The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1879-02-22 00:00:00

Misttlialteons

HOME, FOREIGN, AND COLONIAL.

LUMPSUCKER FISH AS FOOD.—Miss Kelman, who
is giving cookery lectures at Weymouth, writes :
"The lumpsucker arrived all safe, and was exhibited
at my first lesson, cooked at my second. I found the
fish very good to eat, and the pink colour changed in
the process of cooking (with a little lemon juice put in
the water), so that the flesh looked white and nice when
cooked. A very large quantity of fat floated on the
surface of the water, and the fish had a flavour a little
like halibut--Frank Buckland, in Land and Water.
LAND OH !—The easiest way to obtain an estate is
to take your wife and children for a foreign tour; be-
cause when you land in England you will become a
"landed famaily."—Fun.

A NEW "CONNECTOR."—At a recent meeting at
the Academy of Sciences, in Paris, a description as
rgaivtueas or French
eeene u
connector,"
or ao l ffic e o
designed
r ff) y
electric p a
himself
aaepda
French engineer, for which it isc
enable the captain or officer commanding.fh.
laedthaatmiant 701!
is vessel, to
war to himseli manceavre the engines o
last an account was
ivnecrrseeatsheeoter d,fercerme ;hitr;;Adie3:eoh
ship, even
stop,ea if
no
er
eer
se:
sa r y from the rigging. 1
some experiments ma .
corvette
of e 450
connector noil l
horse-power. Dgiven to the Academy of
f the results a
esultasimobiltaarineadppdaurraitifs
fitted on board the Desarx, a screw of 1,640
tons displacement,
uring driventhbeyeeentgirinals es t
worked in a m. ost satisfactory manner ; but, as it was
considered witsehrenaopt
ptaoraatttuesmwpat
atoaotmtauehched intet
ahevafilrvset
experiments,
he machinery only, thereby giving the operator on
daectk the power of altering the speed of the engines,
but not of setting them in motion or reversing them.
To render the accomplishment of these latter opera-
tions feasible, it was necessasy that the connecter
should be arranged to act upon the starting gear, to
move which in a vessel like the Desaix two men are
required; and this problem has now been solved by
interposing betweeneau ry e
the apparatus
of e
and
one
a
e axis
exiosoe and
a
He
ear _
of the
pa mower. A working model of the inven-
tian was exhibited at the Academy, and acted, it is
stated, with the greatest regularity aad certainty.
TALL WRITING I—The Evening Standard remarks :
"It is impossible for an English pressman to read an
American paper without experiencing a mortifying
consciousness of the tameness of his own mild de-
scriptions by the side of the brilliant flights of fancy
in which his Transatlantic rival indulges, even when
treating the most prosaic of circumstances. A de-
scription of a billiard match is with us dull
reading, however exciting the struggle may have been
to those who witnessed it. As an example, however,
of what may be made out of even so unpro-
mising a subject as this,
we quote the following
extracts from an account in the Rew YO2* Times of a
billiard match between Gallagher and Sexton.
Gallagher, we may premise, went away with the lead.
'Sexton once more approached the table, and with
almost inevitable and overwhelming defeat staring
him in the face, played with the wild desperation of
despair, while the spectators sat in spell-bound silence
watching his struggle to retrieve his lost ground.
Though conflicting emotions of hope and fear were
visible in his ashen features, his hand betrayed no sign
of nervousness, as seizing the cue, and resting upon it
awhile to calculate upon difficult position shots, he struck
the refractory balls again and again to lessen the
crushing power of Gallagher's lead.' A hundred and
eighty-four were scored, 'then the player misaed
on a ' double-cushion ' carom, having in a-4-..e splendid
run swept over the yawning gap, ad almost closed
upon his adversary. The latter trembled as he felt
the hot breath of his pursuer at back, his courage
deserted him, and his baud failed him after ha had
made two strides further towards the goal he ki ad
been so swiftly speeding to. Sexton overrode the
obstacle, and sped forward, but tripped and fell in a
position from which he could cartaiely have wrested
victory from his opponent even then.' Br the side of
such a description as this, the narrative of the battle
of Peiwar, as told by our correspondent, is tame and
dull ' • and we can only feebly wonder if its writer could
make se Much of a billiard match, in whist terms
would he describe a battle between two great -,ikTiea.'•


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