Through two oceans and three zones, fifteen thousand miles without
mishap, the Oregon sailed in fifty-nine days. When she joined the fleet
where it lay off Cuba, she came sweeping in at fifteen knots an hour,
the winner of the mightiest race ever run, cheered at the finish by
every man of the American squadron. All honor should be given to her
wise captain and brave crew and to the Western workmen who made her so
stanch and true.

On a fair May day, while California children were rejoicing over their
baskets of sweet May flowers, the first battle of the war was fought,
the first, and for California the most important. When Dewey destroyed
the Spanish fleet on that Sunday morning (May 1, 1898) in Manila Bay, he
not only won an important victory, but a greater result lay in the
change of attitude of the United States toward the rest of the world.

It was a change which had begun long before; many events had led up to
it, but possession of the Philippines and other islands of the Pacific
forced our country to recognize the importance of Asia and the ocean
which washes its shores.

Commerce has always moved westward, going from Asia to Greece, to Rome,
to western Europe, to the western hemisphere; and the race which takes
up the movement and carries it forward is the one which gains the
profits. All must realize the truth of Mr. Seward's prophecy when he
said, "The Pacific coast will be the mover in developing a commerce to
which that of the Atlantic Ocean will be only a fraction." "The
opportunity of the Pacific," some one has called it. Nearly two thirds
of the people of the earth inhabit the lands washed by the waters of
this western sea, and the country which secures their trade will become
the leading nation of the world--a leadership which should be of the