The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1876-08-19 00:00:00

and if the square I

were plakted with shrubs and flowers instead of pre-
senting The appearance of a hard stony desert, the
relief afforded would be still more agreeable. The
present building, although not forty years old, has
more than once undergone considerable improvements
internally, and has jrist been re-opened after having
been beautified to a very considerable extent. Archi-
tecturally however, it is doubtful whether it could ever
be made attractive, and it is not improbable that before
long a more elegant edifice will be raised upon the site
which it occupies.

Amongst those appeals for giving poor children "a
day in the country," which are inserted in the daily
papers, there was one that aeksd this aid on behalf of
the waifs and strays of a parish in Blackfriars, where
600 waifs and strays had never seen a field or a
flower. Yet London, although it cannot boast of
fields, is not totally destitute of flowers. Hard by
Blackfriars Bridge itself, and on the south side thereof,
there are neatly laid out plots of garden ground,
running down to the river's edge from the Chatham
and Dover lildway Station. Acr3ss the stream are
the grounds of the Thames Embankment, bright with
flowers of many descriptions, and very near these are
the Temple Gardens, where in the summer evenings
hundreds of children may be seen at play. In the
parka and squares more attention is paid every year
to tte art of gardening; and as every end of London
has now a pari"for itself—Hyde and Regent's for the
west, Victoria to the east, Finsbury for the north,
and Battersea for the south—flowers in abundance
may be seen in a visit to either of them. These places
of recreation are kept up out of the public taxes, and
no one grudges the money expended upon these lungs
of a great city.

Much has been heard, both in Parliament and in
the Press respecting the Tnehigh strecities in
Bulgaria, and that such cruelties should have been
perpetrated in the nineteenth century would be deemed
to be kcredible had not the facts been abundantly
verified. This is not the first time that the unhappy
Bulgarians have been so treated, although the
barbarities practised were not al ways exposed by the
Indefatigable Special Correspondents which are now
seat forth by enterprising daily newspapers. It is re-
corded that rather more than 850 years ago—in 1014—
the Emperor Basil, after several sanguinary conflicts
with the Buigarians, defeated them, taking 15,000
prisoners. Not knowing what to do with them he de-
prived them of eight, so far as to leave one eye only to
every hundredth man, to enable bim to conduct his
countrymen home. There seems to have been a refine-
ment about such a punishment as this which we
altogether miss in the accounts of the deeds perpetrated
by the Bashi-Bazeuks and Circassians upon the un-
fortunate people whose lot it has been to inhabit the
Bulgarian villages to day.
The separation of Parliament for the recess naturally
suggests the changes which have taken place in its
personnel since it has been sitting. I find that, from
the beginning of the year nine members have died,
nine have, resigned their seats from various caness,
three have become peers, one has received an important
civil appointment, and one lost his seat upon petition.
Here then are twenty-three vacancies within a few
months—a rather larger proportion than in the two
previous years of the Parliament's existence. With
'the termination of its third session the present House
of Commons may be said to have witnessed the empiry
of half the term of its natural life. Parliaments seldom
run more than six sessions, and when they do, the
seventh is merely one of administrative work and not
of great legislative measures. In seven years memleers
grow weary of their labours, and cannot be brought to
attend to business as they were accustomed to do in
the early days of their senatorial career. The last
Parliament saw only five sessions, and its predecessor
three; and although that dissolved by Lord Pal-
merston in July, 186.5, witnessed seven, that was a
very exceptional instance, and one which had not pre-
VlollPly ,„,..Teci since cue reeNee,ent which came to
an end in the year 1826.

Although the annual Volunteer Artillery encamp-
ment at Shoeburynes does not attract that amount of
public attention which is bestowed upon the meeting
of the National Ride Association at Wimbledon, its
solid usefulness must be apparent to al. Wimbledon
is to some extent a picnic and a recreation, and being
only a few miles from London, a considerable number
of visitors, ladies included, are found in the camp. But
at Shoeburyness, far away down upon the fiats of
Essex, at the mouth of the Thames, the work is of a
hard stern nature, the men rising at five in the morn-
ing, and toiling for hours under a burning sun with
heavy handspikes and clumsy tackle. The food, served
by army cooks, is precisely the same as that which
falls to the lot of the private soldier, and in this res-
pect riflemen who have been to Wimbledon will
recognize an important difference in the discipline of
the two places. After all it is to the artillery that we
should have to look as our first line of defence in case of
a hostile combination against this country. It is clear
that local artillery corps skilled in the manipulation of
heavy gnna would be invaluable in time of need, and
the fact that most of our seaports and coast towns are
the headquarters of one or more batteries, must be a
source of congratulation to all lovers of their native
land, for the best of weapons would be of little avail
without efficient gunners.

Amid the very hot weather which has characterised
this summer, many might be disposed to envy the
officers and men composing the Arctic expedition, who
disappeared amid eternal snow and ice more than a
year ago. After the projected tunnel under the
Channel, nothing would seem to be impossible to an
engineer, and he who, in a temperature of rAI degrees
in the sun oould have caused a few icebergs to have
been towed down from the Polar regions into our own
waters, for the purpose of cooling them and conse-
quently the air, would be regarded as a benefactor to
the human race. The extraordinary frigidity of the
atmosphere caused by the presence of an iceberg can
be felt for miles, and has been experienced by many a
voyager elf the hanks of Newfoundland. The great
triumphs of scientific discovery within the vast half
century would point to nothing being considered
impracticable on the part of an enterprising engineer.
Archimedes once declared that he could move the
world if he could find a fulcrum whereon to place his
lever; and projects; which would once have been re-
garded as wild and visionary are now looked upon
as requiring only money and time to carry
them out. Within the lifetime of many still
amongst us the idea of lighting n town with
gas was laughed at; and Earl Russell was a
member of the House of Commons seven years
before gas was generally introduced into London.
Long since that really able men sought to demonstrate,
and succeeded in proving to their own satisfa-Aion that
it was im possible for man to construct a machine which
should travel more than twelve miles an hour; that the
notion of a steamship crossing the Atlantic was an
utter absurdity ; and that the application of electricity
was totally incompatible with the possession of reason.
Our fathers were as proud of their regulation mail coach
as we aro of our express trains at sixty miles an hour;
and there is many a sanguine engineer now living who
would usadertake not only to brirg icebergs from the
north in summer, but to convey to us the Geysers of
Iceland to add to our comfort in winter, and to con-
struct a bridge across the Atlantic with time and means
in his favour.

Mr. Henry Stanley's interesting letters from the in
tenor f Africa have directed public attention to that
continent, and to the capacities which it poseesses for
the development of its resources. The present con-
dition of Africa, like that of Asia, is a striking proof
of the saying that "westward the course of empire
takes its way." Great Britian was a very differnt
place from what it is to-day when the land
of Egypt was alive with civilization, and
Carthage was a great African state, powerful
by land and sea, long before Julius Czesar
set foot upon our shores, and found hosts of savage
Britons drawn up on the rocks and cliffs in the vain
hope of beating him back. Yet the time came when
the African, with all his valour, went down before the
European. when the araiies of Carthage were defeated
by the legions of Rome, and the decree went forth
from the conquering
city that Carthage must be de-
stroyed. In time Africa was overrun by the
Vandals and the Saracens, jut as the cities of
Asia Minor were stamped out under the blighting
and withering influence of the Turk. Mr. Stanley,
like Lieutenant Cameron, Sir Samuel Baker, Captain
Speke, Dr. Livingstone, and other travellers, tells us
that Africa requires only the application of capital to
bring out the marvellous gifts of climate and of soil
with which large tracts upon that vast continent are
endowed. The mineral treasures, too, are believed
to be enormous, but these are totally lost in the hands
of the barbaric tribes with which Africa is now
peopled. It is itopossiMo to believe that such a
splendid country will not be turned to account, and
that the land which produced Carthage two thousand
Teens ago will 7et exert a powerful influence upon the
peace and civilisation of the rut of the world.

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