The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, July 28, 1904, Page 6

English Literary Folk. Special Correspondence. HEADQUARTERS OF THE CALL, 5 HENRIETTA STREET, COVENT GARDEN, LONDON, July 15.—It is rather doubtful If there is anmother poet who can boast of as ro- mantic a career as, that of Colun Wallace, who at the age of 108 is now living and writing in a modest cottage in Oughterard in County Galway, Ireland. Probably Colun Wailace is absolutely unknown in the United States—he is practically in this country—but in his own land his reputation as a verse writer is no mean one and a new collection of his poems has just been published by the Gaelic League in Dublin. Wal- ce was born in 1796 aad for aimost | a hundred years made his living as a mason and a sawyer in various parts of Ireland, writing poetry in spare | moments. married twice, but about three years ago his second wife died and soon afterward Wallace's lack of means obliged him to enter the poorhouse at Oughterard. It was some months before the poet’s readers discovered where he was, but when they did a fund was raised for his| benefit, as 2 result of Which ‘Wallace was provided with a cottage, which he now occupies, s well as money enough to help him through his de- | clining years. He.is now in splendid health and spirits and-wrote an intro- ductory poem the other day for the new volume -of hik verse. Perhaps the most striking: item of this collec- tion is a poem which Wallace ca “The Song of Tea” If is a dialogue, spoken by a hisband-and wife, while they are picking potatoes, as to the | relative merifs of tgbacco and tea to | the ex: ve use of’ which they are respectively addicted. - o A friend who recently has been see- ing something of Signor Gabriele d’Annunzio furnishes me with a Nttle | incident of what the Scotch call “can- | niness” on the poet’s part: Like other writers of renown D'Annufzio receives requests for his autograph by almost | every gnail. His reply to these is in- | variably the same; that he will be de- lighted to furnish his autograph, but oniy upon a copy of one of his works, and Signor d’Asnnunzip implied to my friend that so far the results of this little expedient of his had been high- ly gratifying. . American readers of “Lorna Doone” and Blackmore's other novels, who subscribed to the memorial recently unveiled in Exeter Cathedral, will be interested on hearing that there re- mained after the completion of the whole business a balance of $100. This has been handed over to the S ciety of, AutMors, of which Blackmore | was a most enthusiastic member. R IS A rather undignified contest over the body of George Whyte-Melville, the novelist, who died in 1878, is now going on between his widow and the | Viscountess Massereene, his only child.. Mrs. Whyte-Melville (is peti- tioning the Consistory Court for the issue of a “faculty” authorizing the | disinterment and removal of the re-| maine of her late husband in order that they may be buried in the parish | churchyard of Wherestead, Suffolk, with the other members of his family. The Viscountess Massereene is pro- lesting against the issuance of this “fa¥ulty® her objections, however, not being especially clear. Whyte-Melville, of course, met his death through an accident in the hunting field, which played so prominent a part in prac- tically every one of his noveis. gt That an American author, if only there be quality in his or her work, is sure of an audience in this country is being demonstrated constantly. The latest example of this is the success of Miss Alice Brown's books. The first of them, published almost with- out any booming, were praised unani-. mously by reviewers, and of = Miss Brown’s latest volume, “High Noon,” kindly things are being said on almost every side. - - - The American wife of still another rather prominent figure in the London literary world is making an enviable reputation with her pem: This is Mrs. John Lane, whose husband is, of course, one of the best known of London pub- lishers. The really good stuff in Mrs. Lane's story, “Kitwyck,” led to its being widely praised, and Mrs. Lane’s | the | third-class engineer of the Kasumi. | wretches! occasional articles on social and do- mestic matters are being paid the compliment of publication in the Fortnightly Review. The latest of them, which deals amusingly with the scrvant question, is called “Tempo- rary Power.” T P Oddly enough London has now no weekly comic paper printed in colors on the lines of Puck and Judge at home, and in consequence much in- terest has been aroused by the an- nouncement that such a periodical, partly composed -of American humor, is about to be started. There is plenty of room for it, for Punch appeals only slightly to the man in the street, whereas the English comics, such as Ally Sloper, Scraps and so forth rely for support chiefly upon office boys. At present one of the biggest suc- cesses in the way of a comic weekly is a little periodical called Snapshots, ‘which sells for two cents, and is made up entirely from advance sheets of the principal American gomic week. lies. Its perhaps most popular feature are reproductions of the cartoons of | Charles Dana Gibson, who is almost | as well known here as at home. HAYDEN CHURCH. Where Death Stalks. The following little stories of bravery, taken from Yune Noguchi's translation for the Boston Transcript, show the little brown man’s hardihood in the face of death: In the hot battle outside the south gate of Chongju, Sergeant Sato made & dash and got his foot struck by the enemy's bullet. “Yarrareta” (I was hit), he exclaimed. But he pushed his wey, saying: ‘“As long as my eyes can see—what does it matter?—I shall never be beaten by any Russian.” There was the bustle of men and the tramping of horses. A party of “red-capped” Imperial Guardsare now on their way to the front. They all had their waterproof fur coats rolled | up tightly and fastened them on their knapsacks and carried on their backs shovel-like things, together with sev- eral other implements of war. Their swords and muskets were bright with careful burnishing. They were in splendid martial array. Dear soldiers! Oh, what proportion of these fighters would be fortunate enough to come back safely with laurels of victory! They are hastening to their graves, truly. But they marched, talking quietly and laughing sweetly. Now, from the second story of a beef shop an attractive girl of about 18 or 19 leaned over the rail and watched | them. When they came right before | the shop every one of them looked up | and stared at her at once and passed | on, whispering something. The girl | never took her eyes off the soldiers and kept casting her flirting smiles at | them. One of the soldiers suddenly | turned up his face toward the girl| and exclaimed, “No more flirtation, my | dear lassie! Oh, no, none of your jokes!” The third-class bluejacket Koma Shinowara of the Fuji, a youth of 22 vears, was serving as an aid de camp to the chief gunner, having stood in the front bridge. A shell came whist- ling and carried his right hand off. The young sailor, however, stood calm, stopping the gushing blood with his left hand. “I am wounded as you see,” he said, seeing his superior officer ap- | proach him. “May I leave my post?” | he asked quietly. He saluted his chief, ;r raising his left hand, and quietly | walked down. A frogment of the shell flew past breast of Yasuo Minamisawa, The blood instantly began to flow. But | the engineer was too intent on his duties to become conscious of the | wound. He was deaf to the rolling sound of the guns. Nor did he notice the shells bursting close to him. All that made him suspect something was wrong was the temporary tremors of his hand and a little choking sensation he experienced at the moment. After a while a sailor noticed his wound and cried: “What? Look! You are struck!” The engineer seemed not to hear the remark. “Your honor, you are wounded!"” The engineer remained still silent. The sailor approached him and re- peated, “You have been wounded, sir!” The engineer turned his head and ‘I? Oh, no.” res, sir; your breast.” “My breast?” He touched his bremst and saw his hand stained with blood. Soon after there came the officer who was to relieve the wounded engi- neer and he was accordingly made to to retire into the officers’ room. “Am I to be treated as a wounded man when the wound gave me no pain?” he exclaimed with indignation. A while ago a second torpedo which the Russian warship sent out struck the ill-fated transport Kinsu Maru near the engine-room and split her in two. Sergeant Okano, who had his mus- ket leveled at the enemy all the time, and continued firing, seeing that his ship was sinking, dropped down on deck in despair and exclaimed, “All is over!” The next moment he un- sheathed his sword, and holding it with | its point against him, cut himseif in the stomach crosswise. “How shame- ful of you to destroy an unarmed transport! You, cowards of Russian Now, look and see how a Japanese fighter meets his death,” he exclaimed. The Susanami succeeded in captur- ing the Russian destroyer Steregchiti. She dispatched some of her crew to the captured vessel to have our battle- ship flag hoisted on board and bring her near the coast. But as the sea began to rise higher and higher, the tugging cord was cut off and the poor ship began to sink. The captain of the Susanami said to himself: “The ship may be allowed to sink, but—not our naval flag, never!” He sent a boat to fetch the flag back to him. The foilowing letter was written by Katsutaro Tsuchida to Lieutenant Sai- to, entreating to be put among the members on the occasion of the second sealing of Port Arthur: “® * While I had been at home my father told me that it is said in a proverb the one who does not die when he ought to is liable to disgrace more bitter than death. I will not behave like a coward at any cost. I expect to die for the sake of our coun- try. A rumor is current that in the near future the second calling for the ‘Resolved to die’ party will be an- nounced. If this be the case I solicit your favor that you would do me the honor of selecting me for the party once more. In case the announcement is formally made I, of course, would apply to the captain, chief engineer and divisional lieutenant. The uncer- tainty of the appointment makes me €0 uneasy that I have not been able to enjoy eleep many a night. As you know I have resolved to die under your command, and I would like to fol- low you even to the world next. Please pick me up by vour special influence, if the selection comes to be a fact. As I have already resolved upon dying 1 should not be satisfied till I am dead. am fully convinced and am thinking night and day that now is the time to’ give proof of my devotion to the T THE SAN FRANCISCO CALL, THURSDAY, JULY 28. 1904. THE SAN FRANCISCO CALL "~ | |JOHN D. SPRECKELS, Proprietor . « « « « o + « . o Address All Communications to JOHN McNAUGHT, Manager Publication Office . -Third and Market Streets, S. F. THURSDAY .5.l..ccicorevstcsnssrososasethsespsaonsse FREE SHIPS MAKE FREE GOODS. HE tendency of modern civilizationsis to mitigate the horrors and misfortunes of war and to limit its destructive effects to as narrow a field as poss sible. To this end it has come to almost be written into international law that free ships make free goods on the high seas. Belligerents may prey upon the erce of each other wherever they find it, but a neutral flag protects a cargo. If one belligerent wish to destroy the commercial intercourse of the Sther it must be done by efficientt blockade of seaports, of which all the world must have notice. We used the blockade quite effectively on the Confederate seaports during the Civil War and it has been applied as an instrument of warfare from time to time since. It was used with considerable ef- fect to bring Venezuela to her senses by the concerted powers which had to interfere in behalf of their na- tionals. It is recognized as a civilized process and all the nations require that it shall be actual and not merely constructive. It keeps the martial issue entirely between the nations party thereto and leaves the high seas free to neutral ships. Freedom of the seas has always been insisted upon by the United States. The Old World had recog- nized the right of search and seizure on deep water. During the Napoleonic wars Great Britain claimed this right and exercised it to the injury of our merchant fleet and our commerce. For this we fought the war of 1812. The American slogan in that struggle was “Free trade and sailors’ rights.” This did not mean what after- ward became known as “free trade” in an economic and revenue sense. It meant freedom of the seas for trade as against the taking of neutral ships as prizes. We won our contention in battle, but strangely enough the treaty of peace makes no reference to the issue that caused the war. Great Britain entered into no formal conven- tion to give up the seizure and search of our ships on the high seas, but she did give it up, and on that subject there has been amity between the two nations ever since. We followed this up by ridding the Mediter- ranean of the Algerine corsairs by banishing the pirates of Tripoli, and it will be seen that American influence is solely responsible for the advance made by the world in respect to freedom of the seas. The wisdom of our policy in that respect has become more apparent since the importance to us of the Pacific Ocean was disclosed by the Spanish war. We are the only great commercial nation with a water front on that ocean and we are vitally concerned in the freedomi of its waters. Since the war of 1812 Great Britain has sought and attained primacy in her merchant marine. Her ships are everywhere afloat and for a half century she has spared no pains nor expense to maintain a navy adequate for the protection of her merchantmen. The patriotism of her people has sustained them in all sacrifices neces- sary to maintain her sea power. As her Indian empire took form she safeguarded access to it in every way. For that she fortified Gibraltar and Malta and for that she bottled the Russian fleets in the Black Sea and turned the Mediterranean into a British lake. Later on she bought the majority of the stock in the Suez canal, giving her a short all water route to India. So strong has been the British sense of primacy of the water from Gibraltar to the Straits Settlements that when Sir Ed- win Arnold wrote his interesting book, “India Revisited,” the title to the chapter descriptive of the voyage from Liverpool to Bombay was “On the Queen’s Highway.” He described the waters from the Mersey to Gibraltar and thence to Aden and thence through the Indian Ocean as British waters, the highway of the empire, for the use of her Majesty’s fleets and the British commerce. Sir Ed- win Arnold in this expressed British sentiment and feel- ing. Now that highway is invaded. Russia has sent auxiliary ships out of the Black Sea and through the Dardanelles under a merchant flag and has armed them with sea artillery to prey upon neutral ships that pass by the “Queen’s highway.” No more stinging blow was ever dealt at British pride nor, since the days of Captain Kidd, none more dangerous to all commerce. It is obviously intended by Russia to specifically affront Great Britain, for French ships plying to the Indo-Chinese pos- sessions of France have not been disturbed, while Brit- ish ships flying the flag of the same line on which Sir Edwin Arnold sailed the “Queen’s highway” have been made prizes, their crews prisoners and their passengers subjected to brutality and humiliation. We fought Eng- land for less cause in 1812. What will she do? Her people will not bear the exactions necessary to keep up a navy unless they see results, and it is justifiable Eng- lish opinion that the navy is for just such occasions as this. Russia has announced that her course in the Pacific will be the same as she has followed in the Red Sea. This means that she proposes to pirate the com- merce of Great Britain and the United States and forbid our flag the freedom of the high seas. If this be at- tempted no American will hesitate in demanding repara- tion. It is the same issue we fought for in 1812 when we were a young and weak nation. Now we are strong, ex- perienced and armed. The Pacific is Uncle Sam’s high- way and he proposes to travel his own road at will. The Board of Supervisors has under consideration a measure designed to correct one of the most annoying evils that attend streetcar traffic in Bhis city. It is in-, tended to force the railroad companies to post on their cars notices telling specifically on which side of every street cars must stop; and any violation of the pro- posed written regulation will be regarded as a misde- meanor. Such a law would be accepted by citizens as a miracie of good sense and common courtesy. GROWTH OF VALUES. HERE is a general advance in values in California T counties as estimated by the county Assessors. While all the returns are not in enough are avail- able for the year 1904 to show the growing prosperity of the State. When 2ll the Assessors’ returns are in hand they will make a collective showing that could be used with advantage outside of California to inform inquirers" concerning actual conditions. In the mountain and val- ley counties alike the Assessors find that there is more taxable property than there was a year ago. 3 In Siskiyou County, for instance, there is an advance in the assessment roll of $1.150,000 as compared with the roll for 1903. increase in the total for Marin County is $1,073,050, making a total of $13,004,435. The value of Alameda County’s property of all kinds is placed for as- sessment purposes at $108,240,403; Oakland is assessed for $52,404,081; Berkeley for $12,308,486; Alameda for $12,232,700. The increase in the total assessed value of Alameda County is $3,884,600, and to this should be added at least $2,000,000 more to represent the amount deducted from the Contra Costa Water Company’s as- sessment. San Benito County shows an increase of $27,020 as compared with 1903, and a total value of $6,261,885. Yolo County has increased in taxable property $345,- 692 in a year, and its total is $15,200,162. Placer County’s increase is $226,000; Nevada County’s $57,010; Stanis- laus County’s $1,492,930, with a total valuation for 1904 of $14,287,952. The very large advance in Stanislaus is due principally to the enhancing value of irrigated dis- tricts. The west side and eastern border grain Jands are reduced for assessment. The increase in real estate amounts to $1,214,055, in improvements to $102,015, and in personal property to $208410. Tehama’s assessment amounts to $10,000,295, an increase of $320,070 from last year. The assessment value of sheep and goats was reduced in Tehama County. Had these animals been estimated to be worth as much as they were assessed for in 1903 the total increase of assessment would amount to $500,000. The decrease in Kern County, which amounts to $89,- 163 as compared with the preceding roll, is accounted for by the fact that the McKittrick branch railway is not assessed locally, but by the State board. The assess- ments on Kern County oil lands were reduced about 1234 per cent, and there is also noted a decrease in the assessment of personal property. Modoc County prop- erty has been assessed for $4,023,045. In the county are 275 miles of irrigating ditches that are assessed at $13,- 610. The increase in Trinity County amounts to $343,- 841, the total assessment amounting. for 1904 to $1,901,- 843. Mendocino County’s assessment roll is more than $1,000,000 lafger than it was last year. The total valua- tion of $11,579,676 does not indicate the real value of the county’s resourges, for there are 400 miles of railway that are assessed on an average only $804 per mile. These are but random notes taken from the returns of\county Assessors in a few counties. The complete retiirns, when they are finally summarized, will consti- tute a fine official record of the advancement of this State in all material things in twelve months. ————— o The Hindoo Prince who has been at great pains to prove his royal lineage to the good people of Oakland must remain with us six nfonths longer as a prisoner in the Alameda County Jail, held in penalty for the un- romantic and unprofitable offense of petty larceny. Our friendly feeling for persons princely has no effect upon cur justice, which is blind to Prince and pauper alike. Our only treasures that Princes may steal from us with- out prosecution are our ambitious girls. PROSPERITY OF THE RAILROADS. HE Interstate Commerce Commission has prepared T and distributed an abstract of its forthcoming six- teenth statistical report upon railroad construction, capitalization and operation in the United States for the year ending June 3o, 1903. Even culled as it is from a volume which will comprise 700 pages of summarized analysis, this abstract of the commission’s report con- tains data of the highest significance to close students of finance and the growth of industries. A remarkable increase in the extent of mileage and the capitalization of railroad property seems to characterize the growth of railroad interests during the year 1903. According to the report of the commission no year since 1890 has witnessed the extension of the steel lines into new fields such as has been made during the last fiscal year. The total single track railroad mileage for the year of the report was 207,977.22 miles, an increase of 5505.37 miles over the new construction of thc previous vear. Of the total number of track miles eperated by the 2078 railroad corporations noted in the report, 1185 only were conducted under receiverships. The par value of railroad capital outstanding at the time of their investigations the committee found to be $12,509,990,258, which represents a capitalization of $63,186 per mile for all railroads in the country. Of the dividend paying stock the total accretion of gain for the year is represented by $196,728,176, an increase of $11,337,521. This advance in the producing power of railroad stocks represents an increase in the net earn- ings of $33,176,535 over those of 1902. gauge of railroad prosperity is this. But with all this marked heaping up of values, exten- sion of systems and garnering of high returns, the grim roster of death that overshadows this giant industry in its workings continues to grow apace. For every added dollar, for every new mile of track, it would seem that human weakness and fated decree combine to bloody the rails that yield this ever increasing increment of wealth. For the year of the commission’s report 0840 killed and 76,553 injured, represent the dole paid to death. Of those killed or maimed near a half were the employes of the railroads themselves—one in every 364 was killed and one in every 22 injured. A record such as that adds confirmation to the fact that this, of all our great industries, is the most prodigal of human life. Yet of all the country’s activities none show a greater prosperity or occupy a stronger place in the list of the absolute necessities of modern life. Must it ever be that for this commodity we must pay an an- nual tribute in human life? Let the railroads take coun- sel how they may divert some of the gains that pour into their coffers to the purpose of safeguards, both hu- man and mechanical, against fl!(dangers threatening those whom they serve. A convincing The Health Board has risen to the dignity of a great occasion and has resisted most emphatically any inter- ference proposed by the Board of Supervisors as a rem- edy to various and picturesque violations of the civil service law. The seriousness with which our different municipal departments discuss the farce comedy of local civil service has ceased to be even a joke. An hour of candid discussion would show that civil service has been dead long cnough to deserve decent burial. —_— The gentle art of pursuing and punishing bribers and corrupters of public morals is being practiced with con- summate skill and commendable energy in St. Louis. Several offenders have recently been brought to book and officialdom in the exposition city is agitated by a serious prospect of exposures yet to come. Let the good work go on. It is highly purifying to St. Louis and by some freak of good fortune may be admonitory to us. e g S st Thieves and officers of the law fought a pitched battle the other night in Oakland and the marauders were driven from the scene of prospective plunder in disorder. The incident is an exceptional instance of the foolhardi- ness of evil doers, most of whom have good reason to know that Oakland is one of the unhealthiest towns in the United States for them in which to attempt to ply their trade, ° * Her Rating. He was an elderly son of the Emer- ald Isle who entered the office of the Board of Supervisors and, addressing Chief Assistant Clerk John Behan, re- Quested permission to look at the as- sessment books. Behan informed him that the books had been closed by the Board of Equalization on Monday after acting on all applications for reduc- tions. The Irishman appeared disappointed and then asked Behan to procure for him the assessment figures on property owned by a certain Mrs. McFadden, and Behan volunteered to obtain the data. Behan then looked the matter up #nd found that Mrs. McFadden was assessed as fol- lows: Real estate $2000, improvements $2100, with a mortgage of $1500 on the property. Behan duly conveyed the in- formation to his inquirer, who thanked him in these words: _ “I am very much obliged to vye, young man. Ye see, it wasn't for me- self I was asking. I just wanted to know how much Mrs. McFadden was mortgaged for—her that puts on so many airs with her neighbors.” And the Hibernian softly chuckled as he took himself off. Sunday in Town. I The sun is misty yellow and the sky is hazy blue, And the chime-bells ring out quaintly, Near and deeply, fair and faintly, Each one following its fellow in an echo clear and true. Through the streets, clean-swept for leisure, Many feet make haste toward pleasure, And the sound is as the rustling of the leaves in paths we knew. How I wish I were a-walking in the autumn woods with you! I Oh, the fragrance of the hollows that the little brooks ran through! Oh. the scarlet maples burning Like a torchy at every turning, On the way my spirit follows in a dream forever new— ‘Where from quiet, distant meadows, Dim beneath the mountain shadows, Came the clank of swinging cow-bells down the softest wind that blew. Oh, I wish I were a-walking in the autumn woods with you! besd We have had our fill of roving where spring blossoms bound the view. We have played in young Romances, Danced the nymph -and - shepherd dances; Now the summer of our loving glows and throbs about us, too. In our eye the light yet vernal, In our hearts the fire eternal, And when time has touched the branches and our rose-leaf days are few, Oh, it's then I'd still be walking in life’s autumn woods with you. —Caroline Duer, in the August Scrib- ner’s. The Imperial Chinese Post. A lady of the China Inland Mission at Taikang, in the central province of | Honan, in a letter to her family has | some amusing things to tell about the | establishment of the Chinese imperial | post in the province, jwhich is some ?weeks' journey from-Ahe coast. She | says: | “We have got the Chinese imperial post here now. At Kaifeng when they | first got it the pestoffice clerks had a fight with some men who bought | stamps and wanted the clerks to lick them and put them on the letters for them. They said the clerks were there to lick the stamps and paid for the business, and they wouldn't lick them. | | But the clerks wouldn't agree to lick them, so they came to blows, and the police had to come in and separate them. “Here at Taikang the man who has got the postoffice has begun well. Har- ry was in his shop when the first cus- tomer came for a stamp. It took him nearly five minutes to find the key and get the stamp box oven, and when he gave it to the man he said in a very decided way: ‘Now lick it and put it just there’ The customer was foolish (or wise) enough to do so, and now a custom has been éstablished in Taikang that all purchasers of stamps must lick them and stick them on. There was a great row at the Kaifeng postoffice one day because an address on a letter could not be found and the letter was brought back. “The sender wanted his money back because the letter had not been deliv- ered, but the clerks refused to give it to him, contending that they had had more trouble over it than if it had been delivered. Another man was deter- mined to get the pestoffice clerks into trouble because he had sent a letter some time ago and received no answer. This was clear proof, he said, that the letter had never been sent. The service here is somewhat irfegular yet."—Lon- don Daily News. Do Beasts Think? In Harper's Magazine for August John Burroughs effectually disposes of the idea that any of the lower animals is capable of thought. After recounting many interesting tests, he Vst sM“Anmwls have keen perceptions— keener in many respects than our own —but they form no conceptions, have no powers of comparing one thing with another. They live entirely in and through their senses. To all that inner world of reflection, imagin- ation, comparison, reason, they are strangers. They never return upon themselves in thought. They have sense memory, sense intelligence, and they profit in many ways by ex- periencegbut they have not soul mem- ory or rational intelligence. All the fundamental emotions and appetites men and the lower animals share in fear, anger, love cunning, pride, curi- osity, play; -but the world of thought and thought experience, and the emo- tions that go with it, belongs to man alone. “It is as if the psychic world were divided into two planes, one above the other—the plane of sense and the plane of spirit. In the plane of sense live the lower animals, only now and then just breaking for a moment. into the higher plane. In the world of sense man is immersed also; this is his start and foundation; but he rises :“4nto the plane of spirit and here lives his proper life. He is emancipated from sense in a way that beasts are not.” Alas! Dobbin Is Gone. A brand new use for the automo- bile has been developed in an English dairy country. This Is a motor wag- on equipped to constitute a traveling creamery. The farmers instead of hauling their milk to a central cream- ery have the motor wagon stop at their gates on its dafly round. The driving power is utilized for the oper- ation of separators, so that the skim milk is returned to the farmer for stock feeding and fattening purposes. It is proposed to extend the facilities of the traveling equipment so that the butter fats may be replaced with other cheaper fats, thereby rendering the skim milk suitable for calves or young pigs. Recent experiments have shown that if butter fat or whole milk is replaced with some other ani- mal fat the modified or blended milk is just as satisfactory for raising young animals as the milk of their mothers. A combination of this kind— that is, a traveling separator plant, combined with an emulsor for blend- ing fat with skim milk—would do much to revolutionize the present sta- tus of dairy work. £ ’ F . Celerity. George Wesley, a tailor of Austin,’ Texas, makes a specialty of pressing men’s clothes. He has placed just out- side his store door a liquor barrel, painted green, and painted In bold, black letters on the barrel is the fol- lowing: For Men Only. Stand in Our Barrel While We Press Your Pants For 15 Cents. —Tailor and Cutte Answers to Queries. THE LAUNCHING—A. C. R, City. The armored cruiser South Dakota will be. nched at high tide, July 21, from the Unicn Iron Works, San Francisco. MISSOURI SCHOOL OF MINES— H. U, Dedrick, Trinity County, €al. The name of “Missouri School of Mines”” does not appear in the list of universities, colleges, schools, etc., in the United States. INDIAN CLAIM—Subscriber, Shar- on, Cal. A person having a claim for services as Indian agent a long time ago, should present such claim to the Congressman of the district in which he lives, or send the same to the Board of Indian Commissioners, Washington, D. C. Either will advise as to whether the claim is of any value. WESTWARD THE COURSE—Sub- scriber, City. In the poem, “On the Prospect of Planting Art and Learning in America,” written by Bishop Ber- - keley, an English philosopher, in the first half of the eighteenth century, is the line: “Westward the course of empire takes its way.” . George Bancroft’s epigraph to Ban- croft’s History of the United States has it: E “Westward the star of empire takes its way.” 3 SIEGE—Reader, Santa Crus; Cal In war a siege Is the setting of an army around or before a fortified place for the purpose of compelling the gar- rison to surrender; it is also surround- ing or investing of a place by an army and approaching it by passages and advance works which cover the be- slegers from the enemy's fire. Hence a continued attempt to gain posses- sion of a place is a siege. It is proper to class the attempt of the Japanese to gain possession of Port Arthur a slege. MARRIED NAME—A Subscriber, City. If you married a man, who from the age of twelve years was known to all as Smith, but whose real name was Fay, and he is now dead and the limit of widowhood having paseed, you wish to marrv again you will have to give the name of Smith. The marriage acecording to the statement in the letter of inquiry, was a legal one. You mar- ried the man, not the name, but in marrying him you assumed the name by which he was known. You cannot be known by your maiden name again, legally, unless, by a court, you are authorized to take such name. TO MANILA—Reader, City. During the Spanish-American war of 1398 in order to send a message from San Francisco by telegraph to Manila, P. I, it had to go by the following route: San Francisco to New York by land; to Valentia, Ireland, by cable: to Brighton, Eng., cable and land; to Havre, France, cable; to Marseilles, by land; to Alexandria, Egvpt, by cable; apore, by cable; to Saigom, Cochin, China, by cable, to Hongkong by cable; to Boliano, P. I, by cable; to