Connecticut western news., 1899-10-05
Foote and FarraEut.

| ardly thing they would have had noth-
 Ing to do with 1t. In its faith they
 lived and died. In Brooklyn navy yard
 Admiral Foote held prayer meetings
 and conducted a revival on the receiv-
 Ing ship North Carolina and on Sab
 baths, far out at sea, followed the
 chaplain with religious exhortation. In
 early life, aboard the sloop-of-war
 Natchez, impressed by the words of a
 Christian sailor, he gave his spare
 time for two weeks to the Bible and at
 the end of that declared openly,
 "Henceforth, under all circumstances,
 will act for God" His last words while dying at the Astor House, New
 York. were: "I thank God for all his goodness to me. He has been very good to me-" When he entered heaven,
 he did not have to run a blockade, for
 1t was amid the cheers of a great well | come. The other Christian admiral | will be hohored on earth until the day | when the fires from above shall lick | up the waters from beneath, and there
 shall be no more sea.
 Oh, while old oceans breast
 | Bears white sail
 And Gods soft stars to rest
 ! Guide through the gale,
 Men will him ne CT forget,
 | Old heart of oak
 Farragut, Farragut-
 Thunderbolt strokei
 | According to his own statement, Far ! ragut was very loose in his morals in ! early manhood and practiced all kinds l of sin. One day he was called into the cabin of his father, who was a | shipmaster. His father said, David, | what are you going to be anyhowT He answered, T am going to follow | the sea-" Follow the sea-" said the father, "and be kicked about the world and die In a foreign hospitalT "No," said David; "I am going to command like you" "No," said the father; "a boy of your habits will never command | anything" And his father burst into tears and left the cabin. From that l day David Farragut started on a new life. | - Christian Sailors.
 Captain Pennington, an honored eld- CT of my Brooklyn church, was with him in most of his battles and had his intimate friendship, and he confirmed, what had heard elsewhere. that Far ragut was good and Christian. In ev- cry great crisis of life he asked and obtained the Divine direction. When In Mobile bay the monitor Tecumseh sank from a torpedo and the great war ship Brooklyn, that was to lead the squadron, turned back. he said he was at a loss to know whether to advance or retreat, and he says: "I prayed, o God, who created man and gave him reason, direct me what to do. Shall go on? And a voice commanded me, Go on.' And I went on." Was there ever a more touching Christian letter than that which he wrote to his wife from his flagship Hartford? My dear
 est wife, write and leave this letter for you. I am going into Mobile bay in the morning if God Is my leader,
 and hope he Is, and In him I place my trust. If he thinks 1t Is the proper place for me to die, am ready to sub
 nit to his will In that as all other things. God bless and preserve you,
 my darling, and my dear boy If any thing should happen to me. May his
 blessings rest upon you and your dear mother" Cheerful to the end, he said on board the Tallapoosa in the last voyage he ever took, Tt would be well if died now in harness" The sublime Episco- pal service for the dead was never
 more appropriately rendered than over
 his casket, and well did all the forts of New York harbor thunder as his body
 was brought to the whalf, and well did
 the minute guns sound and the bells
 toll as in a procession having in it's
 ranks the president of the United
 States and his cabinet and the mighty
 men of land and sea the old admiral
 was carried amid hundreds of thou
 sands of uncovered heads on Broad
 way and laid on his pillow of dust In
 beautiful Woodlawn Sept. 30 amid the
 pomp of our autumnal forests.
 But just as much am I stirred at the
 scene on warship's deck before San-
 tiago last summer, when the victory
 gained for our American flag over Spanish oppression the captain took off his hat and all the sailors and sol diers did the same, and silently they offered thanks to Almighty God for
 what had been accomplished, and
 when on another ship the soldiers and sailors were cheering as a Spanish vessel sank and It's officers and crew
 were struggling in the waters and the captain of our warship cried out: Don't cheer; the poor fellows are drowning" Prayers on deck! Prayers In the forecastle! Prayers in the cabin! Prayers in the hammocks! Prayers on 10 Int, hnk of that war opened with prayer, were pushed on with prayer and closed with prayer, and today the American nation recalls them with prayer.
 A Nations Greeting.
 We hail with thanks the new genera ton of naval heroes, those of the year 1898. We are too near their marvellous deeds to fully appreciate them. A cen tury from now poetry and sculpture and painting and history will do them better justice than we can do them now. A defeat at Manila would have been an Infinite disaster. Foreign na- tions not overfond of our American institutions would have joined the oth- CT side, and the war so many months P"SS "Vuiu ihNS pttb ldSlhb Sllli, duu perhaps a hundred thousand graves would have opened to take down our slain soldiers and sailors. It took this country three years to get over the disaster at Bull Run at the opening of the civil war. How many years 1t would have required to recover from a defeat at Manila in the opening of the Spanish war I cannot say. God avert ed the calamity by giving triumph to our navy dnder Admiral Dewey, whose coming up through the Narrows of New York harbor day before yesterday was greeted by the nation whose wei coming cheers will not cease to re- sound until tomorrow, and next day in the capital of the nation the jewel ed sword voted by congress shall be