The Somerset herald. [volume] (Somerset, Pa.) 1870-1936, 1894-08-29
FROM HONG KONG.
News Of Fighters in cathay Has a
Hard Read 70 Travel

latitude and bat - degrees nearer 10
west than 70 the east, and Hong Kong
{ isas far sonth of Pekin ss Havana j.
from New York. - il there were aR
airline Telegraph % the Chimes capital
( the message 70 the World telling that
war n least had heen formally deelar-
( esl between the Japs and the Johns
7 would only have had 60 fiy a little mat-
/ Ter af something like l3,0o0 miles.
+ But il i by many and devi.,ls paths,
under tropical -eas and over bleak
4 Asiatic mountain rInges, acr'ss the
+ dark stretch Of Persia, throagh the land
( Of the Arabian Night. across the Cau-
/ c.isian mountains, skirting around the
lonely shores Of the Black "a, up
through the country of the Danube,
across Austria. aeross Germany. across
{ France % England. and from England,
in IL last, final deep-waserP plunge under
the North Atlantic "a Coney Island
I over all thsss weary leagues Of land and
IA the signaliei wor,is are rushing on
their way to the telegraph room under
[ the World dome, where ths operator
-its calmly smoking hi- pipeaad catch
ing them on the iy.
i No matter what the name ofthe town
I in China the message l. dated a. COM
ing from ii i Hong Kong that i the
I great eable clearinghouse. Here il j.
I the messages are dumped into the -,
not touching land again until they
turn up On the marshy shorss Of Singa-
pore IL i only about half mile in
some plaoes from Siuagpore % the Ma
laocr peninsula, and the books say that
Z tigers 90 acr,rss, and a they hardly sal
over in cs,ft,oatS they must SWIM -
T the message YOU rsssd AZ breakfast may
E very well have flashed under the tawuy
belly Of "a tiger. for the books cannot
tell a lie. And they are very had tigers,
/ too. these tigers Of the straits, with "a
7 weakness for fresh Chinamen, the
books again saying that the tigers count
upon about one Chinaman day from
I Singapore, the Singapore Chinaman
having apparently a particularly fine
E favor 70 make the tigers swim - far
Z for him.
But the words which flashed und--
the bad tiger - he splal-led along on
his leisurely way "a luncheon are iu
type in the World Office before ne has
got ashore and found tender China
man "a his taste. for ihere j. a man ia
/ singapore who catches them A. they
rush in Out of the wet and sends them
hurgling back into the water again,
whence they leap up u the bold onast
Of dens.iy woo,led Penang, az the en-
trance Of the Sialae,a straits. Here
they catch long breath for a div
acruss another sea o. Madras, away
down ia southern India
With the exceptions Of two brief
plunges one up TO and partly through
the Persian gulf and the other under
the English channel. it l. all land trav-
eI for thousands Of leagues after leaving
Madras. The first heat T. little skip
Of 648 miles northwestward aerDss In
dia 10 Bombay. Then the story takes
% the water again, until II rashes out
at white-walled, plague infested, filthy
Bushire. on the Persian gulf. SinbaG'
rocks and Persian gulf hales that look
ed like Islands and loatle,i-stone mOun-
tains are mere humdrum details COM
pared with this cable message journey.
Sinbad could face out pretty goOd-
sized se,-yarn, but he would have drawn
the line al such performance a. now
are everyday occurrences right in his
own stamping-ground-
Perhaps there l. just a gasPing mo-
ment OF two Of rest for the message at
Bushire Ii + the Botany bay Of cable
operators. BaShire- They get the Bush
Ire station s0metims= when the man
agement thinks they need little quiet
life FAR away from temptation, aud
the climate Of Bushire i not calculated
70 inspire a violent form of energy. ~
We viii say fifteen minutes for refresh
ment II Bushire, and then OF the fly
ing train Of words soes % lofty Shirlz,
nearly :. .001 feet above the level Of the -
and the handSomest town in all Persia.
But there J. no stop al Shirlz Teheran
i the place where the story changes
wires. From Teheran il leaps the Cau-
clsls, skips around the eastern and
northern shores Of the Black sazl, fash
e. through much battered --lslStopOi,
and - on o. Odessa, where il l. switch
Z ed to another wire that carries il
/ through the Balkan provinces % Aus
{ tria. Germany, France and London,
whence il i flung 10 Lands End on
Z the bleak Cornish COAST, England, and
there il takes q long breath for IL final
+ plunge down among the whales and
Z sharks and rotting bones of dead ships
I and dead men al the bottom of tlie
{ North Atlantic, 10 bc greeted Al last by
the Coney island elephant and merry
I go-rounsis untwisting the chains 81
Z harmony that tie Daisy Bell'' and
sweet Marie"
/ An hour i a reasonably long time for
a word % make this journey from Chi
na % the Telegraph n,om unsier the
I World domc. and many message b.
/ fore the China-Japan war : over J.
E likely u take more than an hour in the
sending, il may very wei happen that
I the front end 0f the story i being fro
zen into cold type while the rear end
I + Kissing into the "a al far-away
I Hong Kong. Singapore. Penang. Ma
F drls. Bombay, BuShire, Iheran, odf~-
+ "a. LONDON. Lands End and tOneg
I Island are tieSins away al the same
time on the siIne message which World
{ cpnlpoSitors arr Pltting into type,
though il 10. infnsluently happens
that London works directly with Tehe-
ran without any breslk ON the EaroP-an
continent
The messages from Japan 20, A. a rule,
under the "a ta.-klaiivo=toek, whence
bv the Great Northern lines they rush
aer-s u Siteria 10 ~ Peters
blry. and thence 20 London by way of
Corenhagen- And in addition o. the
overland routes there = ali-Water
communication hy way Of Aden. the
a., ~ f=-..,--.r.....r, and fhf.