St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1899-11-22
A STORn AT SEA.
editorial Correspondence.)

IIduSYddl Wdi anu DCSp t'hA~S
in a very peculiar way. At Geneva
got some money at the Credit
Lyonnais bank and found that / re-
ceived more MONEY than | expected.
This was because went to the bank
the day war was declared with the
Beers when exchange was higher
than any time since 1890. The next
time was reminded of the war was
when engaged my passage home on
the Columbia which was to sail from
Cherbourg Oct. 81 and to find that
boat had been taken off and was
carrying English soldiers to the
Transvaal. The Columbia has seen
war service before for she was pur-
chased by the Spaniards in that little
unpleasantness with the United
States and afterwards bought back
by the neutrality-suspicious. line. At
that time the Spanish government
bought the Normannia and this boat
was not sold back to the German line
but has been bought by the French
line and is now crossing the Atlantic
ocean under the name L'Aquitaine.
And so it happened that the Ham
burg American line substituted the
Kaiser Frederick for the Columbia,
and if you are interested in steamers
this boat has also history. 1t was
built in Elbing, Germany, for the
North German Lloyd line and by
firm which makes a speciality of tor
pedo boats for the German navy. 1t
was the first ocean liner the firm had
ever built and great things were ex-
pected of her for speed. The Oceanic
of the White Star line is the largest
boat ahoat, the Kaiser Wilhelm de
Crosse of the North German line is
the next in size and the Kaiser Fred
erich comes next, being GAO feet long
and OF about 10000 tons burden.
On her trial trip she failed to develop
speed and also consumed lot of
coal, which even under the strictest
economy of fuel costs company
$1,000 day, as all the fast boats
burn from $50 to 300 tons of coal
day. And so this boat was refused
by the North German line and is, |
understand, leased to the Hamburg
American line until after the Paris
exposition. Since her trial trip she
has had her boilers replaced by a set
that only burns $50 tons of coal
day, and as far as speed goes all the
passengers wished in stormy weather
that she had less speed and few less
mathematical curves as she rose or
fell, or rolled or pitched, or combined
all these motions in one as she rode
the waves. But in ordinary weather
she makes the run from Cherbourg
to New York, a distance of $3.50
miles in six days and half, which
means an average speed Of over $50
miles day or 10 miles an hour.
The Kaiser Frederick left Hamburg
Sunday noon, Oct. 20, and was due
in Cherbourg on Monday afternoon.
The special train that went down
from Paris that day to meet her had
about 100 passengers on board, in
Guiding a crowd of Spaniards who
kept up rapid fire of conversation
in their own language until just be.
r fore we reached Cherbourg when one
of the ladies said in rather pure
1 English, "There's nothing in the pa
: pers but Dewey, Dewey. Dewey.
e This was intended as a sort of chal
S lenge to the rest of the passengers il
e the car, but no one ventured reply
e At Cherbourg we had to wait in tn,
k harbor three hours for our boat an(
!. were transferred to the big ship from
:. tender in the beautiful harbor. JUS
t as we embarked on our homewar(
s. trip one of those ten course tabl
e d'hote dinners was served and cours
II after course was eagerly disposed @
q by hungry passengers. 1t was tn
't last square meal that many OF us ha
it for several days for that night W
lie struck head wind direct from tn
l. United States and were in storr
a for four days. The first ~ hours {
er the voyage the captain only got 81
re hours sleep and in that time the boa
OF went through more evolutions tina
a! bucking broncho and in many il
e. stances our little insides got the SAN
ID motion as the boat. 1t was tt
a hardest nights because the motion
ut the boat was so irregular that yo
OF had to get propped into your bert
RI with extra pillows and then g
ed thrown out if you did not cling on I
the racks. Some of the passenge
ed who had upper berths slept on Il