The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1884-08-30 00:00:00

Cur foga Cartzgoatnt

(We deem it right to state that we do not at all times
identify ourselves with our Correspondent's opinions.]

When the Queen and her youngest child depart
for Balmoral, which is generally towards the end of
August, life at the West End of London is considered
to be at a very low ebb, if by that term is conveyed
an idea of the tide of fashion which flows through the
parks and the fashionable thoroughfares during the
six months that Parliament is sitting. The latter
psrt of August is, with the beginning of September
perhaps the dullest part of a dull time. Not that
London now so much feels the absence of a
Court which is never kept in it; but it is
about this period that every one who is
able to get out of a stuffy city con-
trives to do so. This year our tourists
have not taken so much to the Seine or the Moselle,
the Rhine, or the Danube, as to our own coast scenes
and mountain views, many of which equal, eyen if
they do not surpass, some of the most attractive
haunts of Continental travel. Northward, more
especially has the course of holiday-makers taken its
way. Years have passed since the Scotch hotels
reaped such a harvest as has fallen to their share
now. Every room, bed, couch, and sofa is occupied,
and in not a few instances have applicants been sent
empty away.

On their way to Abergeldie, the Prince and
Princess of Wales have been performing public duties
at Newcastle-on-Tyne and Edinburgh, and have
maintained the popularity which during more than
twenty years their Royal Highnesses have been
enabled to build up. The season now closing
has been a broken one in consequence of the
death of the Duke of Albany; but if we take any
into which no auch indentation has been made, there
can be little doubt of its trying character for
exalted personages who are expected to go here,
there, and everywhere in response to invitations
to lay foundation stones, distribute prizes,
and in various ways render service to all kinds of in-
stitutions. How many men in middle life would
care to get up such facts as the Prince of Wales has,
to master when he takes the chair at a charity dinner.
opens the wing of a new hospital, or presides at a
bazaar ceremonial for the restoration of a church?
He is sure to be on most occasions presented with an
address congratulating him on the interest which he
manifests in that particular cause; yet to most of us
this would be rather dull work. As the
Queen appreciates Balmoral, with its pure
mountain air, so the Prince and Princess of
Wales are grateful for the quiet of Abergeldie, after
the constant moving up and down, the bustle and
excitement of the London season.

The Maori King and chiefs have set out on their
long homeward voyage, leaving one representative in
England to receive the answer of Lord Derby to the
special mission which brought his tattoed Majesty so
far. This is not expected for some time, so that
the envoy will most likely be here for several months
to come. The Queen declined to receive the
Maori potentate, pleading the necessity of rest and
quiet; and although her Majesty did grant an
audience to Cetewayo two years ago, there can be no
doubt that the cases of the two sovereigns were
widely different. Cetewayo had been a prisoner at
Cape Town nearly three years, after having been
defeated in a sanguinary war. Every one had heard
of Cetewayo and of the fierce people whom he ruled.
The Prince Imperial of France had fallen a victim
to the assegai of the Zulu, and the greatest sympathy
was felt for his fate. "He was the only son of his
mother, and she was a widow." No such
interest attaches to the visit of King Tawhiao.
Very few people understand what he wants, and the
manner in which he was accustomed to move about
the streets of London, puffing cheap cigars, was not
such as to impress the casual observer with a notion
of the dignity of the monarchical office as it is under-
stood at the antipodes.

When the late Emperor Napoleon was on the throne
of France we complained in this country that his
foreign policy was restless and ambitious, conducted
with a view to divert the minds of his people from
the pressing necessity of internal reforms, and carried
out. for dynastic purposes. Well, in place of an
Empire which the sire hoped to pass on to the son
there is now in France a Republic with an elected,
President, who, n an hereditary sense, has nothing
whatever to hope for. It is questionable whether the
fereion nnliov /If iltnedo
'restless now than

..as under the Empire. Its development during
the last two or three years has been irritating to more
nations than on; and our own exp3rionce respect-
ing Madagascar last year is now followed up
by a quarrel with China, which might have serious
results upon the trade of neutrals like ourselves. It
is perfectly safe for the French to fall out with the
Celestials. The Empire of China, though populous,
is poor, and its army is a very different one from
that of the Germans.

• Snatches Of news from General Gordon reach
us at rare and uncertain intervals—far more
rare than are the glimpses of the Thames
to be seen from the Strand. There is
little -doubt that the vote of credit for
£350,000 which the Government obtained from
the House of Commons immediately before the rising
of Parliament commended itself to popular approval
There is something pathetic in the spectacle of Gordon
hemmed in by a horde of fanatics at Khartoum, and
in the thought that although six months have passed
since he arrived at his destination, weeks must yet
elapse before the equatorial sun will permit the relief
expedition to meet him. Compared with the
cost of rescuing a few prisoners from the
clutches of King Theodore of Abyssinia, which was
nearly eleven millions sterling, the vote of credit
seems remarkably reasonable. The Ashantee expedi-
tion of 1873 for the chastisement of King Coffee
Calcalli, coat about £OOO,OOO. -•-!,
The world of politics has been remarkably quiet
since the prorogation. Lord Salisbury is enjoying
the sea breezes at the Chalet Cecil, Dieppe, and
Mr. Gladstone has been spending a few calm
and uneventful days at Hawarden, prior to
his going to Midlothian. It is worthy of note that
only two meetings are to be held, for although men-
tally the Prime Minister is as good as he ever was,
every one who observes him in the House of Com-
mons can see that, physically, he is not the same. It
would be marvellous if he were. Next November
fifty years will have elapsed since he first entered the
service of the Crown, as a Lord of the Treasury.
Many a Parliament has come and gone, and
many an Administration has risen and fallen;
but he has sat in twelve of the former, had a place in
six of the latter. In five Ministries he has held
Cabinet office, and has been at the head of two. It
would not be surprising if after such a life, and having
been in the world three-quarters of a century, Mr.
Gladstone should desire that repose for which he
pleaded when in February, 1875, he surrendered the
lead of the Liberal Party to the Marquis of
Hartington.