Chapter XLIII

THE ARMY MEDICAL MUSEUM—ITS CURIOSITIES AND WONDERS.

Ford’s Theatre—Its Interesting Memories—The Last
Festivities—Assassination of President Lincoln—Two Years
Later—Effects of “War, Disease, and Human Skill”—Collection of
Pathological Specimens—The Army Medical Museum opened—Purchase
of Ford’s Theatre—Ghastly Specimens—A Book Four Centuries
Old—Rare Old Volumes—The Most Interesting of the National
Institutions—Various Opinions—Effects on Visitors—An
Extraordinary Withered Arm—A Dried Sioux Baby!—Its Poor Little
Nose—A Well-dressed Child—Its Buttons and Beads—Casts of
Soldier-Martyrs—Making a New Nose—Vassear’s Mounted
Craniums—Model Skeletons—A Giant, Seven Feet High—Skeleton of a
Child—All that remains of Wilkes Booth, the Assassin—Fractures
by Shot and Shell—General Sickles Contributes His Quota—A Case
of Skulls—Arrow-head Wounds—Nine Savage Sabre-Cuts—Seven
Bullets in One Head—Phenomenal Skulls—A Powerful Nose—An
Attempted Suicide—A Proverb Corrected—Specimen from the Paris
Catacombs—Typical Heads of the Human Race—Remarkable Indian
Relics—“Flatheads”—The Work of Indian Arrows—An Extraordinary
Story—A “Pet” Curiosity—A Japanese Manikin—Tattooed
Heads—Adventure of Captain John Smith—A “Stingaree”—The
Microscopical Division—Preparing Specimens, 475

CHAPTER XLIV.

“OLD PROBABILITIES’” WORKSHOP—HOW WEATHER CALCULATIONS ARE MADE.

“Old Probabilities”—An Interesting Subject—The Weather Bureau—The
Experience Of Fifty Centuries—Foreseeing the Approach of
Storms—The Fate of the _Metis_—Quicker than the Storm—The First
Warning by Telegraph—Exchanging Reports with Canada—The
“Observing Stations”—Protecting the River Commerce—The Signal
Corps—The Examinations—The Sergeant’s Duties—The
Signal-Stations—The Work of the Observers—Preparing Bulletins
at Washington—Professor Maury’s Account—Safeguards Against
Mistakes—Deducing Probabilities—Despatching Bulletins—Watching
the Storm—The Storm at San Francisco—Prophetic
Preparations—Perfect Arrangements—Training the
Sergeants—General Meyer’s Work—An Extraordinary Mansion—The
“Kites and Windmills”—Inside the Mansion—The Apparatus—“The
Unerring Weather-Man”—“Old Probabilities” Himself—How
Calculations are Made—“Young Probabilities”—Interesting Facts, 491

CHAPTER XLV.

THE NAVY DEPARTMENT—THE UNITED STATES OBSERVATORY—THE STATE
DEPARTMENT.

The Navy-Yards and Docks—Equipment of Vessels—Bureau of Ordnance
and Hydrography—The Naval Observatory—The Bureau of
Medicine—Interesting Statistics—The Navy Seventy Years
Ago—Instructions of the Great Napoleon—Keeping Pace with
England—Scene from the Observatory—Peeping through the
Telescope—The Mountains in the Moon—The Largest Telescope in
the World—The Chronometers of the Government—The Test of
Time—Chronometers on Trial—The Wind and Current Charts—The Good
Deeds of Lieutenant Maury—“The Habits of the Whale”—The
Equatorial—A Self-acting Telescope—The Transit Instrument—The
Great Astronomical Clock—Telling Time by Telegraph—Hearing the
Clock Tick Miles Away—The Transit of Venus—Great Preparations—A
Trifle of Half-a-Million of Miles—A Little Secret
Suggestion—Pardons and Passports, 507