The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1879-08-09 00:00:00

ANOTHER BLOW FOR THE HOUSE
OF SPAIN.

On Tuesday morning the deoth took place of the
Infants Maria del Pilar, the second sister of the King
of Spain. She had been taking the baths at Escoriaze,
in the Basque provinces, and was seized with a nervous
fit, followed by congestion of the brain, after a ball
given by the local authorities. The deceased was born
on the 4th June, 1861, and consequently had just com-
pleted her eighteenth year.
The Times, in noticing the melancholy event, remarks :
Another heavy blow has fallen upon the sorely
smitten Royal House of Spain. Death has chosen
once more an immature victim in the family circle of
the youthful king. The Infanta Maria del Pilar, the
eldest of King Alfonso's unmarried sisters, was
stricken a day or two ago with catalepsy and nervous
f ever, at the watering-place of Escoriaza. She sank
rapidly, and before the King and the Princess of Astu-
rias, who were summoned in haste from the Palace of
San Ildefonso, had reached her bedside, she had passed
away. The deceased Princess. who had just entered her
nineteenth year, was in the direct line of succession to
the Spanish throne. King Alfonso is a widower and
childless ; his elder sister, the Princess of the Asturias
ie a widow and childless. The Infanta Maria del
Pilar, and her sisters, the Infantas Maria della. Paz
and Maria Eulalia, were recognised as next heirs by
the Constitution of 1876. A gloomy destiny ap-
pears to enfold the hopes of the restored dynasty.
The treeic end of the young Qieen Mercedes pro-
feundly affected the whole of Europe. The death, a few
menthe ago, of one of her younger sisters revived the
impression made by that painful event. And now
another girl's life has been sadly and suddenly closed
in the same household. The Spaniards are prone to
superstition, and their pity wilt probably be mingled
with alarm at this strange a :cumulation of disasters.
They will begin to cespair of the continuence of the
Royal power in the family of Ferdinand VII.. The
letaeta Maria del Pilar they will bethink them, was
under the highest heavenly protection. She borrowed her
name, like so Pettey of her humbler country women from
her sainted patroness of Z arage ze, the jewel-decked
" Virgin of the Pillar," whose antique image, with its
blackened jasper pedestal, is reported by tradition to
have been broueht to Spain by angels. Yet death has
not spared her in her youthful prime of beauty, with
the prospect before her, as rumour went, of a happy
and exalted marriage. Her alliance with one of the
Austrian Archdukes was enppo.se i to form part of a
settled policy, another and more important part of
which was the negotiation of the King's betrothal with
a Princess of the House of Hapsburg.
In spite, however, of the evil omens, too plainly
embodied in domestic misfortunes which have
darkened the prospects of the restored monarchy in
Spain, there is less ground than there has usually
been in that country for apprehensions about the
immediate future

NEW GOLDFIELDS IN. TASMANIA.
New goldfields have been discovered in Tasmania,
At least, so says the Melbourne Argus, on the author
rity of its Launceston correspondent, who announced
the advent in his city of a man with seventy ounces of
gold obtained on the Pieman River, west coast of
Tasmania, and the prompt departure from Launceston
of a large number of diggers, bound for the new work-
ings. These men have embarked in a coasting steamer
which will convey them to Piemau River, whence
they tramp it for seventy miles through the bush
to the locality that has proved so prodmAive
~f the precious metal. A vessel named the Little
Matta, which arrived at Circular Head on the 23rd of
last May, brou4ht the'news that a party of three men
were " realising" an ounce and a half of gold per diem
at the new dißgings. This irrelligence naturally
caused coupiderable excitement in Melbourne, whence
it appears to have ben telegraphed to all parts of the
4ustralian continent. The population of Tasmania
may be expected to increase with extraordinary
rapidity should further exploration and experiment
confirm the statements of the lucky diggers who have
already come into Launceston With their treasure,
There is nothing like the disnovery of gold for giving a
brisk fillip to the development of a backward colony.—
Daily Telegraph,