National.

The report of the board of army engineers appointed to consider, the advisability of the continuance or abandonment of reclamation projects in the semiarid regions of the West has been made public. Aside from its recommendations as to allotments of the loan, the board made several suggestions for the improvement of conditions of construction for the aid of settlers and on other points. The board examined twenty-five projects designed to irrigate three million two hundred thousand acres of arid or semiarid land at a cost of one hundred and forty-five million dollars. The general irrigation fund, the report shows, amounts to sixty-five million seven hundred thousand dollars and the amounts expended to date about sixty million dollars. Accretions to the fund in the next four years, from the sale of public lands and repayments, the board estimates at a total of twenty-eight million dollars. The board recommends that steps be taken as soon as possible to secure an adjudication of water rights where such adjudication has not been made. The water supply in most projects is under state control. The board heard complaints of the size of farm units, which varies in different projects from ten to forty and eighty acres, but suggests that further experience is necessary before a general change is made. It believes that the Government demonstration farms maintained by the reclamation service at the expense of the projects on which they are located, should be left to the department of agriculture.

Preparations to prosecute the electrical trust, which the department of justice characterizes as the "greatest trust in the world," have been completed by Attorney-General Wickersham. The electrical companies will be charged with a conspiracy to restrain trade under cover of the patent law. The department has not decided where the suit will be brought. For a year the Government investigators have been gathering evidence of the alleged manner in which the combination of electrical manufacturing companies operates to maintain extortionate prices on their products. They have reported that the trust is composed mainly of the General Electric and Westinghouse Electric companies, operating in agreement with seventeen associations of smaller manufacturers of almost every article employed in the use of electricity.

At the instance of the Government prosecutors the equity suit against the meat packers indicted with having formed in the National Packing Company a trust in restraint of trade, was dismissed in the United States district court by Judge Kohlsaat at Chicago. The move of the Government's attorneys in having the suit dismissed was not unexpected by those in close touch with the beef trust investigation. When the policy of indicting individuals instead of corporations was laid down by Attorney-General Wickersham and President Taft, it was believed that the civil suit against the National Packing Company would be dismissed if the directors were indicted by the federal grand jury.

The number of postoffices in operation in the United States June 30 was 59,580. The gross revenue of the postal service for the fiscal year amounted to $224,128,657. The deficit is $5,848,566, as compared with $17,441,719 for the preceding year. It is urged that salary increases amounting to seventy-five thousand dollars be provided for supervisory employees; that provision be made for the promotion to higher grades and increased salaries of expert distributors of mail in various offices, and that an appropriation of ten thousand dollars be made to reward postal employees who present to the department patented devices or processes that may prove of value to the service.

Professor Swain is examining the New York, New Haven & Hartford railroad system for the purpose of revaluation for a commission in Massachusetts which will report to the Legislature. The valuation is expected to exceed that made by Mr. Stevens some time ago, as it goes into the investments and holdings of the company in subsidiary properties. The book value of the road, as made up by the company's officers, is something like four hundred and twenty-five million dollars and it is said that the revaluation will place the figures close to six hundred million dollars.

Recent disclosures in the "draw-back" frauds against the Government have put the treasury department in a position practically to dictate the terms of compromise with the sugar refining companies. The American Sugar Refining Company's recent offer of seven hundred thousand dollars may not be accepted, in view of the fact that the Government is said to have evidence to compel the return of not less than one million dollars.

Archie Hoxsey in a Wright biplane broke the world's record for altitude at Los Angeles last week. He soared more than two miles into the sky, his barograph registering 11,474 feet, or almost one thousand feet above the altitude of 10,499 feet recently attained by Legagneux at Pau, France. This feat was accomplished in a forty-mile gale. Later in the week he sustained a fatal fall in his machine.

There is now pending in Congress a bill recommended by the committee on agriculture and forestry, known as the Doliver-Davis bill, the purpose of which is to secure federal aid in industrial and agricultural education. It would call for an annual appropriation of less than the cost of a battleship.

Demands will be made upon Congress, it is said, for an investigation of the wireless telegraph situation throughout the United States. Formal requests will be made for the appointment of a committee in each branch, with authority to summon witnesses and inspect the books of all wireless companies.

Electricity hereafter will be used to do all the cooking for the sailors aboard the new ships of the navy, as thorough tests have shown the superiority of the electric range over the old coal galley, not only in convenience, but in economy as well.

The battleship fleet is now on a cruise in European waters. Upon leaving the English channel, Dec. 31, it will attempt, as if it were a hostile force, to reach the Atlantic seaboard undetected.

President Taft has appointed Senator Elihu Root as American member of the permanent court of arbitration at The Hague to succeed the late Chief Justice Fuller.

International.

From the moment the old Sultan of Turkey was taken from the throne, the movement to modernize the country takes date. Reports recently rendered by four American consuls related almost exclusively to the plans of the municipalities for the introduction of the agencies of civilization hitherto unknown there. "The lighting system of Aleppo, a city of two hundred thousand," said a consul, "is still the old kerosene lamp, but it is giving way to electricity. A city telephone exchange is to be installed. A complete line of street-railways will be constructed. There are lacking water works, a gas plant, a sewerage system, a fire department, and many other lesser requirements, and the authorities are now ready to grant concessions the moment they are approached by parties able to furnish the necessary guarantees in good faith." The city council of Bagdad has just negotiated a loan of eight hundred and eighty thousand dollars for municipal improvement purposes, and many other Turkish cities are contemplating loans for the same purpose. Salonika is negotiating for a loan of three hundred thousand dollars to be spent in widening certain streets in order that the street-railway may be extended to meet the fast-growing requirements of the town. Every concession so far granted has carried a clause giving the city making the grant absolute ownership and control of the property at the end of a given term of years.

The Canadian railway commission has directed the express companies of the Dominion to file lower tariff rates within three months. The commission declares that express rates are too high and that, as the express companies are owned by the railway companies, there is no occasion for the existence of separate companies to handle the express business. A rate reduction of at least ten per cent in through express traffic is ordered, local rates to be correspondingly cut. The existing form of shipment contract is ordered abolished. The commission affirms that the express companies overpay the railways for accommodation in station, and intimates that this is a convenient way of disposing of profits which otherwise might be so conspicuously large as to be inconvenient.

The Chinese throne has met the situation arising from the almost rebellious attitude of the National Assembly with firmness and tact. Its refusal to create immediately a ministry responsible to the Assembly and to convoke forthwith a general Parliament has been followed by the issuance of an edict which, though peculiarly non-committal, is interpreted as a call to the people to prepare for a program providing ultimately for the establishment of a constitutional cabinet.

King Alfonso having assented to the "padlock" law, which prohibits further establishment of religious congregations, it was promulgated Dec. 28.

Industrial and Commercial.

The United States Government has sold its catch of 12,920 seal skins at Lampson's auction rooms, London, realizing the sum of four hundred and forty-five thousand dollars. This is a direct result of the determination of the United States Government to exploit its Alaskan seal industry, instead, as hitherto, of leasing its rights. The skins came from the Pribyloff islands. The average price per skin was about thirty-three dollars. Last year, when the Government leased outright, it received only one hundred and fifty-three thousand dollars as its share of the proceeds of the sale.

This year's yield of Egyptian cotton is estimated at one million four hundred thousand bales, the Alexandria price of which will average probably one hundred dollars a bale, making the crop worth one hundred and forty million dollars.

In the year 1909 one hundred and three cement factories in the United States turned out 64,196,386 barrels, valued at $51,232,979.

The lumber cut in the United States during the calendar year 1909 was 44,585,000,000 feet, board measure.