Evening Republican, Volume 17, Number 227, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 23 September 1913 — Old English Dishes. [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

Old English Dishes.

Our ancestors’ taste for strange dishes continued until long after the restoration. In seventeenth century menus we find such items as pigeons stuffed with green gooseberres, roast mutton stuffed with osysters, buttered shrimps, grapes boiled in butter, turkey stuffed with cloves, baked peacock and goose-pie. And at this time hot salmon was considered unwholesome, datee and sorrel were put into soup, while a dish of stewed snails was thought fit to be set before a king. Roses played an important part in the meals of our forefathers. Meats, game and poultry were served up smothered in rosewater; and rose vinegar, made of sour wine in which rose leaves had been macerated, was a favorite condiment, The flower also served as a garfish, in the same way as parsley is used today, and some epicures made it the chief ingredient of their salads.—London Chronicle.

A THREE months’ game of "tag” between vessels of the United States revenue cutter service and the icebergs of the North Atlantic steamship lanes, which has just been brought to an end, has resulted in contributions of great value to the mariner’s store of knowledge about ice movements and their dangers to the great fleet constantly passing between Europe and America. The ice patrol itself was a direct result of the tremendous shock suffered by both Europe and America in the loss of the giant liner Titanic a year ago last April, when more than 1,600 persons were drowned when that vessel collided with an Iceberg in the same waters searched this year by the revenue cutter*. The vessels engaged in the ice par trol were the cutters Seneca and Miami, commanded by Capts. C. B. Johnston and A. S. Gamble respectively. Captain Johnston was the senior officer in command of the ice patrol, and in his final report are conclusions which ought to form the basis of study by all commanders and navigators of steam vessels in the North Atlantic ship lanes. The Titanic disaster brought to every ocean traveler, with shocking vividness, the reality of the danger to the transatlantic fast liners from the presence of ice in their tracks during the spring months. To all passengers on such steamers Captain Johnston’s report may serve well as an index to the measure of care and precaution necessary for any ship in the vicinity of the annual path of icebergs, and it has therefore a definite value for the traveling public as well as to mariners. Make Dally Reports. The mode of procedure in the ice patrol maintained by the Seneca and the Miami was for the two vessels to take turns in scouring the ocean for ice in the waters bounded by the fiftieth and forty-fourth parallels north latitude, and the fortieth and forty-ninth meridians of west longitude. All passing vessels reported by wireless to the patrol vessels any ice they had encountered in those waters, while the vessels in turns transmitted to the naval hydrographic office at New York daily reports of all ice either seen by them or reported to them by other vessels. In a short time practically every berg in those waters had been located, Identified and its general movements ascertained. Thereafter the task of of the patrol vessels was to check up on the known bergs at frequent intervals, and by observation of their positions at each sighting, to learn the rate and direction of their movements. It is this secondary phase of the patrol that yielded the general observations of greatest permanent value to maritime interests.

It was found that the icebergs were brought south along the coast of Newfoundland«and the Grand Banks by what is known as the Labrador current The southerly drift was found to vary from practically nothing to as high as 32 miles a day, depending upon wind and tide in its fluctuations. At the junction of the Labrador current accelerated by the flow from the Gulf of St. Lawrence, and the northward moving Gulf stream from the Gulf of Mexico the direction of the drift of Icebergs Is changed from southerly to north and east The Gulf stream is more powerful than the Labrador current and dominates it, taking along in its course whatever ice may be brought into it. This change usually occurs in April and May, and those months become then the period of greatest danger to transatlantic liners from ice. The tracks of the liners hardly touch the Labrador current, but do He along the path of the Gulf stream. The area of the ice danger is at the same time restricted, because bergs coming into the Gulf stream do not last long in the warm water of that current.

Captain Johnston is of the opinion that the quantity of ice brought down in the spring is in direct proportion to the severity of the winter preceding. The severity of the winters in the north Atlantic states, he says, depends upon the prevalence of strong north winds having their origin on the Labrador coast. Similarly it is these same winds which start southward the great masses of ice broken off from glaciers which appear, in the steamship tracks as icebergs. Therefore the ice danger in the steamship lanes is always great est after the most severe winters and less as the preceding winter has been mild. - * Ground on Banks. Many of the icebergs in the southward drift become grounded on the Grand Banks and do not constitute any serious menace to the transatlantic liners. It is those which continue south parallel to and beyond the banks which threaten the safety of the ocean steamers; and it was to these dihat thq revenue cutter patrols paid the most Attention. Captain Johnston said that the largest berg that was encountered was about 400 feet long, 300 feet wide, 70 feet high out of water. The smallest ice which properly could be called a berg was 225 feet long, 100 feet wide and 35 feet out of water. ,

Captain Johnston estimated the rate of deterioration of Icebergs floating iq the Gulf stream as about 5 per cent, a day. He saw many melting so rapidly that waterfalls were pouring down from their sides while others in the advanced stages of dissolution turned over dally as rapid melting shifted the center of gravity. Sometimes icebergs were found literally covered with sea birds. Of the score of varieties of sea birds found on or near Icebergs Captain Johnston concludes that the presence of none but the murre, a bird common in northern latitudes, can be safely regarded as an indication of ice in the vicinity. ; —«■ ——— Perhaps Captain Johnston’s most valuable contribution is that referring to the visibility and means of detecting the presence of ice and icebergs. After three months of repeated observations and experiments, together with the results of his experience in other arctic regions, Captain Johnston concludes that there is no certain method of detecting the presence of ice other than that of a sharp lookout; that in fog, or especially dark nights, it is absolutely incumbent upon the commander of any fast liner to run very slowly and keep an extra vigilant watch.

ONE OF UNCLE SAM'S CUTTERS