xxiv 



DIARY OF EVENTS 1912 



Men. 10-29 



10. Yuan Shih-kai takes the oath of office as President of 

 the Chinese Republic. Suzanne Bernard, French aeronaut, 

 killed at Etampes. 



11. Miners' Federation of Great Britain agree to meet 

 the coal-owners and to discuss the coal strike with the 

 Prime Minister, provided the minimum wage principle is 

 not discussed. Westphalian and French miners strike in 

 sympathy with English miners. Submarine "A" raised 

 and taken to Portsmouth. Spanish Ministers of Finance, 

 Public Works, Public Instruction and Marine resign. 

 "Crown of India," masque by Sir E. Elgar, produced at 

 the Coliseum Theatre, London. U. S. Supreme Court 

 permits holder of a patent to sell patented article with 

 restrictive licence requiring use therewith of certain un- 

 pa tented articles. Suit against "Sugar Trust" begun by 

 U. S. Govt. at New York (see March 31). England beats 

 Wales in Association football at Wrexham by 2 goals to o. 



12. Joint conference of coal-owners and miners begins 

 in London. Report of Vivisection Commission published 

 in London. 20,000 given to endow a Balfour Chair of 

 Genetics at Cambridge University. Explosion of dynamite 

 at Bombay. Attorney-General Wickersham files brief in 

 U. S. Supreme Court to dissolve merger of Union Pacific 

 and Southern Pacific R.R. systems (see Dec. 2). Of the 

 labour union officials at Indianapolis, Ind., indicted (Feb. 

 14) for dynamite conspiracy 46 plead "not guilty" (see 

 Oct. i). 



13. Royal Commission appointed in England to enquire 

 into the methods of appointment and promotion in the 

 Civil Service. Lieut. Seville, French airman, killed at 

 Pau. The Italians attack Turco-Arabs near Bengazi, 

 Tripoli, and inflict heavy losses. American anthracite 

 operators, in conference at New York, refuse miners' 

 demands. 



14. Unsuccessful attempt on the life of the King of 

 Italy by an anarchist, Alba. Frederick Henry Seddon 

 found guilty of murder at the Old Bailey; his wife acquitted. 

 Banquet in honour of the new Chinese Republic given in 

 Paris. Pres. Taft forbids shipment of arms from U. S. 

 into Mexico, acting under special authority from Congress. 

 Lawrence, Mass., strikers in 6 mills return to woi'k (see 

 January 11). 



15. Joint Conference of British coal-owners and miners 

 breaks up without agreement. Sir J. Thomson given the 

 Order of Merit. Oklahoma decides to support Mr. Roose- 

 velt as Republican candidate for the Presidency. Protest 

 from the "four-nations" banks (Great Britain, France, 

 Germany and U. S.) against a loan to China by an Anglo- 

 Belgian syndicate as an infringement of their agreement 

 with the Chinese Govt. New star in Gemini first observed 

 at Greenwich. Mona, opera by Prof. H. W. Parker, first 

 performed at the Opera House, New York. Dr. Harvey 

 W. Wiley (b. 1844), chief of Bureau of Chemistry of United 

 States Dept. of Agriculture, resigns his position. By a 

 vote of 198 to 103, the U. S. House of Representatives 

 passes bill placing sugar on free list. 



16. P. & O. liner Oceana" sunk after a collision with 

 the German barque "Pisagua" off Beachy Head; fourteen 

 lives lost by the swamping of a boat. Resignation of the 

 German Finance Minister, Herr Wermuth. U. S. battle- 

 ship "Maine," after being raised from Havana harbour, 

 towed out to sea and sunk. Lord Kitchener inaugurates 

 new drainage works at Ibshaw in Egypt. Scotland beats 

 England in Rugby football at Inverleith by 8 points to 3. 

 Scotland beats Ireland in Association football at Belfast 

 by 4 goals to i. England beats Holland in Association 

 football at Hull by 4 goals to o. 



18. Strike of London taxi-cabs for one day; settled on 

 the ipth. Mr. Winston Churchill introduces the Navy 

 Estimates in the British House of Commons. Rutherford 

 & Son, a play by Miss K. G. Sowerby, produced at the 

 Little Theatre, London. Coal rises 45. a ton in London. 

 Mahlon Pitney takes oath as an Associate Justice of U. S. 

 Supreme Court, his nomination (Feb. 19) having been 

 confirmed by Senate (March 13). General wage increases 

 made in cotton mills oi Maine. Massachusetts and Rhode 

 Island. A locomotive boiler explosion in the yards of the 

 Southern Pacific R.R. at San Antonio, Texas, kills 25 strike- 

 breakers and injures 1 many more. 



io. Mr. Asquith introduces Minimum Wage Bill hi the 

 British House! of Commons to settle the coal strike. Mr. 

 Tom Mann, syndicalist leader, arrested on a charge of 

 inciting soldiers to mutiny. Asunci6n, Paraguay, besieged 

 by revolutionaries. In U. S. House of Representatives 

 Excise Tax bill passed, by 252 (including 80 Republicans) 

 to 40, taxing net income from business sources i per cent 

 and designed to restore loss of revenue from abolition of 

 sugar duties (March 15); River and Harbour appropriation 

 bill also ($26,000,000) passed. Delaware, Lackawanna 



and Western R.R., U.S.A., fined $2,000 for violation of 

 Hepburn law. 



20. Mr. Roosevelt defeated by Mr. La Follette in the 

 Presidential primaries of North Dakota. Conference at 

 Cleveland, Ohio, between American bituminous coal- 

 miners and coal-owners. By a coal-mine explosion at 

 McCurtain, Okla., 52 men were killed. 



21. Mr. Balfour moves the rejection of the Minimum 

 Wage Bill in the British House of Commons; second reading 

 passes by 348 to 225. Asuncion, Paraguay, taken by 

 revolutionaries; Provisional government established under 

 Navero, with Gondra as Minister of War and Marine. 

 American bituminous coal operators at Cleveland (Ohio) 

 refuse miners' demands. 



22. Guy Bowman, journalist, and B. E. & C. E. Buck, 

 printers, sentenced in London to 9 and 6 months' hard 

 labour respectively for publishing and printing an article 

 in the Syndicalist tending to incite soldiers to mutiny. 

 German Armaments Bill provides for increased expenditure 

 on the Army and Navy up to 1916. French Chamber 

 passes a Vote of Confidence in the Government's Morocco 

 policy. Chinese National Assembly at Nanking raided by 

 women. Mr. Thomas McKenzie elected leader of the 

 Liberal-Labour Party, in office in New Zealand. Fighting 

 between Spaniards and Moors in the Riff, County Morocco. 

 American bituminous coal-miners refuse to work under 

 existing scale. 



23. British coal-owners and miners confer separately 

 at the Foreign Office on the minimum wage figures. 

 German and Austrian Emperors meet at Schonbrunn. 

 Oxford and Cambridge Athletic Sports end in a tie. Sale 

 of Sir W. Farrer's collection of pictures at Christie's, Lon- 

 don. Pres. Taft signs an Act passed by the U. S. Senate, 

 March 16, giving local citizenship to all residents of the 

 Philippines who were Spanish subjects in 1890 and to their 

 children. Four railway companies and four ore-dock 

 companies fined by Federal U. S. Court in Cleveland, Ohio, 

 $123,000 for rebating. Association football match be- 

 tween Scotland and England at Glasgow results in draw. 



24. U. S. Interstate Commerce commission rules that 

 there must be no difference between interstate and intra- 

 state rates for traffic moving under the same conditions. 



25. Motor-car robbery and murder near Paris by high- 

 waymen, who escape. Greek elections result in majority 

 for M. Venezelos. Price of coal advanced in London by 

 55. to 455. a ton. British, French, German and American 

 Ministers hand Yuan Shih-kai a protest against the 

 Anglo-Belgian loan to China. Martial law proclaimed at 

 Meshed by the Russian consul-general. Sale of Roussel 

 art collection begins in Paris. U. S. battleship "Florida" 

 attains a speed of 22.54 knots, best speed so far attained 

 at any trial in U. S. Navy. Mississippi river overflows 

 levees at Cairo, 111. Wales beats France in Rugby football 

 at Newport by 14 points to 8. 



26. Minimum Wage Bill passes the British House of 

 Commons by 213 to 48. Coal-owners and miners' joint 

 conference fails to agree; negotiations broken off. The 

 mill-owners of Lowell, Mass., declare a general lock-out on 

 account of labour trouble in the state. Pres. Taft in 

 message to U. S. Congress sends Tariff Board's cotton 

 schedule, recommending reduction of duties. Officers of 

 " Beef Trust" (U.S.A.) are acquitted in a case under penal 

 provision of Sherman Law. 



27. National Congress of Miners' Federation of Great 

 Britain decides to take a ballot on the question of resump- 

 tion of work. Natural history collection of Canon Norman 

 presented to the Natural History Museum, London. 

 Chou Tzu-chi made Governor of Shantung. Fighting in 

 the Sudan between British Camel Corps and followers of a 

 Moslem fanatic, who is killed with 11 of his followers. 



28. Women's Enfranchisement (Conciliation) Bill re- 

 jected in British House of Commons by 222 to 208. Mr. 

 and Mrs. Pethick Lawrence and Mrs. Pankhurst (suffra- 

 gists) committed for trial on charge of conspiracy. 

 Minimum Wage Bill passes House of Lords.' In Kings 

 Bench, London, in case of R. versus Walker, it was decided 

 that the custody of a child might be given to foster-parents 

 as against natural parents if this were most to the interest 

 of the child in the >udgment of the Court. Italians issue a 

 proclamation to the Arabs of Tripoli. Democratic party 

 in the U. S. House of Representatives re-affirm their de- 

 cision not to authorize construction of Dreadnoughts. 



39. Chinese Ministry formed, with Tang Shao-yi as 

 Premier. German Govt. defeated in Reichstag on Post 

 Office Estimates by combination of Centre Party, Poles and 

 Socialists. P. & O. liner "Syria" collides with French 

 steamship "Circle" off Algiers. 1,000 rifles and _i ,000,000 

 rounds of ammunition sent to American residents in Mexico 

 City with consent of Mexican Govt. U. S. Senate passes 



