The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1902-12-03

these difficulties incident upon the de-
Velopment Of our war fleet the conduct
OF all our officers has been creditable to
the service, and the lieutenants and
Junior grades IN particular have displayed
an aplllty and steadfast cheerfulness
winch entities them to the ungrudging
thanks of all who realize the disheart-
enlng trials and fatigues to which they
are of necessity subjected.
Inere is not a cloud on the horizon at
present. There seems not the slightest
chance of trouble with a foreign power
we most earnestly hope that this state
OF things may continue and the way to
insure its continuance is to provide for
thoroughly efficient navy. The refusal
TO maintain such navy would invite
trouble, and if trouble came would in
sure disaster. Fatuous self-complacency
or vanity, or short sightedness in refus-
ing to prepare for danger, is both foolish
and wicked il such a nation as ours,
and past experience has shown that such
fatulty in refusing to recognize or pre-
pare for any crisis In advance is usually
succeeded by a mad panic of hysterical
fear once the crisis has actually arrived.
The striking increase in the revenues
OF the Postoffice Department shows
clearly the prosperity of our people and
the increasing activity of the business
of the country
The receipts of the Postoffice Depart
ment for the fiscal year ending June 30
last amounted to 1921, S4S, 047 26, an in
crease of 10,216, 853S7 over the preceding
year, the largest increase known in the
history of the postal service. The mag
nitude of this increase will best appear
from the fact that the entire postal re-
ceipts for the year 1860 amounted to but
$8,51S,0 67.
Rural free delivery service is no longer
IN the experimental stage; it has become
fiXed policy The results following its
introduction have fully justified the Con-
gress in the large appropriations made
Tor It's establishment and extension, The
average yearly increase in postoffice re-
celptS In the rural districts of the coun-
try IS about two per cent We are
now able, by actual results, to show
| mat where rural free-delivery service
has been established to such an extent as
10 enable us TO make comparisons the
yearly increase has been upward of
ten per cent.
On November /. 1902. II $50 rural free
delivery routes had been established and
were ~ operation, covering about one
third of the territory of the United States
available fou rural free delivery service.
There are now awaiting the action of
the department petitions and applications
for the establishment of 10, 74S additional
routes. This shows conclusively the want
which the establishment of the service
has met and the need of further extend
ing It as rapidly as possible. il is JUS
titled both by the financial results ard
by the practical benefits to our rural
population; it brings the men who live
on the soil into close relations with the
active business world it keeps the farmer
in daily touch with the markets: it is a
potential educational force; it enhances
the value of farm property. makes farm
life far pleasanter and less isolated. and
will do much to check the undesirable
current from country to city.
II is TO be hoped that the Congress win
make liberal appropriations for the con-
tinuance of the service already estah
lished and for its further extension.
IRRIGATION. PUBLIC LANDS.
Few subjects of more Importance have
been taken up by the Congress in recent
years than the Inauguration of the sys-
ten of nationally aided irrigation for
The arid regions OF the Far West good
beginning therein has been made Now
that this policy of national irrigation
has been adopted, the need of thorough
and scientific forest protection will grow
more rapidly than ever throughout the
public-land States.
Legislation should be provided for the
protection of the game, and the wild
creatures generally, on the forest re-
serves. The scnseless slaughter of game,
which can by iudicious protection be per-
manently preserved on our national re-
serves for the people as whole, should
be stopped at once. It is, for instance
a serious count against our national good
sense to permit the present practice of
butchering off such q stately and beau
tiful creature as the elk for It's antlers
or tusks.
So far as they are available for agricul-
ture, and to whatever extent they may
be reclaimed under the national irriga-
ton law, the remaining public lands
should be held rigidly for the homo build
or, the settler who lives on his land, and
for no one else. In their actual use
the desert-lanl law, the timber and stone
law, and the Communication clause of the
homestead law have been SO perverted
from the intention with which they We're
enacted as TO permit the acquisition of
large areas of the public domain for 9TH
er than actual settlers and the conse-
quent prevention of settlement. More
over, the approaching exhaustion of the
public ranges has of late led to much dis
cussion as to the best manner of using
these public lands in the West which are
suitable chiefly or only for grazing. The
sound and steady development of the
West depends upon the building up of
homes therein. Much of our prosperity
as a nation has been Que to the opera
ton of the homestead law. On the other
Land, we should recognize the fact that
in the grazing region the man who cor
responds to the homesteader may be I'M
able to settle permanently if only allowed
to use the same amount of pasture land
that his brother, the homesteader, is
allowed the use of arabic land. One hum
dred and sixty acres of fairly rich and
well-watered soil, or much smaller