The Rock Island Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1877-1885, 1878-11-19
WASHINGTON.

WASHINGTON, Nov. 49, Subscriptions
to the four per cent loan to-day, $l,l30, 400.
The president to-day appointed Walter
r. Irwin, of Illinois, principal clerk on
private land claims in the general land
cffice.
The annual report Of the revenue ma
line bureau of the treasury department
shows that of vessels wrecked or in dis
tress, with an aggregate of 926 persons on
board, 1913 have been assisted by revenue
cutters, The estimated value of the prop
.erty saved is about $l,70O,OO0 and 142
persons were actually rescued from death
by drowning. The expenses of the reve-
nue. marine service for the year ended
June 80, 1878, were $84, 400, number
vessels in service, 379.
Supervising Inspector Genecai Jas. 4.
Dumant, oI the steamer inspection ser
vice, in his annual report, shows that the
total number of lives lost iram various
causes during the fiscal Year ended June
80, 1878. was: from explosions, 33; fire,
%; collisions, 81; snags, wrecks and sink
ing, l04; accidental drowning, Is; miscel-
lane0us casualties, 4; total, 2I2; whole
number OF accidents resulting IN loss Of
life, At. The severer discipline had de-
creased fatalities, but there is still room
for improvement. Of 100000 per
Sous carried last year, only lilo to each
million were lost, thus making travel safer
than in any other country. He recom-
meDds to all owners of steamboats, the
Importance Of testing boilers frequently,
especially after a season Of inactivity. Of
the total number of vessels inspected 260
belong to the Pacific coast, with a tonnage
Of los, 532; 1920 to the Atlantic coast,
with tonnage of 466, ISL; $50 to Western
riverg, with tonnage of $l86,932; S57 to
the Northern lakes, with q tonnage of
1856, 1878, and 81 to the Gulf coast, with o
tonnage of 69,83l.
Supreme court decisions No IS, Chi
cago 4 Northwestern Railway Com pany,
appellant. VS.. Thos. Sayles, appeal from
the circuit court Of the United States for
the Northwestern district of Illinois
This was an action brought by Sayles, the
present appellee, for alleged infringement
of letters patent granted in 1852 to one
Henry Tanner upon an improved Cal
brake, originally invented by Thompson
Bachelor in l847, The court holds thai
the Stevens brake used by the railway
company is not an infringement of the
Tanner patent, now owned by present
appellant, because when Thompson &
Bachelor, TaDuer's assignors,i filed theil
original application in 1913, at least twt
other kinds of double brakes similar il
construction u theirs, we're already il
use: that the construction and mode o
loperAtion of the Stevens brake are alto
gether different from those of the brakt
owned by the present appellee: that they
must be regarded as independent inven
f tions. The decree of the circuit court i
therefore reversed, with costs, and tn
cause remanded with directions to enter
, decree dismissing the bill OF complaint,
No. SO, City of Nauvoo. plaintiff 10 er
} ror, against Geo, A. Ritter, in error to tn
circuit court of the United States for tn
southern district of Illinois; the question
IN this case is whether a city which ha
bonded itself in order to make a suhscrip
ton to the capital stock Of railroad cas-
can decline to pay the matured coupons c
z its bonds, on the ground that the latte
had been issued without previous sui
mission of the question to the people in
3 general election. The court holds that tn
recital on the face of the bonds and printe
ION their backs, that the election require
! by law was duty held, is sufficient in th
hands of an innocent holder to stop th
municipality from Offering to show tba
there really was no such election. Th
, judgment OF the lower court is affirme
, with costs and interest.
The secretary of state declines as yet I
make public the contents of the dispatc
mailed by him to minister Welsh upon n
ceipt of Lord Salisbury's letter of the 1t
!. inst. but there is no reason TO doubt tn,
= it contains an answer that the $5 10000
awarded BY the fisheries commission wi
be paid before the 23d inst. the treat
limit of the time for its payment.
Ii ln the long pending controversy concerl
Q ing large body of lands claimed by boi