The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1879-04-12 00:00:00

Our Knltlon Corresponknt.

We dm it right to state that we do not at all V*lo:s
klentits ourselves with our Correspondent's opinions.]

We hear little of the Queen in her Italian villa, for
It was her Majesty's intention to spend the month
as quietly as possible under the incognito of the
Countess of Balmoral. When the Queen is at home
she has special hours and special days for particular
departments of her work. Family administration
and imperial administration are the two chief heads
tinder which these duties may be ranked. Her
Majesty has extensive family connections through-
out the whole of Europe. These she maintains by
an active correspondence, and the whole of one day in
the week is devoted to writing letters to absent rela-
tives. There are other private affairs of Royalty not
less exacting. All accounts, all bankers' pass-books,
all estimates of expenditure, are in some shape
or other rersonally presented to the Queen. Mid-
way between this comprehensive class of occu-
pations and the active duties of an Imperial Crown,
there is an immense number of miscellaneous trans-
actions to be disposed of, The officials about the
Court are besieged with telegrams from the outside
world; and it is rare indeed when, even in the depths
of the long vacation at Balmoral, they reach a
smaller daily total than fifty. Of course, only a com-
paratively small proportion of these enter the Royal
presence; but those which do reach the Throne in-
variably require consideration, and usually receive a
tagply. Thus it is that the Queen gives three hours a
week, on alternate days, to the attention of telegrams
alone. Closely allied with this work is the despatch
of messages from the Crown to its subjects. In
most cases the Sovereign acts in this matter
entirely on her own initiative. If it is a domestic
disaster, an accident by land or sea, an ex-
plosion in a coal mine, or a railway collision,
the Sovereign would not as a matter of course
confer with the Minister of State. But when
the announcement made is of a weightier character—
a communication of encouragement addressed to a
military or naval commander in time of war—nothing
would be done without the approval of the Cabinet
Minister responsible for that particular department.
Those who are accustomed to the routine of the
Queen's daily life, assure us that it is only by a com-
bination of expedition and method, and of indefatigable
industry, that her Majesty has achieved the reputa-
tion of being a model woman of business as well as a
pattern constitutional monarch.
During the Crimean war it will be in the memory
of many now living how, in the Royal Patriotic
Fund, the nation showed its appreciation of the
heroism of our soldiers who lost their lives in the ser-
vice of their country in scaling the heights of the
Alma, in riding into the Valley of Death at
Balaklava, in holding their own against over-
whelming odds at Inkermann, and dying from cold
and exposure in the trenches before Sebastopol. The
movement in favour of the Patriotic Fund ran from
city to city, from town to town, and from village to
village, like the electric current. The provision for
the wives and families of thousands of men required a
great effort, and a great effort was made. From that
day until the time when the story of Isandula was
told in this land, nothing has so stirred the souls of
the people of our islands as the narrative of that

gallant and heroic defence against overwhelming
odds. "Theirs but to do and die," as the Laureate
wrote of the Six Hundred, and die they did. Had
they been contending with a civilized foe, they
might have surrendered; but no mercy was to be
expected from savages. Knowing that their lives
must be sacrificed, they sold them as dearly as
possible; and now that the tale of their devotion
has been told, the public is corning forward to raise a
fund which shall keep from poverty the relatives of
the brave fellows who were dependent upon them.
Started upon the Stock Exchange, it passed into the
hands of the Lord Mayor, and several thousand pounds
have flowed into the Mansion House for this very
laudable purpose.
King Cetewayo, we know, at least by repute, but

who is King Thee-Baw? He is the Sovereign of

..
Btuinah, of which country we have heard a great
deal of late, in connection with what many fear to be
an impending war. Of the internal affairs of Burmah
we know indeed little beyond the fact that absolutism
has again got the upper hand after a spell of con-

stitutionalism, such as it was, that lasted a little
over three months. The nobles appear to have
miscalculated the strength of their own moral force,
weakened as that was by shortcomings in purity of
hands and singleness of heart, when opposed to the
will of the king prompted by palace intrigue, and
supported by the physical strength at the disposal of
the prescriptively despotic throne. The barons of
Barmah omitted to note the lack of moral and
physical support, furnished by the aspirations of the

people, which is the ultimate backbone and solid

maintenance of a successful revolutionary reform. The
Burmese, as a nation, have not learned to care for
those things which inspire the breasts of freedom.
loving peoples; but the seed has been sown, and
though it may lie long in the earth, those who are
well able to form an opinion tell us that it will in-
fallibly germinate. Thus far King Thee-Baw shows
no symptoms of an inclination to abuse the powers
which appertain to his newly-achieved position.
The story of the life of Professor Edison, whose

_
name has attained such celebrity in connection with
the electric light, is one of the most remarkable addi-
tions to the lives of self-made men which this century
has produced. At twelve he began to earn his living
as a train-boy on the Grand Trunk Railway of Canada.
Now it should be explained that a train-boy combines
the sale of newspapers with that of apples, peanuts,
and figs. Young as he was, the lad soon showed the
metal of which he was made, and gave promise of his
brilliant future. An old baggage car was given up to
him for the purpose of storing his wares. By making
friends with some of the printers of a Detroit journal,
into which town his train ran, he managed to buy
iome founts of old type, and started the Grand
Trunk Herald, a weekly sheet edited and printed by

himself on the cars, the contributors being all railway
hands. It had the honour of being specially noticed in
The Times, to which some English traveller sent
a copy, as the only newspaper in the world printed in
a railway train, The young train-boy united the
study of chemistry with the pursuit of journalism,
but a bottle of phosphorus happened to break and
ignite one day, and set the baggage-car in flames,
nearly burning the train, whereupon the irate con-
ductor hurled chemicals, printing press, and all the
rest out of window—and there was an end to ex-
periments in the train. Years rolled on, and Mr.
Edison took as his wife a lady telegraphic operator
whose soft and nimble fingers attracted the shy
student's notice as she worked at her instrument.
Two of the little ones who crowd on to his knee when
he comes home from work are named Dot and Dash,
after the letters of the telegraphic alphabet.
This year's Exhibition of the Royal Academy pro-
mises to be one of the best which has been brought
together for years, notwithstanding the adverse times,
and in spite of the fact that none but the very well-
to-do can afford such luxuries as expensive pictures.
At the dinner, which always takes place on the even-
ing of the last Saturday in April, and where philo-
sophers and statesmen, without distinction of party,
assemble at the same hospitable board, the new
President, Sir Frederick Leighton, will this year take
the chair for the first time. To receive an invitation
to the Academy Banquet is one of the coveted dis-
tinctions regarded with pleasure by even our most
eminent men. It was at the Academy dinner of
1870 that Charles Dickens made his last public
speech, when he pathetically referred to the death
of Daniel Maclise, only a few weeks before—little
dreaming that in a little more than a month he
would have taken his place for ever within the walls
of Westminster Abbey. The Banquet invariably pre-
cedes the opening of the Exhibition on the first Monday
in May, when an enormous crowd passes through the
galleries of Burlington House. One cannot be sur-
prised that such a multitude should assemble to witness
this collection, for it represents the best works of our
most eminent artists—works which have cost many of
them years of patient labour. Art critics have thus the
best opportunities of judging of the genius of the pre-
sent and the past—between the productions of to-
day and those of the immortal old masters in the
National Gallery.

Good Friday is a time which to those who have good
memories, brings back at the bidding of the mind a
roll-call of recollections descriptive of events which
have taken their place in history. On the evening of
Good Friday, 1865, the momentous news arrived in
this country that the great struggle in the Western
Republic which for four years had threatened to rend
that land in twain, was practically at an end. On the
morning of Sunday, the 3rd of April, just as Mr. Cob-
den lay dying at his house in Suffolk. street, Pall Mel,
a messenger came to Mr. Jefferson Davis, as he sat in
his church pew at Richmond telling him that the
flank of General Lee had been turned, and that the
Southern confederacy had ceased to exist. This intelli-
gence reached England on the evening of Good
Friday; and singularly enough, at that very time
the telegraph wires were flashing throughout the
length and breadth of the American Union the news
of the assassination of President Lincoln in a Washing-
ton Theatre. After four years of a voyage over a
stormy political sea, the shipmaster had brought his
vessel safely into port only to be shot down an he stood
at the helm. Well might the civilised world recoil in
horror from the contemplation of the senseless crime
of Good Friday, 1865—a crime which is peculiarly
repugnant to the most ordinary feelings of common
humanity, even amongst the dwellers in the lands

which have never yet been taught the value and the
sanctity of life.
Twelve months ago the Bitting of Parliament be
tween its meeting and the Easter Recess was one of
the largest on record. It lasted three months, for the
Legislature met very early—in the middle of January,
and did not separate for the Easter holidays until the
second week in April. Very grateful were the Lords
and Commons for the relief thus afforded. They had
left their country mansions in the depth of winter,
when the days were almost at their shortest, and when
the wind was sweeping pitilessly through the leafless
trees; and returned to find them surrounded by the
bursting vegetation of returning Spring. This year
the time between the assembling of Parliament for the
ordinary work of the session, and the Easter Recess
has been very short—not more than seven weeks;
for owing to the December session, summoned
specially to deal with the Afghan business, the two
Houses were not convoked for the usual routine
work until the middle of February. In December the
chambers adjourned after discussions in each upon the
Afghan policy of the Government. At Easter they
separate after divisions upon the Ministerial course
which has been pursued with respect to South Africa,
The House of Commons has been placed by the Chan-
cellor of the Exchequer in possession of his estimates of
the revenue and the expenditure for the ensuing year,
and the apprehensions of a considerable increase of
taxation have not been borne out. Twopence per lb.
additional upon a luxury like cigars is not a grievance
to the great bulk of the body politic; and although
there were fears of another penny upon the Income-tax,
and of an increased duty upon tea, as shown by the with-
drawal of vast quantities of the latter from bond a few
days before the Budget, it is satisfactory to know that
these have not been realised. And so the Income-tax
remains at fivepence in the pound, which, by the way,
is twopence less than when it was revived by Sir
Robert Peel in 1842, for the purpose of sweeping away
the excisable duty upon hundreds of articles upon
which the tax-gatherer then laid his hand more or less
heavily, but which are now absolutely free.
The members of the Legislature are not alone in
looking forward to the Easter holidays, The recess
is a kind of breathing time for many classes and
interests; and although there is no longer a Volunteer
Review on Easter Monday. as there used to be, our
citizen soldiers do not fail to take advantage of the
day in some way or other, at all events so far
as those in the metropolis are concerned. There
were two reasons why the Review fell into dis-
use. In the first place military critics declared
that its utility was doubtful, and that the bring-
ing together of a large nuraber of men for a few
hours of evolution effected no good purpose. It was
generally held at Brighton, Dover, or Portsmouth,
each of these towns being within an easy distance of
London. But the railway companies found that the
conveyance of the volunteers from the metropolis to
either of these places and back, practically put a stop
to their excursion traffic on one of the principal holi-
days in the year; and seeing that eminent military
authorities had such a poor opinion of the review, the
Boards of Directors gradually came to the conclusion
that they could not make such a sacrifice for a mere
piece of show and pageantry. If the country was
invaded, of course the railway companies would carry
the soldiers from one end of the land to the other free
of cost; but to turn away thousands of excursionists
from their stations on the first Bank Holiday of the
year, when people were anxious to get away from the
crowded town to the seaside for a few hours, was more
than a public body could reasonably be called upon to
do. Yet the Volunteers contrive to get an outing on
Easter Monday notwithstanding, and to reap some
benefit from the change which they are thus enabled to
obtain from the ordinary duties of life.