SEVERAL SKIRMISHES, AND LET THE ELECTRIC WIRE ALONE

 

Maj. Gen. Arthur MacArthur.

Cortland Evening Standard, Monday, November 27, 1899.

SEVERAL SKIRMISHES.

Scattered Filipino Army is Pursuing Guerilla Methods.

   MANILA, Nov. 27.—The last Filipino council of war was held by the retreating leaders at Bayombong on Nov. 13 in the house now occupied by General MacArthur. It was attended by Aguinaldo, Pio del Pilar, Garcia, Alejandrino and some members of the so-called cabinet. Information has reached General MacArthur from several sources to the effect that the council recognized the futility of attempting further resistance to the Americans with united forces and agreed that the Filipino troops should scatter and should hereafter follow guerrilla methods.

   Reports of ambuscades and skirmishes come from every section of the country along the railroads. Those districts seem to be filled with small bands. Saturday four men of Company D, Ninth infantry, were foraging beyond Bamban when 20 Filipinos took them in ambush, killing one and capturing the other three. The Americans resisted for half an hour. The firing being heard at Bamban, Lieutenant Frazer, with a squad, followed the retreating Filipinos several miles. The Americans found the body of the soldier boloed [cut with a bolo]. They burned the hamlet where the fight took place.

   Between Bamban and Angeles a mule train was fired upon by the insurgents and a Spaniard, a former prisoner of the Filipinos who was with the train, was shot. At Malasiqui the officials who welcomed the Americans were murdered. This was the only railroad town which the Americans did not garrison and, on the night the troops withdrew, a band of insurgents entered, dragged Antonio Meji, president of the town, into the street and cut his throat. The murderers then assassinated the vice president and five members of the town council in the same manner and told the frightened natives who witnessed the slaughter to spread the news that a similar fate awaited all friends of the Americans.

   Military activity continues in every section. Colonel Bell's regiment has advanced from Bayombong upon Mangatarem, where it is supposed there is a large insurgent force. Two battalions of the newly arrived Twenty-eighth infantry have been sent by cascoes to Bacoor, to reinforce the south line.

   Major Spence with 50 men of the Thirty-second regiment surrounded a village near Bautiston during the night and attacked a place at daybreak, capturing a Filipino captain and 15 men with seven rifles.

   The latest news from General Young is that there are 10 cavalrymen and 200 Macabebees with him, most of the horsemen who started having been compelled to drop out because their horses failed them.

   The Filipinos took the American prisoners from Victoria to San Carlos. On the walls of the Victoria prison and of the San Carlos convent are the following names: Civilians, George Langford, Thomas Hayes; Soldiers, Harry Winfield, Phil Betterton, J. L. Salisbury, A. N. Gordon, E. N. Nugent, Frank Stone, John Desmond, George Sackem, David Scott, Martin Brennan, Tom Edwards, B. P. Curran. John Cronin, Charles Baker, C. L. Davis, Leland Smith.

   On the walls of the San Carlos convent were also found the following names: Civilians, Charles Bird, W. J. Sheehy, F. E. Huber; Sailors, Edward Burke, battleship Oregon; C. D. Powers, gunboat Urdaneta; John J. Farley, B. J. Greene, Tilden Herbert.

 

PAGE TWO—EDITORIALS.

   The annual report of the federal commissioner of education for the past fiscal year furnishes some timely and useful suggestions especially applicable to our new dependencies,. "It is all important," the report says, "that in the reorganization of the schools in Spanish countries we do not attempt too much in the way of introducing the English language. All the daily lessons should be given in Spanish, save in the reading of elementary English. If the other lessons be taught in English, it will be just ground for suspicion that the United States purposes to enforce the use of the English language in these territories. The old schools must be revived, and those who have been employed in them must be invited to take up their work again. Spanish teachers may be assisted by superintendents thoroughly acquainted with United States methods." The commissioner heartily commends the educational system now in force in Hawaii. This system is described as remarkable for its completeness, and it is pointed out that with a total population of 100,000 in 1896 the school enrollment was 14,522.

 

Fireman's Hall, Main Street, Cortland, N. Y.

LET THE WIRES ALONE.

May be Dangerous to Life and Destructive to Property.

   Between 8 and 9 o'clock this morning the incandescent lights nearly all over town suddenly went out, and it was a half hour or so before they could be started again.

   It appears that tinners were sent upon the roof of Fireman's hall to make some repairs. On the roof in the usual place in which they are permitted to be were some electric light wires used in the incandescent light service. They wanted them moved and notified the electric light office to that effect. A promise was made to send a lineman to attend to it just as soon as he could be brought to the spot. The tinners went back to the roof and as the lineman did not arrive in a few minutes they disarranged the wires in a way to short circuit them on a lower roof by producing a ground. The [effect] was to extinguish the light and to burn out a fuse at the powerhouse. The tinners then cut a section out of the wire and this they were able to do in safety because by the short circuit the power was off that line.

   Superintendent Pearce went up to the roof as soon as he could after being sent for and intended to fix the wires at once. He was horrified as he reached the spot to see one of the tinners standing on the roof with the two ends of the severed wire in his hands. Up at the power house the operator was trying to get the power back into that wire, and he did it a few minutes later. Had the current been turned on when that man stood holding those two ends of the wire with his feet on a tin roof there would have been need of an undertaker at once, as the power going through that wire is 2,000 volts. Mr. Pearce shouted to him to drop those wires and he did so. Shortly after the current was turned on and as soon as these wires were joined it went through this line. The man on the roof made a perfect completion of the circuit.

   The Electric Light company want to impress it upon all people to let all wires alone. They may be alive. It was due to the short circuit that this wire was not alive at this time. Superintendent Pearce says he always handles these wires with fear and trembling, but at the same time he knows how to do it and has the appliances to do it with. Still even then accidents are liable to happen.

   In the next place disarrangement of wires causes damage to property. Mr. Pearce says the Electric Light company will bring an action for damages against those tinners for damage to their property this morning in burning out the fuse at the powerhouse and in the damage to their service by which 600 lights all over town were shut off for a half hour to the great annoyance of the users. Before the accident 800 lights had been in use at the time. After the circuit was shortened there were only 200 on and the users of the other 600 were deprived of light. The only way to avoid accidents is for inexperienced people to let wholly alone such dangerous affairs as electric light wires.

 

For Conveyance of Church Property.

   Attorney W. D. Tuttle was in Syracuse Saturday and before Justice Hiscock made an application in behalf of the First Baptist church for authority for that church to convey its property at the corner of Tompkins and Duane-sts., the Memorial Baptist church, to the society of the latter church. All the preliminary steps had been taken by the former church, and all that was lacking was authority to give a full and legal title. The court took the papers, and will undoubtedly act favorably on the application.

 

HENS AND PIGS.

Clinton S. Brooks of Taylor Center Extensively in the Business.

   Mr. Clinton S. Brooks of Taylor Center has just completed one of the best and most complete hen houses in the eastern portion of the county. The building is 10 by 40 feet in size. It is ceiled and lined with felt with a concrete floor making it absolutely frost proof. The building is equipped with the latest improved automatic racks for holding the nests and feed troughs, both being conveniently arranged so they can be cleaned and aired each day. One of the apartments is fitted up especially for the incubator which is of 200-egg capacity. Mr. Brooks informed a STANDARD man that he intends to keep between two and three hundred hens of the White Leghorn variety which he considered the very best egg producers. After March 1 next he expects to send the New York market both fresh eggs and tender young broilers.

   Mr. Brooks has also just completed a very convenient pig house 34 by 30 feet in size which is also supplied with automatic feed troughs, breeding pens, etc. Nearly thirty pigs of the Chester White variety are kept at present, and this number will soon be increased to fifty. Mr. H. R. Austain of Taylor did the carpenter work on both buildings.

 

BREVITIES.

   —New display advertisements to-day are—A. S. Burgess, Clothing, page 8; F. D. Smith, Rusty tools, etc., page 4; Jones & Tyler, Turkeys, meats, etc., page 7; Baker & Angell, Dolls slippers, page 4.

  —Frank H. Monroe has made quite an improvement to his White House wagon cafe. A small stove has been encased under the wagon and it serves as a furnace, sending hot air through a register into the wagon.—Oneonta Star. Mr. Monroe was formerly of Cortland.

   —The students of the Cortland Business institute gave a very pleasant and enjoyable social party in the rooms of the institute in the Democrat building on Railroad-st. Friday evening. McDermott's orchestra furnished music for dancing. Cards were in order and refreshments were served.