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About The Conservative (Nebraska City, Neb.) 1898-1902 | View Entire Issue (Sept. 20, 1900)
'Cbc Conservative. 9 then for days wo sailed along the cast coast of Sumatra. One morning the breeze died down ; back and forth we pulled the yard arms , tacking ship every few minutes. By evening we sailed up to a low , green mountain. At its base was a lighthouse ; out from the shore a short distance lay the wreckage of an English bark , her ropes , spars and rig ging scattered about in tangled heaps upon the deck. The chain went scream ing through the wildcats , and we were anchored at Angie Point off the Java coast. It was on the thirteenth day out. Java. And now I will tell yon the tragic story of Angie how in 188G it went down during earthquake caused by the now famous Oraok-a-too volcano , and nearby another island came up which , in less than three months , was covered by a jungle that even the southern sun could not penetrate. Four teen years ago Oraok-a-too showed signs of activity , but nobody took much notice of it , when one day the sea began to roll , the rooks tumbled down the mountain side , and the fair oity of Angie , with thirty thousand souls , sank beneath the waves. Since that day the old volcano has always been rumbling or throwing out dense black volumes of smoke. I will never forget how it looked , for one whole day I watched the molten matter run down her furrowed sides and sizzle as it struck the sea. To ride peacefully at anchor above where so many are silently sleeping makes one feel queer. I saw a skull in the shallow water along the shore. It had lain there so long that the sea-moss was thick upon it. Some little fish had made this place , once of living thought , their home , and were swimming in and out the strange abode. The sky was .just as blue , the hills were just as green , and the waves seemed to laugh in the white sunlight , but the story of yester day shone from those bony sockets and told me the tale of the aftermath , and my mind went back to that line of wooden crosses by Manila where the music is soft and low , and says : " today , tomorrow , forever. " That evening several boat loads of native Javanese came out in their bum- boats. They had bananas , cocoa nuts sparrows and monkeys for sale. 1 traded an old coat for eight cocoa nuts and three bunches of bananas. We stayed there several days trading with the natives and taking on provisions , the weather being perfect. One of the boats which came to visit us had a bob-tailed monkey which had lost his tail some way. He would go scampering np into the rigging , jumping from spar to spar All at once he would forget that his tail was gone , and would try to swing from some rope , with the result that he would come down with a bang upon the dock. On January 18th , the wind blew trong from the west sending the white caps booming upon the shore. Again we went singing around the capstan , pulled the yards square , and sailed into ihe Indian ocean. Over the Indian Ocean. For the next twenty days the breeze was light and we did not average over five knots an hour , so we tarred down the rigging , holy-stoned the deck , which mocked the skin from our knees and made us lame all over. Then we scraped ; ho rust from the iron work. About this time the Japanese cook began to feed us on salt meat hash which alone was enough to kill a man , but the pure air , the deep green and the pale blue sky above compensated us for all our misery. It was a typical southern sea , and the hot sun beating down upon the deck made the pitch melt and stick to our bare feet. Caught at Last. One afternoon the breeze freshened up , some dark clouds rose above the horizon and came swiftly towards us , and soon they covered the heavens. "Every bloody one of you aloft , " sang out the mate. In less than ten minutes the typhoon struck us with a mighty boom. Seventeen thousand feet of good canvas went in shreds , ropes and blpcks came down from aloft making dints in the deck. Clinging to the starboard rigging , I looked down into the trough of the sea which looked a half mile deep , while great waves swept over the deck , carrying all loose materials over board. I could feel the ship tremble beneath me and see the forward house slide bock and forth. Every moment expected to see her go to pieces , and in all that din of flapping canvas , twang ing rope and creaking timber , I heard the mate's clear voice shout to the cap tain : "Sir ! I don't believe she will ever weather this gale. " ( TO BE CONTINUED. ) ANNIVERSARY OP LEWIS AND CLARK EXPEDITION. The two weeks following the 21st of July have a peculiar interest to those concerned in the early history of our state , and especially to those in the oities along the Missouri. In 1804 Lewis and Olark arrived at the mouth of the Flatte July 21 , and began their labor of inter viewing the different Indian tribes ol the plains. Extracts from the journa of the expedition will be of interest , and also should arouse local attention to certain localities , which might be suit ably marked for the benefit of future generations. In a sense , this expedition bears a relation to the Louisiana pur chase somewhat similar to the early landings of Pilgrims and Puritans in New England. Now for the records. "July 21. * * The wind lulled at 7 o'clock , and we cached , in the rain , the month of the jreat river Platte. The highlands which md accompanied us on the south ( west ) for the last eight or ten miles stopped at about three-quarters of a mile from the entrance of the Platte. Captains Lewis . and Olark ascended the river in pirogue 'or about one mile. They found the current very rapid , rolling over sand , and divided into a number of channels , none of which are deeper than five or six feet. " ( Note by Elliott Ooues : "We com monly use the French form of the name , but the river has also often been called the Nebraska and Flat water. " ) "At its junction the Flatte is about 600 yards wide. With much difficulty we worked around the sandbars near the mouth and came to above the point , mving made fifteen miles. A number of wolves were seen and heard around us in the evening. " July 22. "This morning we set sail , and having found , at the distance of ten miles from the Platte , a high and shaded situation on the north , we camped there , intending to make the requisite observa tion , and to send for the neighboring tribes. " This camp was on the east side of the Missouri , and there the company re mained until noon of the 27th. It prob ably was near the boundary between Mills and Pottawattamie counties of Iowa , perhaps opposite Bellevue , Neb. It is described by Oaptain Lewis as fol lows : "Immediately behind is a plain about five miles wide , one-half covered with wood , the other dry and elevated. The low grounds on the south ( west ) , near the junction of the two rivers , are rich , but subject to be overflowed. Op posite our camp the first hills approach the river and are covered with timber. " There may not be sufficient topograph ical data in this description to identify the locality , but it would repay careful scrutiny of that locality to discover if any remains or mementos of the expedi tion are to be found. Here they spent their time drying provisions , making oars , preparing maps and dispatches. Two men were sent out to hunt up the Indian chiefs of the Otoes , Pawnees and other tribes , and invite them to a confer ence. They caught a white catfish , an incident which led them to name the camp White Catfish. Sergeant Floyd , in his curious diary , says that it rained and the wind was "very villant from the southeste. " At noon , Friday , the 27th , they swam their horses over to the south ( west ) side , and the boats passed an island at three and one-half miles from their camp , on which were springs , and three miles further another island. Probably both have either disappeared or become part of the mainland. "At ten and one-half miles from our camp we saw and examined a curious collection of graves or mounds on the south ( west )