The American navy has been celebrated for its heroic achievements from the beginning, and some of these pictures recall vividly to the mind the episodes linked with the immortal names of such men as John Paul Jones, Stephen Decatur, Samuel Chester Reid, George U. Morris, John L. Worden, and the whole galaxy of heroes connected with these memorable events down to Dewey, Sampson, Schley, Wainwright and Hobson. The production of these paintings was the result of a patriotic and noble impulse on the part of the artist, through which he has immortalized the maritime achievements of our country, and for which we, as well as future generations, can hardly be sufficiently grateful! "If thou wouldst touch the universal heart, Of thine own country, sing!" BIOGRAPHICAL [Illustration: T. S. M.] BIOGRAPHICAL. Edward Moran was almost seventy-two years of age when he died in the City of New York on June 9, 1901, having been born at Bolton, Lancashire, England, on August 19, 1829. He was the oldest son of a large family of children, and when a mere child was put to work at the loom, the humble vocation of his father who, the same as his ancestors had been for several generations, was a hand-loom weaver. Already while so employed the child was frequently caught sketching with charcoal on the white fabric in his loom instead of continually plying the shuttle. Whence and how he derived this inborn talent is one of those unsolvable problems which seem to set at defiance all the accepted canons of heredity. At all events, his talent was recognized by a local village celebrity, a decorator, who guided the child, then only nine years of age, in a crude way to a development of these artistic instincts, in consequence of which it is related that he was soon able to "cut marvellous figures from paper and afterwards draw their outlines on walls and fences."