The Scranton tribune. [volume] (Scranton, Pa.) 1891-1910, 1897-11-04
TO CARRY OUR GRAIN.
Unique Gathering of Ocean Tramps
in American Ports, from Every
Quarter of the Globes Crews Are n
Queer Medley of Many Nationaiities
from the Washington Star.

Quarter of the GIobe--Crews Are n
Queer Medley of Many Nationaiities $
From the Washington Star.
Never since 1891 certainly and prob
/ ably never since transatlantic freight
! age began, have such large quantities
| of grain been carried abroad as will
/ sail this fall to feed hungry Europe.
/ Any craft that floats Is good enough to
! carry grain this year. The shippers
| and supercargoes, who are ever on the
| scent for business, and range from
/ South Africa to Hong Kong in their
| wayward courses. are now gathering
| to the American ports as flies swarm
| i'm candy shop.
Twice this fall--Once in plain sight
| Of the COney Island excursion boats-I
! have seen crews Of Lascars eating their
| queer foreign-looking meals, squatted
| fiat ON the decks of tramp steamers
! hailing from Indian ports.
The Lascars were sitting in a circle
with a bowl of rice in the center, on the
| deck They dip the rice out with their
| hands, tilt their heads back and throw
| in-that is. the crude Lascar of COM
merce does so; though some have
| learned to eat with spoons by the time
| they get to New York.
Lascars for sailors and Cinnamon for
stewards is the rule on Indian tramps.
The little celestals are simply perfect
cabin servants. and it costs little to
feed them; they, too, live mostly upon
rice
Upon the same steamer one will see
| officers eating meat and vegetables
with knives and forks, Lascar sailors
eating rice pilof with their bare hands,
Chinese stewards flOurishing their little
chop sticks, and perhaps a few Hin
docs in a group apart, who for reasons
of caste must dine separately.
MEDLEY OF NATIONS.
1t is n strange mixture Of races and
religions that gathers on the water
front to help feed Europe with Yankee
grain. There have been seen this year
Hindoo, Mohammadans and Lascars of
the same belief prostrating themselves
toward Mecca in the ports of Philadel-
pha and Baltimore, as we'll as New
York. There are Buddhists and Con-
fucianS-if that is the correct word;
and n ships engineer told me one day
that the cook Of his craft was a NAH
dist from the Soudan--a man from
what has been the most inaccessible
spot on this earth for the last fifteen
years.
This Nahdist believes trat the true
believers are invulncrable by Christian
bullets.
But many of the Mahdists have
been wounded by the Egyptians" ar
gued the teasing engineer one day.
True, o Kwageh. but they must
have been bad men. or the Prophet
would not have let them be hurt"
Invaluable is such Il faith! At any
rate, this zealot of the Soudan is a
good sea cook. II his youth he prob
ably never saw rain, for there are
whole regions in the Soudan where it
never falls, but he has seen water
enough since.
For the rest, the medley Of nations
on the wharves is always confusing
enough, the NorWeGlans and Dutch
cheerily hObnob5ing with British and
Spaniards and Portygees"-who of all
Europeans rank next to I.ascars at
the bottom of the scale.
TRANSFERRING THE GRAIN.
The lighters which take the grain
from the big elevators are ugly hulks
enough, fit only for harbOc use. They
snuggle up t. the big elevators which
dip their tubular probosces deep into
the lighters bodies, and suck away like
mosquitoes until all the grain is drawn
up. The prObosces are clliptlcal tubes
which are thrust down into the grain,
and 'eat 1t up" with an endless belt
of disks of metal showing it up the
tube.
The grain goes up, 5000 bushels an
hour, to the hopper, and thence travels
to the Weighing box. Here it is always
found lighter than when it started
from the nest, having dried out on the
way Endless are the squabbles be-
tween buyer and seller over this differ
ence.
From the weighing hox to the hold
of the tramp steamer the grain travels
on other endless belts Shovels and
human muscle have little to do with
this part of the process of feeding Eu-
rope.
LOADING THE SHIPS.
Pretty nearly all steamships now-
adays have their hullis divided into
sections; and the grain ships must be
so divided. The Erain must be put
evenly into the sections, ard one must
not be too far ahead of another in the
lOdulllSi blHtfWlSe the SNIP VIII be
"hogged," or warped out of her shape.
The work of trimming the wheat is
very hard, and the men who do it must
wear wet sDonEes over their mouths,
or perhaps Wetted rags laid across
their faces. Even then the dust fire.
quently makes them ill.,
When all is done tine ship sails away
with an ever-lurking danger under
matches. The wheat may heat" es-
pecially if it is at all damp when load
ed, and slowly snOldering set the ship
on fire by spontaneous combustion.
Only one form of cargo is more dam
gerous, and that is Gotten. Trans~At-
lantlc steamships that bid for heavy
passenger traffic are obliged TO carry
no cotton If they wish to command high
prices for cabins. There are no such
restrictions as to wheat: but the cap.
tain Of every steamer carrying it is
ready, day or night, at o. moments no.
tice, TO flood any one of his compart-
ments to save the rest of the ship.
These are some of the dangers run
by the queer little dark men of the far
east, and the big blonde Scandipavlans,
and all the rest of the congress of ma
tiops who gather at the loading of the
motley tramp fleet that Is saVinU En-