The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1884-10-18 00:00:00

eitr Kuhn Cartspbtnt.

(Ws den it right to state that 14,3 do not at all times
identiff ourselves with our Correspondent's opinions.]

The Viceroyalty of India is the most responsible
and the most splendid position in the gift of the
Crown. It has been held by statesmen and adminis-
trators of the very highest rank and reputation.
Those who can carry their memories back to the days
of the Indian mutiny, more than a quarter of a
century ago, will be able to form some idea of the
terrible time spent at Calcutta by Lord Canning and
his advisers, and to estimate the value of capacity of
the first order in a sudden emergency. It must be
borne in mind that then there was no communication
with India by telegraph, as there is to-day, and that
the mutiny had been in full swing for an entire month
before we heard of it in this country. Lord Palmer-
ston was Prime Minister, and at once summoned Sir
Colin Campbell to his counsels. Giving him the
command of the British forces in India, he asked the
veteran soldier when it would be convenient for him
to start. "To-morrow morning" was the prompt
reply. It does not take a bachelor long to pack his
carpet bag, more especially when a great dependency
is menaced with insurrection. -

The Earl of Dufferin, who is now on his way to
succeed the Marquis of Ripon in the Indian Vice-
royalty, has had a wide experience of governing
British dependencies and of representing his country
at foreign courts. He has ruled over the vast
Canadian Dominion, with its ice-bound rivers, its
great stretches of lone land, its rising cities, its gloomy
forests, and its snow-covered plains, just as ho
will now exercise sway over the enormous popu-
lation of Hindostan, the gilded mosques of its
busy towns carrying back the imagination to the
glowing descriptions of that land of Ormur and of
Ind, which was a power in the great continent of Asia
long before the disco Very of the pushing Western
world by Christopher Columbus. The new Viceroy
has been Ambassador of Great Britain to the Court
of the Czar, where the windows of the Winter Palace
look down upon the frozen Neva, and he has filled
the same post at the Court of the Sultan, under the
sunlit skies of Constantinople, where he has paced the
shady zarclens of Therapia, full of their associations
of Lord Stratford de Redeliffe (the "Great Eltchi"
of Mr. Kingslake) thirty years ago. He has been
selected for these positions alike by both
parties in the State, so that his promotion to
the Governor-Generalship of India by no means
partakes of a political complexion. It is
the rule for a nobleman who has held the Indian
iceroyalty to be advanced a step in the peerage.
Thus the Earl of Dalhouile was created a marquis;
Viscount Canning was made an earl; Sir John
Lawrence was created a baron; Lords Northbrook
and Lytton both received earldoms. Should the
usual practice be followed in the case of the Marquis
of Ripon he would become a duke, and the Earl of
Dufferin would be rewarded with a marquisate.
One of the most amusing books of the season is
that of Lord Malmesbury, giving to the world his
recollections of more than half-a-century of political
and social life. It is a long time to go back to the
days of Mr. Canning's premiership and to that of Earl
Grey, the head of the powerful Government which
carried the first Reform Bill, and it seems
strange to be told that this stately minister,
in a conversation with Lord Malmesbury, expressed
his conviction that Brougham, his own Lord Chan-
cellor, was one of the greatest rascals in the world.
Fortunately neither Grey nor Brougham know
anything c.f the gossip of to-day; but some living

celebrities must feel these revelations to be a trifle
awkward. For example, Mr. Gladstone is described,
in 1844, as presenting the appearance of a Roman
Catholic ecclesiastic, and in 1860 as being enthusiastic
over negro minstrelsy, an antithetical combination
which has not escaped the attention of Punch, as seen
in its picture and verses dedicated to "Versatile
Will " in its latest number.
The announced retirements of members of the
House of Commons from political life at the close of
the present Parliament follow each other thick and
fast. Some of these are made by men whose names
have stood out somewhat conspicuously in the list of
our lawgivers for many years past. There is, for
instance, Mr. John Walter, the principal proprietor
of the Times, who at the age of 66 will not again offer
lthnself for re-election in Berkshire, where he has a

beautifully-situated country seat, Bearwood by naine.
In the days of Mr. Barnes and of Mr. Delano the
Times was often called the Thunderer, from the vigour
of its style and also from the fact that practically it
possessed a Inonopoly of journalistic influence and

po.wer. It,; has held its own while the
Morning aronicle and the Morning Herald
have passed away. But since the establish-
ment of the penny press in 1855, and
looking at its present vast circulation, no one could
now contend that the Times wields anything like the
commanding authority which it was formerly accus-
tomed to exercise. It is still a magnificent pro-
perty in the way of advertisements; but in the
celerity with which news is presented to the public,
the cheap press of London has often a considerable
advantage.

Another member who has taken a position in the
House of Commons, and who will not be in the next
Parliament, is Sir W. McArthur, one of the represen-
tatives of Lambeth. The hon. gentleman has taken
much interest in colonial affairs, and some years ago
was facetiously known as tho member for Fiji,
from the fact that he spent a long time in that group
of islands after their annexation to England, with a
view of looking into the condition of the people. Of
all the unwieldy metropolitan constituencies, perhaps
the palm may be borne away by Lambeth. Lying
south of the river, it stretches from Blackfriars to
Norwood, running very nearly down to the Crystal
Palace. Its population, ever growing, is now more
than half a million, and it has over 50,000 electors.
No wonder that, after sixteen years of Parliamentary
service, Sir William, a man of mature years, finds the
burden an increasingly heavy one, and has intimated
that, so far as he is concerned, he cannot bear it in a
future Parliament.

The Lord Mayor will be presented to the Lord
Chancellor on the 24th inst., on which day the
Michaelmas sittings will in future begin, instead of on
the 2nd November, as hitherto. The Long Vacation
was, at a meeting of judges held last December,
shortened by the number of days represented by these
two dates. Even now, however, it will be by no means
a bad one, seeing that it commences at the beginning
of August. That her Majesty's High Court of Justice
should be closed to suitors for three months at a
stretch was at length felt, even by the judges ther(..
selves, to be a little too long; hence the change now
made. It will, however, scarcely remain where it is.
Other alterations will have to be made to meet the
convenience of the public.
The London playgoers have seen the last of "Prin-
cess Ida" at the Savoy, at all events for some time,
after its run of nine months at that operatic temple
devoted to the production of the works of Gilbert and
Sullivan. The " Sorcerer " and "Trial by Jury," by
the same authors, are now re-produced; and such is
the popularity of these writers that it is quite within
the range of possibility that "Pinafore," the "Pirates
of Penzance," "Patience," " lolanthe," and "Princess
Ida may all in time be reproduced on the London
boards. Mr. Gilbert never cares to allow one piece
to run too long at a time. Many of us remember
"Our Boys," which ran four years at the Vaudeville,
an experience which, however gratifying to the
audiences, must from its monotony have been little
short of death or lunacy to the actors and actresses.

In the selection of the mover and seconder of the
Address to the Crown at the opening of Parliament
there has been a strict adherence to precedent. The
Address is invariably moved by a county member,
who on this oce,asion is Mr. Edward Stafford Howard,
one of the knights of the shire for the eastern
division of Cumberland. Mr. Howard, albeit he has
been in the House of Commons more than eight
years, is now a young man, having been born in the
year of the Great Exhibiton. Mr. William Summers,
the Liberal member for Stalybridge, has been chosen
as the seconder of the Address. Both gentlemen
are as a rule supplied beforehand with a copy of the
Queen's Speech, so as to give them time to prepare
their own comments upon it; butthis is not invariably
the case. Oftentimes an interview with the Leader
of the House of Commons, who briefly sketches the
subjects to be mentioned and the line to be taken, has
to suMce. At one of these times Lord Palmerston's
instructions to these gentlemen we7us—" Go in for
Denmark and abuse Germany." So that there was
little room for doubt as to what the 2riree Minister
or that day thought upon the most prominent ouoto
Con tilt:: before the public.

DYNAMITE EXPLOSIO/3 IN QUEBEC.

The following telegrams have been received through
Reuter's Agency:
QUEBEC, Oct. 11.

_
About one o'clock this aft' moon an explosion oc-
curred at the new Parliament buildings, destroying a
considerable portion of the masonry and windows.
The shock was felt throughout the city, the windows
of houses in the neighbourhood of the explosion being
shattered. The explosive is supposed to have been
dynamite. At the time of the occurrence the work-
men engaged in the building were absent at dinner,
and only one was slightly injured. A second explosion
took place at three o'clock, but without causing any
damage of consequence. The carpenters state that
they observed a box lying all the morning close to the
wall of the building where the first explosion occurred,
but supposed that it had been placed there by the
plumbers. After the explosion no trace of the boi
could be found, but it is believed to have contained
dynamite and an infernal machine. The second ex-
plosion took place about 30ft. from the first. The
Parliament building is stated to have been so badly
cracked by the first shock that it is feared that one
half of it will have to be rebuilt. After the first ex-
plosion men were sent all through the buildings to
search for suspicions-looking boxes, but found nothing.
The C 31190 of the second explosion is as mysterious as
that of the first.

OCTOBER 12.

An investigation into the circumstances attending
the dynamite explosions at the new Parliament build-
ings here is now proceeding. It appears that the
first explosion made a hole about 12ft. high and flit.
wide in the wall on the third story, directly over the
right entrance to the Assembly and close to the spot
where the Speaker's Chair would be located. The
second explosion was in the north-east corner of the
same building, the corner-stones forming the support
of the buildings being badly bulged. It is doubtful
whether it can be repaired without letting down the
whole wall. Two persons were slightly injured by the
explosion. A number of military are patrolling the
grounds. The building had been completed with the
exception of part of the roof. The Cabinet has
decided to offer a reward of 1000 dols. for informa-
tion which may lead to the apprehension of the per-
petrators of the outrage.
All places where explosives are kept are being
guarded. __ . .

- It is said that the Government were warned of this
outrage some time ago.
OTTAWA, Oct. 12.
Owing to the dynamite outrage at Quebec extra
police have been placed round the Parliament House
here.
The Marquis and Marchioness of Lansdowne aro
staLying at Halifax.