The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1869-10-09 00:00:00

Etletropotitan 6ossip.
OUR MI OURRE3PORDIRit

The remarks under this head are tote regarded as the air
iiilfoargewnlim:ol
uitserbbeies. do not hold ourselves responeible.l
Two official documents have just appeared, which
ought to put the country in a good humour—the
quarterly revenue returns, and the Board of Trade
returns up to the en lof August. They are both if a
very encouraging character. As compared with the
corresponde g quarter last year, the former returns
show a most cheering increase—£l42,ooo in Excise,
A 95,000 in stamps, £lB,OOO in " taxes," I:68,000 in
party tax, tax, £lO,OOO in the Post Office, and £l,OOO
in
Crown land. True, there is a falling-off of £155,000
in Customs, but this iR more than accounted for by the
entire abolition of the shilling duty on corn. As by
another f al, in g.off —4:71,000 in "miscellaneous," no-
body seems to know or care what that may mean, and
the amount is so small that it does not much
matter what it does mean. The main conclusione
to be drawn from these returns is that our revenue
has largely increased from those very items which
show an improvement M trade and that there-
fore there will be all the greater chance of a re-
duction of taxation. The improvement in our trade
Is even more clearly /drown by the Board of Trade
returns, which prove that, compared with the first
eight months of last year, the largely increased con-
rumption of such articles as tea, sugar, wine, brandy,
tobacco, wool, flax, eilk, &c., can admit but of one
inference, that our general trade has improved, how-
ever certain branches may have suffered. And this
conclusion, by the way, is jnet what most people
appear to have arrived at previously. Dating from
limy, 1866, a period which too many will have good
reason to remember, we had three years of commercial
dulness, affecting more or less nearly every department
of trade and commerce; but during the last few
months trade on the whole has exhibited signs ef
revival, and employment has become more general.
The general opinion has now been very agreeably con-
finned by unmistakeable facts and figures.
A longolesired reform is on the eve of being effected.
Both in England and France people have long com-
plained of the heavy rate of postage between the
two countries. For a letter from either country
to the ether the rate has hitherto been four.
ponce, if the letter does not weigh more than
a quarter of an ounce. But the French Minister
of Foreign Affairs has just signed a treaty with
Ilsgland by which the rate will be reduced to
three-pence and the weight is extended to ten grammes,
which is one-third more than the previous weight—
seven and a half grammes being equal to a quarter of
an ounce. This will be a decided reform, but still it is
only part of what is wanted. It is surprising that the
French Government do not see that low rates of post.
age would bring them in more revenue than the present
high rates. In some respects the French system is
better than our own, for the rates are very low indeed
for short distances, but our neighbours have yet to
learn the virtue and benefit of a uniform cheap system.
The proceedings of the Social Science Congress are
not without their importance, and the papers that have
been read, as well as the discussions that have ensued,
have certainly been of an interesting character. It is,
of course, to be regretted that the clever men who bring
forward their views on such occasions as these have no
means of carrying out their views, and that year after
year we find much the same opinions—for the most
part sound and valuable—enunciated and approved of
in discussion, and that there the matter ends. But still
it is by the spread of opinion that reforms are effected.
" Opinion," said Lord Palmerston, "hi stronger
than arrnies"—that is, when opinion is put into
action. Here and there too there is an exception to
this fruitless discussion. For example, the result of
the discussion on some papers on the repression of
crime was that a resolution was adopted to call the at-
tention of Government to the need of the appointment
of a public prosecutor. How often has this been
urged? The balance of argument has long been in
favour of it, and the time has come when we should
have something more than argument.
Seven lives lost by an explosion and fire at a fire
work annfactory is surely a painful fact which carries
its own moral. Either the law as to firework factories
is insefficient to meet the danger, or if the law itself is
adequate it must be badly carried out. And the same
remark holds good of gunpowder mills and storehouses,
where explosions frequently take place. This last sad
calamity will perhape direct public attention to the
danger of all such places in towns, and may perhaps
remit in an alteration of the law or its administration,
wherever the fault lies. The taste for firework displays
PPeTfIN rather on the increase than otherwise, as the
Crystal Palace managers have discovered. It is a
noteworthy fact, too, that it is about this time
of the year generally that firework explosions take
place, the preparations for Guy Fawkes day amply
accounting for it. It would do society no harm
if the stupid and irritating observances of the sth of
November were made illegal. The religions service
for that day has been legally eliminated from the
Prayer Book, but one portion of the Queen's subjects
are still allowed legally to irritate another portion, for
mere silly amusement
The Times does well to call attention to the fact that
Greenwich Hospital is now empty and available for
some useful purpose. It reminds us that this fine
building is the work of Wren and Inigo Jones; that it
is covered in by seven acres of roof ; that its cubic con-
tents are four times as great as St. George's Hospital ;
and that it must have cost from first to last not lese
than a million. By referring to other information on
this splendid establishment I find that there are enor-
mous funds belonging to it, and that last year it had
a revenue of 080,135, and that its capital account
amounted to the handsome sum of £1,16 liSt. There
have, doubtless, been many reforms in the administra-
tration of these funds since the Act of Parliament
pureed in 1065, but it is only reasonable to suppose that
with an immense revenue like this there is room for
further reform. Greenwich Hospital RR it Mande would
make a fine naval and military hospital. To this or
some other noble use it may be hoped this splendid

building will ere long be put.
Other persons beside those connected with the =rai.
cal profession will probably read with interest the in-
angural addresses at the various hospitals. A strange
fact may be mentioned in connection with these
orations. The doctors are in the habit of sending
copies of them to the medical journals, and one
of them actually published all these lectures before
any of them, one only excepted, were delivered.
This is rather too sharp. A somewhat similar
thing ones occurred in reference to the late Arch-
bishop of Canterbury, whose charge appeared in The
Tones on the very morning of its delivery. A reporter
of greater enterprise than principle had succeeded in
borrowing the document of the Archbishop, but on
the understanding that it was not to be published till
after its delivery. He copied it out, and, in a weak
moment, The Times inserted it. The Primate com-
plained, and, on the facts being stated, the reporter
was at once cut off from the chance of ever having
another line of his copy inserted, lint the kind Arch-
bishop, returning good for evil, pleaded for the too
enterprising reporter, and he was reinstated.
Spain seems doomed to be the sport of rival fac-
tions, and to be continually tantalised by having liberty
dashed from it when it seemed within its grasp. It is
now along time since people were startled, and for the
most part delighted, with the news of her bloodles's
revolution and the flight of her Queen, but since then
unhappy Spain has been continually tormented by the
claims of rival aspirants to the throne, and the rest of
Europe must now be pretty well wearied with this long
waged strife. At the present moment the Duke of
Oenoa, who is a pupil at Harrow, and who is but fifteen
years of age, seems to stand the best chance. In
England very little interest appears to be taken in the
subject, and we shall be only too happy to hear that
some one of the many claimants has been chosen for
king.
Nothing, I believe, has yet occurred to render it
unlikely that the Suez Canal will be opened on the
promised day, the 17th of November; and as the day
approaches people will be on the qui rice for narra-
tives t.f the operations connected with this gigantic
undertaking. The London daily liver are snaking
their arrangements for special reports. Dr. W.
Russell, the historian of the Crimean and the Ameri-
can wars, will represent The Trifles; Mr. Edward
Dicey, the Moran's ; and Mr. Rently, the Standard;
thn two latter gentlemen having already done a great
deal of "special" reporting, one of the most impor-
tant departments of a great daily newspaper.
"The treasurer of the Royal Hospital of Bethlehem
acknowledges, with thanks, the receipt of a Bank of
England note for £5, forwarded to him by 'Bag,' with
a request that it be placed to the funds of the hospi-
tal." This just proves, what we knew before, that
there are lunatice outside Bedlam as well as in it,
for this said royal hoepital is immensely rich.

-
TNE NATIONAL REFORM UNION.—AL Man-
chester, on Tuesday night last, Mr. Ryland., M.P.,
addressed the Reform Union on the foreign diplo.
inatic service, which he said was unnecessarily
expensive, and maintained as a means of provil,ing
for younger branches of the aristorracy. In these days
of newspapers, electric telegraphs, mei rapid publicity,
it was an anachronism on the a4e, awl instead of pro-
moting peace among nations it tended rather to pro-
mote war, as in the instances of the late war with
Russia and Abyssinia. He contended that many of
tie foreign missions were extravagantly paid for, and
others ought to be discontinued. He did not think
household suffrage would Wood it,