Kansas City journal. [volume] (Kansas City, Mo.) 1897-1928, 1899-09-30


emerged through a rainbow arch tha
stretched from shore TO shore into a cleal
and brilliant sunset off the Grant tomb.
The night had been busy one in tht
feet OF warships of Tompkinsville. The
last details OF the days ceremony Were
hardly settled before the day itself broke
on d scene of greater activity than the
classic anchorage had ever witnessed be-
fore
swung at their anchorage as for the past
two days, but the crowd OF neighborine
craft had been swelled past counting As
far as could be seen the water was mass
o. mOoFing steamers, from Stapleton
across the wide reach OF the harbor 10 the
Erie basin, and from the Battery to the
NarrowE. the water was alive. 1t was a
modern armada against which the armada
launched by Phillip of Spain would have
seemed a childs toy. It was a moving,
shifting picture of tugs. police boats, fire
boats. torpedo boats. yachts. launches.
tramp steamers and ocean liners and sail
ing craft Of every rig, with big ferry and
excursion boats piowinG their way through
the ruck In mysterious paths that opened
before them and closed again behind them
like the ice Of an Arctic foe.
The only stable points in the scene at
that early hour were the warships. They
about which the pack ice turned and
swIrled without moving them from their
moorings.
II was a morning OF repressed excite
ment on board the New York and the
other ships behind the Olympia. Every
thing had been cleaned and FURNISHED from
ram to ruddcr.
Noon was ushered in with scream of
whistles that sounded like 1900 craft The
IL. I.ef fnd f,asa during which
enough steam was wasted to have run an
ocean liner to the Azores.
The last faraway echo had hardly drifted
back from the Staten island hills when a
sudden impulse seemed to seize the lar
reaching mass of tugs and other craft In
stead of drifting idly round and round the
warships. like ships in an eddy, they be-
gan to steam away 10 the south in parallel
lines. as though the same currents were
bearing them out TO sea. But as they
vanished in scores toward the Narrows
there were hundreds more that swept down
from UP the harbor.
Then there was scurrying home of the
white-h hooded steam cutters of the war
ships. The great boat cranes amidships
reached down their graphing hooks and
whisked the pinnaces aboard. Megaphone
commands flung across the water brought
the torpedo boats to keel, like the grey
hounds they were. at the Olympia's quar-
ter. The brilliant code flags blossomed
like flowers on the Olympia from bridge
60 maintop. It was the order 10 form in
column. The Brooklyns pennant snapped
AYE. aye from the signal yard, and
duplicate set of flags passed the order
10 the Indiana, whence it was flung from
ship to ship down the squadron. The
black speed cones of the Olympia climbed
slowly to her yards as the big cruiser got
under way. The other vessels slowly
turned like "A troop OF cavalry squadron,
front toward the NarrOws. and then. fetch
ing a graceful sweep. beaded back uD the
harbor toward the Battery. the Olympia,
escorted by the mayors boat. the Sandy
Hook, in the lead. Back Of her. at a +sl-
yard interval, came the New York. then
the powerful Indiana and Massachusetts,
the fleet-footed BrcokIyn the sturdy old |
old Lancaster, relic of another naval age; |
the powerful Chicago. and. finally, the little !
Marietta. the rear guard of the fighting |
craft. Behind stretched the transports. and !
further still. almost lost in the distance, /
the yachts and miScellaneous craft, hull
down the horizon. \
The evolution began at / o'clock. and |
in fifteen minutes the lighting line WAS |
Strengthened out up the harbor Admiral /
Dewey was going to his own AT the head |
Of squadron that would have won, at
need. three battles of Manila bay without
stopping for breakfast.
The head Of the colurn was a broad ar
row. Six torpedo boais spread ont the
bar. three on side. from the Olympia
quarter. Outside Of them flying wedge
OF police patrol boats formed a great V
whose apex WIS the Olympia. Flanking
them. ahead and astern, were the harbor
hreboats, spodting great columns of water
that turned threateningly toward the ex-
cursion boats on either side when they at
tempted 10 crowd the line Of march.
But the pageant back Of this powerful
vanguard was not limited TO a single nor
a sextuple line of ships. It was a ginuous
marine monster half a mile wide whose
vertebrae We're the ships Of the white
squadron and whose ribs were rows upon
rows of every floating thing that had ever
run by steam in New York harbor.
Thousands viewed the spectacle as It
moved up past Staten Island thousands
more watched il from the anchored craft
that crowded the Erie basin, and whose
SIars rose in a forest above the foot of
Liberty: But they were forgotten in the
mass OF humanity that crowded the water
front Of Manhattan island and filed every
point of vantage along the Jersey coast
This feature of fhe scane frct hroL.o or
the view as Castle William roared an ad-
mirafs salute TO the Olympia off the Bat
had died away from the wake of the flag
ship, the iInmensity of the watching crowd
gaWned on the crews of the squadron.
Every foot Of the city water front was a
mass of humanity. The wharves the
ferry slips. the roofs of ferry and ware
houses rose one above another in solid
ot the water front. Every roof bore its
living freight. Stores. old office buildings
GlIl ehySETaDcTS were crowded Z,
with stands. tiers upon tiers of seats, like
an immense theater whose roof was the
sky. whose walls were the surrounding ,
nils and whose back drop was the hori- i
zon of the lower bay.
As the pageant moved majesticly into the ,
Hudson. IL was seen that the crowd still ,
lired the water front and housetops. thick ,
Pr, II possible. than ever. and stretching
up the river along the whole line of pa | ,
rade. The heights OF the Jersey side were .
also crowded With parti-coIored masses Of ,
people They were not such an unbroken
rank as along the wharves Of the New :
york side, but wherever the wooded slopes :
broke into clearing. the slope was black
nned with people from crest to water line
There was no possible way of estimating
The crowd The morning papers declared
there were l,5c0.Grc visitors in the cfty
Ihe impression conveyed by the crowded
shores was that X would have taken that :
many in addition TO the local population
TO form the concOurse that watched tho
water pageant The spectators might have
been computed in army corps, certainly
not by individuals
Up the Hudson, pandemonirm rnirned [
supreme. Aerial bombs broke at Intervals [
overhead in pufIS Of white smoke and a >
'eathery canopy of steam hung over the ,
advancing fleet. as hundreds Of steam !
whistles screamed continually The mar a
rowing throat Of the river crowded the
advancing vessels together in an almost a
compact mass. q
The broad arrow formation still drove the IL