Arctic Discoveries and the Flood
HENRY BRACKEN, an explorer who has spent several years in the Klondike country, returned recently from a journey far to the northeastward of Dawson, and reports that he found in the glaciers of those northern mountains innumerable carcasses of goats and mountain sheep which had long been frozen in the Arctic ice. Similar discoveries have been made at other places within the Arctic circle, especially in Siberia and the islands west of Greenland. Scientists are unable to account for the presence of these animals in that region, especially of those animals which were certainly inhabitants of the warmer zones. But they are simply a confirmation of the Word of God in the record of the flood. Whether they were swept into this region by the swirl of the waters, or whether, when the fountains of the great deep were broken up, the earth was so turned over as to bring a portion of the Torrid zone into the Arctic, man may never know; but that these discoveries indicate just such a catastrophe in the earth is certainly beyond dispute. It is authoritatively stated that President Roosevelt favors such an increase of the navy as will make it equal with that of Russia or Germany, and possibly with that of France. According to Germany’s program for naval construction, her navy would be considerably ahead of that of the United States within a few years. The bureau chiefs are asking for large sums of money both for construction and repair of vessels, and also for additional coaling facilities. To carry the navy along for the next fiscal year, $9,000,000 will be required. COMPANY C of the Ninth Infantry, consisting of 72 men, was almost entirely wiped out in an engagement in the island of Samar on September 28. The company was at breakfast when the attack was made. All the commissioned officers are reported killed, and nearly all of the few men who escaped were wounded. The survivors report that about 140 of the Filipinos were killed in the engagement. THE special committee of Methodist ministers, appointed to investigate the report that drunkenness has been increased in the army by the abolishing of the canteen, made its report at a ministers’ meeting held in New York City on September 24. The report states that there has been no increase of drunkenness since the canteen was abolished, and that reports to the contrary are fabrications. VIRGINIA’S Constitutional Convention has voted to amend the State’s Bill of Rights by omitting the guarantee of the liberty of the press and the freedom of speech. With what a full tide we are sweeping on toward a total denial of the great principles which made the United States a great nation. One by one they are being repudiated by men, by states, and by the nation. THE native Indians at Nome, Alaska, are reported to be in a starving condition. They came to the coast to trade furs and ivory for supplies. As soon as they had been paid for what they had to sell, whisky peddlers went among them, stripping them of their money in exchange for liquor, and leaving them without resources. A REPORT from Bennington, Vt., states that an English sloop which was sunk near Carver’s Falls, Lake Champlain, about the time of Burgoyne’s defeat, has been uncovered and broken up with dynamite. The captain’s chest was recovered, which contained 10,000 English sovereigns intended to pay off Burgoyne’s troops. It is reported that on the night of September 29 an attempt was made to wreck the vault in which President McKinley’s body was deposited. An attack is alleged to have been made on the soldier standing guard above the tomb. Other soldiers came to his assistance, and the miscreants fled in the darkness. COMMANDER SEATON SCHROEDER, who was appointed governor of the island of Guam, and who was recalled to this country recently to explain his seeming arbitrary rules, has been ordered to return to the island, the Navy Department deciding that his course was justified by the circumstances. TWO Atlantic steamers of the Cunard line, the Lucania and Campania, communicated with each other for two hours in midocean, on September 24, by means of the wireless telegraph. The shortest distance over which they communicated was three miles, and the longest distance sixty-five miles. REPORTS from Shansi province, China, indicate that terrible famine conditions prevail there. It is estimated that not less than 200,000 persons will have died of starvation before the next crops can be harvested. Rice is selling at many times its usual price, and famine fever is raging. CONTRACTORS who have figured on the cost of repairing the fatal breaks in the Brooklyn bridge, report that it will require at least $1,000,000 to do the work properly. The engineers report that a blockade of cars on Brooklyn bridge now at any time is dangerous in the extreme. MR. SETH LOW, president of Columbia University, New York, has resigned from that institution to become a candidate for mayor of New York City. THE directors of the proposed St. Louis Exposition are planning to have representatives at the fair from all the savage tribes of the earth. PRESIDENT MCKINLEY’S will was filed on September 27. It is reported that the estate left by the late president amounts to about $225,000. A NEW YORK despatch announces that Spain is now placing large orders in the United States for railway material, both steam and electric, and for machinery for its gun factories. Nearly one thousand cars have been ordered from one American firm. THE United States protected cruiser Cleveland was launched at the Bath Iron Works, Maine, on September 28. This is a vessel of 3,400 tons displacement. Her principal armament consists of 10 five-inch, rapid-fire guns and 8 six-pounders. ONE of the questions that will be discussed at the coming Pan-American Congress in Mexico will be the establishment of an international arbitration tribunal to settle questions in dispute between republics of the Western Hemisphere. EMMA GOLDMAN, the Anarchist lecturer, who was arrested as a supposed accomplice of the assassin Czolgosz, has been given her liberty, after two weeks’ incarceration at Chicago. There was no evidence connecting her with the crime. PRACTICALLY the whole crew of the German cruiser Gazelle are reported to have mutinied recently at Dantzig. Some of the men threw overboard the breechblocks of the guns, rendering them for the time useless. THE Turkish brigands who captured Miss Helen H. Stone recently while on one of her missionary tours, are reported to have taken their captive into Bulgaria, where they are still holding her for a large ransom. THIRTEEN men lost their lives in a cloudburst which occurred in Presidio County, Texas, on September 25. The water swept with terrible velocity down a ravine in which the men were camped. TELEGRAPHIC messages can now be sent into the Klondike country, the line having been completed on September 25. It is intended that this line shall connect with the American line to St. Michael. THE expense incurred by France in the recent entertainment of the czar and czarina of Russia amounted to nearly $620,000. THE Arbitration Committee of the Hague Peace Conference has definitely decided that it will not take the initiative in the matter of seeking to arbitrate the South African difficulty. DURING the week beginning October 28 Leon F. Czolgosz, the assassin of President McKinley, will be punished by death in the Auburn State Prison. He will die in the electric chair. ADMIRAL VALCAREL, of the Spanish Navy, recommends to the queen regent that in case the appropriations asked for by the navy can not be granted, the navy shall be abolished. IT is reported that many persons will be compelled to winter in Nome this year, on account of the disabling of five of the steamers engaged in Alaskan traffic. TWELVE men lost their lives in attempting to extinguish a fire in a coal mine at Nanaimo, B. C., on September 30, and a rescuing party narrowly escaped the same fate. ONE of the principal copper mines of Butte, Montana, has been closed by the sliding of the earth, a phenomenon which is frequently experienced in that vicinity. JUDGE J. M. WILSON, chief counsel for Admiral Schley in the court martial now in progress at Washington, died at his rooms in Washington on September 24. ANOTHER shipload of Siberian reindeer has been imported into Alaska. The government now has nearly 4,000 of these animals in the Alaskan country. THE Post Office Department is considering the idea of issuing a mourning stamp to commemorate the assassination of President McKinley. GEORGIA is reported to have entered the ranks of those States which are contemplating or preparing for the disfranchisement of the negro. BOSTON is threatened with a strike of the express drivers.