The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1878-07-20 00:00:00

EPITOME OF NEWS.

BRITISH AND FOREIGN.

In consequence of the satisfactory result of the Con-
gress. the Emperor of Germany has presented to Prince
Bismarck his full-size portrait painted by Winterhalter.
-

A sad accident befel a boy named Underwood, at
Wynemold Leicestershire, whilst in charge of a waggon and
horses. The horse the boy was riding upon took fright at a
passing bicycle, and threw the boy on to the ground with
such force as to break his neck. The waggon wheels also
passed over his body. Death was instantaneous.
It is stated that the value of land in Cyprus has
gone up a thousand per cent. since the news of the English
occupation was first known.
The tallest princess in the globe I am told is the
Crown Princess of Denmark, who measures 6 feet 2 inches.
She is very fond of dancing, but has often to forego the
pleasure, because, being keenly sensible to ridicule, she does
not wish to have an inadequate partner.—Mayfair.

The Paris Correspondent of The Times says :—" A
young lady, the daughter of Mr. C. K. Hall, an Englishman
in practice here as a French advocate, has just successfully
passed her second examination at the Sorbonne. This entitles
Miss Hall to the University diploma of Bachelor of Arts
(Bachelier Es Lettres)."

Fourteen open carriages have been sent from the
local carriage builders at Warsaw to Astrakan, to be thence
transhipped to Persia for the Shah. His Majesty is stated to
have paid a very high price for them.
A gentleman of my acquaintance who made known
in the usual way that he was in need of a clerk at £7O a year,
received 350 applications.—Mayfair.
Sir Richard Wallace has subscribed £lO,OOO towards
a fund for the erection of a museum of decorative art in
Paris.

-----
The Berlin Treaty of Peace is, it appears, to be
printed on parchment in antique type, each signatory Power
receiving a copy signed by all the Plenipotentiaries. The
printing is to take no more than a single day.

A jack fish, or pike, caught in the Crays River, Kent,
weighing 91bs., by an amateur angler, last week, was found
to have inside it 1 young moorhen and a half-grown rat. It
is by no means uncommon for jack, or pike, to swallow young
wild ducks.

•
The condition of the German Emperor is considered
sufficiently satisfactory by his physicians to dispense with
the issue of daily bulletins.
- -

Speaking at a luncheon on Tuesday, at Littleport,
in connection with the laying of the chief stone of a new
church, Lord ilardwicke referred to the great anxiety with
which the Queen had regarded the recent complications,
and of the gratification they all felt at the happy results
obtained by the Government at the Congress.

A boy named Walden, employed at the Vigo Brick
and Tile Company, Northampton, was engaged in feeding a
machine with clay, when the shovel he was using was caught
by a strap, and before he could release it he was drawn into
the machine and literally cut to pieces, portions of his body
being with difficulty extricated from among the wheels.
An attempt to moderate excessive drinking has
been made in Virginia, it is said, where, in the various
city bars and saloons, a small tax—to be paid by the con-
sumer—is levied on each separate " driuk " served out.
The number of drinks is registered by means of a
bell-
punch—a combination of the gas-meter and a gong struck by
a spring with a hammer attached—and a revenue com-
missioner comes at certain intervals to take the state of the
register. The experiment has not worked very well hitherto
as the bar-keepers dislike the exciseman's visit, and the
customers find it cheaper to drink at home.

A considerable increase has occurred in the impor-
tation of potatoes. In the last six months the value was
£1,799,614, against £848,064 in the same period last year.
I remarked to a sporting friend last Tuesday,
"What a good thing they have got Cyprus!" "Have they
really bought him?" answered he. "What did they give
for him? " Vanity Fair.

A Danish provincial paper published at Thisted,
on the north-western coast of Jutland, contains the follow-
ing paragraph :—" On the sands near the village of Minted
a dead body has been washed ashore sitting in a buoy, and
bearing on a string round the neck a medal, inscribed
on one side, England expects every man to do his duty,' and
on the other, 'Shipwrecked Mariners' Society,' with the year
1878,' and the number 13.' The body, supposed to be that
of some member of an English lifeboat crew, was interred in
the fiansted churchyard, with all honours."
The train which left Paris on Friday at 11.57 a.m.
for St. Malo went off the rails at about 6 p.m. between the
stations of Vitro and Chateaulaourg. The cause of the acci-
dent was not then known. Three passengers were killed—
MM. Guillaume Noiseux, of St. Brien.; and Lafosnis Cahours,
of Laval, and a lady whose name has not yet been ascer-
tained. Nine persons received injuries more or less serious,
among them Mme. Richer, who has since died. The stoker
and one of the guards were killed and the driver injured.
The importation of wheat increases. In the last six
months the value was £15,096,047, against £13,941,553 in
1877.
A telegram from Switzerland says these was a sad
accident at Andermatt on the 9th. At a merry-making in a,
shepherd's hut a petroleum lamp was overturned, the cot-
tage set on fire, and two young men and a young woman
burnt to death.

The ancient custom of assembling on St. Swithin's-
day in the orchards and christering the apples was duly
observed in some parts of Kent and Surrey on Monday. It is
popularly believed that all the apples found upon the trees
on this day will mature and ripen.

At 'Wimbledon, on Monday, the shooting for the
Albert Prize, which was won by Private Humphry, of Cam-
bridge University, was attended with much interest.
Mr, Humphry's score at the three ranges was made up of
eighteen bullseyes, two inners, and a magpie, and thus only
three shots were outside the bullseye disc. At the 200 yards
In this competition there were thirteen highest possible
scores, and Sir Henry Halford made fourteen successive
bullseyes at 200 ard 500 yards. The marksman whose acgre-
gate scores were the same as Mr. Humphry's were Major
Young, of the 30th Middlesex, and sergeant Scrivens, of the
Victories.

A decrease in the exportation of beer has occurred
this year. In the last six months the value was £901,C97,
and in the same period of 1877 £1,075,992.
The Paris Soir has reason to believe that the abdica-
tion of the Emperor William will follow close after the
labours of the Congress.

The Mayor of Preston has received a communication
from the Home Department, stating that the Home Secretary
desires to convey his high approval of the conduct of the
magistracy in their endeavours to preserve public order
during the recent trade disturbances in Lancashire.
Among the recruits brought before the Sheffield
magistrates on Monday to make the necessary attestation
was a youth who had been enlisted on Sunday. The mayor
said it appeared to be most objectionable that a man should
be enlisted on Sunday, and the bench must decline to sign
the enlistment warrant until they had a note from the com-
manding officer explaining how it took place on this occa-
sion.

A Reuter's telegram from New York states that
extraordinary heat has prevailed in the Western States; 150
cases of sunstroke occurred on Monday at St. Louis, fifty
of which proved fatal.
A meeting of the leading inhabitants of Middles-
brough was held on Tuesday, when it was decided to erect
a statue in the Albert Park, Middlesborough, to the memory
of the late Mr. Bolcknow, M.P., the founder of Middles-
brough. committee was formed to carry out the object.
A subscription of £lOO was received from Mr. J. W.
Pease, ALP.
At the Reading Corn Exchange on Saturday, a
parcel of very fine new Poland oats, weighing 4411). per
bushel, was offered, and attracted considerable attention.
The price asked was 345. per qr.
Lady Wentworth, who has been in declining
health for the last two years, rose on Saturday morn-
ing and breakfasted as usual. She afterwards complained
of extreme lassitude, and at the re q uest of her medical
athiser, retired to Ler chamber to lie down. On her maid
enterin:i: the room at half-past eleven o'clock, she found her
mistress dead upon the bed, life having passed away
without the slightest convulsion. The deceased, Fannie,
Lady Wentworth, was third daughter of the late Rev.
Georze Heriot, of Fellow Hills, county Berwick, and vicar
of St. Anne's, Newcastle-on• Tyne. She married, 25th
August, 1869. Lord Wentworth, grandson of George Gordon,
sixth Lord Byron, the celebrated poet, and leaves issue by
her marriage, the Hon. Ada Mary, born in February, 1871.
Mr. Henry Lindsay, eldest son of a Glasgow mer-
chants was drowned on Monday whilst bathing at Dimoor.
He was married only nine months ago. His young wife and
several friends witnessed his struggles, but were unable to
render any assistance.
At the Crystal Palace last Saturday, there was a
great Board School festival, the occasion being the distribu-
tion of 4,000 Bibles and Testaments, presented by Mr. Francis
Peek and the Religious Tract Society to Board school scholars
for proficienc/. in Scriptural subjects. Sir Charles Reed,
chairman of Me School Board for London, in the course of a
brief address, reminded his audience that the Board had de-
cided to give Bible instruction throughout all their schools,
so that now 188,000 children daily heard a portion of the
Word of God read to them, not one child in 4,000 had been
withdrawn from it, and not one complaint had reached the
Board MO !WY PUMA who hag ObicCted to Ulo ttlartLCUlell
giYOU.

There has been an increase in the quantity of gun-
powder exported this year. In the last six months the
value was £197,335, and in 1877 in the same period £169,774.
The fifth annual report of the National Training
School for Cookery is rosy enough to lead one to hope for a
good time coming, when the ordinary Abigail will be able to
cook a kidney.— Whitehall Renew.
The Czar, having had a recent attack of his old com-
plaint, calculus, has been ordered by his physicians, to try
the waters at Kissingen, and he will probably shortly leave
St. Petersburg for that purpose. In addition to Prince Bis-
marck and the Autocrat of all the Russias, there will be an
unusually large number of foreign diplomatists and royal
personages at that famous watering-place this season.—
Whitehall Review.
New Zealand spinach is strongly advocated for
growth for the table. It does not run to seed, is very
prolific, and yields enormously for its size. This is a good
thing, considering how difficult of culture is the ordinary
garden spinach.
A new metal, vermicellite, has been discovered in
boulder clay.
- - - - -

The members of the Liverpool Peace Society, have
passed a resolution which, whilst it expressed satisfaction at
the pacifie solution of political difficulties which the Congress
by this time afforded, deprecated in the strongest terms the
assumption by the Government of territorial and other
responsibilities which were sure to involve enlarged arma-
ments and continued germs of international dissension, that
might hereafter plunge this country into war.
- - - •

- -
The Queen and Princess Beatrice attended Divine
service on Sunday, in the private chapel at Windsor. The
Bev. Canon Barry preached.

- -
An outbreak of pleuro-pneumonia has occurred in
the stock of a farmer, at Over, Knutsford. Out of a hundred
head of cattle eleven have already been affected by the
disease, and ten of the animals have been slaughtered--four
of these during the past week—by order of the local
authority.

At an inquest held at Sheffield on the body of a
labourer named Fryer, who fell from a ladder and sustained
fatal injuries, it was stated that his life would have been
saved had he consented to suffer amputation. He, however,
refused to submit, and said that as he brought all his limbs
into the world, he would tak9 them all out.

A monster concert of Orpheonists took place in
Paris on Sunday, in the Tuileries Gardens, Six hundred
and forty-nine societies took part in the proceedings, and
some 18,000 performers were present at the opening of the
concert at two o'clock.

The Paris Correspondent of The Times, writing on
Monday, says The long-talked of voyage round the
world is at last coming off. The 25 voyagers-12 Frenchmen,
and the rest Russians, Swiss, Belgians, and Germans—had a
parting dinner given to them last night at the Continental
Hotel. M de Lesseps presided, supported by General Tarr,
Mr. H. M. Stanley, and M. de Quatref ages. Headed by M.
Biard, Naval Lieutenant, the organizer of the expedition,
the party will leave Marseilles in the Junon, and will be
absent eleven months. Three professors accompany them,
and will lecture on natural history, geography, physics, and
meteorology."
- -

We have had some notable rainfalls in Great Britain
recently, but they are nothing to what they have been in
Hong-Kong. It was recorded as a remarkable fact some
time ago that we had had 3i inches in 24 hours. In Hong-
Kong, as a correspondent writing on May 31 informs the
Times, they had nine inches of rain in three hours, and
nearly 15 inches in the 24 hours.

Daring the Wimbledon meeting the camp has been
remarkably free from accidents and sickness, the first
serious accident not occurring till Saturday evening. This
was a case of a marker, Private Masey, Royal Marines,
whose great toe was badly crushed by the falling of the
counter weight of the target. Amputation was performed
by Surgeon-Major Elkington, assisted by Dr. Packington,
and Mazey is now doing well.
Postal cards are likely to be introduced into India,
both for overland and inland correspondence, as a result of a
Paris Postal Conference.

During the last few weeks the Moscow Cruiser
Committee has purchased of the "Hamburg New York"
Company four steamers, of the aggregate value of Z 250,000
—Mayfair.
- -

It would save some lives if people only understood
the dangers of typhoid. The Queen of Spain, instead of being
kept quiet at the critical moment, was subjected to visits
from her parents, given anxiety by the sufferings of her hus-
band, aud excited by the forebodings of those about her. No
disease in the world needs more quietness than typhoid. No
disease is more dangerous at the point where the patient
seems to have "turned the corner.' Friends should be told
that successful convalescence depends upon its happy begin-
nin g. —Cou rt Journal.
—--- - - - - -

A meeting of the Birmingham Liberal Association
has been held, at which a letter from Mr. Gladstone was
read, wherein he expressed his gratification that the powerful
agency of Birmingham is about to be employed in leading the
public mind to consider the subject of taxation. The right
hon. gentleman regretted the extravagance of the govern-
ment, which he considers deplorable, and without sign of
amendment.

The Shah wishes to have the telephone "laid on"
from the Imperial Opera at St. Petersburg to his palace at
Teheran, so that he can "hear the stars without paying over
£3OO a night for them." . -

... _
As a fresh instance of the failure of trial by jury in
Russia, a German paper quotes a recent case where a man
who had confessed to the crime of bigamy, and both of whose
wives were produced in court, was acquitted by the jury.

The Conaraittee of the Jewish community at Berlin
have presented an address to Prince Bismarck, warmly
thanking him for the part the Congress has taken, underhis
guidance, in making full equality of creeds an obligatory
condition on which the Principalities in Eastern Europe are
to receive their independence.

The London Gazette of Tuesday night contains the
following announcement, dated July 12:—" The Queen has
been pleased to appoint Lieutenant-General Sir Garnet Joseph
Wolseley, G.C.M.G., K C. 8., to be the Administrator of the
island of Cyprus, under the style of Her Majesty's High
Commissioner and Commander-in-Chief in the said island.
A new war-like appliance is about to be introduced
in‘o the service, and will probably be known as the "hand
torpedo." Like the grenades of half a century ago, they
are intended to be thrown by the hand into the enemy's
boats, or over parapets, or stockades, but instead of being
shells exploded by a fuze as the grenades were, they will
consist entirely of gun cotton pulped and compressed into a
cake or ball of 31b. or 41b. weight. A long cord is attached
to each charge, the other end of which is connected with a
kind of pistol held by the operator. The torpedo is pitched
into the required position, when a touch on the trigger of
the pistol detonates the gun cotton, and an explosion fol-
lows, such as experiment has shown to be sufficient to
shatter in atoms a five-ton block of granite. One such
charge skilfully applied would annihilate a boat's crew, and
in the hands of daring men might work great destruction by
being thrown into large ships

The Mark Lane Express of Monday night says that
with the exception of a few light showers the weather
during the past week has been dry and seasonable, and the
growing crops have made further satisfactory progress, in
spite of the low temperature which has prevailed after sun-
down. The blooming time having passed under favourable
conditions, wheat now looks strong and healthy. Unless
weather of an entirely abnormal character supervenes, a
fair average yield may be anticipated.
The Pope is reported to have addressed a private
letter to each of the Sovereigns of Europe, pointing out the
evils of the present state of seciety, and saying that, as the
Papacy finds itself struggling alone against the general sub-
version of order and morals, the Pontiff makes one more ap-
peal to the Sovereigns to put themselves in accord with him.
Should that appeal fail he believes the time has come for
making common cause with the peoples, in order to save
them from ruin and to preserve the faith.

Mr. Gladstone, replying to the Secretary of a Lan-
cashire Liberal Club In regard to a proposed excursion to
Hawarden, says :—" I am sorry to say I have found it a
matter of necessity to disjoin the matter of visits to
Hawarden Park and Castle from my own personal appear-
ance there. Connecting them has had the effect of making
them equivalent to public celebrations. The rule now laid
down is that the visits of large parties can only take place
before August, and we are also obliged to confine the show-
ing of the Castle, which requires detaching men from their
work, to Saturdays."
- -

During the past month four beasts and 47 sheep
suffering from foot-and-mouth disease, and 22 sheep suffer-
ing from sheep scab, were landed in the port of London,
having come from Amsterdam, Antwerp, Bremen, and
Rotterdam. These, together with 1,314 beasts, 10,958 sheep,
and 738 pigs, healthy animals brought over in the same
vessels, were all slaughtered on landing. No cases were
reported from the other ports.

The Bishop of Manchester, preaching in St.
Matthew's Church, Little Lever, on Sunday evening, urged
the importance of parents sending their children regularly
to school. If a man would only reduce his weekly con-
sumption of beer to the extent of one pot he would be able
to pay his child's fee, and surely he might do that without
regarding ieas a very great act of self-denial. In reading
the accounts of the riots in North-east Lancashire he was
sorry to see that a large proportion of those who had taken
part in them were young people. When he saw these things
he could not lay to his soul the nattering unction that
sducation was training the young people up in the way that it
ehould.
-

There was a Volunteer demonstration at Exeter on
Saturday evening on the return to that city of Private Grat.
wicks, who, on the same afternoon, had won at Wimbledon
the chief Snider prize of the meeting, the St. George's Vase,
the Dragon Cup, and the Gold Jewel. The winner was carried
on the shoulders of his comrades through the streets to the
headquarters, and was loudly cheered on the road.
The Athenaum states that the late Mr. MacGahan
has left behind him, corrected for publication, as much of
Ids experiences of Bulgaria and the Russo-Turkish war as will
form a memorial volume. It will probably be issued under
the supervision of his brother, who has come from the
United States in order to take possession of his personal
effects.

Lord Thurlow presided over a meeting of the
Sunday Society which was held at the town house of Lord
Dorchester, in Berkeley•square, on Saturday afternoon, at
which a resolution was passed, heartily thanking Sir Coutts
Lindsay for the opportunities for moral and intellectual im-
provement that he had given to the public by opening the
Grosvenor Gallery on Sundays; and expressing a hope that
the example thus set by him would hasten the time when
such institutfons as the National Gallery and the British
Museum will be opened on Sunday. The Grosvenor Gallery
was opened on Sunday afternoon, when 563 persons passed
the turnstile.

Mr. Charley, M.P., and Mr. Walker, M.P. ad-
dressed a meeting of members of the Salford Constitutional
Association in Tatton-park, Knutsford, on Saturday, and a
resolution was passed declaring that the gratitude of the
nation was due to Lord Beaconsfield and the Cabinet, who,
In spite cf factious and un-English oppositi in, have so ably
and successfully conducted our Eastern policy, and who, by
their sagacity, forethought, and prudent preparations, have
restored this country to the proud pre-eminence among
European nations which it had forfeited under Liberal
vacillation and misrule.
At an American " Independence " banquet at
Geneva, considerable amusement was caused by the receipt
of the following telegram from Chamounix : "The American
flag is at this moment waving on the summit of Mont Blanc.
It you don't believe it, come and see."
Great fires, supposed to be due to incendiaries, have
been raging throughout a large district of Thessaly. The
harvest, which had been gathered in, is completely de-
stroyed.
Bryant was the richest poet in America. By
journalism and poetry he had accumulated property whose
estimated value is about £lOO,OOO. The people of the
United States propose to erect a statue of Bryant, in the
Central Park, New York, near to the statue of Mazzini,
through attending the unveiling
of which Bryant met his
death.
A fatal case of hydrophobia has occurred in India
among the 19th Bengal Lancers at lleean Meer. The victim
was a non-commissioned officer, who had been bitten by a
dog two months previous to his death.
The miners of Anzir: in France, have struck for
,
higher wages and a reduction of the hours of labour. They
demand five francs a day for eight hours' work. A strike of
the waiting girls in a large restaurant at the Paris Exhibi-
tion is also announced.
There were 2,394 births and 1,589 deaths registered
in London last week. Allowing for increase of population,
the births exceeded by 65, and the deaths by 93, the average
numbers in the corresponding week of the last ten years.
The annual death-rate from all causes, which in the two
previous weeks had been equal to 22•9 and 220 per 1,000,
rose to 23•2. The deaths included 11 from smallpox, 16
from measles, 20 from searlet fever, 8 from diphtheria, 85
from whooping-cough, 19 from different forms of fever, and
249 from diarrhcea.

The Journal des Debats says that the placidity and
tranquillity of the Turkish Plenipotentiaries are now fully
explained, as they must have known of the Convention from
the first, the conclusion of which was probably simultaneous
with the retirement of Mehemed Rudchi in favour of Savfet
Pacha. Lord Beaconsdeld, adds the Debats, has attained his
object, and if a more open policy might have been prefer-
able, it must be remembered that it is not England who
made such a policy unfashionable. "England," says the
Vienna Tagblatt, "pays with money now current in Europo,
a motiey of new coinage, and, Iclia kligWg W 119544 1443gC wag
aporacziptla it Wan."

Prince Leopold hat. been Buffering from a severe
illness, but is now, it is undorstlod, somewhat improved in
health.
The report of the death of the tmperor of Morocco
is contradicted. He is, however, very hi. An insurrection ass
the town of Morocco hss been quelled by thc troops.
It is said that Lord Beaconsfield's private physi:
cian is a disciple of Hahnemann, and that his lordship's
speedy recovery is due to homceopathic treatment.
According to an official document the deClarea
value of eggs imported into the "United Kingdom in' tix
months, ended the 30th nit, was £1,377,06.
The Registrar-General reports that scarlet fever
showed fatal prevalence in Liverpool, Sheffield, and Birming-
ham last week.
The Ven. C. A. St. John Mildmay, Archdeacon of
Essex and rector of Chelmsford, died at Homburg on Satur
day. He was a son of the third Sir Henry raulett Mildmay.
The rectory of Chelmsford is of the value of £6OO, and he the
gift of the Bishop of St. Albans.
- -

Among the British Indian troops now quartered at
Malta, there are (the Jewish World says) some Black Jews,
members of the community of the B'nal Israel, existing on
the coast of Malabar. They claim to be descendants of the
Jews sent by King Solomon to India to collect ivory and
precious stones. They differ very materially from other
Jews in many of their religious ceremonial, and only observe
the Jewish Sabbath and the Passover.

_
Ten British and foreign wrecks were reported
during tl.l past week, making a total of 716 for We present
year, or kdecrease of 286 as compared with the con'N;Pond-
ing period of last year. The approximate value of prOperty
lost was £52,000, including British £27,000.
The wealth which Russia draws from the little-
known Golden Caspian may be estimated from the fact
that, since the breaking-up of the ice on the river Volga, last
May, the fishermen of Astrakan have captured no less than
151,000,000 herrings.—Mayfair.
England is about to be visited by a company of
thirty Knights Templars from Alleghany City, Pennsylvania.
- -

- -
The Queen was every hour informed of the progress
of the discussion on the critical questions, at Berlin.

- -
-- - - --
A telegram in a Paris paper says that the Pope has
had another fainting fit this week, attributed to the oppressive
heat.
-

Tuesday night's London Gazette contains a despatch
from Lieut.-General Thesiger, commanding the troops in
South Africa, respecting the war with the Kaffirs. The
despatch says that the war may now be considered at an
end. "Elements of disturbance will no doubt exist for
some time to come," it adds, "but these can be more
efficiently met by police patrols, than by the action of
military bodies."
The British flag has been hoisted at Cyprus, and
the first step has thus been taken in the course on which the
Government have entered. The next will be the vindication
and explanation of their policy before Parliament, and this
will justly absorb the main interest of the country daring
the rest of the Session of Parliament.—Leader in The Times.
For having a Phrygian cap on the flagstaff in front
of the offices of the newspapei on the day of the nationalfete,
the manager of the Paris Lanterne has been condemned to a
fine of £2O. The charge was, "Exhibition of emblems calcu-
lated to excite rebellion and to disturb the public peace."

There has been a considerable increase in the im-
portations of hams. In the last six months the value was
£995,834, against £633,548 in the same period of 1577, and
£486,630 in the previous year.
The Russians affirm the total amount of the ex-
penditure incurred on the part of their Government for war
purposes to be 988,000 roubles, or about one hundred and
forty minims sterling.
Monday's Magnet says the weather during the past
week has not been so favourable as could be wished. The
temperature has been too low, and consequently the progress
of the crops towards maturity has been hindered. Unless
the weather at once becomes hotter the harvest will probably
tun out to be a late affair.
-

--- -
Every endeavour is being made by the Berlin
physicians to brfng Nobiling round. They have so far
succeeded as to place his life out of danger; but his mind
has completely gone, and all hopes of obtaining genuine
information from him are over. The curious, in fact, are
simply rewarded with maniacal gibberiugs and hysterical
laughter.—Whitehall Review.
Her Majesty has contributed £lOO to the fund in aid
of the sufferers by the Haydock Colliery Explosion.
A garden party was given by the Prince and Princess
of Wales last Saturday afternoon, at Marlborough House, to
her Majesty, who was accompanied by Princess Beatrice.
The Duke of Connaught, the Grand Duke and Grand Duchess
of Hesse, the Grand Duke of Mecklenburg-Strelitz. Prince
and Princess Christian, the Duke of Cambridge, the Duchess
of Teck, and the Duke of Teck were present.
The Shah of Persia has stated that his eldest son
will make a tour in Europe next year.
- - -

"The newest thing in hats is bent on all four sides,
and lined with coloured silk or satin, it is worn at the back
of the head, is fastened by a ribbon on the coiffure, and tied
under the chin. It is decidedly chic. Small bonnets are
also worn. The favourite material is silver straw with dark
green trimmings.— Whitehall Review.
It is the intention of a few young men of good
family to purchase a site in Armenia, in the neighbourhood
of Erzeroutn, to found a monastry in connection with the
Church of England. It will occupy a similar position to the
establishments of Fathers Ignatius and Nugee.
-

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A Madrid telegram says that the taxation n the
financial year ending July, 1878, has fallen short of the
provisions of the Budget by from ten to twenty per cent, in
every branch excepting the Lottery and the Tobacco Budget.
"Dear Heart.—Hopefully awaiting promised letter.
ELVKR.S most favourable. Ready to act on four days'
notice. If not before, meet at gdgfh. What joy. Await
your blessing and zlihv hpendfh. Am close by. Write."—
Advertisement in The Times.

The French Minister of Commerce has decided that
2,600 medals of 300 francs shall be awarded at the Exhibi-
tion, instead of 1,000 medals of 750 francs.
Considerable excitement has been caused in the
district of Tekuch (Roumania), by the sudden appearanceNof
a species of mole, yellowish in colour, 20 centimetres in
length and eight in circumference, of a snake-like appear-
ance, which has already destroyed 120 acres of wheat, part of
the ground being cleared so effectually that it is impossible
to tell what species of grain had been frown thereon. These
animals disappear during the daytime in holes dug in the
earth and come out at night to commence their depredations.
The oldest inhabitant of the district has never seen anything
of the kind before.

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The death is announced at Monnetier, in Savoy, of
Miss Catherine Winkworth, the translator of the poems cem-
prised in the well-known volume called "Lyra Germanica,"
and the writers of the biographies of Amelia W. Sieveking
and of Pastor Fliedner, the founder of the sisterhood of
Protestant Deaconesses, at Kaiserworth. Miss Winkworth
also contributed to the Sunday Library Series a book entitled
"The Christian Singers of Germany."

Correspondents writing from the shooting districts
of Yorkshire in anticipation of the 12th prox. appear to
unite in stating that fair sport may confidently be astici-
pated. The breeding season for grouse was unusually
favourable, and the coveys generally appear to be large.
On Monday Mr. Roberts, the Coroner for Anglesey,
held an inquest at the Menai-bridge Police-station, on the
body of Owen Williams, a booking clerk in the employ of
the London and North-Western Railway Company, who was
drowned while bathing in the Menai Straits on Saturday
night. He was unable to swim, and was carried out of his
depth by the tide The cutter of the Bangor Naval Artillery
Volunteers was going up the Straits for Carnarvon, with a
detachment to join the Goshawk gunboat at Carnarvon, and,
attracted by the screams of the companion who was bathing
with the deceased, the volunteers pulled to the spot. Mr.
Rathborne and Instructor Cress immediately dived from the
cutter into twenty feet of water without waiting to strip
their uniforms, and recovered the body, which was taken
ashore, and efforts were made by Dr. Hughes for resuscita-
tion, but without effect. The jury, in returning a verdict of
"Accidental death," warmly eulogised the bravery of Messrs.
ltathborne and Cron