Chapter XV: Miscellaneous Local News (2)

The Boston News Bureau, commenting on the sale,
says: “The sale of $1,000,000 bonds to N. W.
Harris & Co by the city of Springfield to-day is
striking evidence of a revival of confidence in
the bond market. The bankers are offering the
bonds on the following bases: For the 4½’s, 1915
maturity, 4¼ per cent basis; 1916-1919, 4.20
per cent basis; 1920-1934, 4.15 per cent basis.
For the 4’s, 1915 maturity, 4¼ per cent basis;
1916-1919, 4.20 per cent basis; 1920-1954, at
99. To gain some idea of the attractive level
at which these bonds are being sold, compared
with prices for previous issues, it need only be
remembered that in 1913 the city obtained a 3.88
per cent basis for an issue of bonds, a 3.81 per
cent basis in 1912 and a 3.51 per cent basis in
1911. The current sale is the most important bit
of public financing which has been accomplished in
the local market since the war began. It is more
than ordinarily significant that one of the biggest
New England banking houses should take hold of this
Springfield issue at a time when the bond market
is suffering more or less from excessive timidity.
It serves the double purpose of providing for the
financial needs of one of New England’s largest
cities and of creating a little interest in the
bond market on a basis which is fair both to the
city and to the investor. There is evidence of
returning courage and confidence.”

* * * * *

RAILROAD DIVIDEND

_Chicago Tribune_

Directors of the Pennsylvania company declared
yesterday a semi-annual dividend of 1 per cent as
against the usual dividend of 4 per cent at this
time of the year. Since 1910 the Pennsylvania
company has paid 7 per cent yearly, divided into
two semi-annual installments of 3 per cent in the
first half and 4 per cent in the second half of the
year.

The issued capital of the Pennsylvania company
is $80,000,000. The annual disbursement has
been, since 1910, $5,600,000 annually. This year,
however, the company has declared only 4 per cent,
or $3,200,000, so that the reduced amount of
dividends is $2,400,000.

The Pennsylvania company operates all the lines of
the Pennsylvania system west of Pittsburgh. All the
stock of the Pennsylvania company is owned by the
Pennsylvania Railroad company, and to the latter
corporation all the dividends have been paid.

The outstanding capital stock of the Pennsylvania
Railroad company is $499,265,700. The annual
dividends from the Pennsylvania company have been
equal to something over 1 per cent on the capital
stock of the Pennsylvania Railroad company, and the
cut made yesterday in dividends is equal to about
½ per cent on the railroad company’s stock. The
railroad company pays its shareholders 6 per cent
per annum, this rate having obtained since 1908.
The railroad company’s earnings last year, that is,
1913, were 8.02 per cent on the share capital.

The 5 per cent raise in freight rates granted by
the interstate commerce commission was denied to
coal, coke and iron ore. The coal and coke business
of the Pennsylvania system amounts to about
one-third of the company’s gross business and on
that no advance will be received.

In connection with the reduction of the
Pennsylvania company’s dividend, the directors
issued a statement saying that the cut was due
“chiefly to a large decrease in traffic and a
material reduction in the revenues of the lines
west of Pittsburgh.”

Meanwhile the directors of the Pittsburgh,
Cincinnati, Chicago and St. Louis, one of the
controlled lines of the Pennsylvania company,
met and decided not to consider the semi-annual
dividend distribution until the next meeting of the
board, on Dec. 30.

* * * * *

RETAIL PRICE OF BEEF

_Boston Herald_

That there is no truth in the report emanating from
Chicago to the effect that the record-breaking
drought in Kansas will cause the retail prices of
beef to go to unheard of prices in the winter, is
the declaration of local provision dealers. It
is their opinion that, as the dry spell is only
in certain sections of Kansas, it cannot affect
materially the prices in the East.

There has been no increase in prices lately, they
further declare, and certain choice cuts are, in
fact, a great deal lower than at this time last
year. The choicest cuts in sirloin steak are more
than 10 cents lower than they were in 1912 and
other cuts are in the same proportion.

“There is no danger of the prices of beef being
raised in the winter in the East,” declared a local
representative of a large packing house. “There
need be no fear that the steady rush of cattle
to the big live stock markets of the middle West
will materially raise the prices here. In fact,
the prices are lower on some cuts than last year
and I see no reason why they should not continue
to stand at the same price. One must remember that
the drought is confined only to certain sections of
the state of Kansas and that other sections of the
country are not affected. If there is a raise in
prices it will be confined only to those immediate
regions where the drought is.”

That the packers are making fortunes during the dry
spell is also denied by the local dealers. While
live stock prices are to a certain extent lower
now, the wholesale prices on the average have also
decreased and the housewife is getting the benefit
of it, is their assertion. They further declare
that the packers make a small profit at best and
also that the retailers’ profit is not great, as
they have unusually heavy expenses.

* * * * *

LOCAL MARKET PRICES

_Boston Transcript_

Peaches, peaches, and then more peaches, meet
the eye of the visitor to the market section in
these closing days of summer. Little baskets, big
baskets, crates and carriers full of the luscious
fruit are displayed everywhere. Wholesale prices
are reasonable, as usual when the crop is large,
but prices at retail rarely fall below a certain
level. This is one of the hard things for the
layman to understand, why a big crop does not bring
low prices. Wholesalers say that the retailers
are to blame, and the latter say that they cannot
afford to handle the fruit except with a generous
margin of profit. The consumer thinks that the
retailer ought to be content with something less
than 100 per cent profit.

Current supplies of peaches are coming from widely
separated points. Few California peaches are now
offered, and most of the Georgia crop has also been
marketed, but West Virginia, Maryland, New Jersey
and Connecticut are shipping freely to this market.
In late years much of the New Jersey crop has been
shipped into the convenient markets of New York and
Philadelphia. In this market New Jersey peaches
have to compete sharply with Connecticut grown
fruit, and, as freights from Connecticut are less
than from New Jersey, the former have a manifest
advantage. Freights and packing cost the New Jersey
farmer about 50 cents for an ordinary peach basket,
and more for a six basket carrier, which is now
the favorite way of shipping fine table fruit. As
a full basket of Connecticut peaches can be had at
retail at 75 cents to $1, there is not much margin
for the more distant shipper. New Jersey fruit
does not stand up for shipping so well as other
varieties.

When one goes into the market for peaches, one
finds a wide variety of qualities and packages.
As a rule, early peaches are clingstones and late
peaches are freestones. The latter have manifest
advantages, but when they are desired care should
be taken to see that the buyer gets what is wanted.
One needs to remember that freestones from Georgia
and the South may be selling side by side with
clingstones from farther North. Sweetness and
flavor should also be insisted upon, while it is
always a mistake to buy half-rotten fruit because
it is cheap. By the dozen, good peaches can be
bought for 10 to 25 cents. The small baskets that
come in the carriers bring 40 to 50 cents, while
old-fashioned peach baskets sell at 75 cents to
$1.25. West Virginia is shipping peaches in bushel
baskets, a shape first made familiar by Michigan
shippers. That state has not yet begun shipments,
but they will come later. These large baskets cost
$1.25 to $1.75 wholesale, and about $1.50 to $2.25
at retail.

While peaches have the right of way at this season,
other fall fruits are being freely offered,
especially crabapples and plums. “Crabs” were
selling in North Market street Wednesday at 50
cents a bushel, but housekeepers are paying at the
rate of $1.60 a bushel by the peck. Another case of
“quick sales and small profits”? Native preserving
plums are selling at 25 to 40 cents a basket.
Damsons and damson plums are in the market, and
sell at 30 to 40 cents. This is a great year for
New England apple and plum orchards, and, in fact,
fruit of all kinds will be plentiful and cheap.
Exports of apples from this country are likely to
be materially lessened by the war, and the surplus
fruit must be absorbed by home markets. Apple men
are talking $1 a barrel as probably the wholesale
price in this market later. Just now small lots of
apples are selling at 40 to 50 cents a peck for
cooking and 50 to 60 cents for table fruit.

Blueberries from Nova Scotia and Prince Edward
Island are still in the market and sell at 18 to
20 cents, watermelons bring 50 to 60 cents each
and cantaloupes 8 to 10 cents each. California
plums sell at 40 to 60 cents a basket, Bartlett
pears at 20 to 30 cents a dozen, California grapes
at 40 to 50 cents a basket for Malagas and seedless
and 50 to 60 cents for Tokays. Native grapes sell
at 15 to 20 cents for Delawares and black varieties.

Summer vegetables are in seasonable supply, and
low prices are quoted for most varieties. Green
corn is selling at 20 to 25 cents a dozen ears,
early celery at 15 cents, green peas at 65 to 75
cents a peck, string beans at 5 to 8 cents a quart,
shell beans at 8 cents for Limas and horticultural,
cauliflower at 10 to 20 cents each, cucumbers
at 5 cents each, egg plant at 15 to 20 cents,
tomatoes at 8 to 10 cents a pound, mushrooms at $1
to $1.25 a pound, white potatoes at 25 to 30 cents
a peck, sweet potatoes at 5 cents a pound, onions
at 8 cents a quart for native, 8 cents a pound
for Spanish and 18 cents a quart for small white
pickling, squash at 4 cents a pound for marrow, 5
cents each for summer and 20 to 25 cents each for
vegetable marrow, cabbage at 8 to 15 cents each,
beets at 8 cents a quart, carrots at 3 cents a
pound, turnips at 5 cents and parsnips at 8 cents.
Salad vegetables are unchanged, lettuce still
selling at 5 cents and other vegetables at 5 to 8
cents.

Prices of lamb have declined, and a cash customer
can now get a good hind leg or hind-quarter
at 22 cents, though a charge customer who is
particular about quality will have to pay 25 cents.
Forequarters are selling at 14 cents, sides at 20
to 21 cents, loins at 25 cents and chops at 38
to 40 cents. Mutton is unchanged at 18 cents for
loins, 11 to 12 cents for forequarters, 25 to 28
cents for chops and 18 cents for “hung” legs. Veal
cuts are selling at 40 cents for fillet, 45 cents
for steak, 30 cents for chops and 22 cents for
loins.

Beef prices are easier at wholesale, but retail
prices are still firmly held at 33 to 38 cents for
sirloin steak, 40 to 50 cents for rump steak and 25
to 35 cents for round steak. Roasting pieces sell
at 35 cents for the back of the rump, 25 cents for
the face, 25 to 30 cents for the first cut of the
rib and 20 to 25 cents for the second cut. Corned
pieces are selling at 25 cents for brisket, 18
cents for rib, 18 cents for the sticking piece and
10 cents for flank.

Pork provisions are selling at 25 cents for pork
loins, 22 to 25 cents for whole hams, 30 to 35
cents for sliced ham, 25 cents for bacon, 17 cents
for smoked, corned, pickled and fresh shoulders, 15
cents for salt pork, 22 to 25 cents for sausages,
16 cents for Frankfurters, 15 to 18 cents for lard,
10 to 12 cents for pigs’ feet, 12 to 20 cents for
tripe, 25 to 30 cents for tongue, 45 cents for
dried beef, 15 to 16 cents for beef liver, 30 cents
to $1 each for sweetbreads, and 50 to 90 cents each
for calves’ liver.

At the poultry stalls trade is quiet, as usual
at this season. Fall trade has not yet begun in
earnest. Native roasting chickens are selling at 35
cents, Western chickens at 28 cents, Philadelphia
capons at 38 cents, Western capons at 30 to 32
cents, native broilers at 30 cents, Western
broilers at 28 cents, hothouse broilers at $1.25 a
pair, frozen turkeys at 30 to 32 cents, native fowl
at 25 cents, Western fowl at 23 to 25 cents, spring
ducklings at 25 cents, spring geese at 28 cents,
broiler turkeys at $3 to $3.50 a pair, squab at 35
to 50 cents each, and pigeons at $3 a dozen.

Butter and eggs have not been advanced further, but
prices are very firm. Northern creamery butter in
tubs sells at 38 cents, and in boxes at 40 cents,
with individual prints at 40 cents, unsalted prints
at 50 cents, Western creamery in tubs at 35 cents
and Vermont dairy at 33 cents in tubs and 33 to
35 cents in boxes. High prices have promoted the
use of both butter and eggs from cold storage.
Total stocks in local cold storage warehouses at
last report were 300,191 packages, against 299,020
packages a week ago and 321,303 packages a year ago.

Eggs are firm and unchanged, best hennery stock
being quoted at 45 cents, Eastern at 40 cents,
Western at 33 cents and storage at 32 cents. Total
stocks of eggs in local cold storage warehouses at
last report were 399,589 cases, against 402,004
cases a week ago and 490,945 cases at the same time
last year.

Large mackerel are scarce and high, but medium
mackerel are to be had at 25 cents each and small
mackerel at 18 cents. Spanish mackerel sell at 25
cents, Eastern salmon at 30 to 35 cents, Western
salmon at 20 to 25 cents, smelts at 30 to 35
cents, bluefish at 15 cents, weakfish at 15 cents,
striped bass at 35 cents, black bass at 18 cents,
butterfish at 12½ cents, scup at 15 cents, tautog
at 12 cents, swordfish at 25 cents, halibut at 25
to 30 cents, cod and haddock at 8 cents, brook
trout at 75 cents, flounders at 10 to 12 cents,
eels at 18 cents, sea perch at 20 cents a dozen.

Oysters are in season again, but it needs cool
weather as well as an “r” in the month to bring
about a demand. Providence River sell at 45 cents
and Cotuits at 75 cents. New York scallops are
in the market and sell at $1 a quart, though the
close time is not yet off in this State. Lobsters
are selling at 33 cents for live chicken, 35 cents
for large live and 40 cents for large boiled,
soft-shell crabs at $1 a dozen, little necks at 30
cents a dozen or $1.75 a peck, clams at 30 cents a
quart shucked or 50 cents in the shell by the peck,
and quahogs at 60 cents a quart shucked. Finnan
haddie sells at 12 cents.

* * * * *

HOTEL STORY

_New York Herald_

When a clerk at the desk of Bretton Hall picked up
the desk telephone in response to a ring about nine
o’clock last Friday evening he caught the words of
the operator to a man in one of the rooms.

“Indeed, I don’t know what you want, sir,” she was
saying; “but here’s the clerk. You can explain to
him.”

“If they’s such a thing as a bootjack in this
metropolitan hostlery,” a co’n and cotton voice
enunciated in exasperated accents, “I wish yo’ all
would send it up to mah room fo’ about two minutes.”

“Certainly, sir,” said the clerk. “Front! Send the
bootblack up to 846.”

The bootblack came down on a run, talking Greek to
himself. The desk telephone rang again before the
clerk could ask questions.

“I don’t want any bootblack. I don’t want ’em
painted. I want to pull ’em off. Send me a jack.
Don’t yo’ all understand English?”

“Tell the engineer to rush a man with a kit of
tools up to that room,” the clerk hurriedly
ordered. “Right away, sir,” he spoke into the
telephone.

“If it wasn’t for losin’ me job, I’d a kilt that
felly,” the engine room assistant reported when he
quickly returned from the eighth floor. “Th’ way he
talked I’d not stand”--

The elevator door flew open with a crash and a
tall, elderly man with light hair worn long strode
to the desk, his jaws set, but his lips twitching
with each step.

“By gad, suh!” he shouted, pounding the desk and
leaning across it to glare at the astonished clerk.
“I ain’t goin’ to allow no paper collared, Yankee
clerk to make spo’t of me. If I wa’n’t absolutely
certain that yo’ are jes’ one provincial New Yo’ker
of the ignoramus variety I would give yo’ all the
canin’ of you’ mis’able life, old as I am.

“Neveh mind explanations. Yo’ jes’ send that long,
lanky No’th Ca’lina lookin’ boy yondeh up to mah
room with me and we’ll see if I got to go to bed
with mah boots on or go back to Geo’ga to get ’em
off.”

The lanky boy reported that the boots were “sure
some tight,” but his co-operation in their removal
had netted him “fo’ bits.”

* * * * *

SUBWAY STORY

_New York Times_

“Wake up! Your station next,” shouted the Subway
guard, as he shook a sleeping passenger. The
passenger managed to let a “thank you” escape him,
and propped his eyes open until the train came to a
stop at the station.

“How did you know he got off at that station?” the
guard was asked as the train moved on.

“How did I know? Why, he is on here every night,
and he goes to sleep as soon as he gets on the
train. I have awakened him so regularly that he
thinks now it is one of my duties. He would never
forgive me if I overlooked him.

“See that man sleeping over there in that middle
seat, and that one over yonder near the other door?
They work downtown somewhere and come up every
night on this train. I always have to wake them up.
The first man there gets off at 145th Street and
the one by the door at 168th. We know practically
all the regular passengers on the late night
trains. Some work, while others are just rounders
who are out every night, returning always on the
same train with as much regularity as those who
work.

“I have never missed but one, and he seemed
terribly cut up about it. He talked like I was paid
to ‘mind’ him. I look out for him now. I have
scraped up a good many acquaintances in this way.
Sometimes the sleepers are newspaper chaps, and
they give us an early morning paper; others give us
a smile and say ‘howdy?’ when we meet.”

* * * * *

A MIRAGE

_New York Sun_

Cap’n Duke, who hangs about the beach at Far
Rockaway and tells stories of the sea to little
children, saw a mirage yesterday afternoon just
as the sun was setting. He was talking to a group
of little ones at the time and he called their
attention to it.

“See that four funnelled steamship hanging up there
in the sky upside down?” he said. “And then off
there on the starboard bow of the steamer don’t you
see a five masted schooner with all sails set and
her booms to port?”

“Oh, yes, Cap’n Duke,” cried the children. “And
there is still more.”

“What do you see, Johnny?” asked the captain.

“Why, there is a battleship and a ferryboat, and
over on the right I see the Statue of Liberty.”

Cap’n Duke took off his specks, rubbed them with
his red handkerchief and looked hard.

“To be sure, to be sure,” he said. “And astern of
the battleship there is a torpedo boat, and after
that comes a school of whales and a yacht race.
Never see the likes of that even in the Desert of
Sahara.”

In half an hour it was all over and the children
went home for dinner. It was noised about Far
Rockaway last night that really there was a
beautiful mirage to be seen at sunset, and there
was not a soul in the place who refused to believe
it. Cap’n Duke and the children had seen it and
that was enough.

* * * * *

STORY OF SAILOR

_San Francisco Examiner_

If you had done nothing worse than going to sleep
in an out-of-the-way place on a bay steamer and
awakening to find yourself in State’s prison with
a fifteen-year sentence hanging over your head, how
would you feel?

John Larsen had such an experience last Friday. He
was, and may yet be, a deckhand on the schooner
Mary. He imbibed a quantity of refreshment on
the water front and then hid away in the steamer
Caroline for a quiet nap. He didn’t know that the
Caroline was about to go over to San Quentin with
a load of supplies for the prison. The first thing
he did know was that a husky guard with a big gun
was prodding him into wakefulness and saying hard
things. Captain Smith of the Caroline was standing
near.

“Yes, it’s that fifteen-year man, all right,” the
guard said, as he gave Larsen a stiff jolt under
the ribs.

The sleepy sailor was yanked out into daylight and
taken ashore, where he saw only prison walls and
men in stripes all about him. He was marched to the
office of the captain of the guard, the man beside
him meanwhile commenting on the fine disguise
Larsen wore. The poor sailor was dumb from fright,
and could not make an intelligible protest. But
when the officials looked him over, they laughed
and told the guard to throw him out. He was not the
man.

“Ay scart lak djefoul ven woke oop in yale,” said
Larsen yesterday after he had got back from San
Quentin by ferry. “Ay ban sleep on bale yute in
Caroline ven gun stick me in ribs an’ ay see mens
vid stripes all aroond, an’ man vid gun say ay ban
fifteen-year faller. You bat heart went in boots
and ay ban sick. Ven man stick gun in ribs an’ say
‘Git!’ You bat ay coom quick avay. No more sleep in
Caroline on bale yute, you bat!”

* * * * *

A STOWAWAY

_Boston Journal_

Abraham Grabau wanted to get into the United States
mighty badly.

He was poor and had never had a chance. But he had
read a lot about America and thought how fine it
would be to come here and retrieve himself and
really do something worth while before it was too
late.

So at Port Said he hid away on board the steamship
St. Patrick, which was bound for Boston from
Yokohama.

Of course he knew it wasn’t right to become a
stowaway, but he couldn’t see what real harm there
was in it. Besides, he hadn’t any money and it
seemed to be the only thing that was left. And he
never dreamed that the great free country beyond
the seas often keeps worthy men outside its borders
just because they haven’t the price of a ticket.

But he learned many things that worried him from
the St. Patrick’s crew during the passage, after he
had made himself known, when he couldn’t starve any
longer, and had been put to work.

He was told that an alien stowaway has a mighty
poor show of “getting by” with Uncle Sam--that, in
fact, he hadn’t a chance on earth of being landed
here. It nearly broke his heart, for there seemed
to be no way out. But he finally found one--and
why not? It was as good a way as any other. And,
besides, he might win.

While the St. Patrick lay at anchor off quarantine
Thursday night, Abraham slipped off his shoes and
stole on deck noiselessly. He placed his shoes
on deck alongside the railing and pulled down a
life-buoy.

He gave a last look toward the lights that were
twinkling on shore and dropped into the water.

Next morning the shoes were found near where the
life-buoy should have been.

Of course the ship was searched, but Abraham was
missing. Immigration officials at Long Wharf and
the harbor police were notified of the escape. But
there was no trace of the stowaway.

Yesterday the Hebrew’s daring act was talked of
admiringly in many quarters, and the hope was
expressed that he had won. There is a slight chance
that he was picked up and carried to safety. But
those best informed declare that the little Hebrew
has beyond a doubt reached the Port of Missing
Men, where entry is never refused, even to the
friendless and the hopeless and the forlorn.

* * * * *

SEARCH FOR LOST TREASURES

_New York Sun_

In the gray hours before the dawn this morning,
when all Ulmer Park sleeps and nothing is heard
along the reaches of Marine Basin but the crowing
of the restless cocks, will slip from her moorings
a low, rakish craft. With hawseholes muffled and
silence cloths on port and starboard anchor,
hatches muzzled and even the kick of her propeller
smothered by a blanket, this phantom will speed
past the clam factories and chowder distilleries
out to the bounding main.

Hush! ’Tis the Mayflower, onetime defender of
the America’s cup, bearing her daring crew of
gentleman adventurers down to the isles of spice
and the bloodied seas where Morgan trod piratical
quarterdecks and Teach snicked off the heads of
treasure bearers. Skipper Scull is at the helm,
Buck Harrison in the galley; four more, good men
and true, stand in the port chains and shade their
eyes as they scan the waters of Gravesend Bay for
the police boat.

Romance lies behind the horizon and the glint of
the rising sun has the glint of Sir Henry’s gold.
For, mark ye well, Skipper Scull has wrapped in
tarpaulin, next to his open front undershirt,
a chart. Red and blue is the chart; it marks a
reef in the Caribbean; it limns in the sea the
boundaries of a precious spot; it tells where lies
the English corvette, Good Faith, out of Santo
Domingo City in 1684 with five millions in plate
and minted doubloons in her strong boxes.

But who are these men, tried and found trusty, who
sail with Skipper Scull on the converted yacht
Mayflower out of Marine Basin this morning? Skipper
Scull, Harvard, ’98, a venturesome soul who lived
in Tokio many, many months, and who, wishing to be
a war correspondent, finally was allowed to get
as near as forty-five miles from the scene of a
battle. Then there are Gordon Brown, Yale, ’01, who
was captain of the football team that laid Harvard
so low in 1900, Stephen Noyes, Harvard, ’03, H.
L. Corbett, Harvard, ’03, Buck Harrison, Harvard,
’04, fullback, whose name was a terror to all
opponents, and Roger Darby, Harvard, ’05, a tower
of strength on the Crimson line in his time.

Consider this, that Matsukata, whose father is
a Baron in Japan and holds fief over hundreds
of samurai, was offered a place in the intrepid
crew--as cook. Matsukata yearned for adventure, but
he could not so demean himself, and that is why
Buck Harrison of the line holds his place in the
galley when the Mayflower slips out of the Basin
this morning.

With the Mayflower steaming out of Gravesend Bay,
nose to the south, there must come a hiatus in this
tale, and the curtain of the past must be lifted,
revealing dark and bloody scenes.

.................
. .
. CURTAIN .
. .
.................

It is a fair day in June, Anno Domini 1684, and
the tropical palms that fringe the beach about
Santo Domingo Bay are nodding in the breeze. [Santo
Domingo Bay is used as a disguise of the real port,
which it wouldn’t do to reveal.] All is astir about
the wharf, for the good English corvette, Good
Faith, is sailing this day for Plymouth, laden
fair to the gunwales with plate of price, spoils
of cathedrals in Mexico and hard minted gold in
doubloons--and oh, yes, pieces of eight!--that is,
the ransom of cities in Salvador and the Guineas.
Spanish gold it is, torn from the grasp of bleeding
men.

A cheer, a roundelay as the anchor comes up, and
with sails bellying and the crosses of St. George
and St. Andrew whipping from the gaff, the Good
Faith ploughs her way past the reef and out to sea.

But wait! From around the bluff beyond the sea
gate, which is hidden from the Good Faith by the
rocky headland, come stealing two long feluccas.
The brass of cannon glints from bow and taffrail;
sails strain with the wind; the gorgeous banner of
Spain streams from the mainsail peak.

The watchers on the headlands of Santo Domingo City
drop on their knees in prayer at the sight, for
are not those two feluccas the sea vultures of
Don Sebastian Fernando Hacienda y Juan Fernandez,
plunderer of towns and pillager of altars?

At gaze stand the citizens of Santo Domingo City as
they watch the feluccas steal into the track of the
Good Faith. Tortured with anxiety are these good
folk when they behold the Good Faith swing about
the headland and come into view of the dastard
Spaniards. Now the Good Faith is aware of her
peril. See her crowd the canvas on! See her leap
to the tug of the wind and race for her life down,
down the watery way to the horizon! The feluccas
follow fast; they gain yard by yard; still they
gain and yet still.

The horizon rises and swallows up the Good Faith
and the Don’s feluccas, mere dots on the horizon.

Alack, never again did man set eyes on the Good
Faith. Plymouth awaited her in vain; Santo Domingo
City sent out sloops and men-o’-war to search for
her. Never again did Don Sebastian ravage the
coasts of Salvador and plunder the galleons of the
Main. Men forgot that there had ever been a Good
Faith or a Don Sebastian.

* * * * *

[Stars here indicate hiatus of 220 years.]

A fisher of sponges, an American fisher of sponges,
in sooth, is sailing his craft about the Caribbean
in search of his prey. It is some years later.
It is only a few years ago in fact. A storm
comes roaring out of the Gulf, and the fisher of
sponges with his native fishermen is driven in his
cockleshell far, far out of his course. In the dead
of night and the murk of the storm the boat is
piled up on a reef and they rub elbows with death
until the ruddy streaks of dawn come.

Then this fisher of sponges, this American fisher
of sponges--he was also a diver and he helped
raise the Merrimac in Santiago harbor once--looked
over the side of his boat and he saw down about
fifteen feet in the blue water the prow of a ship.
Straightway he dived. He came up with pieces of
eight sticking through the cracks of both fists, or
maybe it was doubloons.

Forthwith all of his native fishermen dived,
and they came up with silver and golden coin
representing maybe $1,221.34 American, who knows?

They dived again and brought up the ship’s bell.
About the rust eaten rim was graven this motto:

“Good Faith yclept Dom. 1680 Plymouth. Ringeth this
Belle God’s hours and telleyeth man’s life Space.”

Straightway did this American fisher of sponges get
him his sextant and his latitude. He had to guess
at the longitude. Then with the ship’s bell and the
pieces of eight he sailed to Jamaica.

There he found one who was interested in his tale.
Together they went to a lawyer, and he recommended
them to another lawyer, whose name is Reginald R.
Leaycraft and whose office is at 129 Pearl street,
this city. Many old records in Santo Domingo City
and in England were gone over, so say this fisher
of sponges and his lawyer, and at last the shipping
register of the original Good Faith was discovered.
Then they knew of her fatal journey out of Santo
Domingo City on that June afternoon so long ago,
and knew, so say both, of the treasure that was in
her bottom.

Skipper Scull, and he alone, knows how it was
that the sponge diver happened to meet such an
adventurous spirit as himself here in New York.
Yet, hark ye, within a month after the sponge
fisher and Skipper Scull had met fortuitously,
all of those other brave gentlemen and true from
Harvard and Yale had met to form a solemn bond and
compact.

This was the bond and compact: That the
organization should be made under the auspices of
the Southern Research Company, a duly registered
organization; that the sponge fisher and his lawyer
should have share and share alike with the others;
that the sponge fisher should be one of the party
of discovery, in that he knew best how to interpret
the chart that he had made that blue morning after
the storm; and that, chief of all, Matsukata, the
man whose father is a baron in Japan, should be
cook.

All of these conditions, save the last, so
recalcitrant did Matsukata prove, were fulfilled
to the letter. Then went the representatives of
the company to Mrs. Eva M. Barker, the owner of the
old cup defender, Mayflower. Five years ago the
old defender had been converted into a sloop with
auxiliary power. The Mayflower was brought around
to the Marine Basin and all sorts of strange stores
in boxes and crates were lowered into her hold.
Diving suits flopped upon her decks and grappling
hooks shoved their prongs through burlap sacking.

Skipper Scull was there on the deck of the
Mayflower each day to shoo away the curious and
to scowl at the prying. Not a word would the war
correspondent skipper say to the most veiled
interrogations. Until the Mayflower slipped past
the chowder distilleries in this morning’s early
light the mystery of her mission and her bourne
remained inviolate.

But Skipper Scull, Buck Harrison and the rest have
overreached themselves in their secretiveness. For
know that over a long glass clinking with ice one
sleepy night up at the Harvard Club on Forty-fourth
street one of the sextette of adventurers revealed
the scheme of the expedition. That is why not even
Skipper Scull knows what fell plot is now a-brewing
to rob him of his putative treasure.

This is the plot: Up in Boston lives Alexander
Forbes, the grandson of John Murray Forbes. He is
the possessor of the yacht Merlin. To his ears
came the tale of the treasure hunt. Not long did
the grass grow under the Forbes foot. He called
together the following men, known to be desperate
pirates: Jim Field, Harvard, ’03; Donald Gregg,
Harvard, ’02; Ralph Page, Harvard, ’03; Buz Baird,
Harvard, ’04, and W. Davis Conrad, also of Harvard.
To them he broached his counter plot, and all
gleefully agreed, if they did not sign a pact with
their life blood.

So it will be--and one of these Boston pirates
said yesterday that it cannot but be--that
after the Mayflower has gone to her all but
secret destination in the Caribbean and is
sailing homeward, either laden with gold or with
experience, the yacht Merlin will one day stalk out
of the horizon and confront her. The Jolly Roger
will fly from the peak of the Merlin and a six
pounder will cough out demand for the Mayflower’s
surrender. The Mayflower will have to heave to
and be robbed or go to the bottom with all of her
gallant gentlemen adventurers weltering in their
own blood.

It will be about three weeks hence, so swore this
Boston pirate by book and ring yesterday, that the
Merlin will sail on her fell mission. After that
the Spanish Main will roar again and bloody death
will be abroad over the mellifluous waters of the
Gulf stream.

* * * * *

RELIEF SHIP

_New York Evening Post_

Capt. Pickels--“Pickels of the schooner Cluett,”
as they called him on the Labrador coast--standing
on the deck of that stanch little vessel, which
will soon be bucking ice in Baffin Bay, is not
the figure of an Arctic explorer. To the mildly
interested visitor to the East River dock, where
his ship was moored, there was nothing about the
square-set skipper in shirt sleeves and straw
hat, watching supplies come aboard, to suggest
that he is the man selected to command the
relief expedition which will search for Donald
B. MacMillan, starting to-day. MacMillan set out
from New York just two years ago to find mythical
Crocker Land, and now the American Museum of
Natural History, one of the chief backers of his
expedition, is sending Pickels to find MacMillan.

Both the captain in summer city garb and his little
schooner, dwarfed by the overhanging pier, and not
so different to the unpracticed eye from hundreds
of sailing craft loading here, refused at first to
fit into the picture which he painted in simple
language of the months ahead. Within a few weeks
the Cluett will be feeling out open reaches in
the ice which is rarely absent after Nachvak Bay,
on the north Labrador coast, is passed, laying a
course almost due north up Davis Strait. Thence to
Melville Bay, near Etah, the MacMillan expedition’s
base, it will be nip and tuck between the Cluett
and rapidly descending winter. She will be late,
and, skirting the ever-present “middle ice” of
Baffin Bay, on a course not far off shore, she will
be lucky to reach her objective before the waters
close entirely.

And luckier still if she finds MacMillan and
his party waiting. For then there is the chance
that, with more good fortune and able seamanship,
Capt. Pickels may be able to bring all hands out
through the thin crust which by September will
cover all those waters. In that event he will
have made a season’s record to be very proud of.
What is far more likely--and that is the reason
for the two years’ supply of foodstuffs on board
the Cluett--the schooner will nose her way into
Melville Bay with hardly enough time in which to
select a winter berth in the ice. If MacMillan has
to be waited for or search made for him, the long
winter will make either task easy. The diminutive,
unpretentious wooden sailing ship which now reeks
of oil and ship stores under the warm sun, will
then find herself encompassed with leagues of ice.
Eskimo ice huts will spring up around her like
mushrooms, and in the long Arctic night it would be
difficult to identify the little Cluett with the
picture at the foot of East 21st Street.

But closer acquaintance with Pickels and the Cluett
helps one’s imagination to bridge the gap. Ever
since she was built at Tottenville, some four
years ago, for the Grenfell Mission service on the
Labrador coast, Pickels has commanded her. She
was designed for work in northern waters. As the
bronze plate in the captain’s cabin sets forth,
she was presented to Dr. Wilfred Grenfell in July,
1911, by George B. Cluett, of Troy, N. Y. That she
went to sea with purposes other than those of the
ordinary trading schooner, the plate makes plain
in these few words: “The Sea is His and He made
It.” The inscription in the brass band which binds
the wheel, “Jesus saith I will make you fishers of
men,” serves to distinguish her from the run of
fishing craft which infest the Labrador waters. But
for these symbols of a higher vocation she is just
like them, save that she is much more stanch.

From stem to stern the Cluett measures 142 feet,
and her beam is 26 feet. Every foot of timber
in her is white oak. And back of the thin steel
plate on her bows, where the impact of ice is
concentrated, she can boast about two feet of solid
timber. The outer shell forward is composed of
white oak timbers eight inches thick. Behind them
is nearly a foot of timbering, and then an inner
shell of six-inch white oak all stiffened with
drift bolts. The Cluett can be counted on to stand
up to the force of her eighty horse-power kerosene
engines, against all but solid ice. And she has
proved it more than once.

That brought the captain to the recital of an
achievement which probably had much to do with the
selection by the Museum authorities of him and
his ship for the work in hand. Making ordinarily
about three trips a year as supply ship to the
chain of missions established by the Grenfell
Association, it was no new thing for the Cluett to
show her seaworthiness in ice and dirty weather.
But last summer she did something out of the
common. Chartered for a few months by the Carnegie
Institution for magnetic investigations in Hudson’s
Bay, she and Capt. Pickets displayed remarkable
facility for edging into ice-strewn waters and
slipping out with promptness.

In a month’s time she made the circuit of Hudson’s
Bay, undeterred by almost constant snow-storms and
gales, frequently traversing untried waterways.
She escaped without misadventure, where a less
careful pilot might have lost his ship. Once the
two principal members of the party, the observers,
were swamped in a small boat. Losing instruments
and all their equipment they went five days without
food or fire, and owed their lives to Capt.
Pickels’s prompt appearance with relief. Getting
into Hudson’s Bay in mid-summer of last year was
not easy on account of the ice. After cleanly
threading Hudson Strait, the Cluett encountered a
Canadian icebreaker, smashed by the very element
she was designed to combat, and breaking up. As
this point was a long way south of his present
destination, Capt. Pickels is mindful of what may
be in store for him this summer. But he regards the
MacMillan relief expedition with as much serenity
as if it were one of his regular northern visits,
and with as little timidity as might be expected
from a mariner who has navigated every ocean and
circumvented ice in Bering Sea as successfully as
in Grenfell’s Tickle.

Although the proved nimbleness of the Cluett leads
her charterers to hope that she may slip into
Melville Bay and out with the rescued MacMillan
party in time to get back to New York in November,
the way food supplies have been poured into her
show that no chances are to be taken, in a locality
where, as the captain remarked, “ye can’t fetch
stuff from a grocery ’round the corner.’” He shed
light upon what for a dozen men might be considered
a two years’ food supply. Some two thousand pounds
of beef, nearly half of it canned and the rest
pickled in brine, and an almost equal quantity of
mutton and pork, formed the backbone of the stores.
Beans and potatoes and barrel on barrel of pilot
bread set off this impressive meat supply, which
winter hunting is to vary with fresh steaks and
roasts.

Several hundred pounds of coffee and a hundred of
tea, onions and many gallons of lime juice to ward
off scurvy, were important items; strangely enough,
not a particle of chocolate or cocoa. A comment
upon the rather small supply of milk--condensed,
of course--as compared with, for one thing, three
hundred pounds of rolled oats, drew from the hardy
captain the explanation that crews in the North
preferred molasses with their oatmeal, and of
molasses he had nearly a hundred gallons.

Perhaps these assurances of creature comfort have
had their attractions. At any rate, Capt. Pickels
has been pestered with would-be passengers who want
to make the trip with him or put in a winter of
hunting on Melville Bay. And they were not all men.
One young person from Vassar sent a request. But
Capt. Pickels will have none of them. So that, when
he starts on the last leg of his journey north,
with decks piled high with barrels of kerosene--the
Cluett is to be stocked with nearly five thousand
gallons of kerosene and 900 gallons of gasolene
for her engines--the only person aboard beside his
crew of eight hardy Nova Scotians, will be the
representative of the Natural History Museum. Capt.
Pickels’s Newfoundland dog “Chum” completes the
list.

* * * * *

SQUIRREL

_New York World_

Somebody let a squirrel loose in City Hall Park
yesterday, or more likely Saturday night, and as a
result that part of the green grass plot just north
of the Nathan Hale statue was the only busy section
in the business district from 2 until 3 o’clock
on the Sabbath. If there was one cat there were
thirty. Of all sizes and conditions they ranged,
hailing from Cherry Hill and other points. Toms,
tabbies and kittens were all there, and in circles
they sat about a big tree on which a gilt sign read
“Ulmus Americanus.”

Above, perched in the branches, was Mr. Squirrel.
Intently he looked down at the cats and the crowd
of park loungers and others leaning on the fence
and flicked his gray tail saucily at the feline
delegation. One venturesome Tom scooted up the
tree, but when he began to crawl out on the branch
on which “Brer” Squirrel sat the latter lightly
jumped to an adjoining tree, not labelled, and
chattered back at Tomcatus Cherryhillibus.

The other cats with uplifted eyes watched the
flight of the squirrel and camped under the second
tree, while the crowd of human onlookers increased.
The siege was getting interesting.

“I wonder will the cats get him, Jimmie,” said one
young woman, but the squirrel only kept on scolding
to himself.

Not long after a young man in a gray suit stepped
over the fence and stood beneath the tree. He
carried a small bag over one shoulder. The moment
the squirrel saw him he ran down the tree and
perched on the man’s other shoulder. When the man
opened the bag he popped in, and they started off
for a Jersey ferry.

The disgusted cats dispersed and the crowd melted
away.

* * * * *

POLICEMEN’S PET

_Philadelphia Telegraph_

Just as the “joker” tapped 12 o’clock today in the
Trenton avenue and Dauphin street police station, a
file of unhelmeted patrolmen marched silently into
the back yard and reverently placed the remains of
“Benny” in his last long resting place.

For a moment they stood sad-eyed, while Bill Tufts,
the old turnkey, softly dropped the earth upon the
coffin, and then, when only a memory marked the
spot near the patrol house where “Benny” slept,
they went back to the roll-room and discussed in
whispers the unexpected death.

“Benny” died at 11.20 o’clock, despite the efforts
of House Sergeant Site, who immersed him in fresh
water and tried in every way to restore the
fast-ebbing life. But a broken heart could not thus
be appeased, for “Benny’s” heart had undoubtedly
been broken when a younger rival for the affections
of the bluecoats turned up in the station house not
long ago.

Old age might also have contributed toward the
death, for “Benny” was 7½ years old, and his
species never exist longer than seven years,
according to Street Sergeant Murdock, who is well
posted on the subject. “Benny” holds the record
for age around the station house. There have been
others of his ilk there constantly for fifteen
years, but “Benny” was the longest liver of the
entire crowd.

“Benny” was a fan-tailed goldfish.

* * * * *

ZOO STORY

_New York World_

This rock shall fly from its firm base as soon as I.
--Hippopotamus Pete.

“He’s a pig-headed brute,” say the keepers in
the Bronx Zoo after they have been up all night
watching Pete, who weighs 1,300 pounds--more than
four Tafts.

“He’s a wise old guy,” say the keepers admiringly
after they have slept and are wondering at Pete’s
sagacity.

Director Hornaday, of the Zoo, and the keepers
fondly hope to remove Pete to-day from his old cage
in the antelope house to his apartment in the new
and splendid elephant house. But whether Pete goes
or stays in the antelope house depends upon how
hungry he was last night.

The World has told of the futile efforts to move
this Gibraltar of hippopotamus flesh. As a last
resort, Director Hornaday has been starving Pete
for two days and nights. When Pete is hungry he
is very hungry, indeed. He eats a wagon load of
provender a day, shovelling in the food as stokers
shovel coal into a steamship’s furnace.

Taking advantage of this, Director Hornaday had
placed in Pete’s cage a “moving case,” a very
strong box big enough to hold Pete. At one end of
the box is a drop door rigged to a fall and tackle.
At the closed end of the big box the keepers placed
a tempting meal of all the things Pete likes best.

It was all very simple. Two keepers watched Pete
every hour of the twenty-four. Pete, hungry, was to
walk into the box after the food, the keepers were
to let the drop door fall and--there you are, or,
rather, there Pete was.

The simple plan did not work out well. By day Pete
seemed to have lost all appetite. But by Saturday
night he had thought out a plan in his turn. While
the sleepy keepers watched, Pete entered the box,
but he carefully stretched back his hind legs so
that they remained outside it. The keepers dropped
the door; it fell on Pete’s hind quarters.

Pete backed out, scooping the food along with his
fore legs. Once outside he had a hearty meal, which
he seemed to enjoy exceedingly.

They built a much longer moving case yesterday and
put food at its closed end. A hippopotamus is not
built like a dachshund. To get that food Pete must
include his whole bulk in the box.

* * * * *

CAT

_Chicago Inter Ocean_

Tom Stroller is dead.

Tom Stroller was only a cat, and he was old and
ugly and never even had been allowed within the
sacred precincts of a cat show, so, perhaps, it
doesn’t matter much.

And yet there were a hundred girls, students at the
Art Institute, who looked wistfully at the desk of
the Klio Club when they went to their lunch. And
there were 100 others who didn’t smile as they sat
about the tables. One or two attempted a eulogy,
but the efforts were not inspiring, for the best
that could be said of old Tom Stroller was that “he
was such a friendly cat.”

Time was when Tom was young and useful. Those were
the days--twelve years ago--when there was a stern
work to be done at the Klio Club, then at South
Michigan Avenue and East Monroe Street. Those
were the days when Tom stepped proudly through
serried ranks of rodent dead, the days when he was
tolerated because he was useful, and was forgiven
his ugliness because he was so friendly. Those were
the days when Tom achieved his first love--the love
of Mrs. Bush, mother of the club.

Side by side Tom and Mrs. Bush grew old together.
When the girls at the institute moved their club
to 26 South Wabash Avenue, Tom, now toothless, and
Mrs. Bush, now almost at the end of the road, were
established together at the cashier’s desk.

New students came to look amused and remained to
love them both. Old students came back to Chicago
to rush up to the Klio Club and cry: “Why, if there
aren’t Tom and Mother Bush. God bless you both!”

But one day last year Mrs. Bush was stricken with
an illness that soon may prove fatal. She was taken
to the Mary Thompson Hospital and a new cashier
came to the club’s desk. She was kind to Tom and
stroked his grizzled fur, but things were different
now, and Tom began to grow old very fast. He died
yesterday morning.

* * * * *

DOG

_Chicago Herald_