The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1870-08-27 00:00:00

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utterly

A u REVINANT. "

Mr Edward Legge, Special Correspondent of the I ri4ll
Times has written teem St. ATold to contradkt the ,port
that ha was shot tlaosith the head In the Iwilabartimeut
of
Bsazlnneken and St. Johann on the 2nd inst.

THE TROVISLES' OF A NEWSPAPER CORRESPONDENT:

• •
If a real spy be only half as much bothered and Insulted
as a wretched man who is viewed askai cc with questioning
eye and suspected of harbouring sinister designs, it must be
quite the most unpleasant trade in which a man can posPibly
embark (writes a Newspaper Correspondent). Every °Ulcer
appears to consider himself a policeman, 111141 atfeeibmitely
makes most pressing inquiries ad to who you are, where you
are going. whence you came, end what is your liminess. If
you satisfy him he appears disappointed, and leaves you with-
out a word of thanks for your information. As to a passport
once across the frontier it is of no more use than
waste paper, and the polite request made by (Iran-
vile George Earl Granville, Viscount Granville,
Baron Leveson, Peer of the United Kingdom, dcc &c.,
! Is treated with as little ceremony as though it were preferred
by Mr. John Smith, tradesman, artisan, voter, ai.d member
of a trade union of England. These things area great nuis-
ance but cannot, I presulne. be avoided in war. Fortunately,
I had letters wKIT me that secureT my pasaage to the
" front ," but It was amusing to see the way in vehicle the
handwriting of the address Wee scrutinised, the seal turned
round and round,and carefully examined from every point of
view, and each letter in it deciphered.

A VISIT TO AN HOSPITAL.

" Having but little or nothing to do at Woerth, while the
hones were devouring their scanty allowance of dust and
hay. I went over the hospitals. still tilled w,th the wounded '
from that fatal field. The arrangements were areal.% the
rooms large and ventilated, anti all armlet:ices for the alle-
viation '.f pain that could be ob'ained were freely med. 11l
one hospital there were thirty men, nearly all French,
severety wounded, and under the care of three surge's..
teethe day after the action, they had had 300 men under their '
charge. The chief interest that attaches to a study of the
surgical history of the warts with reference to the influence
of modern projectiles and the description of wounds that they
produce, the conical bullet now in use is so differently
shaped to Its round predecessor, and the velocity imparted to
It so much greater than was forn.rly possible, that the as-
sumption of Its pursuieg a different course and producing
wounds totaby unlike, is at once justPed. It does not
appear, however, to be alwass tile s.a.e. The practl. e
does not quite bear ont the theory For instance.
in the case of one man I raw at Weerth, a bullet had
entere treat the breast.bone on the right elite, coursed round
the rib ander his arm-pit, and emerged at the point of his
ahoulder-olade on the same side, thus performing a feat nut
unworthy of the old round ball of queen liedt. The vast
majority, Intact nearly al, the wounded were victims of the
needle yun, the chassepot, or the mitraitcuse ; and it is
curious to have to state that the wounds produced by the
long bullet of the latter weapon differed but very little from
the others. In almost every instance the course of the bullet
had been direct, the openings left between the entry Sad art
being Weight. This was evidenced in a few remarkab'e
cases. A bullet had entered a man's upper lip, torn down a ,
portion of the roof of his mouth on the left hid.,rent through
the soft palate Oil the sight side and come out lower d 'an
on the back of his reek. Another bullet entered a mates
left eye, passed round the back of his nose. which it bu`ged
forward, and made its exit under the Lel of the right eye. 00
the other hand, a bullet pared in front of ad suave's wlrd.
pipe, entering on the left and emerging on the right side,
without doing hlm any very serious injury ; and in another
Instance the ball had entered a man's neck behind the gullet
and windpipe and in front of the vine, passing out eta point
similar ill situation at the opposite side, wlthout causing
more Inconveuience than some difficulty In swallowing fore
few days. However, it would be out of place here to describe
the 'Aloofly sights that met one at every turn. Let those who
think war a glorious thing inspect but one battle field, and
.visit the hospitals fore few days after, and he will return a
wiser and more thoughtful man. I spoke to one very j.dly
feliow, a Frenchman, with his right leg smashed to bits. A
small present of two cigars cheered him up wonderfully, and
he told me all about himself—where he was struck, awl
how long he had lain upon the ground, lie asked him tf
Phalsburg bad fullest ; and when I assured him that it still
held out he got quite excited. 'Alt,' he said, 'lt Is not all
a Padeburie, 1:140., arid diniabUra still remain—
and Meta. Why, Mete hos never been taken. Rut,' he ad-
de I, and hie countenance fell,'lts out des millions des
hommes.'"--Correspondent of the Dailg Telegraph.

THE " SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT IN

" but to attempt to enter one of the detached ferts just at
present is about as difficult and aa hazardous a thing ae to
penetrate Mtn the harem of the Shah of l'ersla, or to attend
one of her Majesty's drawing-co ms in corduroys and a
billycoek hat ; while the fosses of the lines of circumvallation,
which Paris owes to M. Tillers, are full of !temente de vile,
who hide behind heaps of rubbish, and spring catlike en their
prey wheriever they happen to see it in the shape of an in-
quisitive tourist, with a race-glass thing at his hip, peephig
into a ditch. Collared by the municipal functionary, and
with a furious mob of five hundred patriots—, ho I
always seem ready, at a moment's notice, to start
from the bowels of the earth—following at his beet.,
shaking their fists, and shrieking ' A mort lee esphins
the Curious Impertinent, race glass and all, is hauled
off to the nearest guardhouse, there to be arraigned
as a Prussian spy. A dozen witnesses are sure to I
rush forward to swear that they saw him purehue a map of
the Veatre of war in the Rue de PAncienne Comb tie only
last Thursday, and that he subsequently proceeded td the
Cale du Nouveau Monde, where, in a strong German accent,
he ordered a bock, and offered successively in payment for
his beer a 'souverain anglais'—which very likely the poor !
devil did—a Russian rouble note, and two and a half lens-
Sian silbergroschen. Then, when he ha, exhibited his
' papers,' and has striven to exculpate himself in that
French which he acquired under the tuition of the 'resi-
dent Parisian ' at Perfunctory House Academy for Young
Gentlemen, Denmark-hill, S —when he has been ques-
tioned, cross-queetioned, bristled and bullied half out
of his life, he may be bidden to go about his business
—the ietimatien being frequently coopled with a strong h hat
that he had better leave Paris by the next trete. Adven-
tures quite as ludicrous, and quite as disagreeable, as the one
I have just li ditty sketthed, have happened during the past
week to at least helf-a-dczen of my acquaintances—amateur
'special.,' if I may so term them ; bet, the significant warn-
ings they have received notwithstanding, they are not to be
deterred from their mission of inquiry ; and were even two
or three of them really to get sh.d. as Prussian spies, I am
of opinion that their fate woidd but serve—as Voltaire
ironically, but, as it turned out, truthfully, remarked in the
case of Admiral Byng—poer eoe,soooger lei autree—The
Paris Correspondent of Daily Telegraph.