The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1884-11-01 00:00:00

A NOVEL MATRIMONIAL AGENCY.

The Evening Standard has the following: It seems
that the young men of the period in New York so
appreciate the freedom conferred on them by celibacy
that they avoid wedlock, and young ladies are com-
plaining of this state of things. According to the
American papers, a missionary has come forward to
their assistance, and has started a marriage bureau of
a rather novel description. He has done this out of
pure sympathy, he says, with single women, and to
promote marriage, which he holds to be an excellent
institution. But he has also taken care that the matri-
mental office shall prove a profitable concern for him-
self. The missionary charges all his customers a fee of
five dollars, and having paid this, they are free to take
their choice. He offers them a paper to be filled up
by subscribers, in which each person writes down his
or her particular tastes, habits, wishes, hopes, and so
on. The male applicants search in the papers re-
served for ladies, and the ladies in those filled up by
gentlemen, and when a kindred spirit has been found,
ho or she is communicated with. In this way, it is
said, a good many happy marriages have been made,
and a good number of dollars have been paid to the
missionary. In the event, moreover, of the union
contracted under his auspices turning out unhappy,
the parties can again apply to him with advantage to
themselves. On payment of another five-dollar fee
this useful individual will undo what has been done
through him, and get any couple who may apply a
divorce.

IC DE CASSAGNAC'S GOOD FORTITNB,
The Marseilles papers furnish further particulars
respecting the death of M. Jullien, reported on Thurs-
day, and of his friendship for M. de Cassagnac. On
Monday evening M. Jullien, who had long beer
Buffering from a painful disease, and had repeatedly
expressed his intention of putting an end to his misery,
unobserved by his wifo and a female servant then in
the same room, crawled to an arm-chair in a corner,
from which he took a small pocket pistol and shot
himself in the mouth. The bullet having penetrated
the brain' he fell lifeless at once. The frjendship of
deceased for M. de Cassagnac began in 1879. At that
time the election of the latter as Deputy for Condom
had been quashed and fresh elections ordered. Mde
Cassagnac made an appeal to his friend through his
paper, the Pays, for funds to carry on the electioneering
campaign. Among the persons who responded was
M. Jullien, whom he did not know. The letter re-
ceived by M. de Cassagnac announced to him the
astounding but most welcome news that not only the
writer undertook the entire expense of the approach-
ing election, but, in addition, intended making him
his heir there and then. Shortly afterwards M. de
Cassagnac, duly re-elected for Condom, insisted upon
M. Jullien settling a million of francs upon Madame
Jullien for her lifetime. As already stated, M. Jullien
stood godfather to M. de Cassagnac's first-born, while
the ex-Queen of Spain acted as god-mother. The
day the child, a boy, was baptised, M. Jullien placed
the title-deeds of a mansion on the Boulevard Males-
herbes in the cradle. Some people are born lucky.—
Galignani.

The new Cathedral of St. Saviour at Moscow is a
remarkable structure. It was built to commemorate
the departure of the French army from Moscow.
The style is ancient Russian. The five copper
cupolas, for the gilding of which was required 900
pounds of gold, cost £170,000. The domes are sur-
mounted by crosses, the centre one being thirty feet
high and 340 feet from the ground. The largest bell
weighs twenty-six tons. The whole edifice is faced
with marble, the doors are of bronze, ornamented
with Biblical subjects and lined with oak. The prin-
cipal entrance is thirty feet high and eighteen feet
broad. Two of the doors weigh thirteen tons, and
the total cost of all the doors was £62,000. It is in
the form of a Greek cross. The walls are adorned
with frescoes illustrating the chief events in the his-
tory of the Russian Church. Throughout the build-
ing are many of the most remarkable paintings pro-
duced by Russian artists. The whole cost of the
sfracture is placed at £2,250,000 sterling, and it is
uid to be capable of containing 10.000 worshippers.