ‘When they are in adjust- the ideal the divinie stands in the fiésh and the mortal is glorified of the immortal.” In developing these ideas the author “New gives voice to many keen remarks om feminine beauty and shows how it is possible for a physically ugly face to be beautified by mental culture alone. If a person is not more beautiful at 60 than at 16 it is certain the interven. ing years have been lived both thought- lessly and negligently, for it is impos- sible to live, mix with the world and move amidst its many beautiful en- vironments without acquiring good, healthy moral thoughts. - Thoughts, sentiments, emotions, passions, says Piner, by means of the muscles and nerves, physically transmit them- selves to the face. It is through this that men are generally what they seem and that “the body is the drama- tization of the soul.” There is no evading the fact that persistent, beau- tiful thinking draws the features into harmony and then illuminates them with beauty There is nothing very startling about the author’s theories.. There is no great attempt at a sclentific proof for them. The worth of the book lies more in what it suggests to a thoughtful mind than what it states.” None but a thoughtful mind can find any pleasure in its perusal (Funk & Wagnalls York. Price $1 50.) FOR BOOK- WORMS Stray Leaves Culled by One of Them. ) ESSRS. GEORGE BARRIN & SONS of Philecelphia have taken heed of the complaint by Albert Bushnell Hart and Ed- ward Channing, professors ln,)!arvn.rd University, that there is no comprehen- sive history of this country 'from the discovery to the present time,;with the result that they now announsexthe first definitive, authoritative, inclusive, nar- rative History of North A a. The scope of the work includes,Ju ferritory, from the isthmus of Panasfd to the farthest north; and, in timsf ffom the prehistoric period to the presdnt date. In plan they have followed thé sugge: tion outlined by the American Histori- cal Association, the greatest collective bedy of historians in America, and have in preparation a series of twenty vol- umes incorporating the three principles laid down by that soclety: (1) that it be co-operative; (2) that it be under the direction of an editor-in-chief; (3) that each volume be complete in itself. Neith Boyce, whose first long novel, “The Forerunner” (Fox, Duffteld & Co.), has attracted much attention from the critical, began writing in California— short stories of California Ilife which dealt with well-known materials of ro- mance—the priest and confessional, the beautiful Spanish senorita, the miner, the cowboy, ete. “The Forerunner” is an achievement in quite another vein, showing neither the California of Bret Harté nor of Mrs. Atherton. It has not a single cowboy, miner, ranchero or senorita in it. It is more nearly the country of Frank Norris, though deal- ing with a different section and with cly rather than country life. Beatrice Harraden once wrote a novel of Call- fornia with the fromance” left out—a story of plain pebple who tried to grow oranges and failed. “The Forerunner” describes the land boom which tem- porarily wrecked Los Angeles, and its subject and treatment place it in line with “The Octopus” and “Hilda Straf- Company, New ford” rather than with the literature of the “palmy” .or blood-and-thunder days. NEW BOOKS RECEIVED The New American Navy, 2 vols.; John D. Long; The Outlook Publishing Company, New York; illustrated; price $5 00. The Story of a Labor Agitator, Jo- seph R. Buchanap; The Outlook Pub- lishing Company, New York; {llustrat. ed; price $1 25. Builders of the Beautiful, H. L. Piner; Funk & Wagnalls Company, New York; price $1 50. The Lost King, Robert Shackelford; Brentano's, New York; price $1 50. The Sclence of Study, James G. Moore; Hinds & Noble, - New York; price $1.00. Habits of California Plants, Kather- ine Chandler; Educational Publishing Company, San Francisco; {illustrated; price $1 00. Zionism and Anti-Semitism, Max Nordeau and Gustav Gotthell; Scott- Thaw Company, New York. The Manor School, Mrs. L. T. Meade; The Mershon Company, Rahway, N. J.; Mustrated. Boys’ Second Book of Inventions, Ray Stannard Baker; MeClure, Phil- lips & Co., New York; illustrated; price $1 50. A Japanese Physical Training. H. Irv- ing Hancock: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, York: illustrated. American Sculpture, Lorado Taft; “The Macmillan Company, New York; {llustrated; price $6 00.