The Portland daily press., 1893-05-15

Sequel to the Trent Affair-The Fur
Seals and Their Habits-The Dyeing
Process a Close Secret--Our Rights in
Behring Sea and the Pending Arbitra-
ton.
On November 6. 1861, Captain Wilkes
of the United States steamship San ia
cinto boarded the British packet steam
er Trent plying between Bermuda and
Liverpool. From the Trent were taken
Messrs. Mason and Slidell and their sec
retaries, Mason was commissioned Min
lister Plenipotentiary &C., from the Con-
federate States to England, and Slidell
was to hold the same position near to the
court of France. Captain Wilkes re-
ceived the thanks of Congress, and his
act met with the appreciation of the
whole North. These ENJOYS had run the
blockade and then reshipped themselves
from the Bermudas. Besides, they were
living dispatches, and neither Great
Britain nor any other neutral had the
right to carry dispatches of the enemy.
So the American people reasoned.
And, as often happens when public opin-
ion starts on its headlong career, the
American people reasoned wrongly.
Great Britain, with the chivalric abandon
with which she pounces on weaker ma
tons, especially when they are in dis
tress, Great Britain smiled as she made
preparations for war with the United
States, already sorely pressed by the
Southern Confederacy. The fact that
President Lincoln and his advisers apol-
ogized for the insult to Great Britain
was . make no difference. England s
smile grew broader, and the steel ingot
was drawn from the furnace. The Presi-
dent disavowed the act of Wilkes, said it
was done on his own authority without or
ders from Washington. Great Britain was
grinning now, and the hammer began to
forge the sword that was to avenge the
Revolution Of '76. Our country could do
no more. Suddenly the English smile
froze. The hammer stopped in mid air.
The ingot lost its dazzling glow, and
slowly cooled to dark blue mass.
What was the matter? Nothing.
Nothing but fleet OF
Russian Warship Patrol1ing
our coasts. Nothing but a few stern
silent vessels lying idly in our harbors
with the double headed eagle perched
on their mastheads. AS nothing was the
matter, nothing happened, Russia said
nothing, and nothing further occurred to
hinder the United States from settling
the Civil War without open interference
from abroad.
But the massing of her FLEETS put the
Russian government to considerable ex-
pense. In addition, gratitude impelled
the United States to show her apprecia-
ton of Russia's friendliness. So, in
1867, we paid $7,2oo.ooo for Alaska.
Alaska was of no earthly use to Russia
and apparently still less to the United
States. But were it absolutely useless,
it would represent millions upon mill
ions saved to this country when we had
the rattlesnake of South Carolina coiled
ready to strike, and the Lion of Great
Britain shifting at our heels.
And so we bought Alaska. Having
bought it, Uncle Sam buttoned up his
pocket and turned away thanking his
lucky star that he had paid SO little for
the friendship of the Russian Bear. But
he took one last look at his new farm.
What did he see? An ice field? Well,
nearly a thousand miles from north to
south and fifteen hundred miles from the
eastern border to the extreme western
island; it lay with at least one third its
area within the Arctic Circle. But it
reached southwark to the fifty. fifth
parallel of latitude or a little north of the
Gulf of st. Lawrence. Its main body
lay in about the latitude of the British
Isles, and Uncle Sam saw that the warm
current from Japan, like the Gulf Stream
gave this new country about the same
climate that has developed the Anglo
Saxon race. Vast rivers coursed down
from the mighty mountains and flowed
through broad plains to the sea. Uncle
Sam was becoming interested. He
looked again. Away to the westward
stretched chain of islands, the Alutian
archipelago. This enclosed the Behring
Sea, which seemed
Alive With some Marine Animals
He stepped nearer. Yes, they were
seals. And from the middle of the sea
rose two islands, st. Paul and ST.
George on which the seals were gathered
i'll great herds. Then Uncle Sam be-