Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1902-11-22

steamer that had lost thirty passengers
from cholera and had been abandoned on
the shore.
The regiment lost men all along the line
OF march from cholera. Graves of emf
grants who had died from the same disease
were found everywhere along the trail.
The emigrants in that year carried the
cholera with them, and 1t remained among
them until they crossed the North Platte.
They scattered the infection through the
whole western country, and once the troops
came ON camp of Indians with only six
persons left alive out of seventeen who had
made camp the night before.
In that November. while the message
was being written surveying party of
army engineers was in the field looking for
a route for wagon road from ST. Louis to
the great bend of the Red river. Another
was trying to find way through the Sac
ramento mountains.
alteration of $4,000 flint lock muskets to
percussion arms
The Indian agent at Santa Fe, N. M, then
under military governorship, reported the
successful liberation of four men who had
been prisoners among the Navajo Indians
from six to eighteen years.
The Navy of Then.
The Secretary of the Navy reported that
there were in commission race, frig-
ates, 10 sloops of war; briggs, steam frig-
ates, l steamer of the first class 3 steam
ers less than first class and receiving
ships.
The sloops-of-war Portsmouth John
Adams and Dale and the briggs Porpoise and
Perry We're on the coast of Africa hunting
Save traders.
The report says occasional instances
have occurred of the interference of British
cruisers with vessels bearing our flag on
that coast, on suspicion of their being
slavers; but in each case the offense has
been atoned for by explanations and apollo
g1es to our officers on those stations"
The departure of the relief expedition TO
search for Sir John Franklin is also men,
toned in the Navy Departments report
The Secretary discusses the articles of
war and says that .'as the department con-
strues the act just passed, the punishment
of whipping on board naval ships is entirely
abolished and he wants to know what
punishment shall take its place, because, as
It stands, death Is the only summary pun
ishment left for severe infractions Of disci-
pine
In discussing an appended suggestion Of
the chief of construction. that naval sailing
ships be fitted thereafter with steam pro-
pellers to be used in time of head winds
he remarks that he would not recommend
q large addition to this species of naval
force lest the progress of invention shall
supplant them by others Of superior con-
struction."
Commodore M. c. Perry proposes a plan
In this report for vessel to be propelled by
steam to ram frigates and other warships
that depend on sail power. He says:
Il had always determined to try this ex-
pertinent, should opportunity have offered,
and actually made preparations for secur-
ing the boilers and steam pipes of the Full
ton at New York when l thought 1t proba-
Bile l might be sent to our eastern border
ports at the time of the expected rupture
with Great Britain upon the northeastern
boundary question"
He closes his proposition with IT claim
no credit for the originality Of this sugges-
3n,, Sho4 -,
their sea fights dashed their war galleys
with great force one upon the other. My
proposition Is simply the revival of an an
cient practice by the application of a power
unknown in early times. and still, as many
believe, in the beginning of it's usefulness"
A Pent-Up Giant.
The Postmaster General reported that the
aggregate length of the mail routes Of the
country was 1TS.672 miles. Last year 1t
was 81. sos miles. AT the last letting" he
says, -four horse coach transportation was
contracted for on the thoroughfare roads in
the southwestern and northwestern states.
In railroad trains at that time improve
ments had been made on several lines to
give a speed Of twenty-five miles an hour
by means Of special trains, and it was
hoped that soon 1t will be possible to start
mail matter from New York as late as Z
o'clock in the evening and deliver it in
Washington by o'clock the next morn
ing" ~r- r--
That presidential message Of 1850 is par
ticularly interesting on this Thanksgiving
day for purposes of comparison. The Presi-
dent, Willard Fillmore. had succeeded like
Roosevelt to the office through the death
of the elected President.
1t was the year of the convention be-
tween the United States and Great Britain
for facilitating and protecting the con-
struction of a ship canal between the At
lantic and Pacific oceans 1t was the year
when American capital became interested
in constructing the Tehuantepec railroad.
A treaty had been made between the
United States and the King of Hawaii. The
United States began to reach out into the
West Indies by trying to settle tne strug-
gle then on between the French and Span
ish portions of the Island of st. Domingo,
now the independent republics of Haiti and
Santo Domingo. The formation of a De-
partment of Agriculture was preached.
Two-cent postage was promised. Law had
tice, William P. Bryant, had just made his
camp in the primitive forests, proclaimed
court. collected a jury by sending mounted
men as far as two hundred miles to bring
settlers IN. and there, surrounded by hos
tile savages, had tried six Indians for the
murder of settlers family, convicted two
and attended their execution.
And this is the country whose Thanksgiv-
ing day feast Of 1902 will be celebrated
around the world. and from the frozen seas
to lands south of the equator.