p. 21 | Current Mention

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Sep 16, 1902

Current Mention

—Extensive oil fields are reported to have been discovered near Evanston, Wyo.

—The French government has ordered the evacuation of the entire northern portion of Martinique, the part of the island which is dominated by Mont Pelée.

—An Italian engineer has invented a method of transporting mail by electricity, using small cases which are propelled along a copper wire. A speed of over two hundred miles an hour is believed to be easily attainable for mail matter by this device.

—Another son of “General” Booth of the Salvation Army, has left the army, and will go into business in Montclair, N. J. There are now six of the Booth family in the United States who have cut loose from the organization ruled over by the elder Booth.

—The native chiefs in Rhodesia have promised to destroy all the dogs in that country excepting special favorites, on account of an outbreak of rabies, the nature of this disease having been explained to them by the whites. From 60,000 to 80,000 canines will be put to death.

—An expedition which has recently returned from an exploring trip in the interior of Labrador, reports the discovery of an unknown river and seven large lakes, one of the latter being about forty miles in length. The river has its source in an elevated tract of country west of Nain Bay.

—The revolution in Colombia is attended with almost daily fighting, in which the insurgents appear to have the advantage. The town of Culebra, on the line of the railway between Colon and Panama, has been captured by the insurgents, and an attack on Panama is expected soon.

—The army and navy have been playing at war along the shores of Long Island Sound, the navy seeking to land a force and capture or bombard some of the cities and towns, and the army to prevent any successful attack. There has been much maneuvering and great expenditure of energy, with the result that both sides claim a great victory.

—Paul Kruger, the ex-chief of the Transvaal, is writing an autobiography which is to be completed and published in Europe and the United States by the middle of November. The book will be of particular interest on account of the revelation it will give of “inside” facts relating to the late Boer war. The volume will contain about 100,000 words.

—An engineer on a Chicago & Northwestern Railway train running through Evanston, Ill., early Monday morning, being suddenly seized with an impression that there was some obstruction on the track, brought his train to a stop, the investigation which followed disclosing a man lying between the rails only a foot or two in front of the engine. He was revived, and explained that he had been taken sick and had fallen in a faint while crossing the railway track.

—The value of the gold output in the United States the last year is $78,666,700. The silver output is $33,128,400.

—A great demonstration is being organized for St. Peter’s Church in Rome, to be made at the pope’s jubilee next March.

—Alpine climbing continues to be a fascinating and dangerous sport for tourists. The Alpine casualty record for this season includes sixty-three persons killed.

—Five freight wrecks occurred in one day, September 7, on the Pennsylvania Railway between Johnstown and Harrisburg, Pa. Two men were killed, and others were injured.

—A fatal strike riot is reported from Candela, Italy, a small town in the southeastern part of the peninsula. Italian troops attempted to intervene in the riot, and being attacked by the mob, fired into the latter, killing five men and wounding ten.

—The island of Bermeja, in the Gulf of Mexico, has suddenly disappeared, according to a report brought by a French admiral commanding a French naval division in the Atlantic. No reefs have been found on the spot formerly occupied by the island.

—A cablegram from Calcutta, India, reports an earthquake which was felt over the whole of the alluvial basin of Assam and Chittagong. Astrologers in that country prophesy that a great convulsion will occur there shortly, and the inhabitants are in great fear.

—Recently 10,000 native soldiers of Borneo were sent against the “head hunters” in the interior of that island, who were to be punished for their depredations. Cholera broke out as soon as the expedition was under way, and such was the fury of the epidemic that only 1,000 men of the expedition returned alive to their homes. The head hunters were not seriously disturbed.

—A Haytian insurgent gunboat was sunk by a German gunboat in Gonaives harbor, Hayti, September 7, in retaliation for the boarding of a German merchantman by the insurgent commander three days before. The incident, it is said, is likely to lead to a European demand for a protectorate over Hayti by the United States, and further, to a demand that the United States assume a “protectorate” over all the Central American republics in order to put an end to the chronic state of revolution which is characteristic of those countries.

—The almost complete collapse of the cycling “fad” in this country is a subject of considerable comment at this time, following the announcement of the failure of the American Bicycle Company in New York City. According to statements made by dealers, sales of bicycles have fallen off eighty per cent or more in the last three years. The League of American Wheelmen, which a few years ago was an organization reckoned with by politicians on account of its power and influence, has shrunk to wholly insignificant dimensions. Bicycle clubs all over the country have been disbanded; and the club houses sold. The cause of the bicycle’s decline is not clearly defined even in the minds of people who have abandoned it.

—For about thirty miles off the coast of Maryland the surface of the Atlantic was observed on September 9 to be covered with a thick red coating, appearing when closely examined to be a sort of dust, presumably from some one of the West Indian volcanoes which have been in recent eruption.

—La Soufrière, the St. Vincent volcano, has been in active eruption since September 5, and the topography of the country surrounding it has been completely altered. The Rabacca River has been converted into a stream of fire a quarter of a mile in width. There has been an extension of land seaward, and the summit of the mountain has been perceptibly lowered. New ridges and valleys are visible where none were in existence last month. Great crops of arrowroot and cocoa have been ruined.

—There seems to be a general revival of volcanic activity in all parts of the globe. The news now comes that Stromboli, situated on an island in the Mediterranean, which has for centuries been in a state of mild eruption maintained with unvarying regularity, has broken out into violent activity, throwing up great columns of fire and torrents of stones and dust, enshrouding the island with a pall of darkness. Signs of renewed activity in the crater of Vesuvius were observed at Naples, September 7. In the Hawaiian Islands the great crater of Kilauea has burst into activity, following severe earthquake shocks at Hilo. A lake of molten lava has formed in the crater, and is reported to be rapidly rising, being at last reports within six hundred feet of the top. This outbreak is not in the main crater of Kilauea, but the natives predict that a great eruption will occur in the main crater shortly. The volcanoes of Central America are unusually active.