Show T N acile S qt n by a lieutenant in the AS 11 united states navi t v sow S ow v aach A ACt RED TAPE LD TAPIS iv as once the means of R tying up official documents now red tape la Is the means of tying up most anything from gumshoes gum shoes to go governments red tape may draw a line against the errors of slipshod workers more often however it fetters efficiency and makes mabes a hang hangman mans a noose for action once in the fleet there was a captain wbk desired an especially convenient form of waste basket ile had it made on requisition by the navy yard unfortunately just as it arrived aboard be he was ordered to another ship in the confusion of departure the waste basket hasket remained behind at the end of the quarter the captains itoman clerk made an invoice as per begs everything checked up 0 X but the basket it was missing and it could not be expended because it was an item of some value and rather new A letter of inquiry was sent to the old ship stating the case and requesting that the article be forar forwarded ded after some M ecks eels the letter was returned with several sheets of endorse ments attached it turned out that the navigator had lad taken the basket with him when he went to command a pacific coast cruiser the navigator respectfully stated that his baggage had bad gone adrift the basket with it Av hereupon a survey survey or investigation was ordered by the original owner the yeoman prepared all till papers in due form explaining the loss of the article and fora forn added them to washington these papers including six endorsements of explanation were sent out to the navigator he smeared on a few more and mailed the packet back to basold his holdship ship on arrival tal the batch was nas not fully understood it was endorsed a few times more and find boosted on to headquarters who shot it back to the captain briefly that packer ninde the circuit four and a half times I 1 ach time it connected a few dozen more end endorsements arse remarks comments inquiries and respectful statements finally the captain billed in his yeoman jones he said it if I 1 find that blanket blank waste naste basket batch of rot on my desk again I 1 ra going to dis rate you to coal passer if I 1 dont find it rate you up to chief jones aye aye sired and beat it lie ire looked up the monthly difference in pay between ins his rate and that of chief it was mas something like ten dollars ile went ashore find spent ten beans next icet day the captain found under his design desla fine new waste basket it was vas just like the one hed lost in the bottom of it was a pile of paper torn to bits red tape had been snipped into a million pieces but suppose everybody started snip ping SLOP CHEST battleships before long A few years hence the last remnant of line spars will be uprooted and laid in the navy yards to rot rigging ang has already gone are going elimination of the useless Is the cry there Is also metamorphosis no that a not a kind of bug Meta sis Is change such as dough to flap jacks not to tx dimes mud to bricks apes to men though the samples will not bear too keen philosophical scrutiny they ser serve sere e to illustrate the way old naval customs have become so rooted in the service that they do not disappear even after centuries and ft hen the old roman catapult has given way ay to hundred ton breech load ere ers they merely change on a long cruise the sal lorman runs shy of clothing ills work suffers in proportion to his ills III clad condition skippers have recognized this maritime maxim by keeping a slop chest aboard a tidy manof man of war any mess Is known as slops slop stop chests hold a miscellaneous supply of seamans clothing hence the name an ali account of the first slop chest ft chronicled in B C it con tattled 1000 garments assorted in three sizes the garments were nere exactly alike and cut to fit the stern sheets of galley slaves ethnologists sometimes refer to them the gir ments as breech clouts clonts the largest was a nautical cubit in circumference 0 01 nearly a life size fathom columbus gave us the next authentic account of slop chests in 1492 1402 he ile in eluded leather boots woven shirts irks dirks breeches sea bonnets and neck he ile makes no mention of wrist watches elies john paul jones turned the slop job over to hia his supercargo or purser ilo however ever he lie got ills little rake off at fit tho end of the cruise for it must be understood that 2 2000 miles and a vl month out fixes a pretty good price on necessary apparel gum cum boots were the greatest step utter after the civil war far old sea dogs put them down as a sign that the navy was going to b ha I 1 I 1 the idea of a tar minding ing wet net fertil feet let they dally daily turned to the chest for sewing gear needles and thimbles and the like then the Tent twentieth leth century broke like a typhoon over our world A caust of progress swept away the relics of 0 man mans 3 past mechanical genius was nas supreme only the charred stubble of original ideas remained the slop chest n was as one isow now e have the I 1 clothing and small stores room boom 11 in it our leal ical jack jach may procure silk necker chiefs sheffield steel knives and hand sewn senn shoes not boots but gloves for ills feet the captain makes no ra rake ke off and the purchase record Is in quadruplicate ru it s still the slop chest however only different that Is 1 metamorphosis which Is sometimes better than liver pills tor for cleansing ft life AIR CREDIT THE HE world has conceded the genius of wright and curtiss but only as individuals in reality our national aeronautic prowess runs back sixty years year and more NN when lien u we e contemplate the which has been suggested for the next aviation budget and the plan of building 50 machines in one year it Is a little difficult to understand the governments former attitude the balloon idea was uns brought to AN washington ashington in 1861 by professor L ae lie ile was a young inventor who nho started us making artificial ice lie ile died only four years ago after a long life which was calculated to spite his enemies in the capitol they had called him hin a lunatic when he proposed to fly over the confederate lines and bring back information was mas a rumor that the hostile army was about to attack young lou lowes e a balloon was used as a last resort resart he ile ascended about feet drifted over the enemy batteries and find returned with what nhat proved to be that johnny red had no Intent intention loil of starting anything this exploit was such a feather in Ln ands ds bonnet that his pay was in creased to 10 a day N aich ruined him though he made subsequent nights flights or drifts the gross indecency of paving a common prof such a sum when nhen men were dying for less created a near riot As a compromise it was nas reduced to 6 but his retirement soon followed sic semper the cit ell the union army then made its own aerostats aero stats as ns they were called be reg ular reconnaissance work was nas carried out but as the balloon was always captive the zone of inquiry was very narrow foreigners came over oner to in esti gate the wild rumors which had become rife in europe the technique of this early aviation corps was nag very crude their gas bags were of rough cotton goods oiled and doubled spilled at the seams inflation was U as achieved by means of hot air fro n a pinek pine k knot not fire A heavy rope anchor anch or cd ed the tile balloon several times this got foul of the operators on the ground and had to be cut the observer land ed when hen and where he could usually he drowned or else ato ate his ills supper in a confederate prison camp STREAMS ili bradge Is shrouded in im THE penetrable gloom bo Is the officer of the deck inky black Is the splotch of a battleship ahead ti two 0 shades blacker Is the blotch of another in swift pursuit astern the fleet la Is steaming darkened in column A bell rings the 0 0 D never takes ills tense eyes from the rail 6 hello 11 shouts a quartermaster down the engine room voice tube I 1 condenser temperatures show weve run out of the stream comes the muffled report U in in grunts the 0 0 D as its though bored but he isn an t lie ile knows the gulf stream has been left behind the knowledge Is as definite nIte as a times square I 1 shouted by a subway guard streams sti earns of ocean currents are the great rivers of the sea movement of lie file water Is caused mostly by winds prevailing alling in one direction for long periods of time the gulf stream Is 50 to miles 11 in width and flows flos at the ki Ici surely pace rince of 3 to 5 miles an hour it swings upward along the florida coast Is deflected by Ilat teras and shoots a cool coot three thousand miles to iceland and the british isles A southern branch strikes the belly of surope Iu rope as the day bay of biscay Is awkwardly called all these countries it warms arms but the american coast shivers in the tile chill of an arctic current tills frigid stream squirts from tile he mouzli in auth of baffin bailin bay boy and drench eq with its berg cooled spray the rock rocks of labra dor and maine and nd the sellow ellow jersey sands if as has been proposed a mammoth breakwater were built eastward from new Found land shooting the northern current out america would become tropical in climate while our anglish brethren built snow igloos in the tile pacific a japan current and one from bearing behring sea corre correspond spon d to the warm and cold pair in the atlantic the alaskan coast liko like eng land Is warm helow below tile continental tips lips a great stream runs clean around the world in n the tile south atlantic south pacific and indian oceans are huge lazy whirl pools pool miles in diameter caused by 1 contrary currents |