greatest naval conflict since Trafalgar. Gen. Nelson A. Miles presented an understandable account of the war as it had progressed down to and including the battle of Mukden. Andrew D. White, scholar, diplomat and member of The Hague peace tribunal, contributed to the illustration of the effect of the war upon international politics, and Capt. H. A. Saxe, of the Russian Navy, told a graphic story of the terrors of life at Port Arthur, where he was in the thick of it.

THE WORLD DURING THE CHINESE TROUBLE.

During the Boxer trouble in China, before and after the operation of the allied Powers, THE WORLD kept its readers constantly informed, from the most reliable sources, of all that transpired there. Its war corespondent, Mr. Frederick Palmer, was the first to reach the ground. Appreciating the sensitiveness of the situation from a standpoint of world politics, it was alert in its watchfulness of the steps of the American Government, constantly arousing the American conscience with its trusty searchlight of Publicity to the dangers of any false step. It constantly insisted that the true American policy was not one of vengeance, but of conciliation, with proper compensation for any damage done. When the President announced on July 3, 1902, in a note to the Powers, his programme of co-operation with the European armies "in aiding to prevent a spread of the disorders to the other provinces and a recurrence," THE WORLD immediately began to point out the Inevitable consequences of this programme of joint pacification and joint bayonet rule. Mr. McKinley, firm in the belief that the country was infected with his craze for imperialism, and "glory," and foreign domination, steadily made his preparations, increased his army for Chinese conquest, and sent munitions of war and supplies for a six months' campaign. And on July 19 Mr. Root, the Secretary of War, said: "No matter what action is taken by the Powers, the troops of the United States will remain in China."

THE WORLD vigorously denounced it, and was joined by all the other newspapers of the land, irrespective of politics.

THE WORLD insisted that as our Minister and our other citizens shut up in Peking were rescued, our army had accomplished its mission, the object for which alone it was sent. the only excuse for its presence in China was gone, and there was left no reason why a single American soldier should stay on Chinese soil. It should withdraw, leaving China to restore her disorderd affairs. When peace was restored our Government could arrange for indemnity and reparation. On September 22, 1902, President McKinley bowed to public opinion, voiced by THE WORLD, and in his reply to Germany, Russia and China, he announced a policy of peace, justice and civilization; peace through independent negotiation.

RAMAPO STEAL AND ICE TRUST KILLED.

Among the most distinguished of the public services of THE WORLD must rank its destruction of the Ice Trust and the killing of the Ramapo steal. It was THE WORLD that first discovered and published Mayor Van Wyck's pecuniary connection with the ice monopoly. On May 5, 1900, THE WORLD exclusively printed the news that Mayor Van Wyck and John F. Carroll, then the Tammany leader, owned millions of dollars, par value, of the stock of the ice monopoly, which had doubled the price in New York City, and was then perfecting an absolute monopoly of the ice trade in New York City by control of the docks. THE WORLD invoked the anti-Tweed law and forced Mayor Van Wyck to testify before Justice Gaynor, eliciting the confession that he held $400,000 worth of the stock, having paid only $50,000 in cash, the rest being covered by notes. Charges were preferred before Governor Roosevelt, but his action was long delayed, the Governor being away campaigning for the Vice-Presidency in the West. He finally refused to remove the Mayor, but said the Mayor's moral guilt was proved.

The Ramapo scandal involved a projected steal of $200,000,000 from the city in the giving of a water contract for twenty years on the plea that the city's water resources were exhausted and the Ramapo Water Company had gained possession of the only available watershed in the State, the city being prohibited by law from going to any other State.

It was attempted by the Tammany administration in 1899 to sneak through the Board of Public Improvements a contrast by which the city was to pay $70 a million gallons for water from the Ramapo Company. THE WORLD showed that the same company had been ready to sell at $53 a million gallons, and that this was a combination of Republican and Democratic politicians to loot the city through its supposed helplessness. The contract had been approved by Corporation Counsel John Whalen, and the Tammany President of the Board of Public Improvements was eager to execute the contract. THE WORLD obtained from the Supreme Court an injunction forbidding the city to make the contract.

The fight was carried on until the Legislature convened, and THE WORLD secured the passage of a bill repealing the Ramapo charter.

GRAB KILLED AND MILLIONS SAVED.

Under the pressure of a powerful lobby, the New York State Legislature, in its closing moments in 1901, jammed through a Lill giving to the New York and New Jersey Bridge Company, financed by a syndicate whose personality was a deep, dark mystery, a franchise in perpetuity, worth not less than $100,000,000, under the guise of a permit for a terminal and bridge approach.

The bill granted the right to construct an overhead railway along the New York waterfront to connect with the New York Terminal Railway's tracks of the same company's bridge on the Hudson River, and no limit to the length of the water-front overhead road was named. It might go to the Battery south and north to the Yonkers line, and a careful study of its provisions for compensation failed to discover anything under which the city could force the company to pay for this invaluable privilege more than $60,000 a year, compensation depending on computation of gross receipts by a system that would enable the company to show that its bridge earned everything, the water-front terminal nothing. THE WORLD denounced it as a steal that made the Ramapo job look insignificant. A further analysis of the bill developed the astounding fact that it did not guarantee the construction of the bridge over the Hudson at all. In other words, the holders of the franchise could build and operate the overhead road along the water-front, on the recently reclaimed and enormously valuable bulkheads of the city, and practically force shipping interests to transmit goods to and from their piers on their tracks, and besides, under the provisions of the bill, the company would have the right to construct spurs and branches across town through every street, and up and down through any avenue.

"Next to rapid transit," said THE WORLD, "nothing will do so much good for New York as a bridge over the Hudson annexing New York to the continent, and there must be a connecting road along the water-front to collect and distribute the enormous traffic that would pass over it. But this is no reason why the city should not get a suitable payment for this privilege, and there is every reason why such a franchise should not become a perpetual monopoly."

All these points were laid before Governor Odell, who vetoed the measure in a ringing message, in which he recited the very objections raised by THE WORLD.

FATHER OF GREAT INSURANCE REFORMS.

It cannot be disputed that the most herculean task ever attempted and performed with amazing results by a newspaper has been the cleaning of the augean stables of life insurance companies by THE WORLD. The labor is still going on, and THE WORLD'S campaign against extravagance and corruption by men who have posed as the zealous guardians of widows and orphans is too fresh in the mind of the public, to make necessary more than a brief rehearsal of THE WORLD'S war against insurance vices during the past two years. It was THE WORLD that awakened the press of the country and millions of policyholders to join in its thundering denunciation of the crimes of high-paid insurance company officials. It was THE WORLD that first produced evidences of these crimes, and it was THE WORLD that first bearded in his den at Albany the "silent" lion, Francis Hendricks, State Superintendent of Insurance, and later exclusively published the report of Mr. Hendrick's investigation of the affairs of the Equitable Life Assurance Society before DistrictAttorney Jerome could get a copy. It was THE WORLD'S insistence which led to Governor Higgins requesting the appointment of a Legislative Investigating Committee, and, better still, to a real investigation, calling attention to the fact that the testimony taken by the Superintendent plainly showed that THE WORLD'S charge that there was a combination, or "system," in which the Equitable, New York, Mutual and Prudential Insurance Companies were engaged, and worked together, was proven.

Governor Higgins finally yielded to THE WORLD'S pressure "because of the great public demand for it," and sent a special message to the extraordinary session of the Legislature requesting the appointment of a committee to investigate insurance methods, and report to the next session, with recommendations for changes in the laws so as to more completely safeguard the interests of policy-holders, "although I am still of the mind that there is nothing to be gained by it."

The people know whether "anything has been gained by it."

The story of the "system," as revealed in testimony before the Armstrong Committee, reads like a recital of what THE WORLD had been telling for months before the committee was named. It shows that more than a million dollars has been spent by the "Big

Three" in corrupting Legislatures during the past ten years; that each of these companies paid $50,000 to $75,000 to the Republican National Committee to help along the election of McKinley in 1900, and like sums in 1904 to the Roosevelt campaign fund, substantiating the charge made by THE WORLD during that campaign and denied by the Republican managers with much righteous indignation.

Hyde testified that the Mercantile Trust Company, one of the Equitable's subsidiary companies, was "held up" by ex-Governor Odell and made to pay him his losses in the Shipbuilding Trust fiasco. Hyde said that Odell's friend Harriman told him it would be best to settle Odell's suit. He feared Odell would make reprisals. Senator Ambler had introduced a bill cancelling the charter of the Mercantile Trust Company, one of the most valuable of the assets of the Equitable. Odell could stop this bill. Odell got $75,000 in settlement, and the Ambler bill was allowed to sleep to death "in committee."

Harriman and Odell denied Hyde's story, and a jury of twelve clergymen, to whom the question was submitted, were unable to agree as to which of these witnesses was guilty of perjury.

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The investigation revealed that the Mutual and the New York Life were strictly family affairs by the McCurdys and the McCalls; that Richard A. McCurdy received a salary of $150,000 a year, a rise of $146,000 in twenty years, and that the Mutual had paid an aggregate of $4,918,607 to McCurdy, his son, his son-in-law, and other members of the McCurdy family-more than the salaries of all the Presidents of the United States during 116 years combined.

The New York Life Insurance Company paid $509,127 for "legislation," which is only another name for "bribery."

The Equitable Life Assurance Society loaned $250,000 to the Depew Improvement Company in 1895, and no interest had ever been paid until THE WORLD'S exposures. Then the original loan was repaid in full, with interest.

The Equitable had a "Yellow Dog" fund in the Mercantile Trust Company in the form of a loan. It amounted to $685,000 when THE WORLD began its crusade. It had been $1,400,000 at one time. It was secured by the notes of James W. Alexander, Thomas D. Jordan, comptroller of the Equitable, and William H. McIntyre, fourth vice-president. It was used to enable the Equitable to make secret payments and avoid scandal. Out of it were paid political campaign assessments, to the settlement of blackmailing suits and the like. After the exposure this loan was mysteriously paid and the account settled, Hyde paying $212,000 of it out of his own pocket.

While the salaries of the McCurdy family were mounting, the dividends to policyholders went down. In 1872 the dividend on a $5,000 policy was $149.96. In 1889 it was $110; in 1893, $50; in 1903, $22, and in 1904 it had got down to $7. The average policy in the Mutual is $2,346, on which the annual premium is $95. The premiums on more than 1,500 policies were eaten up in paying President McCurdy's salary, and the salaries of all the McCurdys ate up the premiums on 4,784 such policies, or all the dividends on 109,922 policies.

President John A. McCall, of the New York Life, admitted that his company paid $235,000 to Judge Andrew Hamilton, the notorious insurance lobbyist at Albany, but compromised himself by swearing he did not know what was done with the money. ♦

The capital stock of the Equitable is only $100,000, of which Hyde held by inheritance $2,200, par value. The law under which the Equitable operates limits Hyde's profit on his holdings to $3,514 in annual dividends, yet he sold his stock to Thomas F. Ryan for $500,000, after declining an offer of $7,000,000, because of its possibilities as a moneymaker through "juggling" by the "system."

Cashier Banta, of the New York Life, testified how the Chemical National Bank evaded paying taxes by "borrowing" $700,000 worth of bonds from the company, leaving its check for that amount, and after the tax-gatherer had passed by brought the bonds back and exchanged them for the check.

The Mutual maintained a house in Albany called the "House of Mirth," where members of the Legislature were welcome free guests, and ex-Senator Charles P. McClelland, who was promoted to a membership in the Board of Appraisers by President Roosevelt, was one who lived there.

For five years Senator Depew had been paid an attorney fee of $20,000 a year, and David B. Hill $5,000 a year; Elihu Root, Premier in the Roosevelt Cabinet, had received $25,000 in the first half of 1905; the Mercantile Safe Deposit Company was earning 29 per cent, dividends, "all at the expense of the parent company." the Equitable, and Superintendent Hendricks said all THE WORLD'S charges regarding the Hyde-Alexander syndi

cates, and their looting of the funds in loans, sales of securities at inflated prices, and the like, were true, and that Hyde and Alexander ought to refund.

On the reading of the evidence, the Merchants' Association held an indignation meeting, and passed resolutions declaring these givers of the money of policy-holders to campaign funds "plain thieves," and demanding that they be removed and that they be compelled to make restitution.

The year 1906 crowned with glorious triumph THE WORLD'S struggle against insurance corruption when the New York State Legislature passed the Armstrong bills, reorganizing and remodelling the whole system of life insurance in the State of New York. These laws embody the exact insurance reforms recommended by THE WORLD in the best interests of the policy-holders. They wipe out the whole tainted system, the foundations of which were laid by Henry B. Hyde more than forty years ago, and were wrought to perfection by adroit men during the years that followed, until its alliances reached into the Capitol of every State in the Union, into the United States Senate, and into the organizations of both political parties. It sought to buy Ambassadorships; it corrupted Legislatures, and paid for it all with the savings of policy-holders all over the earth, turning the proceeds of their thrift into the channels of political and financial corruption.

The Convention composed of Insurance Commissioners, Governors and other public officials of a number of States at Chicago in March, 1906, adopted almost word for word. THE WORLD'S life insurance reform platform. The Arena said: "THE NEW YORK WORLD, seizing on the opportunity for the unmasking of the festering moral corruption, began a series of editorial leaders devoted to the expose of the true Inwardness of the company that have seldom, if ever, been equalled for boldness and lucidity of persistence."

A review of some of the occurrences following THE WORLD'S merciless blows reads like a page of tragedy.

John A. McCall, late president of the New York Life Insurance Company, after making a brave defence of his management and justifying it with so much earnestness that the conviction was forced upon most people that he had really erred more in the head than the heart, first gave up all that he had in partial restitution, and then died of a broken heart, leaving his family practically penniless; James W. Alexander, former president of the Equitable Life Assurance Society, whose dislike and jealousy of James Hazen Hyde gave THE WORLD the instrument it had been searching for for many months with which to break through the case-hardened shell of the egg of insurance corruption and expose the rottenness inside, is mentally and physically broken down; Richard A. McCurdy, former president of the Mutual Life Insurance Company, is a physical wreck, vainly searching in Europe for health and surcease of worriment; James Hazen Hyde, former vice-president of the Equitable, is an exile; Lewis A. Thebaud, son-in-law of McCurdy, is an exile, and Robert A. McCurdy, son of Richard, has been forced out of the company; Vice-President W. H. McIntyre, of the Hyde regime, has been forced out and is seeking his fortune in Texas; Vice-Presidents Robert A. Grannis and Walter R. Gillette, since indicted for perjury, and the latter convicted, were forced to resign; "Judge" Andrew Hamilton, who "handled" over $1,600,000 for the "Big Four" as legislative agent and was never asked for an accounting, is no longer in power; Andrew Fields, who was a legislative agent and host at the "House of Mirth" at Albany, has been dropped, the house closed, and he is broken in health; Thomas D. Jordan, former comptroller of the Equitable, and with Hyde and McIntyre a co-trustee of the $685,000 "yellow dog" fund, out of which secret payments were always made-as of political campaign contributions, "promotion" of legislative action and the like -and in the restoration of which James Hazen Hyde paid $212,000 out of his own pocket and the rest came from anonymous sources, is removed from office; Frederick A. Burnham, president of the Mutual Reserve Life Insurance Company, was indicted by the Grand Jury five times for larceny and forgery; Vice-President George D. Eldridge was also indicted on five counts of larceny and forgery, and George Burnham, Jr., vice-president of the Mutual Reserve, was tried on a charge of grand larceny.

Suits have been commenced by the looted companies against the looters or "high financiers" for the restoration of an aggregate of more than $10,000,000, and there are more to follow.

All of this is the result of the persistence of THE WORLD having for its alm the service of the people.

THE DESTRUCTION OF ST. PIERRE.

On May 10, 1902, THE WORLD gave to the public the first account of the destruction of St. Pierre, on the island of Martinique, by the eruption of Mount Pelee, the supreme

catastrophe of the age, rivalling in sudden, swift and wholesale annihilation of man and his works the greatest tragedies in history, the burial of Pompelf, the swallowing up of Lisbon by an earthquake, and the cremation of Catania. In the twinkling of an eye 30,000 people passed from life to death. Their bodies were found afterward, just as they had fallen, unmarked. They had been asphyxlated by the deadly gases of the lava-dust which had fallen like a rain storm upon the land.

Simultaneously with the publication of the news THE WORLD appealed to the public for funds and supplies for the relief of the survivors of the calamity, and at the same time cabled to Governor Hunt, of Porto Rico, to charter a ship and send relief to Martinique in its name, and THE WORLD steamer Longfellow, on May 17, arrived at the island with the first relief supplies. It carried also fifty tons of supplies from the Government.

A WORLD correspondent at Fort de France was the first to reach the scene of the catastrophe. Two days later he gave the first complete survey of the situation, and told the saddening news that the survivors of the calamity were so very few that the supplies already received were ample for all probable needs. From the first THE WORLD easily led in the completeness and comprehensiveness of its accounts, illustrated by photographs. At the same time the long-smouldering volcano La Soufriere in St. Vincent erupted, laying waste two-thirds of the island, and killing more than 2,500 people. In a tug, through an electric storm on raging seas, THE WORLD correspondent reached St. Vincent from Fort de France, and after traversing the devastated British island sent from St. Lucia the first complete story of the St. Vincent tragedy.

THE WORLD AS A MEDIUM OF COMMUNICATION.

One of the proudest distinctions of THE WORLD is its long record of occasions when it has been requested to lend its columns to distinguished leaders of thought and action as the best possible medium of reaching the greatest number of people in the United States and in all directions abroad. The pre-eminent standing of THE WORLD as an international forum has so long been undisputed that it is recognized by dignitaries everywhere as a means of communication. Elsewhere is told how marked was the service by THE WORLD at the time of the Venezuelan boundary dispute, and preceding and during the South African war, as are other instances. Among the many additional examples are these:

Ambassador White addressed the American people through THE WORLD in an impressive summing up of the work of the International Peace Conference at The Hague, saying: "It marks the first stage of the abolition of the scourge of war."

The last great public utterance of Congressman Nelson Dingley, Chairman of the Ways and Means Committee of the House of Representatives, was in the form of an address to the people, in which he presented an able and remarkable exposition of the finances of "Empire," and he chose THE WORLD as the medium through which to reach the people. Emperor William II. talked to the people of this country through THE WORLD of a closer union of the United States with Germany.

Cardinal Gibbons, head of the Roman Catholic Church in America, reached the people through THE WORLD in a 3,000-word communication on "The Cancer of Divorce."

Vice-President Figuere, of San Domingo, informed the American people through a despatch to THE WORLD that the assassination of President Heureaux was a murder, not a political killing. This gave much relief to those having commercial connections likely to be injured by an uprising in the "Black Republic."

Governor Jennings, of Florida, desiring to thank the people of New York for their prompt and generous assistance to the fire sufferers of Jacksonville, did it through the recognized medium. "The people of Florida," said her chief magistrate in a telegram to THE WORLD, "are grateful to the people of New York. I beg you to express our earnest gratitude."

The first message sent out by King Edward VII. after his accession was to THE WORLD. It was a message of thanks for the sympathy of the American people.

In those trying days when Queen Wilhelmina and all the statesmen of Holland were striving to smooth out the domestic troubles of the Queen and her Prince Consort, THE WORLD was asked by the authorities at The Hague to deny to the American public the sensational rumors of the domestic discord.

Zanardelli, the Italian Prime Minister, told the people of America through THE WORLD how he admired the United States, and hoped the existing feeling of mutual good will might grow stronger every day.