Jasper County Democrat, Volume 4, Number 21, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 31 August 1901 — WASHINGTON GOSSIP [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

WASHINGTON GOSSIP

Rear Admiral Crowninshicbl, chief ot the bureau of navigation, has come to take the view that he has been violating the naval personnel law. He is at work on a general order, shortly to be which will repair some of the damage which lias been wrought by the failure to have the engineer officers attached to ships of war. The order will require that two line officers shall be detailed on board each ship in commission, as assistants to tlie chief engineer, for service in the engine aud fire room. The officers serving in this way will be assigned so as to have the detachments occur alternately, once in six months. It lias also been decided that line officers shall be detailed to duty with chief engineers, especially during the overhauling aud repairing of ships of war, and it is likely that there will be a detail of officers to duty in the bureau of steam engineering, where the experience and information gained will be of great value to line officers destined for engineer duty on board ship. This general order is the result of the reports received at the Navy Department in regard to the deterioration of machinery on ships of war. It has been found that this deterioration is more extensive than naval authorities have realized. A number of instances have occurred in the last year to demonstrate that the failure Io provide vessels of war with naval engineers is a great mistake, ami if the situation continues without relief there is every chance that it would not lie long before Congress was compelled to resort to legislation to re-establish tlie engineer corps. Consul General Mason has sent to the State Department a complete synopsis of the new tariff law of Germany, which shows the desperate means resorted to by tlie Emperor's government to drive out American competition. The report given out by the State Department shows that by far the more important advances are in food materials, notably cereals, meats and live animals. Of the whole schedule as now presented the following items will affect principally the import trade ot Germany from the United States. In this synopsis are given under each head the present normal rate of duty, tlie minimum rate to which the present duties have been reduced under special treaties with certain favored nations, and the rates designated under the new statute. The rate is in all eases, unless otherwise specified, the net amount in marks and federal equivalent per double centner —i. e., 100 kilograms of 220.46 pounds: Present Treaty New Articles. , dirties, rates. (Julies. WheatJ. .SI.Ill $ .83 $1.54 lye 1.1 II .83 1.42 Juts.... .95 .<>7 1.42 Harleys3 .47 .85 .'ora 47 .38 .95 f10ur2.50 1.74 3>o Datmeal 2.50 1.74 3.80 Jrled fruits9s .95 1.90 Sausage .... 4.76 4.04 9.52 1’0rk4.76 3.67 7.14 Blitter 4.76 3.Ml 7.14 iggs 53 .47 1.42 Margarin 4.76 3.80 7.14 "ows and oxen, per head 2.14 2.14 5.95 Young cattle, per head. 1.19 1.19 3.57 logs, per 100 kilograms 1.19 1.19 2.38 laicouiotlves 1.1.0 1.14) 2.61

Some idea of the tremendous growth of the postal service of this country can be gained from the fact that the department will require nearly 4,< NX).000,009 postal cards during the next four years, or a billion cards a year. This, of course, is in addition to the million of letters mailed annually. The other day the department jpeued idds for 3,000,OOOJXM) single postal cards, large size; 70,000,00 double postal cards, and 5,000,000 single cards, small size. Albert Daggett, the present contractor, was the lowest bidder, his bid for the three classes of cards being 21.75 cents, 42 cents an-1 17.50 cents per thousand. These are the lowest bids ever received by the department. During the last fifteen years there has been a decided reduction in the price paid for postal cards. In 1885 40 cents per thousand was paid for single cards, large size; in JBB9 35 cents, in 1893 32.25 cents, in 1897 23.95 cents, and this year 21.75 cents. • ’

Surgeon General Sternberg of the army objects to the employment of corn doctors in that service, as has been recommended by Col. Philip Reade, lately ou duty at St. Paul as inspector general. The army medical officers say, in the first place, that the men selected for military duty are not of the half lame and decrepit variety, and if anything happens to the feet of soldiers it is likely to be more serious than cun lie attended to by so-called pedal surgeons, or, as they are more commonly known, chiropodists. It is true that soldiers suffer a great deal as a result of long marches, but the remedy for this is in following the rules laid down by the doctors for the care of the feet and in supplying the army with a shoe which is at once comfortable an I serviceable.

Caterpillars have attacked the elms in the White House grounds, and their ravages have extended to the shade trees in parks and avenues in other parts of Washington. As in the case of fleas, myriads of which invaded the homes of Washington two or three weeks before. Prof. L. O. Howard, entomologist of the Department of Agriculture, has come to the rescue with a Latin name for the caterpillar, and calls it the product of the tussock moth known ns orgyia leucostigma. But the caterpillars continue their operations, and ninny of the most beautiful trees in the White House grounds and elsewhere have been almost stripped ot their foliage.