GREAT INLAND SINK.
FIERCE RAMPAGE OF COLORADO
RIVER DESPOILS THOUSANDS
OF FERTILE ACRES.
Huge Engineering Difficulties Must
be Overcome; or Otherwise Eight
Thousand Families WillBe Render-
ed Homeless and Destitute
C.J. BLANCHARD at Los Angeles,
The great Colorado river of the]
southwest the Nile of America, is on
its bad behavior. Like old travellers
who forsake the beaten highways, the
Colorado, grown tired of its channel,
is seeking a new route. Its desire
for change naturally is the cause of
Gulf and created a huge inland sea
which covered all of what is now
known as Imperial Valley. The shore
line of this great sea can be distinct-
ly traced by the old beaches which
are found there.
Enormous Salt Beds.
Under an almost tropical sun the
sea evaporated, uncovering a great
level plain over large portions of which
was laid a deep deposit of rich river
sediment wanting only irregation te
produce abundant harvests. At the
lowest depression in the valley, where
evaporation has not yet carried off
| all the water, the salts were deposited
| thickly and large works have long
been established there marketing
thousands of tons of this mineral.
For centuries the Colorado has beer
Map showing Imperial Valley Basin.
i threatened to be covered with water
. from overflow of Colorado River,
© rendering homeless 8.000 families.
Ww
CAL EF PO a
much consternation on the part of the
railroad which happens to be located
near by, and of some little disquietude
among several thousand settlers
whose farms are apparently threat-
ened unless the erratic stream can be
induced to return to its old pathway
to the sea. A glance at the map will
make clear the unusual conditions
which at present prevail in the Col-
orada Delta. ‘
Below the town of Yuma, Arizona,
the stream has cut its banks at three
places and passing through old, dry
channels, is now pouring westward
and northward into Salton Sink. Aug-
mented by the volume of this great
stream the Sink has already become
a vast inland sea, spreading out for
60 miles in one direction and 30 miles
in another, and growing daly.
The Giant Force of Nature.
Passengers on the train now ex-
claim with wonder as they look out
upon the broad sea reaching to the
western horizon, where but a short
SIXTY FIVE MILES OF LAKE,
time ago the desert reigned supreme
in its awful desolation.
Glance at the map again and note
the faint line near the international
boundary, and encircling the large
area marked Imperial Valley. All the
land included within this line is below
sea level, the lowest portion situated
in Salton Sink where it is 287 feet be-
low. To those who visit this remark-
able region it is apparant that in anci-
ent geological. fimes the Gulf of Cali-
building up its delta, higher end |
higher until today the bed ot the river |
is above the valley on eitaer side.
Once let it cut its banks and the
stream spreads out all over the coun-
try. About four years ago a large
corportion, imbued with the laudable
purpose of making homes for settlers
in the Salton Desert, completed a big
canal heading in the river below Yu-
ma and almost on the International
boundary. The canal was a large
one, 60 feet on the bottom, and carried
a great amount of water through
Mexico into California on to the area
now called Imperial Valley. The
canal heading, owing to the character
of the banks of the stream, was iuse-
cure. It has always been a source of
trouble and annoyance. The river
resented it as an obstruction in its
course and deposited great loads of
silt in front of it and then proceeded
to cut a channel around it. Dredges
were used constantly to keep the cinal
heading open.
The last great flood in the stream
simply wiped away the head gates
and opened a way for a large part of
the stream to flow into the valley.
Just ‘below this point the stream
spilled over the banks again and fol-
lowing down an old stream channel
it finally began to pour its whole vol-
ume in to Salton Sink. Only the high
banks of the Imperial canal prevented
larger areas of irrigated lands from
being inundated and millions of dol-
lars in crops from being destroyed.
Great difficulties are presented to
the engineers who are trying to imduce
the stream to go back to its old chan-
nel. A new heading is projected.
Thousands of feet of lumber have
been ordered and steamboats are
awaiting its arrival. If these means
prove ineffective there is dahger that
8,000 families now residing in the Im-
perial Valley, may be rendered home-
less. Competent engineers are in-
‘clined to believe that the task is be-
yond the strength of the present com-
pany to perfom and that measures
now being undertaken will not prop-
erly nor permanently safeguard the
property of the people in the valley.
This is a question for the engineers
Steamboat
Crew
reparing fo
, build he
REN
ie
hes
Imperial
fornia extended far northward. The
Colorado River, carrying as it does a
vast load of silt and detritus from a
drainage basin covering 225,000 square
miles, built a bar entirely across the
to settle. Meanwhile, the citizens of
the valley are somewhat philosophi-
cal and are continuing to reap, under
almost tropical skies, the heaviest
crops grown in the world
THE JOY OF AGE.
Misinterpretation of Dr, Osler’s
Statement.
Dr. William Osler, late professor in
John Hopkins University, Baltimore,
met with a great deal of undeserved
notoriety because he was misunder-
stood when he said the creative facully
disappeared usually at the age of forty
years. He did not mean to convey the
impression that man’s usefulness
ceased at that time, but that the imag-
inative faculty was not as active then
as it was in earlier years, when men
are green and raw in judgment and put
forth many things that they wish to
have suppressed later on. His little
jest about chloroforming those who
“lag ‘superfluous on the stage” was
meant to apply only to teachers who
failed to move with the advanced
thought and had a special humorous
reference to himself, but the miscom-
prehension and exaggeration of the
press has magnified his utterance and
given it a sweep he never intended.
Must Seek New Fields.
When the acquisition of knowledge
is used merely as a means through
which to earn bread, that is the end
of a man’s career, whether he be thirty
or forty or a thousand years old. Men
who seek no new fields of exploration
nor carry forward to fulfillment any
work they attemt in early days are
mere drones in the hives of life.
Dr. Osler, who is close to the sixty
year line, has gone to England to take
a professorship of medicine in Oxford
University, which will without doubt
lead to an increase of his professional
fame, which did not come to him until
after he had passed the half century
post in his journey of life. His part-
ing injunction to his medical asso-
ciates in America, at the Washington
meeting in May, was to follew the
Golden Rule in all their actions, and to
cultivate that moderation which is said
to be the golden thread running
through all the virtues. This advice
is not new, hut it cannot be repeated
too often in an age when many men
are striving to shove their neighbors
to the wall in their desire to occupy
the middle of the road themselves.
Man is naturally a selfish animal and
needs to be often reminded that he
must do unto others as he would have
them do unto him, even if he desires
to attain more worldly success. The
man who has no consideration for his
laboring fellows is likely to find no con-
sideration extended to him when the
hour of misfortune comes.
Best Work Late in Life.
Dr. Osler never depreciated age,
knowing that man’s best work is done
after age has mellowed his under-
standing and strengthened his judg-
ment. There are numerous examples
of what virility in age can do all along
the track of history. It was seen in
3enjamin Franklin, William E. Glad-
stone, is seen in Edward Everett Hale,
Lord Kelvin, Charles H. Haswell, en-
gineer and author, still at the age of
97 at his desk in New York, and other
names will occur by scores to general
readers.
It is an inflexible law of nature that
the being who does not progress must
retrograde. There is no place on this
fearful ascent of life where, spiritually
and intellectually, we are not forced
to go forward lest we slip back. But
it is a happy provision in nature that
even in the longest life there is no
arbitrarily fixed point of time where
expansion must cease as if by a fiat,
where there are no more heights be-
fore the soul to climb, no more views
to be obtained, no broadening and ex-
panding of the vision possible. Al-
ways and forever a new bud may be
formed on the topmost bough of the
old tree, even though the trunk be
partly hollow, and the nourishing sap
mount slowly through the bark.
eet.
CHINESE GRAVEYARD CUSTOMS.
Peculiar Custom of Placing Cooked
- Food on the Graves of the
Departed.
Assorted foods, literally by the
wagon load, are annually taken out to
Cypress Hills Chinese Cemetery by
members -of New York's Chinese col-
ony, says the New York Times, and
these offerings, which are to us such
strange evidences of affection and re-
membrance, are placed with piec-
turesque rites, on the graves where the
departed Celestial brothers of the
colonists are awaiting the convenient—
or is it the auspicious?—season for
transshipment to the land which these
most stolid of sentimentalists insist on
believing to be the only one where the
dead ean rest comfortably. These an-
nual illustrations of the fact that the
Chinaman has feelings like the rest of
us, even if he does, choose different
ways of showing them, attracts the
usual amount. of attention, some of it
respectfully curious and some openly
derisive, but neither variety affects the
performance of the ceremonies or
enables us to get a bit nearer the mys-
terious Mongol mind. It is hard to
believe that our far-traveled Chinese
really think that anything is accom-
plished for the dead by putting roast
pig and boiled rice on a grave, and yet
they do it year after year.
' A Bright Retort.
The ancient story of the Chinaman
who, when asked at what hour the
spirits consumed the food thus offered
to them, replied that it was at the same
hour chosen by our dead for smelling
flowers we similarly place, is always
pertinent to discussion of this mystery,
and reflection on the story has the
admirable effect of giving a new
standpoint from which to study the
“outlandish” custom of our useful but
unloved guests. In all these things it
is the thinking so that constitutes
right, propriety and congruity. The
Chinese ceremonies do show affec-
tionate or pious remembrance, and
whether the dead are indifferent or not,
the reflex action on the living is effec-
tively brought to bear.
eet
Black Friday.
“Now, children,” said the Sunday
school teacher, addressing the juvenile
class, “can any of you tell me any-
thing about Good Friday?”
“Yes, ma'am, I can,” replied a boy.
“He was the colored man what done
the housework for Robinson Crusoe.”
sms Bh———icosm—
A Good Buggy For Sale.
Leesville (Mo.) Light: Luke Bel-
mont’s new buggy is for sale. He got
married last week, you know,
TOBACCO FOR THE NAVY.
Government Selects Supply for
Oificers and Men.
The American naval officer and the
Jacky smoke and chew. This is a fact
of which the Government takes official
cognizance and recognizes in a way
that makes such habits inexpensive
incidents to life on board ship. Re-
cently the Navy Department had un-
der consideration the award of a con-
tract for 150,000 pounds of cut plug
tobacco, and in November next bids
will be called for another supply of
like amount. The contract under
which the supply is now being fur-
nished was secured on a basis of a
bid of 40 cents a pound. Twenty-
nine bids are now under consideration,
the prices ranging from 30% cents a
pound to 48 cents. The contract will
not necessarily be let to the lowest
bidder, but to the one supplying at the
lowest price the grade best suited for
the purpose.
Practical Chewing Tests.
Each bidder is required to submit
a sample of the tobacco to be fur-
nished, and these, after the factory la-
bels are removed and secret identifl-
cation marks substituted, are divided
into small lots, part being sent to a
chemist for analysis, and a goodly
supply going to the various navy yards
for distribution among officers and
men for practical test, the opinion of
the officers and ‘jackies” being taken
before the award is made. Final re-
sults are reached by the process of
elimination, until the selection of the
chewers dwindles down to two or
three samples which are bound to be
favorites. These favorites are then
taken up with regard to the chemical
test, and the contract is awarded, so
that perhaps the lowest bidder has no
consideration whatever when the final
result is obtained.
While heretofore the navy supplied
the men with the tobacco (a very in-
ferior article) free of cost, the Gov-
ernment now insists upon the best
grade, which it sells to the sailor at
the contract price, plus a very small
percentage to cover the cost of han-
dling. Only such tobaccos are consid-{
ered which are manufactured from
pure leaf tobacco of the growth of the
current or preceding year in which
the contract is made, and which shall
have undergone a natural sweat.
irii——s
How to Tell Counterfeits.
Any visitor to the Bureau of Engrav-
ing and Printing where Uncle Sam is
printing the much sought-after green-|
backs, comes away impressed with the!
intricacies of the manufacturing of a
paper note. Few, indeed, understand
the rule of four adopted b;- the Govern-
ment as an aid in thwarting the plans
of counterfeiters. Acquaintance with
the rule of four, might help many peo-
ple of the outside world in detecting
counterfeit money. Every note printed
by the Government—national currency
and not bank notes—contains a number
and a letter, no two bills having the
same number. These are printed, as
the visitor can see, in the blocks of
four as they leave the plate printer’s
table. For instance, a number will be
found on a note, 58,383 with the letter
C in the upper left hand and lower
right hand corners; another bill bears
the number 79,988 D ; another 42,566 B.
These numbers and letters have a re-
lation for each other and are easily de-
termined. The last two numbers on
the note determine, when divided by
four, the letter to be found in the two
corners. Should the last two numbers
be divisible by four, with a remainder
of one, the letter appearing should be
A; if two remain, B; if three remain,
C; and if the last two numbers are
exactly divisible by four, with no re-
mainder, the letter appearing should
be D.
eee eet eee
Rest the Bones of Pocahonlas.
The proposition to bring back to the
ancient city of Jamestown the body of
Pocahontas, in connection with the ex-
position at that place, has aroused con-
siderable indignation, both in England
and in America, by people who believe
that such a step is nothing more than
a move intended as a side-show feature
of the exposition. While it is true
there have been instances of a disturb-
ance of a grave made hundreds of years
before, as in the recent case of Ad-
miral John Paul Jones, still the cases
cannot be compared. One is a man who
had much to do with the preservation
of the American nation and navy; the]
other was the central figure in a bit of
fiction surrounding the settlement of |
this country by English settlers. Po-
cahontas, it is true, was a native Amer-
ican, which John Paul Jones was not,
but Pocahontas married an English-
man, lived aud died in England, and
the traditions of her later life were sur-
rounded by all that is English.
The London Standard, in comment-
ing on the movement to bring her body
to America, cites pages from a book by
an American writer tending to show
that the life of Pocahontas was a tra.
dition and poetical version and add-
ing: “If the original myth is really
believed by the people of Jamestown,
we only hope they will do something to
answer the audacious skeptic that has
impugned it.”
Fr —— I —— em ——
Toothache or Appendicitis ?
A movement looking to the better
care of children is spreading. It is
proposed now that the tooth brush
drill be a part of the curriculum of
our schools, and that dentists should
visit regularly the children attending
them. Doctors have spoken very
strongly on the usefulness of taking
tonics and similar medicines in order
to promote better digestion, or to
purify the blood, when a constant
system of poisoning is going on in the
mouth, It is claimed that much poor
blood and weakness in children comes
from dental decay. A noted physician
declares that appendicitis is caused by
bad teeth, Take your choice—either
have your teeth extracted or your ap-
pendix cut out. The doctors get you
either way, going or coming,
eee eee eee,
To Be Reunited.
“Have you seen my poor, dear little
duckling?” asked the distressed but be-
witching young mother duck.
“Ah! madame,” replied the polite but
still hungry fox, “I have iuside infor-
STOP ‘LAND-GRABBING.
THE DUTY OF CONGRESS IS TO
AMEND FAULTY AND ANTI-
QUATED LAND LAWS.
President Hill,of the Great Northern
Railroad, Calls Attention to Enor-
mous Disposals of Government
Land Without Settlement Into
Homes.
From the Philadelphia Bulletin,
There will be people ill-natured
enough to charge that President Hill,
of the Great Northern Railway, did
not come into court with entirely clean
hands in the vigorous denunciation of
the land-grabbers contained in his re-
cent speech before the National Irriga-
tion Congress at Portland. This, how-
ever, does not necessarily detract from
the truth of his charges. Perhaps few
men in the country are better qualified
to speak upon the blighting effects of
the dishonest policy which has appro-
priated millions of acres of valuable
lands, only to exclude from them the
actual settlers who would have devel-
oped them.
President Hill is a railroad manager,
and railroads depend for profit upon a
traflic afforded by a populous and well-
cultivated country. A railroad ¢-tend-
ing through territory without farms or
farmers, towns or industrial communi-
ties must suffer serious disadvantages.
Where great tracts of land are owned
and controlled by mere speculators, de-
velopment is impossible. It is very
likely that President Hill spoke by the
card when he charged that those who
go upon Government land at this time
for the purpose of making homes are
only a handful.
Rapid Disposals of Public Lands.
His figures, showing the rapid in-
crease in area of public lands which
have passed into private ownership |
since 1898, possess a significance that |
is startling. Nearly 90,000,000 acres, a’
total area equal to three times that of
the State of Pennsylvania, have been |
awarded to private owners in the s
years from 1898 to 1903, inclusive, very |
little of which—according to President |
Hill—has become the property of home-
stead seekers. The bulk of it has be-
come the holdings of the lumber kings,
cattle barons, and speculators pure and
simple. It is evident that there are]
more men who deserve the penalties of |
the law which have lately been inflicted
upon Senator Mitchell, of Oregon.
The duty of Congress in this connec-
tion is unmistakable. The laws under
which this vast domain has been se-
cured by private interests with no in-
tention of opening it to development
should be repealed or amended to pre-
vent any further looting of the public
lands.
«mina an——
The Modern Rush.
From the Chicago Times-Herald.
He didn't have time to chew
The food that he had to eat;
But he washed it into his throat
As if time was a thing to beat. ~~
At breakfast and lunch and dinner
Twas a bite and a gulp and go—
Oh, the crowd is so terribly eager,
And a man has to hurry so!
A bite and a gulp and away
To the books and the ticker! A bite
And a drink and a smoke and a seat
At a card table half of the night;
A pressure, a click and a pallor,
A cloth-covered box and a song;
A weary old fellow at forty,
Who is deaf to the noise of the
throng.
Agents Wanted
To Canvass for the
J
United States
Senator Number
NOW PUBLISHED.
The issue contains portraits of the
NINETY MEMBERS
two from each State in the Union, This
collection was made from recent exclusive
sittings for the
BOSTON BUDGET
The Pictures’
12 x 8 inchesi n size
are protected by copyright and can not be
reproduced legally elsewhere. The group
forms the most valuable collection of states-
men ever offered to the American people,
The number will be of unrivalled value to
individuals, schools and libraries,
Price 60 Cents Delivered
For terms and other particulars address
The Budget Company,
220 Washington Street,
Boston, Mass.
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