The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1876-05-06 00:00:00

ur ya6on aorrespoOtni.

[We deem it right to state that we do not at all timei
tdentliy ourselves with our Correspondent's opinions.]

For a period during which the memory of man run-
neth not to the contrary the month of May has been
a time of more than ordinary interest. It received its
name, some say, from Romulus, the founder of Rome,
who gave it this appellation in respect to the senators
and nobles of Ha city, who were denominated majores.
Others suppose it W 53 so called from Main, the mother
of Mercury, to whom they offered sacrifices on the first
day of the month. The ancient Romans used to go in
proceseion to the grotto of E;eria on May-day. For
centuries the opening hours of this month were
welcomed with special expressions of gratification and
delight. There was an occasion, however—the Ist of
May, 1517—when advantage was taken in London of
the popular demonstration, to manifest great violence.
against foreigners, particularly the French. The
quaint language of an ancient chronicler thus tells
the story :—" The rioters were headed by one Lincoln,
who with 15 others was hanged ; 400 others,
In their shirts, and bound with ropes, with
halters round their necks, were carried to
Westminister, but they crying 'Mercy, mercy!'
were all pardoned by the king (Henry VIII), which
clemency gained him much love." Coming down to
more recent times, it is recorded that a charitable lady
who died in 1800 gave, for many years at her house in
Portman-square, an entertainment to the chimney.
sweepers of the metropolis. They were regaled with
roast beef and plum-pudding, a merry dance succeeding.
Upon departing each guest received a shilling from the
hands of the mistress of the feast. Tradition has it
that this entertainment was instituted to commemorate
the circumstance of the lady having once found a lost
boy of her own, or of a relative, among the sooty tribe.
In allusion to this incident a story resembling the ad-
ventures of this lost child is pathetically related by
Montgomery in "The Chimney-sweeper's Boy." In
our own times there are no such rich banquets for the poor
sweeps of the capital; yet the annual arrival of May-
Day is commemorated in various ways, some of them
amusing and grotesque perhaps, but all suggestive of
pleasure that we are at length fairly launched upon the
commencement of Summer.

The May meetings are now in fall swing. From the
last week in April until about the middle of the present
month the yearly gatherings of the various religious
and charitable organizations take place in London,
and the majority of these are held in Exeter Hall.
This building, standing at the north-west end of the
Strand, takes its name not from the cathedral city of
the westernmost diocese in England, but because it
stands upon the land of the Marquis of Exeter. There
are really two halls under the same roof, the larger
eapable of holding 3,000 persons, and possessing excellent
acoustic preporties. Unlike the House of Lords, where
hearing is extremely difieult, Bxeter Hall was built
for utility, and not for grandeur. No building in the
metropolis is so associated in the minds of the people at
large with the work of missionary societies or of religious
institutions. 1k reputation is in no way a political
ens, nor is it the scene of grand festive dinners like
the " London " Tavern in Bishopsgate-etreet, or
Willis's Rooms in King-street, St. James's. But
Exeter Hall, capacious as it is, often finds
itself unequal, in this month of May, to
the demands made upon its powers of accomnao.
dation. The "London Tavern," and Willis's
Rooms aforesaid, the Freemason's Hall in Great
Queen's, the City Terminus Hotel in Cannon-street,
and the Memorial Hall in Farringdon-street, are all
pressed into the service of religion and philanthropy.
Thus, on a busy May-day, when the marts of London
teem with traffic, there are thousands of earnest men
and women gathered in the buildings above mentioned
for the sole purpose of encouraging good work wherever
it can be prosecuted. The toiling missi,mary in distant
lands, who has left home and kindred to labour
amongst swarthy tribes in the uttermost parts of the
earth, is bidden to keep up heart in the face of many
difficulties ; for amongst the ships being loaded in the
Thames are some not bent upon the pursuit of com-
merce, but by the liberality of the public are to be sent
over the bright blue waves of the Indian Ocean, and
far away to the Islands of the mighty Pacific, conveying
civilization and the gospel throughout the earth.
The tenacity with which public bodies cling to con-
demned institutions, has often been the subject of
comment. Any pedestrian passing westward out of
the City of London by way of Fleet-street, will have
noticed on the north side of Temple Bar an immense
structure, rising gradually stone by stone,
and brick by brick, and steadily progressing
towards completion. Those are to be the new law
courts; and although it is as yet too early to form a
judgment respecting the architectural pretensions of
the building, there seems little doubt that it will be
of colossal size, and quite capable of receiving under
its ample roof the scattered courts which now sit at
Westminster and Lincoln's Inn. The excavations for
these law comte FO seriously affected the foundations
of Temple Bar that, two years ago, ominous looking
fissures threatened to rend the antique structure in
twain from the top to the bottom; it was shored up
with vast blocks of wood; and to this day policemen
are stationed in the carriage way to warn the drivers
of vehicles to proceed through the arch at a walking
pace. On the 17th December, 1874, the City Parlia-
ment, or in other words the Court of Common Coun-
cil, rejected a motion for the removal of the Bar, and
this decision has now been repeated. It is known all
the time that the finishing of the law courts will
necessitate its removal, for it now stands directly
in front of them, is a serious obstruction to the
immense traffic constantly flowing between London
and Westminster, and is, besides, in a very shaky
and decrepit condition. The question is not one
of the permanent continuance ef Temple Bar,
but at most of its existence for a year or
two more, and every foot added to the altitude
of the court lessens the time during which it
will span the crowded thoroughfare. There are few
experiences more irrit -ting than having to pass along
the footway of the Bar on a wet day. The place is
so narrow that if you fail to close your umbrella, you
find that it is being butted at and torn by the
umbrellas of numerous other pedestrians who are also
hastening through, and if your own happens to be a
bran-new silk the incident is not like), to soothe a
need temper.
Time was, not very long ago, when the fact of a
gentleman driving a coach was regarded as a piece of
eccentricity which with other circumstances might
indicate the possession of an unbalanced mind. This,
however, has ceased to be a prevalent impression; and
of the large number of washes which, during the
summer, Etart from the "Whit. Horse Cellar" in
Piccadilly, there is scarcely one case wherein the
ribbons are not handled either by a nobleman or a
gentleman of position. There are now coaches running
between London and Tunbridge Wells, Guildford,
Dorking, Windeer, Oxford, Reading, Brighton,
and several other places. How strangely events turn
eat in these go-ahead days! Considerably less than half
a century ago, when railways began to be practically
carried out in this eountry, and the coaches gradually
disappeared, who could have supposed that the time
wszsild again conic when the ring of the hoofs of leaders
and wheelers would clang merrily out upon the turn.
pike roads of the home counties? Of course we miss
the mail guard dressed in scarlet, for her Majesty's
mails are now conveyed by rail; but the echoing
horn enlivens the air as the coach bowls cheerily on
through pleasant valleys, the moist woods glistening
in the soft sunlight. If time be of importance, then
take the train; if not, and the lover of nature wishes
to enjoy a day, and to appreciate all the beauties of a
landscape, he cannot do better than secure a seat on
either of the coaches which now daily leave the west-
end Of London.

Mr. Frank Buckland's report to the Home Secre-
tary upon the condition of the Salmon Fisheries is
on the whole encouraging. He tells us that, al-
though the rivers of the 'United Kinvlom are still
polluted to a degree which ought to be prevented
by legislative enactment, the value of flailing property
is increasing rapidly. Fisheries which, a few I ears
ago, were estitna'ed to be worth only £30,000 per
annum, are now computed to be worth at leait
£IOO,OOO. His opinion is that there are almost limit-
less possibilities of wealth in our rivers, and that it
does not requite much expensliture of capital or
labour in order to develop those resources. Indeed,
without spending money at all, landowners may add
largely to the value of their property. It ie true that
the existing law with respect to pollution is not so
strong as many wish to make it; but even this, if en-
forced, would be effectual to prevent the turning of
clear streams into open sewers. There is no more
reason for the wholesale poisoning of fish than for
meting out that measure to sheep or cattle. Both
supply a valuable article of food; and fish more
especially, from the quantity of phosphorus which it
contains, is regaDded as being of essential service in
repairing the wear and tear of the brain.
The island of Barbadoem, which has been brought
into Kish prominenoe of late in oonsequenoe of the
rioting there, is one which does not come before the
public so often as 110/131) of the others forming the West
Indian, Jamaica for instance. It is, however,a place
of very considerable sine, its governorship, with that
of the smaller windward isles, is worth .k 4,800 a year,
and it is the seat of a bishopric. The English took
possession of it in 1805, and, daring the civil war, ,so
many royalists settled at Birbadoes' that the Wand
was taken by the Parliamentarians. Like other places
in those latitudes, it is sometimes subjected to atmo-
spheric disturbances of the most violent character.
Hurricanes, cyclones, siroccos, tornadoes, and similar
visitations have occasionally swept with devastating
fury over its fertile groves, and many now living can
remember the great storm of the 10th of August,
1831, when there was an immenee destruoblen a pro-
pos*, whit a loos et thatmada of live,.