Venezuela, $7,500, Ministers to Switzerland, Denmark, Paraguay, Bolivia and Portugal, $5,000; Ministers to Liberia, $4,000. The heads of the Government departments receive: Superintendent of Bureau of Engraving and Printing, $4,500; Public Printer, $4,500; Superintendent of Census, $5,000; Superintendent of Naval Observatory, $5,000; Superintendent of the Signal Service, $4,000; Director of Geological Surveys, $6,000; Director of the Mint, $4,500; Commissioner of General Land Office, $4,000; Commissioner of Pensions, $3,600, Commissioner of Agriculture, $3,000; Commissioner of Indian Affairs, $3,000; Commissioner of Education, $3,000; Commander of Marine Corps, $3,500; Superintendent of Coast and Geodetic Survey, $6,000.

In 1893 the Ministers to Great Britain, Germany and France, were made Ambassadors without increase of pay.

The pay of army officers is fixed as follows: General, $13,500; Lieut.General, $11,000; Major-General, $7,500; Brigadier-General, $5,500; Colonel, $3,500; Lieutenant-Colonel, $3,000; Major, $2,500; Captain, mounted, $2,000; Captain, not mounted, $1,800; Regimental Adjutant, $1,800; Regimental Quartermaster, $1,800; 1st Lieutenant, mounted, $1,600; 1st Lieutenant, not mounted, $1,500; 2d Lieutenant, mounted, $1,500; 2d Lieutenant, not mounted, $1,400; Chaplain, $1,500. The navy salaries are: Admiral, $13,000; Vice-Admiral, $9,000; Rear-Admiral, $6,000; Commodore, $5,000; Captain, $4,500; Commander, $3,500; Lieut.-Commander, $2,800; Lieutenant, $2,400; Master, $1,800; Ensign, $1,200; Midshipman, $1,000; Cadet Midshipman, $500; Mate, $900; Medical and Pay Director and Medical and Pay Inspector and Chief Engineer, $4,400; Fleet Surgeon, Fleet Paymaster and Fleet Engineer, $4,400; Surgeon and Paymaster, $2,800; Chaplain, $2,500.

WAYS AND WORK OF THE PATENT OFFICE.

Applications for United States patents must be addressed to the Commissioner of Patents, Washington, D.C., and signed and sworn to by the inventor. The invention must not have been in public use or on sale for more than two years prior to the application. The applicant must fully describe his invention and distinctly claim those parts which he believes to be new. The application must be illustrated with drawings when possible. When filed, a first fee of $15 is payable, and a second fee of $20 is exacted if the application is allowed before the patent will be issued. The patent runs seventeen years from date of issue. Extensions can be obtained only by special act of Congress. A pamphlet of rules and forms is distributed free by the Commissioner of Patents. Suits to enjoin infringement of letters patent are brought by bill in equity in U. S. District or Circuit courts. The profits realized by an infringer can also be recovered.

The total number of United States Patents granted up to and including Oct. 25, 1892, was 485,158. The average issue is about 25,000 a year. The average number of applications for patents is 40,000 a year. Since 1881, the annual receipts of the Patent Office have exceeded $1,000,000. The figures for fiscal year ending June 30, 1892, were $1,268,727.35. The expenditures for the same year were $1,114,134.23. The total balance to the credit of the Patent Fund in the United States Treasury on June 30, 1892, was $4,102,441.00. The two main items of expense are salaries, about $650,000, and printing and photo-lithographing, about $400,000 annually. The Patent Office Library contains 60,000 volumes. The model hall has 154,000 models. The office does not require models now, except in special cases.

UNITED STATES LAND MEASURE AND HOMESTEAD LAW.

A township is thirty-six sections, each a mile square.

A section is

six hundred and forty acres. A quarter section, half a mile square, is one hundred and sixty acres. An eighth section, half a mile long, north and south, and a quarter of a mile wide, is eighty acres. A sixteenth section, a quarter of a mile square, is forty acres.

The sections are all numbered 1 to 36, commencing at northeast corner, thus:

The sections are all divided in quarters, which are named by the cardinal points, as in section 1.

The quarters are divided in the same way, as shown in the smaller diagram. The description of a

NWNE!

6

5

4

3

2

SW SE

12

7 7 8 9 10 11

18

17

16

15

14

13

forty-acre lot would read: The south half of the west half of the south-west quarter of section 1 in township 24, north of range 7 west, or as the case might be; and sometimes will fall short and sometimes overrun the number of acres it is supposed to contain.

ALIEN HOLDERS OF OUR LANDS.

The following is a table of the leading alien holders of lands in the United States, with amount of holdings in acres:

To these syndicate holdings should be added the following: The Arkansas Valley Company in Colorado, a foreign corporation, whose inclosures embrace upwards of 1,000,000 acres; the Prairie Cattle Company (Scotch) in Colorado, upwards of 1,000,000; H. H. Metcalf, River Bend, Colorado, 200,000; John W. Powers, Colorado, 200,000; McDaniel & Davis, Colorado, 75,000; Routchler & Lamb, Colorado, 40,000; J. W. Frank, Colorado, 40,000; Garnett & Langford, Colorado, 30,000; E. C. Tane, Colorado, 50,000; Leivesy Brothers, Colorado, 150,000; Vrooman & McFife, Colorado, 50,000; Beatty Brothers, Colorado, 40,000; Chick, Brown & Co., Colorado, 30,000; Reynolds Cattle Company, Colorado, 50,000; several other cases in Colorado, embracing from 10,000 to 30,000; Coe & Carter, Nebraska, fifty miles of fence; J. W. Wilson, Nebraska, forty miles; J. W. Boster, twenty miles; William Humphrey, Nevada, thirty miles; Nelson & Son, Nevada, twenty-two miles; Kennebec Ranch, Nebraska, from 20,000 to 50,000 acres.

Lands forfeited to U. S.-Lands forfeited by acts of Congress and restored to the public domain aggregate about 36,681,527 acres.

TITLES TO THE PUBLIC LANDS-HOW ACQUIRED.

The public lands of the United States still unsold and open to settlement are divided into two classes, one class being sold by the Government for $1.25 per acre as the minimum price, the other at $2.50 per acre, being the alternate sections reserved by the United States in land grants to railroads, etc. Such tracts are sold upon application to the Land Register. Heads of families, or citizens over twenty-one years, who may settle upon any quarter section (or one hundred and sixty acres) have the right under the pre-emption law of prior claim to purchase, on complying with the regulations.

Under the homestead laws, any citizen, or intending citizen, has the right to one hundred and sixty acres of the $1.25 land, or eighty acres of

the $2.50 land, after an actual settlement and cultivation of the same for five years. Under the timber culture law, any settler who has cultivated for two years as much as five acres in trees of an eighty-acre homestead, or ten acres of a homestead of one hundred and sixty acres, is entitled to a free patent for the land at the end of eight years.

INDIANS AND THEIR RESERVATIONS.

The entire extent of territory now in a state of reservation for Indian purposes, including all portions of the Indian Territory, whether in fact occupied or unoccupied by Indians, is 112,413,440 acres, being equivalent to an average of 456 acres for each Indian, computed on the last reported number of the total population, including those estimated as outside the reservations. Of this area about 81,020,129 acres are within the scope of the general allotment law of 1887, and afford an average for the population residing upon such lands, amounting to 173,985, of about 465 acres to each. It will be seen that, by the execution of the general allotment law and breaking up of the reservations, a wide area of the public domain will be opened to settlement.

The Cherokees, Creeks, Choctaws, Chickasaws and Seminoles, constituting the five civilized tribes; the Osages, Miamis, Peorias, and Sacs and Foxes of the Indian Territory, and the Seneca nation in New York, are excepted from the provisions of the allotment act. The territory occupied by them embraces 21,969,695 acres, not counting therewith the 6,024,239 acres of the Cherokee outlet, the 1,887,801 acres known as Oklahoma, and the 1,511,576 acres lying in the Indian Territory south of the north fork of the Red River. The number of these excepted Indians is shown by the reports to be 72,110 in all.

INDIANS IN UNITED STATES, 1890. Total number Indians in the United States, 249, 273 (exclusive of Alaska, but including 32,567, taxed or taxable and self-sustaining, counted in general census). On reservations or at schools under control of Indian Office (not taxed or taxable), 133,382. Five Civilized Tribes, Indians and colored, incidentally under the Indian Office and self-supporting, 68,371 (Cherokee, 25,357, colored, 4,242, total, 29,599; Chickasaw, 3,464, colored, 3,718, total, 7,182; Choctaw, 9,996, colored, 4,401, total, 14,397; Creek, 9,291, colored, 5,341, total, 14,632; Seminole, 2,539, colored, 22, total, 2,561); or 64,871, less 3,500 colored, estimated, not members of tribes. The Chickasaw nation contains 1,161 other Indians,

the Choctaw 257. Population of Five Civilized Tribes, 66,289 (Indians, 52,065, colored Indian citizens and claimants, 14,224). New Mexico Pueblos, 8,278; Six Nations, Saint Regis and other New York Indians, 5,304; North Carolina, Eastern Cherokees, 2,885. Apaches held as prisoners of war, Mount Vernon barracks, 384, Indians in State or Territorial prisons, 184.

SLAVERY AND SERFDOM; A COMPARISON.

Some of the wealthy Romans had as many as 10,000 slaves. The minimum price fixed by the law of Rome was $80, but after great victories they could sometimes be bought for a few shillings on the field of battle. The day's wages of a Roman gardener were about sixteen cents, and his value about $300, while a blacksmith was valued at about $700, a cook at $2,000, an actress at $4,000 and a physician at $11,000.

The number of slaves emancipated in the British Colonies in 1834 was 780,993, the indemnity aggregating, in round figures, $100,000,000. In Brazil, in 1876, there were 1,510,800 slaves, 15 per cent. of the entire population. These were held by 41,000 owners, averaging 37 to each owner. In 1882 the number of slaves was 1,300,000. Owing to the gradual abolition of slavery in Brazil by law, it is expected that it will be entirely obsolete in 1900.

SLAVERY IN THE UNITED STATES.

There were 47,932,000 serfs in Russia in 1861, as follows: Crown serfs, 22,851,000; appanage, 3,326,000; held by nobles, 21,755,000. The cost of redemption was, in round numbers, about $325,000,000, as follows:

Mortgages remitted..

Government scrip..
Paid by serfs..

Balance due..

$152,000,000

101,000,000

52,000,000

20,000,000

The indemnity to the nobles was $15 per serf. The lands are mortgaged to the state till 1912. The lands ceded to Crown serfs are mortgaged only till 1901. The item of "mortgages remitted" is the amount due by nobles to the Imperial Bank and canceled.

There were 7,000,000 serfs, whose tribute averaged more than $35 per head, which was, in fact, the rent of their farms. Some Bohemian nobles had as many as 10,000 serfs. The redemption was effected by giving the nobles 5 per cent. Government scrip, and land then rose 50 per cent. in

value.

U. 1.-3