1905. 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
9oi 
EVENTS OF THE WEEK. 
DOMESTIC.—In one of the most terrific gales in the his¬ 
tory of the great lakes, even surpassing in fury the terrific 
Storm of last September, in which so many men lost their 
lives, three big lake steamers were driven ashore November 
28 within sight of the lighthouse at Duluth. Minn. Lake 
Superior from Duluth to the Soo, the upper peninsula of 
Michigan, the upper ends of Lakes Huron and Michigan 
and the northern counties of lower Michigan was swept by 
i terrific wind and snowstorm. The blizzard raged with 
a velocity of from 40 to 00 miles an hour, and all the 
harbors from I’ort Huron north on I^ake Huron aud from 
Sault Ste. Marie north on Lake Superior were filled with 
vessels which had run in for shelter. Marquette reported 
an unusually heavy snowfall for this time of year, with 
Irifts so high that train and traction service was impeded 
ind greatly delayed. The total property loss of the storm 
is put. at .$2,710,500; ,‘16 ships were wrecked and 17 lives 
lost. One hundred aud forty-nine lives have been sacrificed, 
more than seventy ships wrecked and a loss of nearly 
$7,000,000 has been sustained in the three big storms on 
the (ireat Lakes this season. That this is the most dis¬ 
astrous season in the history of shipping on the lakes is 
(teyond question. Shipping and dock property at Wauke¬ 
gan. Ill., forty miles north of Chicago, was seriously dam- 
agd December 1 by a tidal wave seven feet in height, which 
5wept in from I-ake Michigan. The steamship Tioga was 
driven against the pier and a small hole knocked in its 
side, and two tugs in the harbor were also slightly damaged. 
. . . . It was discovered at Philadelphia. Pa.. Novem¬ 
ber 28. that upward of five hundred immigrants within the 
last four years have been kidnapped and sent to torture 
on the oyster boats in the Chesapeake Bay, and many of 
them are believed to have met their death on these boats. 
Plie full report of this discovery will unearth a tale of 
frlme that has no equal in the history of shanghaing. 
Certain policemen are believed to be party to these crimes, 
and evidence, expected within a week, will show, it is 
said, that they winked al, connived and shared in the graft. 
There is little doubt now that the bodies found in the 
Delaware from time to time, and designated by coroners’ 
juries as “found drowned,” were those of men actually 
murdered on oyster boats. . . . Charles F. Douglass, a 
farmer, his wife and two children were instantly killed 
December 1 by an explosion near Weston, W. Va. Their 
borne was wrecked and later caught fire, almost consuming 
the bodies. The explosion was felt for a distance of five 
miles and caused much excitement. It is supposed the 
pain sprung a leak and the gas was in some way Ignited. 
. . . . Nine men were burned to death in a fire which 
lestroyed a pullboat on which thev slept on Middle River, 
Mabama, December 1. . . . Gov. Chamberlain and State 
Land Agent Oswald West have closed the last link in a 
.T.ain of evidence that discloses the most astounding land 
fraud transactions yet brought to light in Oregon. The 
operators have forged the signature of the clerk of the 
Land Board and the seal of the State and have sold or 
hypothecated the spurious certificates among bankers and 
capitalists all over the United States. The certificates are 
So cleverly done that they can hardly be distinguished from 
the genuine. Even State Land Office clerks have been de¬ 
ceived and have issued deeds upon false certificates. Forged 
Certificates are held in Minneapolis and other Minnesota 
cities. In Wisconsin, in Chicago, New York. New Jersey 
and even as far south as Florida. The holders must lose 
their money unless they recover from their assignors. . . 
. . The warehouse of the Standard Oil Company at 
Armourdale, Kan., was burned November 30, causing a 
loss of ,$175,000. The property was not insured. . . . 
The five-story building of the Graff Stove and Range Com¬ 
pany in Pittsburg, I’a., was destroyed by fire November 30, 
Ihe loss being about .$150,000. Adjoining buildings were 
Slightly damaged. . . . The steamship Lunenburg, from 
Pictou. N. S., to the Magdalens, struck Amherst Island, on 
the Nova Scotia coast, December 4, in a blinding snow¬ 
storm; 11 lives lost. 
CONGRESS.—The Fifty-ninth Congress convened Decem¬ 
ber 4. President Roosevelt's annual message is a document 
of tremendous length, discussing exhaustively the subjects 
which he has especially at heart, and, also covering the 
whole field of the public interests of the country. He re¬ 
asserts the right of the Federal Government to supervise 
the corporations engaged in interstate commerce, and pre¬ 
sents the question of railway rate regulation as the prime 
matter for Congress to deal with. He advocates the giving 
of power to some administrative body created by Congress 
(such as the present or a reorganized Interstate Commerce 
Commission), to supervise railway rates, and, in cases where 
they are unjust or unreasonable, to prescribe maximum 
reasonable rates. Rebates in every form must be stopped, 
and private car companies and industrial roads must also 
come under supervision. It is also suggested that there 
should be a system of examination of railway accounts like 
that now conducted In the case of the national banks. The 
exposures of the life insurance investigation call forth the 
President’s strong condemnation of the lark of a sense of 
ordinary business honesty, in the officials of the companies, 
and lead him to renew his recommendation that Congress 
consider whether the business of insurance should not he 
brought under the oversight of the Bureau of Corporations, 
or otherwise made subject to Federal control. Other topics 
discussed are the naturalization laws; breaches of trust in 
the public service; public land law reforms; the merchant 
marine ; immigration restriction, including a plea for greater 
liberality towards the Chinese; needs of the Indians; legis¬ 
lation for the Philippines and other island possessions; and 
Statehood, the President favoring two States of the four 
'Territories desiring admission. 
THE CATTLE TICK WAR. 
The Southern States Association of Commissioners of Agri¬ 
culture held Its seventh annual meeting in Richmond, Va., 
November 22-24, and had a most successful aud entertaining 
meeting. While tobacco, fruits, dairying, cotton and the 
boll-weevil each had its share of the programme immigration 
led in Interest, with the cattle tick a close second, the latter 
being considered a matter for immediate solution, and of 
great practical value, in connection with the improvement 
of farming methods by diversification of crops in the South, 
especially as supplementary to the raising of the peculiarly 
southern crops. Inasmuch as the other topics considered 
were more or less local in their application, and the “cattle 
tick” question does have more or less bearing upon the entire 
cattle industry of States contiguous to and even remote from 
the cotton-growing States, and since Congress will be asked 
to appropriate considerable sums in ensuing years for the 
eradication of this pest, it may he of some interest to enter 
into a fuller discussion of the matter. 
Rather unexpectedly to all who have not been conversant 
with the subject, the Cotton boll-weevil has been the chief 
exciting cause leading to a desire for improvement in cul¬ 
tural methods, and for the production of more cattle to 
consume the products of rotation crops throughout Texas and 
Louisiana. While the Experiment Station of Louisiana has 
demonstrated that cattle which “top” the market may be 
raised in, that State, it has also experienced the relentless 
fact that the cattle tick handicaps all the efforts of the 
planter in that direction, and that the ticks must be exter¬ 
minated by concerted State and Federal action before any 
marked and permanent improvement can be made. That 
such tick eradication is entirely feasible over large areas 
and ultimately in all of the South has been amply demon¬ 
strated by North Carolina, where Veterinarian Tait Butler, 
acting under the Commissioners of Agriculture, has elimi¬ 
nated the tick from the pastures and cattle of 12 counties, 
and is continuing the work in other counties, any of which 
equal the areas of small States. The meeting of the Com¬ 
missioners of Agriculture of 11 States to discuss and finally 
to ask for an appropriation for the eradication of cattle tiiks 
was the culmination of a long series of events, rendered 
possible since early in the nineties, when the U. S. Depart¬ 
ment of Agriculture worked out the facts concerning the 
cattle tick and the disease it carries to northern or non- 
Immune cattle. A few years prior to that time, the Depart- 
men had established a more or less effective quarantine upon 
the movements of all southern cattle in Summer, but it was 
not until the facts had been worked out that the quarantine 
was made more rigorous, and greater protection for north¬ 
ern tick-free territories secured. Until the last year, how¬ 
ever, the Department seems to have been quite satisfied 
with the quarantine and its enforcement, and has left for 
individuals and States through their commissioners of agri¬ 
culture and experiment stations to demonstrate the feasi¬ 
bility of the radical plan of entire eradication of ticks over 
large areas. Within a year the United States Department 
has undertaken to enlarge upon the work already done on 
the life history of the cattle tick, and is now. through its 
Entomological Bureau, and in co-operation with southern 
experiment stations, gathering data for a very comprehen¬ 
sive understanding of the tick in preparation for the field 
work to follow. 
The papers presented at the meeting were “Preliminary 
Measures to he Adopted in Dealing with the Extermination 
of the Cattle Tick,” by .1. R. Mohler, Pathologist, Bureau of 
Animal Industry; “Practicability of Exterminating the Cat¬ 
tle Tick in the South," by Tait Butler, State Veterinarian of 
North Carolina: "Methods of Exterminating the Cattle Tick 
Based on Its Life History and Habits," by C. A. Carey, 
State Veterinarian of Alabama, together with a discussion 
by II. A. Morgan, Director of the Tennessee Experiment Sta¬ 
tion, and by Cooper Curtice. Animal Husbandman of the 
Rhode Island Experiment Station. What the movement 
means to the South and to its agriculture cannot be told in 
few words. The cattle ticks have been the chief means of 
reducing or holding back the cattle industry of 14 States 
and Territories to the present conditions therein. August 
Mayer of Shreveport, Louisiana, a cotton grower, who has 
failed in his cattle experiments after spending thousands of 
dollars, has from his study of cattle statistics of the South 
estimated a loss of not less than three hundred millions of 
dollars annually. W. R. Dodson, Director of the Louisiana 
Experiment Station, Tait Butler, and others believe that the 
southern cattle industry cannot thrive in face of the losses. 
All southern agriculturists are advising diversified crops and 
more cattle. If a northern man would appreciate the condi¬ 
tions, he must study them in the South close at hand. The 
writer has long known of this handicap upon the southern 
cattle industry, and believes that the conditions are not 
over-estimated. 
The interests of the North in the situation are more than 
would at first appear. For the United States Government 
to maintain a perpetual cattle quarantine on a portion of it? 
cattle, when the reasons for the quarantine may be econ¬ 
omically removed, does not seem just or reasonable; the 
more especially when in the past it has exterminated “foot- 
and-mouth” disease, and contagious pleuro-pneumonia. and ts 
now stamping out sheep and cattle scab. Texas fever, the 
name by which the northern cattle trade knows the trouble, 
is a constant menace to the northern markets. It costs 
heavily to maintain quarantine against it. and constant 
guard to prevent its spreading from the special pens set 
aside for quarantine cattle. In spite of all precautions north¬ 
ern cattle are at times infected to the ruin of their owners. 
The South is otherwise well adapted to the raising of cat¬ 
tle, and a recognition of this has led to the former importa¬ 
tion of a host of northern purebreds, which have usually suc¬ 
cumbed to the lick before the first season is over. The erad¬ 
ication of the tick means a home market for northern breed¬ 
ers. Even now the recently disinfected areas are stocking up 
with a better grade of cattle than ever before possible. The 
movement means much also to northern and western home- 
seekers. It makes it possible for farmers seeking a milder 
climate, like that of the Piedmont region of the South, to 
take with them their cattle and farm as they have been ac¬ 
customed to do in the North, and so suffer no loss through 
the disease or the disadvantages of quarantine. The South 
has asked the Federal Government to extend a helping 
hand, and the North should urge upon its representatives in 
Congress that aid should be extended as a matter of self- 
preservation, prudential economy and justice. The recent 
convention of the Commissioners of Agriculture of the Cot¬ 
ton States was an epoch-making one for the cattle industry 
of the country, and its effects will be far reaching. War 
was declared against the cattle tick, and eradication was 
shown to be easy, practiciible, and profitable. c. c. 
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