The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1885-08-08 00:00:00

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HOME, FOREIGN, AND COLONIAL

SOCIETY OF ARTS.—Sir Frederick Abel, 0.13., has been
re-elected chairman of the Council of the Society of
Arts for the ensuing yPar.
SHAKESPEAREAN REFERENCE.—The glory of the Bir-
mingham Public Reference Library is the Shakespeare
collection, originally founded in 1801, destroyed by fire
in 1879, but now restored almost to its former number
of 7000 volumes.
__ _ _ _

THE HARVARD UNIVERSITY.—Mr. Rendle, the his-
torian of Southwark, is preparing for immediate publica-
tion the result of his researches in connection with the
Southwark family of Harvard, alias Harv-ye, from
which the founler of Harvard University, U.S.,
sprang.
RELICS OF BURNS.—At a sale of relics which had
been the pr-puty of the poet Burns, at the Tam
O'Shanter lou. Ar, the • Tam O'Shanter " and
"Souter Jut Die" chairs fetched £37 each, being
secured for s cottage. The stirrup cup, a small
wooden bowl with a silver band, was sold to Mrs.
Christie, pal-can. for 155, and an autograph letter to.
Hamilton Nimmo fetched VI.
ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY.—The additions to the Zoo-
logical Society's Gardens during the past week include
a leadbeater's cockatoo, from Australia, presenteny
Mr. H. Grant; two great eagle owls, European, pre-
sented by Mr. E. G. Carpenter; a common peafowl,
from India, presented by Miss Rowland; an Indian
shams, from India, deposited; an axis deer, two
squirrel-like phalaugers, bred in the gardens.—
"Nature."
SALVATION or MSS.--/t was feared at one moment
that some Persian MSS. belonging to the Bodleian
Library, which Dr. Ethe kept for the sake of his
catalogue of the Persian MSS. contained in the library,
now in the press, were lost in the fire that broke out
lately at the Aberystwith University College. We are
glad to state that Rot only are these MSS. intact, but
that also the college library has been saved.
COPYRIGHT. The Copyright Association is co-
operating in the production of the new Copyright Bill,
which will be the jouat work of the two societies and
represent every copyright interest. The main provi-
sions of Mr. Daldy's Bill have been accepted in prin-
ciple both by the Authors' Society and the Copyright
Association. The assistance of the secretary of the-
Musical Copyright Association has also been received.
THE HI'FTITE LION.—A cast of the Hittite lion of
Marash, with a complete Hittite inscription engraved
upon it, has reached the British Museum, and is now
exhibited in the Egyptian gallery. A copy of the in-
scription, the completeness of which renders it
especially valuable, will be given in the forthcoming
new edition of Dr. Wright's Empire of the Hittites."
Another cast of the lion has been presented by Mr.
Mocatta to the Society of Biblical Archmology.
CURIOUS QUARREL.—A somewhat amusing quarrel
has arisen between the parishes of Kjelvik and Marisa
about a point of considerable geographical interest—
viz., the proprietorship of the North Cape. It is caused
by the establishment on the celebrated promontory of
a restaurant, the taxes of which are claimed by both
parishes. The Cape has always been considered to form
the boundary between the two, without it being stipu-
lated to whom it actually belonged.
SINGULAR " Fnin."—An interesting discovery has
lately been made at Sidon. Some natives who were ex-
cavating for stone, after penetrating through the allu-
vial soil, dug through a deposit of blown sand six
metres in depth, below which they found a stratum of
earth containing flint implements, fragments of coarse
red pottery, and other objects, among which a clay
whistle may be noted. It is clear, therefore, that the
Phcenician city of Sidon was preceded by an older
settlement whose inhabitants were still in the stone age,
Flint-hakes and implements, it will be remembered,
have already been found in the neighbourhood of the
Dog River, north of Beyrout.
Ics IN THE ATLerrro.—The Deutsche Seewarte has
issued a chart of the ice in the Atlantic Ocean this
spring, which, as it may be remembered, penetrated
very far south and east in consequence of continuous
northerly and north-westerly winds. Several icebergs
even appear to have been found in the Gulf Stream.
It seems from experience that, first towards the end of
June the ice recedes northwards, while between the
banks and the east coast of Newfoundland it remains
longest even after it has disappeared south and south-
east of the banks.

GEOGRAPHICAL RESEARClL—Lieutenant Palat, of the
French Cavalry, has been despatched by the Ministers
of Publicglnstruction and of Commerce on a mission to
the Sahara, his point of departure being Senegal and
his terminus Algeria. The advanced posts recently
occupied by the French in the Senegal, and the pre.
sence of a gunboat on the Niger, are believed to
render the present a favourable moment for such an
expedition. At Tim buo too Lien tenant Pala* will
appear as a French officer, but from this place to
Algeria he will travel as a Moslem doctor. His mis-
sion, though of geographical interest, appears to be
undertaken chiefly with the object of leading the trade
of the Sahara to Senegal on one side and to Algeria on
the other.
METEOROLOGY.— Mr. Clement L. Wragge, F.R.G.S.,
late of the Ben Nevis Observatory, intends to visit
Brisbane shortly, calling at Melbourne and Sydney to
confer with the Queensland Government on matters
relating to meteorological work in Northern Queens-
land and New Guinea. He hopes to establish a station
at Port Moresby. An assistant will carry, on the work
of his Torrens Observatory, near Adelaide, aided by
self-recording and electrically registering instruments,
asidther
ffiesuoltweeil,l henceforth be sent direct to the
Royal Meteorological Society and the Government Me-
teorologicalLis ononcdonn
t
arranging. for the continuance of his observance on
Mount Lofty, South Australia.
c d. with
both
11lr . We f
rag wg hei alsothe
Torrens Observatory
a on of the author
of "Sam Slick," who on a visit to Jamaica,
in a letter
JAMAI CA. —Mr. R. G. Haliburton, s
the
winter in a secluded district of Jamaica, and have ''
been
un,
dated July 6 give a deplorable account of the coFditiori
of the colony. He says: "I have been spend
simply horrified at the truly pitiable state of the
coloured people there. Ninety per cent, of the deaths
and were buried without the aid,
during the past two years were of poor persons who
sickened, died, .
comfort, or attendance of a doctor or clergyman, and
without poor relief, many of them dying of actual
want. Before I was here a fortnight I saved the life .
of a poor woman and her children who were dying of
starvation, sickness, and neglect. Even the people of
Kingston do not know what is the real condition of the '
poor blacks here. A sweeping reform is needed !"
A NOVELTY.—A telephone has
just been brought to
this country from America which is absolutely indes
pendant of electricity, so that batteries, coils, and mile
are quite dispensed with. This oviously
greatly
simplifies the workinz of the instrument, and in the '
"mechanical telephone," which was recently subjected
to a severe test, simplicity and distinctness are claimed
as the chief characteristics. The instrument 000815t8 of
a diaphragm, or sounding-board made of strips of f.
willow wood, which has been found by experiment to
possess a remarkable serbitiveness to sound vibrations.
These strips of wood are closely woven together and
varnished. In the centre of the diaphragm a small disc
of metal is placed, from, which the wire proceeds to any
point desired tin to tV7O iniTes." In recent trials the in-
strument freely- answered to all demands upon it, the.
ticking of a watch, musical !sounds, whispering, &c.,
being heard with great distins'—ess.