p. 477 | News and Miscellany

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · May 15, 1913

News and Miscellany

Notes and clippings from the daily and weekly press

— The strike of the Welsh coal-miners in protest against the open-shop policy of the mine owners is spreading to a serious extent in Cardiff, Wales. Fifty-five thousand men have stopped work.

— Twenty-five persons lost their lives May 2, when the steamer “Concordia,” loaded with refugees from the Southern flood district, crashed into a bridge pier in the Mississippi River near Natchez, Miss.

— Thirty-three buildings, including practically all the principal business houses in the town of North Sydney, Cape Breton, Nova Scotia, were destroyed by fire May 4. One life was lost. The property damage is estimated at $300,000.

— An army of women, twenty thousand strong, marched up Fifth Avenue, New York City, on the afternoon of May 3, parading in behalf of equal suffrage. A forest of yellow banners appealed for “votes for women,” and the spectators were estimated to number half a million.

— Approximately $1,000,000 annual income will be added to the government coffers as the result of a recent action of Secretary of the Treasury McAdoo, requiring all government depositaries to pay interest at the rate of two per cent on average monthly balances, to be credited semiannually. Accountings will be made on January 1 and July 1 of each year.

— The entire silk industry of the country was tied up May 2, when 4,200 weavers in the silk-mills of West Hoboken, Union Hill, and Jersey City Heights, N. J., went on a strike, demanding an eight-hour day and a twenty-per-cent increase in wages. The strike is in sympathy with the one at Paterson, N. J., the men at present working ten hours a day.

— The Baltimore and Ohio Railroad alone suffered loss to property amounting to nearly $3,000,000 during the floods in Ohio and Indiana, according to estimates of the president, Daniel Williard. The total loss to all roads, not counting the very large item of loss of income, will be nearly $20,000,000 in the two States.

— Boston has appropriated $3,000,000 for the construction of a dry dock capable of taking the largest ocean liners. New York lacks such facilities. If the “Titanic” had been able to crawl to New York harbor after encountering the iceberg, she would have had to remain there indefinitely, for there is not a dock in the country that would have accommodated her.

— A new epoch in ship propulsion is promised through the launching, at Middlesborough, England, of the first seagoing vessel to be electrically propelled. The new craft, the “Tynemount,” which has a load weight of 2,400 tons, and is 250 feet long, will be controlled with ease, it is expected, by means of electric switches. A large boat with electrical propulsive power is also being constructed on the Great Lakes.

— Belgian strikers returned to work last week, for the most part satisfied with a compromise which amounts to victory. The government receded from its first position and agreed to a revision of the constitution and laws with reference to suffrage, and the objectionable plural voting system will probably be abolished. Thus peacefully ends the largest and apparently the most successful political strike in the world’s history.

— The condition of affairs in Mexico seems about as chaotic as it has been at any previous time. There are numerous bands of revolutionists operating under independent leaders. The larger and more important bodies are known as Constitutionalists, and are made up of sympathizers with, and former supporters of, the murdered Madero. They appear to have undisputed control of extensive areas which are among the most important in the country, commercially and politically. Their strength is steadily increasing by reason of growth in numbers and seizure of towns and means of transportation. Public sentiment in the city of Mexico is represented as pessimistic with respect to the stability of the Huerta provisional government. Lack of cohesion and unity is attributed to the members of it. The treasury is in straits for lack of funds; and owing to the fact that there has been no recognition of the Huerta government and because of the increasing strength of the revolutionists, there is reluctance to finance the provisional government. The warfare carried on has the savage and barbarous characteristics which have hitherto been practised. As conditions present themselves to the news gatherers at the capital, “the government is face to face with the most serious situation which it has been called to meet in many years.” Many foreigners are leaving the country in the fear that anarchy will follow revolution. The United States government appears alert as to its responsibilities along the Mexican frontier.