Fred Funston was born in Ohio, November 9, 1865. His father was a prominent public man and one time a member of congress from Kansas. He was graduated in 1886 from the high school at Iola, Kansas, and later studied for two years in the state university at Lawrence, but was not graduated. In 1890 he was a reporter in Kansas City, and his first public work was done as botanist in the United States death valley expedition in 1891. Returning he was made a commissioner in the department of agriculture and was assigned to explore Alaska and report on its flora. In 1893 he floated down the Yukon alone in a canoe. He served eighteen months in the insurgent army in Cuba, and upon his return to the United States, in 1896, was commissioned a colonel in the Twentieth Kansas volunteers. In 1898 he went to the Philippines and took part in several battles. He crossed the Rio Grande river at Calumpit on a small bamboo raft under heavy fire and established a rope ferry by which the United States troops were enabled to cross and win the battle. For this deed of valor he was promoted to brigadier-general of the United States volunteers May 2, 1899. He remained in active service in the Philippines and organized the expedition which succeeded in the capture of Aguinaldo. For this he was promoted to brigadier-general United States army, March 20, 1901. RICHMOND PEARSON HOBSON. Many of our naval and army officers are of southern birth. Richmond Pearson Hobson is a case in point, since he was born at Greensboro, Alabama, August 17, 1870. His ancestors were English and many of them were members of the nobility. Young Hobson, after a course in the public schools and the Southern university at Greensboro, entered the United States naval academy at Annapolis in 1889. He was immediately appointed a midshipman on the Chicago, under command of Rear-Admiral Walker and ordered to the European station. Upon his return he received the compliment of an appointment as one of the United States officers permitted by the British government to receive a course of instructions at the Royal navy college, Woolwich, England. Here he remained three years, taking a special study in naval architecture. On returning home he received an appointment to the navy department at Washington, and discharged his duties with such fidelity and intelligence that he was given an appointment as assistant naval constructor. He was later ordered to the Brooklyn navy yard, where he remained one year. Next he went to Newport News to inspect the battleships Kearsarge and Kentucky, which were under construction there. He then became instructor in the post-graduate course in naval instruction, which he inaugurated at the naval academy in 1897. In 1898 he, with his pupils, was ordered to join Sampson’s fleet at Key West, with which he remained until the performance of the remarkable and historic feat of bottling up Cervera in the harbor of Santiago de Cuba. He received a great deal of deserved