The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, April 10, 1904, Page 32

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THE SAN FRANCISCO CALL, SUNDAY, APRIL 10, 190z Random Science Notes. At the hearing before the New York State Senate Committee on Miscel- laneous Corporations at Albany on the bill to increase the water rights of the Niagara, Lockport and Ontario Power Company, Charles M. Dow, president of the Board of Commissioners of the at Niags vigor- } -asure. Among remsr"=, he said: “Owing to ter declivity of the river bed 1 side, as well as the State reservation ously objected to on the Canad wider expanse of the Horseshoe Fall, it is estimated that only one-fifth of the whole volume of the river passes er the American fall. Furthermore, owing to the difference in elevation of the Canadian and American river beds, the American fall is the first show the effect of any subtraction of water from the river above, As the general depth of the water on the fall is only about four feet, and as the elevation of the American fall is thing like six or seven feet abov of the Canadian fall, it is apparent that the American fall might be made entirely dry le water poured over the Capadian fall. That such a discrepancy would appear in the event of the dlversion of a suf- ficient amount of water is not simply a theory; the fact was demonstrated w in 1848, when the flow of the river was | diminished by an ice blockade at the foot of Lake Erie, and on a lesser scale by more recent ice gorges. “From the foregoing it will that the diversion of 20 per cent of the water of Niagara River would be suf- ficient to render the American fall as | dry as the once famous cataract of Lodore in En nd. Now, let us see what the State has already done to ac- complish such a disastrous result: The reservation had hardly been created, for the express purpose of preserving the scenery of the fails, when the Leg- islature began, with singular inconsls- tency, to give away gratuitously the | very water upon which the existence of the fall depends. Seven corporations were granted charters to take water | from the Niagara River, between 1886 and 1894, besides another corporation which is taking water without author- ity, making American corpora- tions which have either been authorized or are taking water without authority frcm the river There are two Can- adian corporations, for which the New York Legislature is not responsible, of | but the effect of whose opera- cours tions upon the flow of the falls must be rec d with. “Som { these corporations are lim- ited in the amount of water which they can divert re are unlimited. One limited American company alone is au- thorized to develop 200,000 horsepower, requiring 6 per cent of the volume of the river. With a similar development by its corresponding company on the Canadian side the flow of the river will be diminished about one-eighth—suffi- cient to dry up the American fall, ac- cording to one estimate. A similar de- velopment by all of the companies in existence would rob Niagara of one- third of its volume and insure the ob- literation of the American fall beyond a peradventure.”—Electric World' and Engineer. Ol RO The large modern ice-breakers de- pend for their efficiency ability to ride up upon the ice and break down the edge of the sheet by sheer weight, thus “biting” their way through the sheet. Such action re- quires that the hull shall be con- structed with the greatest possible stiffpess, the vessel being subjected to stresses which would break an ordi- nary ship in two. With this great strength there must be ample power, | the combination of the two being needed to oppose the heavy resist- ances. Vessels of this kind are now in active service in Copenhagen, Kiel, Riga, Stockholm, Amsterdam and other ports, besides many small boats used as postboats and pilot-boats in the Baltic, the German coast and the Black Sea. A typical example of the boats used in general service is found in the Sampo, operating in the port of Hango, in Finland. This vessel, which was built on the Tyne, has a propeller at each end, the bow engine having 1200 horsepower and the stern engine 1350 horsepower. She is 202 feet long and 2000 tons displaccment, with a full draught of eighteen feet. This boat breaks through field ice twelve to sixteen inches thick #t a speed of eight knots and she can work through drift ice eight to ten feet thick at a rate of two to three knots, also breaking down larger packs with- out much trouble. The greatest of modern ice-breakers is the Ermack, built originally for use in the Baltic, but also occasionally em- ployed elsewhere. This vessel is 385 feet long, 71 feet beam and 8000 tons displacement, with a draught of 22 feet. She was originally fitted with a bow propeller as well as twin screws @t the stern, this propeller, with its in- dependent engine, being intended to fce, but became choked jJand useless in polar field ice, and was removed before the vessel was sent to the Arctic. In solid ice two feet thick, with six to twelve inches of snow on top of it, the Ermack cah make a speed of nine knots, while she can charge and demolish packs of ice twenty to thirty-five feet in thickness. attaches &t the still | appear | upon their | present time to the ice-breakers on Lake Baikal, in Siberia, these forming a portion of the system of the Trans-' Siberian railway. The Baikal, which is. the powerful ice-breaker for this serv- ice, is 292 feet long and 4200 tons dis- placement, and is fitted with three lines of rails for the locomotives and cars forming the train, there being also a promenade deck for the use of the passengers during the crossing. The field ice on Lake Baikal 'om!i thirty-six inches thick, and also forms | Jeavy packs, but the ice-breakers have been found successful in carrying the regular passenger trains and the mails across throughout the winter. The desert of Fayum, southwest of | Cairo, in Egypt, is the locality’in which the oldest known inscriptions written in Greek letters have been discovered. In the last two years it has become equally famous for the number of hith- erto unknown varieties of extinct ani- mals whose bones have been disin- terred from the sands. One of these beasts is the moeritherium—the anes- tor of all elephants—a creature with a [long snout, but with a lower jaw so |long that the enout could not hang | down in trunk style. | - | St more interesting, from the point of view of scientists, however, is the arsinoitherium, an animal that was bigger than the biggest of our modern rhinoceroses. Some six or seven skulls of this animal have been ‘.\»evurod. the largest having a lower jaw over two feet in length. Above | the nostrils the arsinoitherium had a | huge pair of horns projecting forward. | The striking thing about these honrs is that they were not of horny, fib- rous material, but bony ouu;row(hs.1 covered in life with blood vessels and | skin, like the horns of a giraffe, though probably protected at the tips with horny matter. Behind the:&l‘g horns was a pair of smaller ones. e nearest relative of the arsinoitherium known to sclence is the dinosaurus, specimens of which have been discov- ered in Wyoming in sands of the same | s those of the Fayum. The ian beast had the Wyoming one beaten in the size of its horns, though | some of the latter have three pairs of | horns. The arsinoitherium is named after | Queen Arsinoe, daughter of the First | | Ptolemy, who had a palace in the! | Fayum in davs when that region was | | more nearly habitable than it is to- | | @ay. The time that has elapsed since | the arsinoitherium lived is, however, | as much greater than that since Ar- | sinoe as a century is greater than a | couple of minutes. Excavations in the | Fayum are still being pushed, though 1under great disadvantages, owing to | | the fact that the best localities are three full days’ march from water, and many more finds are anticipated. —Chicago Record-Herald. | Invar, an alloy which, when heated, | contracts instead of expanding, has re- | cently been invented by Dr. Guillaune, | the physicist. It consists of nickel and steel, therefore of two metals which | each for itself expands rather consid- | erably in heat. Correct measurements | have, however, shown that Dr. Guil- | | laune has really produced alloys which, | | when heated, expanded even less than | marble or wood, and which, when | slightly changed in their composition, | even contract when heated. Propor- tions of compositions of alloys have also | been found so that they neither expand nor contract, but remain the same in all degrees of heat. The importance of this invention is | extraordinary. For scientific as well | a= for practical purposes, measuring in- | | struments of invar, as the inventor | | calls the new alloy, will render most su- | Already objects fer | | tropical survi have been made of it. | Such measurements always suffered from certain inaccuracies, owing to the | expansion of the metals in the heat, and | required numerous remeasurements. | Measuring sticks for laboratories, as| | well as for official gauging, are also to be mfde of this new alloy. Dr. Guillaune has made a special al- loy to correct the unrest of naval chronometers by the medium defect of temperature. Such a chronometer, re- | | cently tested at the observatory at Kew, near London, had only a devia- tion of .18 of a second per day,%and | for an increase of temperature of one degree Fahrenheit each the deviation was only .004 of a second per day more. That pendulums of invar, | therefore, must excel by their unchangeable and | even swings is self-evident, and the| | tests made at the same observatory | have demonstrated that even in dif-| ferences of temperature of 18 degrees | | Cel. simple pendulums of invar rods| showed only a deviation of .2 of a sec- | ond per day. It has to be added that| | these pendulums had no equalizing at- | tachments, but consisted only of rods. | "7ith these examples the number of | perior services. uses of invar is certainly not at all | exhausted, and undoubtedly many-more will yet be found.—Frankfort News. Non-Sinkable Boat. The Board of Supervising Inspectors of Steam Vessels of the United States has indorsed the merits of the Engle- hart collapsible boat, and authorized the adoption of the same on passenger steamships. A contract for building one of the boats has already been awarded. The question of providing sufficient lifeboats on trans-Atlantic and coastwise steamers has for a num- ber of years been a serious one. The ordinary lifeboat takes up too much room, and it was in hope of provid- ing something more compact that a number of inventors have for several years been experimenting ! along these lines. Englehart of Copenhagen, Denmark, has Dbeen one of the most successful of these in his experiments. He has invented the boat mentioned above, which not _There are upward of 80,000 inhabit- ants on the slopes and skirts of Ve- suvius. If it were for the fertilizing F | port. Captain Valdemar | results would be very different. T11THE SAN FRANCISCO CALL JOHN D. SPRECKELS, Proprietor . .. . ... ... Address All Communications to JOHN McNAUGHT, Manage: .- PUbOMIOn OO +eoeesessissssssassmssvesssot @ ieeeeeseesese.s...Third and Market Streets, S. F. SRR e B R Vi R i S A e ST L G BT R SOCIALISM IN CHICAGO. SUNDAY..: HICAGO has just voted again in favor of muni- ‘ cipal ownership and operation of the street rail- ways. This vote is at a time when Chicago has entirely failed in the essentials of a city government. The city is practically bankrupt. The streets are like over-ground sewers, and filthy beyond belief. The police are inefficient and insubordinate. Mobs destroy life and property in broad daylight, and maltreat working women as they leave their place of employment for their. homes. The cry of good citizenship in that city -is for the proper administration of its present duties by the municipal government, and not for the assumption of duties that do not belong to a political government at all. The city runs the water works, and the first thing a stranger reads in the morning papers is a warning by thc Board of Health not to the use the water, as it is danger- ous, The school children are compelled by the health regulations to carry their supply of boiled water for drinking to the schoolhouse in bottles. That being the situation in that great city, instead of putting its rev- enue and its energies into the proper discharge of the existing duties of its government, 130,000 of its people vote to leave all undons that should be done, in order to assume the doing of more. « Mayor Harrison, for personal political purposes, pro- moted the public ownership idea, but seems to have been sobered by the result, for he says it should be a future and not a present policy, and the vote is due to the ignor- ance and misinformation of the people. The foreign exceeds the native population, and is very largely socialistic in its views. The socialists were ac- tive in promoting the vote, while those who oppose the plan were, as usual, idle or indifferent. Thinking Americans are repelled from all schemes for putting government into business by the history of the management of the postal business by the Federal Gov- ernment. More reasons can be given for the Govern: ment going into the business of carrying letters than for embarking in any other kind of business. Yet it has al- ways shown itself incompetent and incapable in perform- ing that function. What final sovereignty has failed td do cannot be hoped for if undertaken by a municipality. We do not know what the government of Chicago proposes to do under’ instruction of the recent vote. 1f it take over the street railroad system, it must borrow millions fo‘ that purpose, and following the usual course in such experiments, the bonds will be made a lien upon the general fund, absorbing the credit that should be used in purifying the water and cleansing the sewer-like streets. The future proceedings of the city will be watched with interest. Our worthy Board of Supervisors, with incongruous gravity, is investigating the “amateur” prize-fighting | clubs which are lining their coffers with easily earned money and are breeding dangerous men out of vicious boys. The evil which the Supervisors are solemnly dis- cussing has become so widespread and so corrupting in its influence upon the youth of San Francisco as to be- come a serious public menace. Public opinion if not public authority should stop it at once. FORESTS AND CLIMATE. ORESTERS and climatologists in this country will be surprised at the action of the German Meteor- ological Society in its report upon the influence of forests upon climate. Without the full text of the report it may be easy to make mistakes in discussing"t. But, a Berlin telegram says that its conclusion is that for- ests have no appreciable effect upon climate. Without knowing just what is included in the term “climate,” one is somewhat in the dark as to the full meaning of the re- It is stated that cbservations of temperature and humidity, taken in the forests and clearings of Branden- burg, 4nd at remote peints therefrom, justify the con- clusion that forests do not affect climate, and that like observations in the marshes of Russia confirm this. The diagrams and tables accompanying the report are to be shown as an exhibit at the St. Louis Exposi- tion. Taking the report to be as stated in the Berlin telegram, the examination of the subject is incomplete. 1t has not been contended that forests create humidity, but they conserve it. Against this it was formerly pointed out that humidity in the prairie States existed without the influence of forests. This was for a long time supposed to negative the claims of the foresters that trees affect humidity. But the experience of years has proved that nature provided water storage and con- servation on the treeless prairies, in the form of sloughs, swamps, ponds and lakes. These reservoirs caught and held the rainfall, and evaporation carried the moisture in- to the air, to be distributed by the thunder showers com- mon to all that region. In the progress of settlement these natural reservoirs have been drained for cultivation, and it is (discovered that the climate has become more arid. The precipitation of moisture in the late fall and winter and early spring goes on undiminished. It.comes from the great lakes. But, the reservoirs which originally stored it being destroyed, it runs into the drainage channels and gravity carries it away, inc/reasing the floods in the Mississippi River and its tributaries. Not being stored, the summer humidity is decreased, the water is not distributed to the soil by the summer showers, and the crust of the earth is drying out. It takes more original precipitation to do the work than formerly. There are seasons in which the moisture from the great lakes is unusual in quantity when the ground is unfrozen, and it is saturated sufficiently o avoid drought. But the main problem remains, caused by draining the natural reservoirs. No one has ever contended that the annual rainfall of California is caused by the forests. Its source is the moisture evaporated from the Japan current, the evap- oration being caused by difference in temperature be- tween the air and the surface of that ocean stream. If the Sierra Nevada range were a bare granite wall the State would receive the same rainfall as now. But the The water would all run off, as from a roof, as fast as it falls. The creeks and rivers would all be torrents, and when the rain ceased, would immediately dry up, and the water would all be back in the ocean. It is demonstrated that stripping the mountains of the forests that clothe them, and destroying the lesser vege- tation by grazing or by fire, produce exactly the same results as if they had always been naked rock. The for- ests conserve the moisture. By their agency it pene- trates the soil and slowly finds its way into the creeks and springs and through them into the rivers, preserving make the valley lands fertile. If the German ments deny this function to the forests, we mast LA that they omit essentials and have included only a part of the factors. In New England and the Middle States, observation confirms the’fact that destruction of the forests has made the earth’s crust the drier and has impaired the fertility of the soil. It is doubtful if observations made in Germany can be applied to other countries, differently situated in relation to the origin of the rainfall they re- ceive. It is a small country, subject to the influence of the Baltic and the North Sea. Its supply of moisture from those bodies of water is close at hand, and their in- fluence may well produce an average humidity over for- est and plains. But the test of the real function of the forest in con- serving moisture is not to be made in the air but in the soil. . We are of the opinion that a cubic yard of soil from the forest floor will be found to contain more moisture than a cubic yard taken from untilled land at a distance from the forest, and at the same depth. The German report will be taken as a challenge to the American climatologists and foresters, and they will find in California the proper field for experiments, which | will either demonstrate or disprove the function of the forest as a conserver of moisture in the ground, not in | the air. Confession has followed quickly upon expose in the local Chinese substitution cases. It is high time that punishment severe enough to be salutary be adminis- tered to stop this hideous traffic in coolie chattels that has grown and fattened in San Francisco. The Federal courts have a very serious duty to perform. Is it a city suffering from a village organiza- V u tion? Is it like a man dressed in the clothes of a child? If so, let the town slough its village gov- ernment and the man put by childish things. Berkeley is too much in evidence in the operations of footpads, burglars and highwaymen, who seek the low way: of life by resorting to any community that is insuffi- ciently guarded, in order to prey upon its people. Now we don’t want this to be resented sby somebody in Berkeley telling us that when the tilltapper, porch thief, WAKE UP, BERKELEY! HAT is the matter with the town of Berkeley? thug and pickpocket no longer ravage San Franéisco, | it will be time to advise Berkeley. San Francisco is big and can stand more thieves. But Berkeley can't. It is a university town. It has unusual charms and attractions. It is the home of hundreds of families who seek it for the excellent advantages of the university and find life there in the midst of every visible physical charm. The gardens of Gul bloom in Berkeley, and from the greén mountains above :t to the sheen of the bay and the gilded path through the Golden Gate in front and below, it is graced and garnished with every charm of scenery and climate. Yet thieves are there and break through and steal They also break heads with sandbags. When a univer- sity professor cannot go from his house to the post- office without being knocked senseless by thugs, it is time for Berkeley to wake up. We are told thut the town has only three policemen! The university grounds, with their trees and shrub- bery, their copse and shadows, with the deep gorge of the stream that flows by them, offer the best of night hiding for marauders, and three policemen can no more guard the town than the three tailors of Tooley street could speak for the people of England. i We have high hopes invested in the future of the ! cast side of the bay. San Francisco has there a hinter- | land in which the metropolis can never lose interest. The State has there some of its most important insti- tutions, ; and heads to be cracked. Berkeley, under the circum- stances, should emerge from the chrysalis of a village and be the butterfly that nature intended. The people should rouse themselves, enlarge the powers of their municipal charter, build a jail and have policemen enough to fill it with the moonlight mechanics who go around cracking the well-stocked skulls of the university | professors. i ADULTERATED FISH. HE pure food inquiry is yielding some interesting results, The American who picnics has long been deceived by consuming as sardines in olive oil the inferior sprat, juvenile herring and nameless minnow en- | tombed in tin and a lotion of cotton-seed oil or lard oil. But this was supposed to be the limit in sophisticating our fish diet. All over New England the Friday dinner of codfish has been eaten with the secure feeling that cod is cod, and on Saturday codfish “twice laid” has fol- lowed to clean up the remnants. The quality of Yankee brains has been fearlessly as- cribed to this appetizing fish diet. and over the State House in Boston the efligy of the codfish has been long given to the east wind, zs the origin of all the art and lit- erature of the Hub. Margaret Fuller and all the gods and goddesses of New England letters have been pointed to as proof of the gray matter fertilized by codfish. Of late years there has been a decline. New England has lost her literary primacy. The great ones have passed away. Boston has ceased to produce the masters of American thought. Public attention has been diverted from philosophy to fisticuffs, and the greatest Yankee of the generation ‘is John L. Sullivan, pugilist and publicist. This discouraging decadence must have a cause, and it is at last revealed in the sophistication of codfish. proved now that instead of the pure cod from Georges Banks the fishermen of Gloucester fill their smacks ‘with hake and pollock, cusk and other inferior ground- | feeding fish, the plebeians of the finny tribe. Codfish are worth on the smack $5 per hundred pounds, while these base-born substitutes are worth only from & cents to $2 50. The innocent consumer seeks this inferior fish. supposing that he is increasing his mental fertility. He fills on it, reads Emerson and awaits results. The re- suits don't come. The crop of thought is not pro- duced. The inspiration fails. 'He eats more and gets duller. He finds himself losing interest in the works of _Hawthorne and Longfellow, Holmes and Higginspn, “and inclined instead to read the sporting news and drop philosophy. It proves that we of this coast are not alone in the ne- cessity for guarding commercial honor. And it also oroves the need of strict legal oversight of foodstuffs. We eat tomato catsup made of pumpkin, currant jelly made of glue, aniline and vinegar, and a whole menu of us stuff, and now are compelled to take cusk, e ifieufl pollock for the nutritious and historic cod! a steady run off and supplying the means of irrigation to Woe i§ us if something is not done to restore the for- Monthly of an knglish mer state of our diet, for our brains will become like unto the messes we take into our stomachs. The people have there good things to steal | It is ! The Glamor of a Title. Confined in a cell in the Detention Hospital\ for the insane suspects at the City Hall, deserted and disowned by her children and other blood rela- tives, is a woman who at one time was the wife of a German Baron. Early residents of this city and old members of the Police Department would, if the Baroness’ name was mentioned, recol- lect the sensation which was created when a policeman wi‘h a German title eloped With a widow, the mother of a large grown up family and the pos- sessor of a large fortune left her by her departed husband. The self-styled German Baron, who was incidentally a policeman, had obtained leave of ab- | sence from the Chief during the time he won the widow and her fortune, much to the indignation of her chil- dren. All persuasion on the part of | the family and the Baroness' sisters | | could not induce her to quit the man | she so desperately fell in love with. After enjoying a brief honeymoon at | the bride’s expense the couple returned to this city, where they resided for| some time, until eventually the deluded woman found herself deserted and her | fortune squandered. The Baron de- | serted the country and was lost to| , sight, | | - Since that time this woman had] | eked out a kind of an existence until in her old age she was forced to throw | herself on the charity of the taxpay-| ers and seck sheiter and food in a pub- | lic building. Now she is held for in- sanity. Such is the glamor of a title. Another Substitution Case. el One of the Almshouse attaches mor- tally wounded a fox in the forest back | of the institution a day or two ago and, | on trailing the wounded animal to her lair, three »ung foxes apparently a few davs old were discovered. The young animals were brought to Super- intendent Frank Schmitz, who at once | ; hit upon a scheme to raise them by providing a foster mother in the per- son of the cat which has made the | Alinshouse her home for many years. | The cat was at the time nursing her | own offspring, consisting of four kit-/ tens. The latter were drowned forth- with and the baby foxes were placed | ! under the protecting care of the mother | cat. The cat seemed to be utterly oblivi- | ous to the fact that any substitution had been made and offered no resist- ance when her foster children cuddled up to her to be nursed. Schmitz says that, if anything, the cat is even more | r solicitous for the baby. foxes than for the kittens, and both the cat and the| foxes are doing well Frogs in April. Not for the world's delight In the wet, moonless night _ Ye 1ift your litanies, O tuneless Choir, To one high note and shrill | Piping your own wild will, | From your dark lodgings in the moss | and mire. No poet voices praise The ringing notes ye raise; ¢hanticleer himself doth sweetlier | sound His farmyard trumpet clear When first the dawn is near, And gaping milkmaids make their morn- | ing round. 2 .Yet never golden bell ¢ gladder tidings tell ! till night air o'er a moonlit town S e tale ye bring, | rophets’ of the Spring, Chirping of April mid the brown. meadows { Your artiess anthems range | Along the stops of change. | “Thé snows are gone” ve pipe, “and | bluebirds come! | Time's at the dewy turn ‘When dandelions burn; | In yon bare boughs ere long the bees 1 will hum.” 2 Pipe, then, your vernal theme, | Pipe on. though eyes may gleam, ur keen chorals, through a mist of t Mid i For with your notes come back Old things we love, but lack, | And dear, dead faces out of vanished years. I | | Aye, but to hear that hymn | Onch more in meadows dim, God's saints, mayhap. shall cease from i heavenly mirth : Along the wall to listen, | With down-dropt eyes that glisten, | And sighing, say, “'Tis spring in our | old earth.” —Youth’s Companion. Canada at the Fair. Five carloads of exhibits from dif- ferent parts of Canada have arrived |in St. Louis. A car of fruit has also been placed in cold storage awaiting | shipment. The exhibits already ar-| rived include the pick of Canada's ag-| ricultural, forest and mineral wealth. | Commissioner General William Hutch- | ison is authority for the statement that the Canadian display at the St. Louis exposition will be far ahead of the former efforts of the Dominion. The general policy is to give prominencé to | the items of natural wealth peculiar to Canada, or, rather, those not found in the other countries making exhibits. For examvle, in minerals, Canada’s almost exclusive resources of nickel, { corundum, chrome iron, peat and as- | bestos, are to be featured. The dis- ! plays will not be confined to show- cases, bLt unique and striking mass dis- plays will also be made. Separate pyramids of asbestos, mica and nickel are to be built and placed in prominent positions in the Canadian quarter. | These pyramids will illustrate the pro- cesses the ores undergo in the transi- | tion from the crude state to the fin- ! ished product. The nickel pyramid is to be twenty feet in height. The ore, as turned out of the mine, will form the base; above it will be a section con- | taining the nickel product after the | roasting process. Above it again will ' be a section containing the copper and ! nickel matte, and the apex of the pyr- ‘amid will be finished in the refined ! nickel. Surmounting the pyramid is [ to' be a statue made of the refined nickel and truly Canadian in design. Fair Play. 7 During the reform riots in Park, London, in 1866, the mob, on a fwell—remembeud night, began tearing down the fences oL Hyde Park and barricades. Colonel Th worth Higginson tells in | this girl was addict-~ & partment, telling him that his regiment was ordered out to deal with the mob. He hastened back to his own house, but when he called for his horse he found that his servant had received permission to'go out for the evening, and had the key of the stable in his pocket. The officer hastily donned his uniform and then had to proceed on foot to the Guards’ Armory, which lay on the other side of Hyde Park. Walk- ing hastily in that direction, he came out unexpectedly at the very headquar- ters of the mob, while they were al- ready piling up the fences. His uniform’ was recognized, and an- gry shouts arose. It must have seemed for the moment to the mob that the Lord had delivered their “worst enemy | into their hands. There was but one thing to be done. ! He made his way straight toward the center o who was evidently action, and called to a man mounted on the pile, and was the leader of the tumult: “I say, my good man, my regiment has been called out by her Majesty's orders. Will yowgive me a hand over this pile?” The man hesitated a minute, and then said with decision, “Boys, the gentleman is right. He is doing his duty, and we have no quarrel with him. Lend a hand and help him over.’ This was promptly done with entire respect, and the officer in his brilliant uniform went hastily on his way amid three cheers from the moh. Then the mob returned to its work, to complete it if possible before he whom they had aided should come back at the head of his own regiment, and perhaps order them to be shot down. Opium Using on the Increase. The London Daily Mail prints an in- terview with a prominent physician, who says: “The drug habit, whether in t! » form of morphia or laudanum, is more and more asserting a sway which | we are powerless to check.” The remark was prompted by the | case of a girl who, when remanded at Bradford on a charge of stealing, at- tributed her po: 1 to her craving for laudanum and cigarettes. .Every effort had been made to break her of this habit. Her father had known of it for three or four years, while the girl confessed to a seven years' slavery to the drug. wpium, of which morphia and lauda- num are forms, is rapidl the doctor added, “becoming the intoxicant of the upper and middle classes. If there is 1 1 one person more than another suscepti- ‘ ble to the drug habit it is the neurotic individual, and the neurotic being is one of the products of the age. “Town life is one of the chief factors in the forming of a race of neurotic ' and in the town the opium habit is so easily gratified. .. person who wants laudanum can visit a large number of chemists and get small quantities from each without raising any suspicions.” “A prescription containing opium is often the beginning of the habit,” the doctor added. It would be better, he thinks, if the medical profession did not prescribe 6flum so much in chronic cases, but reserved it for acute ail- men‘s. “I note,” he said in conclusion, “that to cigareties. This is strange, for the Jevotee of opivm is generally faithful to the drus. But it is suggestive in.this regard— that T have recently heard that a cer- tain “rand of cizarettes contain opigm.” Answers to Queries. TWO RECITATIONS — Subscriber, Palo Alto, Cal. The catalogues of pub- lished recitations do not contain such titles as ‘The Convict” and “The Gambler.” VIOLINS — M. W. G., Fresno, Cal For such information as you desire about violins, address a communication to any first-class house that deals in musical instruments. ' GREAT FIRES — W. R, City. The loss by the great fire in Chicago, which commenced October 8, 1871, was $190.- 000,000; that in Boston, Mass., which commenced -November 9, 1872, was $75.- 000,000, and that in Baltimore, which commenced February 7, 1904, was $100,- 000,000, HOMICIDES—Subscriber, Palo Alto. Cal. The number of homicides in the United States in 1890 was 4920, accord- ing to Mulhall's statistics. The legal executions in 1880 in the United States were 460S. RUN OF SALMON—A. 8., City. The great run of salmon in the Fraser Riv- er, B. C.,, ended in September, 1833. This department has no means of as- certaining when the next great run in . that river will occur. THE MAILS—C., Seiad Valley, Cal. If a person receivé an offensive com- munication through the United States mail the receiver should submit the same to the nearest United States Dis- trict Attorney to ascertain if the sender has been guilty of violation of This week good eyeglasses, specs. 25c- 50c. 79 4th (front Key's Cel. Oys. House).* . L ——— Townsend's California Glace frufts and choice candles. in artistic fire-etched m»ndt 5 boxes. Amm"' . East 35 Markot street. above. Call buildt daily to o 4 i

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