The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1876-12-09 00:00:00

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Our fonbn Correspitbtnt.

[Ws deem it right to state that we do not at all times
identity ourselves with our Correspondent's opinions.]

Those with good memories for dates will nut find it
difficult to carry their recollections back just exactly
five years._ It is not a long time—only half a decade;
and the incidents of those few December days will
live for many a year in the minds of the people of this
country. 'On the evening of Friday, the Bth of
December, 1871, London was electrified by the
language of a bulletin issued from Sindringham EIGU7B
by the three &eters in attendance up-n the Priece of
Wales, who had been for E ome days suffering from an
attack of typhoid fever...."Pirs bulletin was cated 5.30
p.m., and ran as follows :—" His R ryal Highness the
Prince of Wales is in a very precarious state." The
message, having been telegraphed from Sandringham
to London, was printed with marvellous rapidity
by the Government press at the Foreign Office, and in
less than an hour from the time at which it WAS
written, was placarded throughout the length and
breadth of the metropolis. You saw it at the railway
stations where thousands of City men were hastening,
home by the suburban trains; it was posted outide
every police station, it appeared upon the front of the
Mansion House ; it found a place upon the walls of the
venerable Guildhall. It formed the exclusive topic of
conversation in lereet, and mart, and square ; it ab-
sorbed the attention cf every' honsehold. The time,
too, was Gee of bitter winter eeeather. For miles and
miles round Sandrirghem House snow lay thickly
upon the greund; and the Queen with the other mem-
bers of the Royal Family had made the journey
to Norfolk amid forests of leafless trees, unre-
lieved by the sound of the song of birds, and an
oppressive silence hanging over the fields and
the woods. For days crowds blocked the pavements
in Fleet-street, watching the language of the bulletins,
and criticising the precise words used by the medical
men. Throughout the battle which the Heir.
Apparent fought for his life, and won against such
fearful odds, it was remarked that one word which
had appeared in some of the later bulletins descriptive
of the Prince Consort's fatal illness was not now
mentioned. That word was "critical." The Prince
of Wales had been in a precarious, but never in a
critical state. And so, after lingering for several days
upon the mysterious borderland between life and death,
and having tided over the anniversary of the demise of
his father ten years before, the Prince gradually
emerged from the darkened Valley, to the inexpres-
sible relief of the Queen and of all classes of her
people.

The National Conference upon the Eastern Question
at St. James's Hall is regarded as one of the most im-
portant gatherings which has assembled for many
years. The moving object of its conveners is to give
the public opinion of the country an opportunity of
expreseion that a war undertaken by Great Britain to
support the territorial integrity and independence of
the Ottoman Expire cannot now be thought of. The
sacrifices which were willingly made in 1855, could not
be made now, after the disclosures of the past few
months. When we were called upon, to pay for the
war with the Emperor of Abyssinia, the Increase of the
income tax, from fourpence to sixpence in the
pound was cheerfully assented to by the people. In
1855 Mr. Gladstone, who was Chancellor of the
Exchequer in the administration of Lord Aberdeen,
subjected the patriotism of his countrymen
to a severe test by doubling the income-tax from seven.
pence to fourteenpence at a bound. It was a bold ex-
periment, but such was the martial ardour of the
people that it succeeded. The income-tax now stands
at threepence, and if even that were doubled to carry
on a war on behalf of Turkey, there would be many
a murmur on the part of the long-suffering tax-
. .
payer.

Public opinion is by no means unanimous respecting
the system of voting adopted at School Board elec-
tions. TheFe contests in London created much inter-
est, and in every one of the ten divisions there was a
struggle. The greatest of these W 33 the borough of
Marylebone, with its population of half a million.
This contributes seven members to the School Board,
each elector having seven votes, which he could
concentrate upon one candidate, or distribute
amongst the others, as he thought fit. But
the plan advocated by the late Mr. Cobden
was, instead of giving such a vast constituency seven
members all of a lump, and each elector seven votes
in the same way, the borough should be divided into
seven wards, each ward with one member, and each
elector with one vote. By this plan he contended that
a more complete representation ot the conflicting in-
terests of such an immense place would be secured.
Marylebone, for instance, extends from Oxford-street
right out to Hendon, amid the green fields of
Middlesex; Lambeth includes the great popula-
tion between the "Elephant and Castle" and
Norwoed. What does Oxford-street know of Hendon,
or Walsvorth f Dulwich Or Norwood? Mr. Cobden
would have allowed each district to return ha own
member, while Mr. Mill. argued - for, the present
syst.'m, on the ground that Mr. Cobden's plan
ceuld result in the return of merely local men known
in their respective districts, and that men of amine**
would never find seats if elections were to turn upon
local and sectional considerations.

The "dull December light" immortalised by Hood,
is not a very lively accompaniment of the Smithfield
Club Cattle Show; and if the atmosphere be muggy
and the breeze from the south-west, the Agricultural
Hall. lighted from end to end with gas, ia not sugges-
tive of the breezy moors from which many of the
splendid prize cattle have come. Visitors to the hall,
year after year, as they gaze upon the long lines of
animals, have often wondered how they have reached
the building with so little observation. They have
seen no cattle driven through the streets, and none
have passed before their own houses so far as they
have been witnesses. The reason is that nothing
of this kind is allowed in the day time. There is,
consequently, no chance of a bull playing havoc in any
of the china shops of the chief thoroughfares of Lon-
don. If we can imagine a herd of cattle leisurely
advancing through Cheapside at noon, or pattering
over London Bridge, or descending Ludgate Hill, or
gradually becoming bewildered in Fleet street, we
should have some idea of the great displacement of
traffic and the enormous inconvenience which must be
the result. So the drovers have to perform their duties
at night, when the voice of the mighty capital is hushed,
and when more than three millions of people are
asleep within its walls.

The entertainments given to the officers and men of
the Arctic Expedition are an ample testimony
to the appreciation by the British public of
the virtues of gallantry and enterprise in a
cause in which, although they could not cora-
maed success, they certainly deserved it. Nearly
twelve months have elapsed since these explorers were
preparing to spend Christmas in their frozen home.
With seven feet of snow banked upon the ships, so as
to prevent the little heat remaining in the vessels from
escaping into the terrible a.mosphere outside, they yet
managed to erj sy themselves, and one of the Most
interesting records of that strange life in the Arctic
regions Vi',lB the description of the manner in which the
great Christi sn festival wee passed in the dreary soli-
tudes of the northern sea?. The celebration of Christ-
mas is indeed a matter which to Englishmen is
affected by climate in the slightest degree. Whether
our countrymen are wintering in the 82nd parallel of
latitude, or rhether, as in Australia, the midsummer
sun shines brightly on the 25th December, there is no
relaxing of the observance of a season fraught with so
many pleasant associations.
The report issued by Mr. 3. M. Ludlow, the Chief
Registrar of Friendly Societies, respecting the opera-
tion of the Act of 1875, is worthy of some attention. It
will be remembered that the Act effected some great
changes. It created a Chief Registrar; it increased the
powers of the registration offiee in some directions
while very much limiting its discretion; it arranged to
give the societies now tables upon which to work out
their accounts; it drew up new rules for the prevention
of the ove,r insurance of infant life for the sake of
gain after the death of the child ; the registra-
tion cffice was remodelled; Her Majesty's
Civil Service Commissioners brought the depart-
ment under the rules for appointments in competitive
examinations. In doing so, the Commissioners made
one special exemption. They arranged that a char-
woman might wash the floors and dust the desk
without having in the first place shown her proficiency
in vulgar fractions ! Strange as it may seem, this is
literally tree. On the whole, according to Mr. Ludlow,
it eePrh.:nat the Friendly Societies' Act, which made
RuchlEn and threw at fugt the whole busineHl
of ti,e Eseistrsa Office into confusion, has in the
end j.viltie,djlf, raid is now working in a way
approachirg to emou)tilnea3. The Chancellor of the
Exchequer Ensse:l gave attention to the difficulties
which arcee, and Hs advice and assistance, ms.
Ludlow says, made an apparently hopeless task pos-
sible. It will be seen what a tribute this is to the
crganiaing powers of Sir Stafford Northcote.
India is a land of strange and singular contrasts.
While in some of its cities mosque and shrine glitter
in the sun. like burnished gold, in other parts at that
same moment the tornaClo is sweeping over the plain,
its course marked by ruin and desolation. While a
cyclone is wreaking its vengeance upon an unoffending
population, and carrying more than 200,000 of them
into eternity, preparations for the Dnrbar at Delhi on
the Ist of January go merrily on. Simultaneously
with the forecast of these festivities we have the news
that the famine in India is becoming increasingly
serious. The dearth threatens to extend over a very
wide area, and the distress next year can hardly fail
to be severe. There is one compensation. The
public works will have to go on in order to

find employment for the starving natives. The
people of London, as they read of the waters
of the sea rising suddenly twenty feet higher than
their normal height, could not but be grateful that
they lived in a latitude where such visitations of nature
are entirely unknown. Let a high tide but raise the
Th Imes a single foot above its ordinary level and there
is a wail of distress along the shores of Southwark and
Lambeth. But it has never entered into the heart of
man to conceive the heaping up of the waters of the
irhames to an altitude twenty feet higher than they
are accustomed to flow. Could such be possible, the
d• straction of the mightiest city in the world must

the result. Yet those upon whom the Tower of Siloam
fell were in no degree more sinful than their neighbours,
but it is as true now as in days of old, "one shall be
taken, and the other shall be left."

'WAR RUMOURS. .
e -
The castles of the Dardanelles are, says a Constantinople
paper, being armed with new Krupp guns, and General
Rifaat Pasha has left on a special mission to the proper
acjustment of this armament.
N Vienna paper I üblishes intelligence from Bucharest
whiet states that events of the Russian Government are
travelling through Rumania to ascertain the condition of
tbe roads and bridges, and the distances between certain
points. They are also making inquiries respecting the quan-
tity of provisions and forage obtainable and the sentiments
of the people. The railway line connecting Roumania with
Russia has been placed under Russian management within
the last few days.
The Russian Consul at Scutari has packed up the archives
Of his comula'e, and is ready to leave the town. It war
shou:d break out, tLe care of Bastian interests will be con-
fided to M Betin, the Millen Consul.
The Servions have sei ,zE d an Austro-Hungarian vessel which
w.s carrying Bulgarians to Galas. z Count Andrassy has ad-
dressed to Belgrade an energetic remonstrance against this
violation by the Serviana of existing treaties.

It is stated that an address from the Poles has been sent
from Warsaw to the Emperor of Russia expressing their
readiness to make any sacrifice to effect the liberation of the
South Sclavonic Cbristhns. This uocament was forwarded
through General von Kotzebue, who obtained instructions
from head-quarters before receiving it, and has requested
that the text of it might not be published lest it should re-
ceive an ifficial character. , -
The impression in well informed circle at Constantinople,
Is that the prospect of peace is much improved. Mnch less
bitterness is expressed on either side. It is thought that
Rumania will, under no circumstances, be hostile to
Turkey.
el e writer of a letter to the Pester Lloyd takes anything
but a hopefal view of the prospects of a Russian invasion of
Balcatia. He thinks the Russians will have much harder
work than in 1828.

According to a telegram from Ragusa, Turkey has insisted
upon concluding a separate peace with Montenegro, pro
mising some Herzegovinlan and Albanian territory and a
fort. This propo!al Montenegro has declined, and she has
furnished arms to the Miridites who are prepared to fight
against Turkey.
The Cologne Gazette says that the Russian Government
painfully realises its want of good e ificerS, and Is endeavour-
ing to secure the services of 'German officers for the
threatened war.

Special telegraphic despatches which have been received
at,Vienna from Constantinople confirm, says a correspondent,
the impression that, it the Turks are not threatened with an
armed occupation of Bulgaria, they will be really anxious on
their part to render the Conference a 'amass.
A correspondent of the National Zeitung at Kischeneff
says that the Russian Government is taking measures fur
organising and calling out the Landstnrm, a last reserve, in
certain military districts. The district authorities have been
directed to prepare rolls of persons liable for such service.
A telegram from Ragusa says that Nicksich is at the last
extremity, being surrounded by 5,000 men under Paulowich.
The insurgents having refused, notwithstanding the armis-
tice, to allow the Tarkish Commissary to- revictnal the place,
the Turks are preparing to relieve it by force.
A telegram has been sent to the representatives of the
Porte abroad by the Turkish Minister for Foreign Affairs,
in which a denial is given to the statement that a disagree-
ment has arisen between the Grand Vizier and the Presi-
dent of the Council of State with regard to the proposed
reforms. The statement is declared to be unfounded. It is
added that the plan of the reforms is almost finished, and
that a complete understanding on the subject has always
prevailed among the Ministers.
According to the Gam, if the Russian demands are not
accepted by the Porte before the Slat Of this month, the
Turkish armies will be attacked simultaneously by the forces
of Russia, Greece, Servia, Roumania, and Montenegro.
Altogether the Goks, estimates the forces which would be
opposed to the Pprte at 5113,000 men, namely, 30,0(0
Montenegrins, Herzegovinians, and Albanians, 4,000 Bosnians,
80,000 Servians, 200,000 Greek', 52,000 Roumanians, and
150,000 Russian/.

Regarding Russian war preplrations, the Berlin Corre-
spondent of The Times telegraphs :—'The mobilized Russian
regiments are being successively sent south. In the second
half of December 250,000 men will be on the Pruth, ready to
cross. Eizhty•four rnili(ary hospitals, for a total of 52600
men, have been formed by the Russian military authorities.
The principal hospitals are at Odessa and Krementschug
General Nepokoischitzky, the Chief cf the Staff of the Rus-
sian Army of Invasion, is 65 years ( f age, and has the repu-
tation of a scholarly and well-informed strategist."