THE 
National Capital 
Events of Interest from the Seat of 
Government 
By J. E. Jones 
The Breeze Bureau 
Washington, Feb. 19, 1914 
PaNnaMA CANAL TOLLS. 
Congressman Adamson of Georgia 
attempted to find a back stairway of 
retreat, by declaring that the plank in 
the Baltimore platform in favor of 
discriminating in favor of American 
ships was “‘slipped over” on the plat- 
form committee. This old-fashioned 
political subterfuge was immediately 
strangled by Senator Walsh of Mon- 
tana, who pointed out that he and 
Secretary Bryan and Senator O’Gor- 
man, as well as other party leaders, 
knew just what they were doing 
when this plank was put into the 
platform. The President maintains 
that our policy discriminating against 
foreign ships cannot be carried out 
with honor in view of our treaty ar- 
rangements with Great Britain. The 
issue appears likely to be squarely 
met, and it is a sure indication of im- 
proved conditions since Democratic 
leaders refuse to hide behind the 
bushes, but declare the question wil 
be settled in the open arena of debate 
in the Senate. 
OPEN SEASON FOR WAR SCARES. 
In many of the states there is an 
open season for hunting and fishing, 
and each year the sportsman anxious- 
ly count the coming of the happy 
days, Likewise there is an open sea- 
son for war scares in the United 
States; and now we are being told of 
the dangers that surround us because 
of the fact that our navy is only sur- 
passed by that of Great Britain—and 
possibly Germany, which country we 
have “tied” if not passed. Washing- 
ton has its thumb on the date of this 
open season, and the rest of the coun- 
try should mark it up on the calendar, 
as it can always be counted as an an- 
nual visitor when the naval appropri- 
ation bill appears in Congress, Keep 
cool, children—Japan, Germany, 
Great Britain, Mexico, nor any of 
the rest of the nations of the world 
are planning trouble with the United 
States. 
THE BEGINNING AND THE END. 
On the outer wall of the United 
States general land office in Wash- 
ington there appears the following 
bronze tablet: 
“Samuel F. B. Morse, Artist and 
Inventor, opened and operated on this 
NORTH SHORE BREEZE 
site under the direction of the Post- 
office Department, the first public 
telegraph office in the United States; 
April 1, 1845, “What God Hath 
Wrought.” 
In view of the present day agita- 
tion of government ownership of the 
telegraph and telephone, who will 
dare to say that this is not the Alpha 
and Omega? 
Tue Lincotn MeMorIAL,. 
The clouds that have surrounded 
the formulative processes of the Lin- 
coln monument have cleared away. 
The contract made by the commis- 
sion, of which ex-President Taft is 
the head, has been approved by the 
Secretary of War, and whatever fric- 
tion might arise over the dispute of 
authority between the Commission 
and the Secretary’s office has been 
discounted in advance by the appoint- 
ment of a joint representative of both 
bodies, As a result, the ground will 
be broken in Washington on Lin- 
coln’s birthday for the greatest of all 
our national memorials—for a build- 
ing which will in fact be a greater tri- 
bute than even that of the Washing- 
ton monument. In short the Lincoln 
memorial will be the greatest struc- 
ture ever contemplated by the Ameri- 
can people, in honor of its most il- 
lustrious martyr. 
In trying to find uses for blight- 
killed chestnut it has been found that 
it cannot be utilized for crating stone; 
quarry owners say that chestnut 
wood leaves an indelible stain on the 
marble or granite. 
REINDEER THAT SANTA CLAus MapE 
FAMOUS. 
There is an explanation of the 
growth of conviction in the Santa 
Claus story found in the fact that 
30,000 domestic reindeer remain in 
Alaska. The United States govern- 
ment, which has finally discovered 
this country upon its map, has turned 
attention to the reindeer as an agri- 
cultural proposition, and is advocat- 
ing stringent methods of preventing 
the destruction of these animals. 
There have been instances of cross- 
breeding the domestic reindeer and 
the native wild caribou. It is found 
that the blood of the latter can be 
used to good advantage in building up 
the reindeer herds, The domestic deer 
seem to have decreased in size and 
other ways because of the lack of 
careful selection in breeding. The 
caribou are superior in size and are 
not so wid as to make their domes- 
tication impracticable, The people in 
the Agricultural department who 
have determined this are suspected 
Sait yore 
7 
of having based their conclusions 
upon early experiences with the tame 
deer in Missouri and lowa back 
yards. It has been found that the 
meat of the reindeer is of excellent 
quality and, and the skins are of 
great value. We learn that the Euro- 
pean deer is used for dairy and trans- 
portation purposes, yet little attempt 
has so far been made in our coun- 
this line. The: customs 
of different countries are  inter- 
esting, and a case in point was il- 
lustrated in a recent lecture by Ma- 
dame Montford of Palestine, at a 
Masonic gathering in Washington. 
She related how: the shepherds of 
Jerusalem drank the milk of sheep, 
and said that in her girlhood days 
she had been “almost brought up on — 
it.” She declared it to be as nutritious 
and palatable as cows’ milk. Yet in 
the United States no one ever heard 
of drinking sheeps’ milk. And here 
there is no driving of reindeer, except 
when Santa Claus used it in prefer- 
ence to later-day airships, which have 
proven far more feasible than ever 
the fleet-footed reindeer, inasmuch 
as the country now has so large a 
number of chimneys; and these can 
be more easily reached by airships 
than by reindeer that stub their toes 
over housetops and shingles. 
LopcE vERsuS Norris. 
From Senator Lodge of Massachu- 
setts comes the admission that “suf- 
fering and injury” have been done to 
hundreds of innocent people in New. 
England, as the result of the break- 
down of the New York, New Haven 
and Hartford, and the Boston and 
Maine Railroads, and his opinion is 
that the Department of Justice and 
not Congress should be the instrument 
for righting the wrongs of investors 
and stock-holders) The minions of 
justice have been riding exceedingly 
slow, and though the public is assur- 
ed by Mr. Lodge and others that the 
new President of the New Haven 
system, Mr, Elliott, is a man of “high 
character and honest purposes” yet 
but recently these same things were 
said about Mr. Mellen and the finan- 
ciers of the house of Morgan, who 
milked almost dry one of the greatest 
properties in America. Men like Sen- 
ator Norris, who stands for up-to- 
the-minute methods of righting 
wrongs, has declared that a thorough 
sifting of the New Haven affair is 
within the province and rightfully 
rests with Congress. Norris does not 
agree with the “waiting methods” of 
Mr, Lodge, but would “soak it to 
’em.” 
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