The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1876-04-15 00:00:00

4- -11 GOLD FOR IRON."

The enthusiasm at the beginning of the century,
when the Germans of all States and ranks rose to
throw off the yoke of Napoleon, was immense.
There had been nothing like it since the enthusiasm of
the French at the beginning of the revolutionary were
when Republican France round herself confronted by
nearly all Europe. The youth of Germany flocked
to the standards of their leaders, and those who were
unable to tight contiihnted their wealth in support
of the national cause. A vast number of gold and
silver rings were handed to the Government by per-
sons who could not afford to present money; and it
has always been understood that in return iron rings
were given, which the patriots wore as a mark of the
highest honour. Many of these iron rings are said
to have had inscriptions, the most common beitz,
"Gold I gave for iron." Curiously enough, the
director of the Brandenburg Museum has issued an
appeal, in which he says that, although many thou-
sand iron rings must have been made at the Govern-
ment flundry and cistributed thronghout the country,
he ha a never been able to obtain a specimen.
He therefore begs that some person interested
in.; he museum will either favour him with one, or
tell him where one can be obtained. He adds that,
as no mention of the iron rugs is made in the
records of the Government foundry, be would be
obliged for information as to the time and place of
their manufacture. After .11, may not these rings be
of mythical origin? It may be shocking to patriotic
sentiment to suggest this • but if they were made in
such vast numbers as alleged, surely some trace of
them would now be found without much difficulty.
Even if they were real, we -do not see that they are
articles to be very proud of, for all who wore them
were evidently quite as anxious that their good deeds
should be known as-about the good deeds themselves.

A NOVEL INDUSTRY.

An industry of quite a novel character, says Consul
Playfair in his report on the trade and commerce of
Algeria for the past year, promises to spring up in that
country. Immense sums of money are annually spent
by the fishermen of Franca in obtaining cod roe as bait
for the sardine fisheries Not only is that substance
increasing in price every year, but the quantity pro-
curable is qu,te insufficient to meet the demand. It is
proposed to utilize the locusts which periodically in.
vale the colony in immeesq numbers, and are nearly
ai ways to be found in the south, as a substitute. Toe
Governor-General has sent 1,000 kilos of these in-
sects, prepared and salted, to France, and this result,
it is stated, is sufficiently successful to warrant the
experiment being tried on a larger scale. This scheme,
although at first eight it may appeer disagreeable to
the Algerian locusts, can hardly, on reflection, fail to
commend itself to their reason. The locust has of late
entirely lost the respectable position it once occupied
of being fit for food. Locusts and wild honey are
never seen now on any breakfast table, and, as the
locust requires a vast amouns_of sustenance for its own
consumption, it is looked upon as an intolerable
nuisance in those countries it honours by its visits. If,
however, the sardines take to the locusts as baits,
these insects will at least be entitled to the credit of
being instrumental in providing food for the human
race, and may possibly at no distant date resume their
place on the table.—Pall Mall Gazette.