DOMESTIC | AdventAI

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Oct 22, 1896

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 22, No. 42.

DOMESTIC.

—The police have discovered a $10,000 illicit still in South Boston, and have arrested the owner.

—Cardinal Satolli, ex-papal representative to the United States, sailed for Europe on the 17th inst. Such a demonstration as greeted his departure down New York Harbor could not have been secured for any Protestant clergyman in the United States.

—The great sugar trust, it is said, is about to have a rival, the new institution being another trust composed of Wall Street speculators.

—The New Orleans grand jury has indicted eleven directors of the Bank of Commerce, which closed up last month, with a loss of $310,000.

—Beginning November 1, the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad Co. will reëstablish its fast train service between California and Chicago.

—Fire in a large winery near Guerneville, Cal., on the 15th inst., caused a loss of $40,000. The fire was caused by heated pomace in the fermenting tanks.

—By the burning of the house of J. E. Miller, at Lynden, Wash., three children and a man named Boies were burned to death, and a girl aged 16 was seriously injured by the flames.

—Justice Clift, of this city, has decided that George A. Blank is entitled to $200 damage against the S. P. Railroad Co., because the company's agent refused to accept five copper cents in part payment for a fare ticket.

—Little Ferdinand Hoffman, aged 6 years, of this city, chewed and swallowed the brown wrapping paper that came from a baker's shop, and died on the 15th inst. The doctors say it was the poison in the paper that caused the child's death.

—The telegraph reports that among the business men of Yankton, S. D., an organized and general effort is being made to boycott the hard coal combine throughout the northwest by inducing as many consumers as possible to substitute corn for fuel.

—Fire at Corning, Iowa, on the 9th inst., caused a loss of property to the amount of $150,000. At Peoria, Ill., on the 7th inst., a conflagration in the Ide Manufacturing Company's buildings and the Parsons Horological Institute resulted in a loss of $124,000.

—Between Pacific Grove and Salinas, Cal., on the night of the 12th inst., a wagon and four horses carrying the Pacific Grove football team, were plunged over a precipice to the bottom of a gulch forty feet deep. One young man and all the horses were killed, and eight young men were seriously injured.

—By a trolley car accident at Hazleton, Pa., on the 14th inst., three men were killed and a score of others injured. These trolley car disasters are becoming as frequent as were river steamboat accidents until the government took in hand the matter of inspecting engines and boilers, and licensing engineers and pilots.

—Three Mexicans, one of them a lieutenant, members of the band of revolutionists who attacked Palomis, Mexico, a few weeks ago, have been convicted in the U. S. Court, at El Paso, Texas, of violation of the neutrality laws. They were each sentenced to two years' imprisonment in the government prison at Fort Leavenworth.

—The California state convention of the W. C. T. U., in session at Petaluma, decided that the 31st inst., and the day immediately preceding the election, should be observed as days of fasting and prayer, and that the ministers of the various churches in the state be requested to preach on the suffrage question on the Sunday preceding election day.

—It is claimed by the state board of examiners that nearly three-fourths of the coyote scalps presented for bounty money in the state have been shipped from other states and territories. During the last quarter 17,000 scalps had been presented, whereas the number per quarter previous to that time had been 3,000 to 5,000. At $5.00 a scalp, the run is quite heavy.

—Even the government of the United States is afflicted by hard times. The first half of October shows a deficit of $5,739,873, and for the fiscal year to date of $30,934,000. The total receipts for the fiscal year to date have been $91,175,670, and the expenditures have aggregated $122,509,679. The receipts for the month of October to date have been $12,400,120, and the expenditures $18,140,000.

—A despatch of the 14th inst. says that Governor McIntire, of Colorado, had been in Leadville two days, holding conferences with the officers of the Miners' Union, with mine managers, and with delegations of leading citizens. The stagnation of business, owing to the long-continued strike, together with the damage to mining property, is disastrous to the interests of all parties concerned.

—General Greeley, chief signal officer of the U. S. army, in his annual report of military telegraph lines, gives this interesting item: "A very superior system of using the lines at once for both telegraph and telephone has been perfected by Captain Allen, of the Signal Corps, and with instruments weighing only sixteen pounds, including a battery, one soldier may be telegraphing a message in Morse, while another is telephoning another message over the same line. This system has been severely tested up to a distance of 625 miles with perfect results. With these instruments the operators were also able to establish communication over a grounded cable in San Francisco Bay over which no ordinary Morse system would work, a most valuable feature for military purposes."

—Three robbers entered the bank at Meeker, Colo., on the 14th inst., held up a number of men, and helped themselves to the cash in sight. But when they attempted to leave the building they found their way of escape blocked by a posse of armed citizens, and in the fight which ensued all the robbers were killed and two of the posse were wounded. The robbers had fired two shots in the bank to intimidate the men inside, and this piece of bravado sounded the alarm on the outside.

—Mining in Alaska is, at best, fraught with hardship and a degree of exposure to which few men are inured. The season in which active work can be prosecuted at all is very short, the remainder of the year being a time of dreary monotony and heavy expense. A member of the Alaska Commercial Company, who recently returned to San Francisco, says: "Ambitious miners who entertain ideas of going to the Yukon River in search of gold should not attempt the expedition unless they have money enough to keep themselves out of want for at least two years."

—A single bandit managed to hold up a train near Unitah Station, Utah, early in the morning of the 14th inst., and got away with the registered letter packages in the mail car. He compelled the engineer and fireman to stop the train and uncouple all the cars back of the baggage car, and then, taking the fireman with him, he himself ran the engine some distance ahead. He attempted to break open the express safe, but finally gave it up. Strangely enough, no one attempted to interfere with him, as they seemed to think he must have unseen accomplices somewhere near.

—By party combinations it is now deemed beyond doubt that ex-Congressman Breckinridge, of Kentucky, whom the women of his district defeated at the last Congressional election on account of scandalous conduct, will be successful at the coming election. His return will add what strength he possesses to the Sunday law force in Congress, as he was once the author and champion of a bill for enforced Sunday observance in the District of Columbia. It is quite probable that an ardent advocacy of the Bureau of Reform measures will do much toward redeeming his sullied reputation in certain religious circles.

—The end of the highbinders among the Chinese in San Francisco seems to have come, for a time at least. A dozen headquarters of the hatchetmen were destroyed by Chinese police on the 14th inst. These agents of the consul-general overthrew the josses, broke down the signs, and dismantled the headquarters, until now, where the hatchetmen have been wont to meet is desolate, and the desperadoes are homeless and hunted. The work was done on the following order from the Chinese minister at Washington, to the consul-general at San Francisco: "Instructions have been issued to have bond of good behaviour given within limited period. Said period has expired without compliance on the part of those concerned, whose conduct is very disrespectful. You are to dissolve the highbinder societies and the See Yup Association without delay. Non-compliance will subject you to impeachment and degradation from office."