McKinley

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Pan-American Exhibition is held at Buffalo and an International Exhibition in Glasgow. Santos-Dumont's airship sails around the Eiffel Tower. Prince Chun goes to Germany to express regret for the murder of Baron von Ketteler. President McKinley is shot at the Pan-President American Exhibition in Buffalo on September ated. 6, and dies on September 14, when President Roosevelt takes the oath of office. The PanAmerican Congress is opened in the City of Mexico. The South Carolina and West Indian Exhibition is held in Charleston, S. C. Great Britain and the United States sign the Isthmian Canal treaty. In 1902, the Emperor and Empress Dowager of China re-enter Pekin. England and Japan form an alliance to preserve the integrity of China and Corea. An earthquake in Transcaucasia kills about 2,000 people. Prince Henry of Prussia visits the United States. China and Russia sign a convention at Peking, wherein Russia agrees to evacuate Manchuria. The first Congress of the Cuban Republic meets at Havana. An eruption of Mont La Soufrière, St. Vincent's, on May 7, destroys 2,000 persons, and on May 8 an eruption of Mont Pelée, Martinique, destroys St. Pierre and 30,000 inhabitants. T. Estrada Palma is inaugurated first President Palma first of Cuba; the Campanile at Venice falls. Mont of Cuba. Pelée is again in eruption (August 30-September 4), and more than 2,000 persons are killed. Lieutenant Peary travels to 84° 17′

T. Estrada

President

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northwest of Cape Hecla. Stanley Spencer, the English aeronaut, sails his airship 30 miles over London. The Canadian-Australian caCanadian- ble, of 3,455 miles, from Vancouver to Fanning Island, is completed. The Assouan Dam on the Nile is opened December 8. Great Britain and Germany present an ultimatum to Venezuela, seize her fleet, and demolish a fort at Puerto Cabello. Venezuela appeals to the United States for arbitration.]

pleted.

ASSASSINATION OF PRESIDENT MCKINLEY

(A.D. 1901)

WEMYSS REID

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HE chief event to be recorded here is the sad and most unexpected tragedy of which the city of Buffalo was the scene on Friday, the 6th of September. President McKinley, whose power and popularity seemed to be steadily growing, and who had just found it necessary to announce that under no circumstances would he consent to serve for a third term in the Presidential office, had arrived a day or two earlier in the town in order to visit the Pan-American Exhibition. Thursday, the 5th, was "President's Day" at President's the Exhibition, and on that day "the greatest American crowd that has ever assembled on the esplanade heard Mr. McKinley's speech, which was a long one and the most important he has delivered for a considerable time." It was, indeed, of an importance even greater than was realized by the reporters and critics of the moment, for its gist was an acknowledgment by the High Priest of Protection that the time was come when Protectionism pure and simple could no longer be maintained with advantage to the United States, and when it was neces

Pan

Exhibition.

sary in the interests of the new "world policy" of the Great Republic to modify it in the direction of a system of reciprocity.

"Isolation," said the President, addressing McKinley's not only the greatest crowd Buffalo had ever speech. known but all the people of the United States, "is no longer possible or desirable. . . . Our capacity to produce has developed so enormously that the problem of more markets requires immediate attention. A system which provides for the mutual exchange of commo-. dities is manifestly essential. We must not repose in the fancied security that we can forever sell everything and buy little or nothing. Reciprocity is the natural outgrowth of our - wonderful industrial development. If, perchance, some of our tariffs are no longer needed for revenue or to protect our industries, why should they not be employed to extend our markets abroad?"

To describe such a speech as epoch-making is not to exaggerate. The President's words proclaimed the fact that a new departure in the policy of the United States was imminent, one that was bound to have momentous and far-reaching consequences, and that could not fail to have a direct and far-reaching influence upon the fortunes of all the great nations of the world.

But before men had realized the full meaning of McKinley's utterance, before even the hurried commentators of the daily