Fred Fearnot's Revenge, or Defeating a Congressman
ARTICLES OF ALL KINDS
A NEW POST OFFICE ORDER.
Picking up loose money has grown to be such a hardship for the overworked rural free delivery carriers that the post office department has issued an order warning reckless citizens against leaving loose coins lying around. Hereafter coins must be tied in bundles or inclosed in envelopes whenever the patrons of a rural route wants stamps from a carrier and leaves the necessary amount in the way side box.
KAISER'S TRAIN MUST BE SALUTED.
Leze majesty is always guarded against in Germany. An order just issued by the Ministry of Railways says:
"Switchmen and gate keepers at crossings on the passing of the royal train must face the train and adopt the military attitude of attention, with eyes to the front and holding a covered signal flag by day on the right arm. During the passing of the royal train assistant switchmen and Watchmen without service caps must also take up the attitude of attention. All night thelantern must be held in the right hand; by day, the cap. railwaymen at stations must do likewise."
The Berliner Tageblatt sracastically observes: "After deeply contemplating the new ordinance we are sure the safety of the royal train will gain greatly thereby."
A TEN-YEAR-OLD SLEUTH.
Only ten years of age, Daniel Allen Badeker, son of Chief of Police Badeker, of Birmingham, Ala., is a clever amateur detective.He has caused the arrest of all sorts of offenders, mostly thieves of various sorts, leading to the recovery of not less than $10,000 worth of stolen goods. Car robbers, bicycle thieves and shoplifters have come to grief through him. He is also the terror of blind tigers. Even since he was five years old, when his father was chief of the, Birmingham secret service department, he has been much around headquarters, and before he was seven years old he manifested analytical powers, and on occasions gave the detective useful "tips." Sometimes his father or others carried him along in working up cases.
He became known among the men as "assistant chief" after his father was elected chief of police. Two years ago he donned the full uniform, including cap and gold band, gloves and leggings and was given special officer's badge No. 53. Joining the mounted police squadron, he appears regularly on his Shetland pony at the bead of police escorts at all public parades. He is a skillful horseman.
"I want dad's job," Dan says. "To wear his badge is my ambition."
TWO WARSHIPS LAUNCHED.
The British battleship Emperor of Indian, the last of the four battleships on the 1911-1912 naval construction programme, was launched at Barrow-in-Furness recently. It was at first intended to call her the Delhi. Her construction had been considerably delayed owing to labor troubles at the shipyard, so that the new vessel is not of such modern type as some of the ships already launched. She was laid down on May 31, 1912.
The British Admiralty departed from its recent custom and invited the naval attaches of the foreign embassies in London to be present at the luanching, its reason for doing this being probably because the details concerning the new battlewhip were already known.
The Chilian battleship Almirante Latorre was launched at the Elswich shipyards, Newcastle. Her displacement is 28,000 tons and her engines are expected to develop over 37,000 indicated horsepower. The contract calls for a speed of 23 knots.
The main armament of the new vessel consistf o ten 14-inch guns, placed in pairs in turrets on the centre line. She carries an auxiliary battery of twenty-two 4.7-inch guns.
The largest oil carrying vessel in the world, having a capacity fo 15,000 tons of oil, was launched at Jarrow the other day. The vessel was christened San Hilario by Mrs. Herbert J. Carr, of new York city. The new ship is onf of ten tank steamers of the same size now being contructed for the Eagle Oil Transport Company.
SIXTY-FIVE YEARS EMPEROR.
History has no parallel to the record of Francis Joseph of Austria, who has just completed sixty-five years of his reign.
Queen Victoria reigned less than sixty-four years. The nominal seventy-two years of Louis XIV. of France and the sixty-seven years of Pharaoh of the Scriptures began when they wore young boys in tutelage. Francis was over eighteen on December 2, 1848, and he has been an actual ruler every day.
It is the fashion to cite him as a "Hapless Hapsburg." Any man, much more any king, who lives eighty-three years must expect sorrow, and in his family life the old Emperor has had his share. But Austria- Hungary has not done so badly. It was near disruption in 1848, only saved by Russian troops. No such menace now exists. It was defeated by Prussia and France; but Prussia, by Bismarck's, wise insistence, took no toll of territory, and the loss of the discontented Lombards and Venetians was no calamity. Or if calamity it was, it has been recouped by the addition of the equally rebellious Slavs of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
In political freedom the Dual Monarchy does not lag far behind Germany, in spite of the wrongs of the Southern Slavs and Romanians and the ragings of the Czechs and the Italian Irredentists. In material progress the country has moved with the rest of the world.
Never was the old ruler more popular with his mixed races than he is now. A natural interest in his length of reign helps him as it helped Victoria of England. But most of all he draws respect and liking from the unpopularity of his successor, except with a small military clique. When the people wish him long life and health they mean just what the say.
