THE CAMBRIAN is published monthly at the following rates: Single subscription for one year,..... To Ministers,.... $1.25 1.00 All money received by mail will be acknowledged by mail. Payment for THE CAMBRIAN should be made in a Post Office Money Order, Bank Check, or Draft, Express Money Order, or in a Registered Letter. All correspondence, orders and remittances for THE CAMBRIAN should be REV. E. C. EVANS, REMSEN, ONEIDA Co., N. Y. sent to THE CAMBRIAN FOR 1893. We shall be greatly obliged to our subscribers for their continued favors to THE CAMBRIAN, and for their aid in extending its circulation for 1893. And except in cases where it is ordered to be discontinued, THE CAMBRIAN for 1893 will be forwarded to all subscribers of the present year, and their names entered on the list for 1893. DISCONTINUANCES.-When you wish THE CAMBRIAN stopped, notify us by mail. Be sure and do this and thus save yourselves and us annoyance. Of course you will also be sure to pay all arrearages at the same time. The Courts have decided that all subscribers to newspapers are held responsible until all arrearages are paid and their papers are ordered to be discontinued. NEW FEATURES FOR 1893. Monthly Letter on "Wales and its Affairs," BY OUR LONDON CORRESPONDENT. Monthly Reviews of the Topics of the Day, BY THE FOLLOWING CORRESPONDING EDITORS: REV. FRED EVANS, D.D., (Ednyfed), Philadelphia, Pa. REV. R. T. ROBERTS, M. A, Racine, Wis. REV. RHYS GWESYN JONES, D.D., Utica, N. Y. Sketches of the Welsh Signers of Declaration of Independence. Articles on Number of the Welsh Population of the United States. Chapters on Welsh History, &c. CAMBRIAN PREMIUMS FOR 1893. THE BIOGRAPHY AND SERMONS OF THE LATE REV. DR, ROBERTS, UTICA, Sent Free by Mail on the following Conditions: 1. To old subscribers who pay all arrears up to January, 1893, and send the name and subscription of one new subscriber for 1893. 2. To old subscribers who pay in advance for 1893 and send the pame of one new subscriber for 1893. THE CAMBRIAN. Now, go write it before them in a table, and note it in a book, that it may be for all time to come for ever and ever THE LATE MR. JOHN WILLIS GRIFFITHS, The biographical sketches of eminent Welsh-Americans that appear in the CAMBRIAN from time to time have proved instructive and interesting to many of our American and British born Welsh people. And among those who have taken a prominent part in the affairs of our American national life and who were glad to acknowledge their Welsh blood or Welsh descent, we are glad to place the name of Mr. John Willis Griffiths, who held a prominent position in the naval service of his country and re flected great hou or on his own nati na'ity. We copy the following sketch from Appleton's Encyclopædia of American Authors: John Willis Griffiths, naval architect, was born in New York city Oct. 6th, 1809, and died in Brooklyn, N.Y., April 29th, 1882. His father, John Griffiths, was a shipwright in New York. After working for a while at various occupations the boy was apprenticed to his father's trade, and when nineteen years of age he laid the lines of the frigate Macedonia. In 1836 he published in the Portsmouth, Virginia, Advocate a series of articles giving his ideas on naval architecture, and in 1842 he delivered, in New York and in other cities, the first lectures on that subject ever delivered in the United States. He also opened a free school for instruction in ship-building. He favored many improvements and suggested the clipper model of the first ship built for the China trade. And And as early as 1835 he proposed the ram for the bow of war ships. He made the calculations for the Collins steamers. And in 1850 he sent to the World's Exhibition in London steamship model that attracted much attention. In 1853 he began to build for Mr. Norris of Philadelphia, Pa., a steamer intended to cross the Atlantic in seven days. After the failure of Norris, it made the fastest time on record between Havana and New Or leans. a In 1856 Mr. Griffiths became part proprietor and co-editor of the Nautical Magazine and Naval Journal, but it was suspended in 1858 ou his acceptance of an appointment from the Government as special naval constructor to build the U. S. Gunboat Paunee, which he fitted with twin screws and a drop bilge to increase the stability with the least expenditure of propulsive power, and other new features. The PauLee was the widest and lightest draught vessel of her displacement that was ever built, and although drawing only ten feet of water, she carried a frigate battery. In 1864 Mr. Griffiths invented a timber-bending machine, which he first used in building the ship New Era in Boston. In 1870 every frame imber that required curvature was bent from the straight log, and futtocks were extended in one stick from the keel to the rail. The use of iron in ship-building supplanted this method. In 1871-2 he invented improved timber-bending machinery for the Government, and in 1872 he built the United States war ship Enterprise at Portsmouth, N. H. Mr. Griffiths received two prize medals for his machines at the Centennial Exhibition in 1876. Mr. Griffiths was the originator of the idea of life-boats for steamers, and also displayed plans and models for such steamers at the Centennial. From 1879 to 1882 Mr. Griffiths edited in New York city a weekly journal entitled The American Ship-Builder. Although many of Mr. Griffiths' inventions in ship-building were opposed by more conservative architects, experience has usually proved the wisdom of his views, and no architect in the United States has been as generally followed by young ship-builders. Other inventions by him are: iron keelson for wood ships, (1848), bilge keels to prevent rolling (1865), rivets (1880.) His most important work, however, is his Treatise on Marine and Naval Architecture, New York, 1850, (4th edition, 2 vols., 1854.) This treatise was re-published in England, and had a wide sale through Europe. Its publication did more to advance American shipbuilding than any other single influence, and it brought its author orders for models and drawings from nearly every maritime nation. Mr. Griffiths also published the Ship Builders' Manual (2 vols., 1853,) and the Progressive Ship Builder(2 vols., 1875–6.) Mr. Griffiths' father was born at Ty-Mawr, Llangian, Carnarvonshire, North Wales, about the year 1793, and came to New York when he was about 12 or 14 years of age. Returning afterward to Wales, he learnt the AMERICA DISCOVERED BY THE WELSH. 355 the liability of strain from shock. The plates, instead of being strapped together, as in the old way, are riveted to each contiguous plate. It has been said by prominent ship builders that Carpenter Griffiths' idea is likely to revolutionize iron ship construction. One prominent builder said Griffiths was twenty years ahead of the times. The patentee is fifty-five years old, and has been in the navy thirty years. He served in his official capacity of carpenter on the Chicago during her recent service in the White Squadron. trade of shipwright, and came again to New York city, where in a few years he was married to an American lady. His family consisted of one son and two daughters, namely, John Willis Griffiths, Elizabeth and Mary. The latter became the wife of Gen. Bates, Portsmouth, Va. Mrs. Mary Bates is the only one of the family surviving. Mr. John Willis Griffiths is survived by five sons and one daughter, who occupy positions of trust and are highly respected. Oliver Griffiths holds a good position in the Brooklyn Navy Yard. Herbert M. Griffiths is an officer of thirty years' experience, on board the flag ship Chicago. Edgar B. Griffiths is connected with the Reliance Oil Co., New York city. Butler and George Griffiths are in Philadelphia, and the daughter, Mrs. Mary S. Vermelson, is at Portsmouth, Va. Messrs. Richard Richards (Penrhiwdar), Remsen, N. Y., and his brothers and sisters and Griffith Parry Jones, Wells St., AMERICA DISCOVERED BY THE Chicago, and Wm. Wynn, Lowville, N. Y., were first cousins to Mr. John Willis Griffiths-all being descendants of the Ty-Mawr family in Wales. We are glad, also, to insert the following notice, which is copied from the Commercial Advertiser of New York for Nov. 5th, 1891, and referring to a new invention in iron ship construction by Mr. Herbert M. Griffiths, son of the above Mr. J. W. Griffiths. Patents in the United States and Canada have been issued to Herbert M. Griffiths, a carpenter in the United States Navy, for a simplified method of construction of iron ships. Patents are pending on the invention in France, Germany, Spain and Italy. The invention consists of an overlapping of the iron plates at a reduction of 15 to 35 per cent. from the present cost of iron ship building, doing away entirely with the inside frame and lessening to a minimum Mr. Griffitns is a son of the late eminent ship constructor, John W. Griffiths, author of "A Treatise on Marine and Naval Architecture," and employed at one time by this Government as a special naval constructor. The elder Griffiths was the patentee of the bilge keel used on vessels at the present time. WELSH. BY THE HON. THOS. L. JAMES, STATES. (Concluded from last Number). One of the strongest arguments in favor of the Welsh claim to the discovery of America is the fact that their language was spoken by so many tribes of Indians located in widely separated parts of the country. There is abundant testimony offered in favor of this presumption. In 1740, in the Gentleman's Magazine, London, there appeared a statement written by the Rev. Morgan Jones, in 1685; he stated that in 1660, while a chaplain in Virginia, he journeyed to South Carolina, where, in the wilderness, he was taken prisoner by the Tuscarora Indians, and condemned to death. One of the war captains heard him soliloquizing over his fate, speak ing the British tongue,answered him in the same language that he should not die, and secured his ransom. He lived with these people four months, conversed with and preached to them in the British language. The original tongue, tho very much altered by the introduction of new words, was radically the same. Another traveler, about thirty years before the date of Mr. Jones's letter affirms that he found Welsh Indians along the coast between Virginia and Florida, Furthermore, he had information of a pirate, who, being wrecked near Florida, had learned what he supposed was the Indian language but which in reality was the Welsh tongue. The Welsh Indians aided in constructing forts and works which resemble very much similar achievements in their own country. The round tower, at Newport, R. I., is constructed on the same principle as Stonehenge, England, and many other Cambrian Memorials. It conforms exactly to the Druidic circle. Its materials are unhewn stone, and accordng to the principles of archæology, must have been constructed by Cambrian rather than Scandinavian navigators. It is said that our American mounds agree in the minutest particuculars with those described by Pennant as found during his "Tour in Wales." One Benjamin Sutton, who had been taken captive by the Indians, had been in different nations, and had lived many years among them, once visited an Indian town some distance from New Orleans whose inhabitants were lighter in color than other Indians, and who spoke Welsh. heard some of these Indians speak the language with a Welshman who was a captive there. One writer says that an old Indian prophet (the fifteenth in the line of succession) told him, in He broken English, that long ago a race of white people who had red hair and blue eyes lived at the mouth of Conestoga Creek. They cleared the land, fenced, plowed, raised grain, etc., and introduced the honey-bee, then unknown to the Indians. There is a great deal of testimony going to show that there was a tribe of Indians who spoke the Welsh language, that they once lived in the eastern part of the country, but, owing to conflicts with their enemies, both red and white, they gradually retreated into the interior, becoming incorporated in some cases, with other tribes. The forts or mounds for sepulture which have been found in New York, Pennsylvania, Virginia and the Carolinas as far West as the Mississippi, it is reasonable to suppose were erected by the Welsh with the aid of the Indians with whom they became associated. These mounds correspond to similar monuments found in England and Europe known to be of Cambrian origin. On one of these mounds in the Wyoming Valley, Pennsylvania, there grew a large oak, which, on being cut down in 1817, was found to be seven hundred years old. Relics of iron instruments have been found in Pennsylvania, proving a tradition of the Shawanese Indians that the coasts were inhabited by white men who used iron instruments. Six buttons were found bearing on their faces the mermaid, the coat of arms of the Principality of Wales. Pieces of earthenware have been discovered on the banks of the Ohio and in Kentucky, a manufacture the Indians were never acquainted with ; also wells dug which remained unfilled, the ruins and buildings, millstones, implements of iron, ornaments, etc.; a silver cross containing the capital letters I. S.-interpreted to mean the sacred name Iesus Salvator. Some years ago there was found |