The Birmingham age-herald., 1905-04-16

navy is quite a unique and remarkable little town, in it's way, and has had d thoroughly dramatic and interesting his tory. First an Indian camp, then trading post and a rendezvous of adven- turers, an early Spanish settlement for tifed by grim batteries, then an Eng fish township it became again a Spanish city and once more English before 1t capitulated to Andrew Jackson in 1S14- and even then it did not become Ameri- can and never could be quite natural ized.
 At this day it is only American ir spots. After the harbor, the navy yard the docks, the forts, the old guns-and Palafox street-are duly inspected the up-to-date and conventional visitor finos nothing else but sand fieas mosquitoes and unspeakable hotels. A lazy, sleepy, hybrid little town, cove of the jackiesl
 It is no wonderl Long ago, so tho legend runs, when it was but the bel ligerent little Spanish settlement, it was cursed by Franciscan friars, and doomed to rot for a hundred years. So there on the white gulf coast, with feeble step and unsightly look, has it tottered ever since. and yawned nodded and slept. But-tread softly!-all along through the years it has cherished tenderly in some few hidden gardens-as in old General Francesca Moreno's orange trees, mag nolias figs, lemons and pomegranates, and the gracious breath of jasmine; it has treasured as the most precious heir looms the Castillian jewels-tales and romances of three centuries ago; 1t has clung savagely to its ancient protectors, Fort San Miguel, Fort San Bernardo San Carlos and Barrancas-but skeletons in armor are they now-and when the red moons glows from the heart of the Gulf of Mexico then Pensacola dreams old dreams of Spanish days.
 But breeze strs from the north It whistles up the ancient, drowsing streets, Intendencia, Zaragossa, Romano, South Alcaniz and La Rue, and into the deep harbor. like a squadron of bristling ice bergs, sweep the white battleships. An chors are cast, flags salute, gun is fired and Pensacola wakesl
 If that the little town were young and fair she might be likened to the Sleeping Beauty and the Navy to her Prince-but ito be forgotten of the god-mothersl
 However, Pensacola has a harbor, the fairest and most wonderful water em- braced by long arms of the land and I girded by the sweet island Santa Rosa And under the palmettos sleep the guns! Yes, wonder stands Fort Pickens, with its big 12-inch modern rifles; further down to the left lies the new battery of the 10-inch disappearing guns; just across the channel Fort Mckee mounts guard, armed with its s-inch disappearing rifles and rapid-firing guns, 15-pounders in the | background; to the right beyond the mortar battery stirs Barrancas.
 It is indeed strongly fortified. When the armament is complete Pensacola will be almost Gibraltar. It's peculiar strat- | egic situation in relation to the guf-it is pretty nearly midway between the mouth of the Rio Grande and the en- trance to the gulf through the Florida straits-makes 1t, to an enemy's mark the bulls eye in the target It's occupa- ton as a basis of supplies for the con- duct of operations either at sea or in- land would be imperative. So this is one of the acute advantages of the place for the naval maneuvers with added consideration of the winter climate, the docks and the near neighborhood of the Alabama coal fields. Then, too, con sidering the coming accomplishment of the Isthmian canal, the political and 1 commercial importance of the Pensacola naval station will be trebled.
 Pensacola comprises many other bays and lagoons besides the bay proper which is so famous all over the world East bay, Escambia bay, Blackwater bay, St. Mary de Galvez bay, and the gracious little bayous, Bayou Texar Bayou Grande and Bayou Chico.
 This vast bay-tbirty-six miles long 1t | is and four miles wide-was the first har- Dor in America entered by the navies of the old world. Here in the latter part of October, in the year 1539, so the records IL n11 1f a1.. which brought Hernando de Soto to Tampa, Fla, anchored in Pensacola har- bor to await their captains return from | the interior wilderness. At the place that is now Tuscaloosa, De Soto learned of the conspiracy among his soldiers to | seize him at Pensacola and force the abandonment of the expedition, so he did not push on to meet Ills ships, but turned his face toward the Father of 1 Waters.
 One of our own famous historical ves- sells often in Pensacola harbor is Ad- mral Garraguts old flagship, now the | United States training ship Hartford, still scared from service. An interest | ing instance this spring Is the meeting | of the battleships commemorating the old battle-the Kearsarge and the Ala bama-while another will be the Maine | Just made the flagship. Certainly there 1 is no better place, the harbor being the only deep water harbor of the gulf, for the assemblage of the ships for great and small arm target practice and the | intricate maneuvers. It is glorious and formidable array; fiagships battle ships, cruisers, gunboats, training ships, | torpedo boats and torpedo boat destroy | CTS of every fleet of our that sails the Atlantic and the aCribbean meeting here | in winter quarters and for the spring rem dezvous.
 And how the old town stirsl Palafox | street at once becomes a Broadway- seething, swinging with the men, officers and jackies, thousands of them. and | threading through the blue and gold the red of the artillery regiments. Visitors throng into the town. The dimming so- cial life is polished for a space; dinners, teas, balls, receptions-not Newport, how everi Then, too, the Pensacola Chal- lenge cup is held aloft and races are the order of the day: the dash of the twleve- cared cutters. the gigs and the double banked whaleboats till the ships crews are gone half mad with excitement and the bay is a circus Ashore baseball and football contests between the lads and of the old posts and then again it is Palafox-always Palafox!
 | What a street that is! A weary length of sand, saloons and shops stretching across the city and then dripping into 1 the salt waters edge, rotting wharves, docks and fish sheds, like the tarred and frazzled ends of a dirty ships coil l and smelling to high heavenl Yesl Be- warei It has been described as "a beau | tiful boulevard fianked by long ex- | panse of greensward and planted on both