The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1883-09-22 00:00:00

EPITOME OF NEWS.

BRITISH AND FOREIGN.

If France should want to treat with the Black Flags,
and send them a White One, she hasn't got one now.
—Puna.

There are no fewer than seven vast new hotels now
in course of erection in London, four of them with
about 1,000 bed•roonis each.

At a public meeting held in Bradford on Saturday,
a resolution was passed condemning the practice of
giving home lessons to children.
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The barque Britannia, of Shoreham, from Morant
Bay for Montreal, was wrecked on the 3rd inst. off
Sable Island. The captain's wife and three children
and eight of the crew were drowned. •
Sixty•three of the 126 men employed on the
London Steamboat Company's boats struck work on
Saturday morning, and aa ac nsequence 14 out of the
Company' 21 boats running between London Bridge
and Kew have ceased working.

The total subscriptions up to the rrasent to the
fund for raising a monument to the late M. Gambetta
amount to the large sum of 278,004 francs 5 centimes.
Mr. Chamberlain has been yachting. As the song
says, "They all do it." The President of the Board
of Trade became so popular with the men on hoard
that they christened him the "Birmingham Pet, or
the Darling of his Screw."—Punch.
The Rev. J. T. Dove, Vicar of Cowbit, and a ma-
gistrate on the Spalding Bench has been fined Is. and
costs at Spalding Petty Sessions for obstructing the
highway by leaving his tricycle thereon, which fright-
ened a horse. Notice of appeal was given.

On Tuesday a silver crown, sent by the French
colony of Rosario, Santa Fe, was deposited on M.
Gambetta's tomb in the presence of M. Gambetta's
father and the Prefect of the Alpes Maritimes.

Some handsome subscriptions have been recently re-
ceived towards the Manchester Cathedral Restoration
Fund. The amount now reaches about £23,000. It is
expected that the whole of the north side of the nave
will be completed by Christmas.

The authorities have under their consideration the
advisability ci giving the troops stationed at home a
fish dinner once a week in lieu of the ordinary meat
ration. The fish would cost about 2i per ration,
whereas the meat now supplied (viz , three quarters of
a pound of good beef or mutton) costs 6d. per ration.

On Tuesday afternoon, at Kew, a young man
named Jotn Grant, in attempting to exhibit his skill
as a swimmer, was drowned. He dived frlm the
summit of Kew-bridge, a height of nearly 401 t., into
the river, but, encumbered with his clothes, be was
unable to exert his skill and sank immediately. He
had on several previous occasions accomplished the
feat. The deceased leaves a young widow.

During the working of one of the new Howard
sheaf•binding reaping maohinea in a crop of wheat on
Mr, 0, Harrison's farm at Fulford, near York, a
leveret was caught by the gathering reel, lifted on to
the platform of the machine, taken up by the elevator,
bound tightly in the wheatslaeaf, and, singularly
enough, when released, appeared little the will() for
the extraordinary occurrence,

Early on Monday morning, as the Lanarkshire
police were apprehending several men f,r fighting at a
colliery village, Low Blantyre, Bergeant Stewart was
stabbed in three places and struck on the head with a
brick, while Constable Morton was twice struck on
the forehead by the sharp end cf a miner's pick. He
was removed to the Glasgow Western Infirmary in a
precarious condition.
At It-adinn, on Saturday, John Ashby, a miller,
aged twenty-tive, met with his death in a very shock-
in,: manner. It apvears that the deceased was engaged
In putting a belt i,ver the chatting rf some machinery,
when his hands were caugit beneath the leather
strap, and about iminviately he was dragged round
and throl,n agsin.t the wall, An it quest has been
held, when the jury retorted a verdict of " Acci-
dEntal ath."

The Gippsland Mercury records that on July 8 there
passed away, at the age of seventy•five, Mn, Ellen
Cony nghazu Biack, who at one time bc'ed ,a governess
of the Cxnte de Chambord. Her stepson married
Th6rik.e Maori, the Maid of Athens of Lord Byron's
song. Soon after 1820 Mr. and Mrs. Black were
douiciled bt the valace of Holyro d, which was occu-
pied iy Obasiles X , the exiled King of France. Mr.
Illmck was tutor, hod Mrs. B:hos g.,uvernante, of the
Duo de BJrtleanx, otherwiec Comte de Chambord, and
travelled much with him. Mn. Llack went to Aus-
tralia in 1869.

Baptist statistics show an average of somewhat over
1,786 baptised in the United States on each Sunday.
There were thirty British and foreign actual ship-
wrecks reported during last week, making a total of
1,287 for the present year, or an increase of 308 as corn.
pared with the corresponding period of last year.
Aclric.s received from Chicago state that Kansas
has become a " sorghum " raising State. The crop
meets the demand for fodder as well as for sugar and
syrup making.
The poultry produce of the United States last year,
amounted in value to £112,000,000.
A strike has occurred among the workviomen of the
tobacco factory at Havre. The number of women
who have stopped work is 600. It appears that they
only earn from if. to if, 50. a day at present.
The number of Italians who emigrlted to ether
countries during the 12 months of last year was
161,562, as compared with 135,882 in 1881.
A aencva telegram says that Miss Booth has been
put in prison at Neuchatel for attending a religious
meeting, and " Colonel" Clibborn has been expelled
from the canton of Geneva for singing a hymn at a
funeral.

In consequence of the outbreak of cattle plague at
Theodosia, in the Crimea, the importation of cattle
from that place into Constantinople has been pro-
hibited.

Last week's receipts of cotton at all United States
ports were 64,000 bales; since Ist September, 97,000
bales. Week's exports to Great Britain, 10,000 bales;
week's exports to the Continent, 7,000 bales; total since
Ist September, 0,000 bales. Stock at all ports, 240,000
bales.
The foot-and-mouth disease still continues to in-
crease in Irelatd, and Tuesday night's Dubli* Gazette
contains numerous notices declaring various places in
the counties of Dublin, Kildare, Meath, and West-
meath infected.
The number of visitors at the Fisheries Exhibition
last Saturday was 37,741, making a total for last week
of 110,8. The total number from the opening of the
Exhibition has been 1,777,154.
Four young men have just been arrested at German.
town, Pennsylvania, for carving their names on a
statue of William Penn in the public park, and have
thereby rendered themselves liable to a fine of 500
dollars and six months' imprisonment.
The ship EiNdenham, of 1,063 tons, Captain A. D.
Ross, chartered by Sir Saul Samuel, K.C.M.G.,
Agent• General for New South Wales, sailed from Ply-
mouth for Sydney on the 15th inst., with 342 emi-
grants.

The voters' registers at Glasgow F how an increase
on last year. The Parliamentary lists contain no
fewer than 61,817 names, and an increase of 4,31 ;
and the municipal constituency now numbers $5,000
voters, an increase of 5,235. There are nearly 14,000
women on the municipal Hate.
A collier, named John Dudson, aged nineteen, has
been instantaneously killed in Moss Colliery, near
Ashton under. Lyne. He was engaged propping the
roof with stone and dirt, when a large stone fell upon
his head.

Six women employed in field labour have been
killed by lightning at Koleo, in Bohemia, while stand-
ing for shelter under a large tree during a thunder-
storm. Three other women accompanying them re-
ceived dangerous injuries.
A telegram from Rome says that disastrous floods,
caused by vety heavy rains, are reported to have
occurred in the neighbourhood of Taranto. Many lives
are said to have been bet, and there has been con-
siderable destruction of cattle.
The Fetes held in the Tuileries Gardens, in Paris,
for the xelief of the sufferers by the Ischia catastrophe
and for the poor of Paris realised 380,000 francs, from
which has to be deducted 153,521 francs :or expenses.
Already 150,000 francs have teen distributed to the
sufferers by the earthquake at Ischia.
On Monday a thunderstorm broke over London,
which was most violent in the northern district. At
four o'clock the rain was coming down in torrents, and
in some roads in Holloway, the surface water traps
having become choked with street refuse, the water
rose to the height of three or four feet. The basements
of many houses were flooded, and considerable injury
done to carpets and furniture.

Darmstadt advices correct the recent statement
about the wedding of the Princess Victoria of Hesse
with Prince Louis of Battenberg. The wedding will
take place at Darmitadt, not at Windsor, and will not
he before February next.
The Board of Trade has received the following tele-
gram from Her Majesty's Consul at Palermo :
" Marsala lighthouse completely destroyed by light-
ning." The Board of Trade understands this to refer
to the harbour light on the extremity of the pier at
Marsala.

The wheat crop of California for the present season
is estimated to be worth 60,000,C0 dole. One-third
of this crop will be retained in the State for home
consumption and seed, and the rest will be exported to
foreign countriea. The wheat crop of the other
Pacific Coast States and Territories will, it is calcu-
lated, be worth 20,000,000 dole, more, making the
value of the total wheat crop of the Pacific Coast
80,000,000 dole.
A New York telegram says that the visible supply
of wheat on Sept. 14 was 23,500,000 bushels, as against
21,400,000 bushels the previous week. Visible supply
of Indian corn, 13,200,000 bushels, as against 11,300,000
bushels the previous week. The export clearances of
wheat for Europe during last week amounted to
1,340,000 bushel& The export clearances of Indian
corn for Europe during last week amounted to 88),000
bushels.
The cab and omnibus drivers of Marseilles have
struck for higher wages. The csb drivers earned
ninety francs a month. They now demand no less
than one hundred and fifty francs, without any addi•
Vonal hours of work. The omnibus drivess demand
one hundred and fifty francs per month, instead of the
one hundred and ten which they receive at present.

Information has been received at Portsmouth to the
effect that three persons in that town and one in
Australia have each just come in for a fourth share of
a quarter of a million of money which has for years
been lying in Chancery. One of the prospective re.
cipients is, and has been for some time, in the work-
house,

Three deaths from drowning were reported in
London on Monday. One was that of a man partially
dressed, whose boay bad been found, in the Lea, at
Bow.; another, that of a boy about eight years old,
found in the Grand Junction Canal; and the third, a
youth, apparently about 18 years of age, whose body
was found in the Thames, off Hammersmith.
The first experiment of a new system of judicial
statistics has been made, and the result for 18E1 is
published, and compared with that of previous years.
In 1880, 362,709 parsons were convicted. In 1879 the
number of persons convicted was 815,105; and in 1878,
242,570. In 1880, 3,023 soldiers and 14 officers of the
army were condemned; and of the navy, 2 officers and
194 men.

The national statue voted by the Homes of Parlila.
ment for ereation in Westminster Abbey to the
memory of the late Lord Beaconsfield has been
finished by the artist, Mr. J. E. Boehm, R. A., to
whom the work was intrusted. The statute, which is
a correct likeness of the deceased statesman, is about
seven feet in height, is made of the finest white
Carrara marble, and stands on a marble pedestal. The
late Premier is represented in full ministerial dress,
with the Order of the Garter on his breast. -
The remains of the Right Hon. Hugh Law, the late
Lord Chancellor of Ireland, were interred on Saturday
morning at Mount Jerome Cometery, Dublin. The
coffin • bore the ir,scription 'The Right Hon. Hugh
Law, born June 19, 1818, died September 10, 1883."
The Lord-Lieutenant attended the ceremony.

Upwards of 1,200 applications have already been
received for the post of executioner, vacated by the
death of Marwood. These have been forwarded from
ihe Home Office and eirewhere to the Sheriffs of
London and Middlesex, who are now engaged in so
c moldering and sifting them as to have a tittiog man
at hand to carry-out the sentence of the law in cal() of
need.

At the Liverpool Police court on Tuesday, before
Mr. Raffles, James M'Dermutt, 40 yews of age, was
brought up on remand, having been beveral weeks in
custody, charged in connection with the dynamite
conspiracy. Mr. Marks, the prosecuting solicitor, now
stated that after consideration, it had been decided to
offeeno evidence against the prisoner. M'Dermott
was accordingly discharged.
At a meeting of the magistrates and cther gentlemen
held in the Town•hall, Aberdeen, on Saturday, Mr,
John Gray, of Spring•gardens Iron Works, and a
member of the town conncil, intimated his intention
to present to the city a building suitable for an art
school, to be erected from plans submitted, at the
cost of over £5,000. The site of this munificent gift
is contiguous to the public museum now beb g built.

A sad boating fatality occurred on the Fossdyke
navigation, at Lincoln, on Saturday evening. Jona-
than Cooke, filecutter, his wife, and her brother,
were proceeding along the canal In a boat when the
wife expressed a wish to row. Places were being
changed to allow her to do so when the boat capsized,
and the occupants were precipitated into the water.
The wife and her brother were rescued, but the
husband was drowned.

At a special meeting of the Wisbeach Town Council
on Tuesday, Mr. AbErnethy, C.E. attended and Ex-
plained the detiils ot the proposed docks, which the
Council resolved to promote in the ensuing Sesaion Of
Parliament. The estimate for a six-acre dock
£142,00), and for ten acres £180&o. The lock is pro.
posed to he 25n1t. log between gates, and 501 t.
depth of water over sill, 24ft. at spring tides, and laft.
Gln at neap tides.

A fatal accident has occurred at the London and
North Western station at Crewe. A pointsman was
engaged in oiling the points, when, apparently not
noticing the approach of an express train that was
running up the Liverpool line, he was struck, and
hurled a considerable distance on the metals. Before
the engine could be stopped he was run over and
decapitated. He had only reoently been married
On Friday in last week a young man named WU-
liamson, of Glasgow, while on his way to the Dun-
heath (Caithness) Highland games on a bicycle, lost
control of his machine at a part of the road which
crossea a stream at Latheron. The wheel took an
abrupt turn, and came into violent contact with the
rparapet wall, with the result that the rider was pro-
jeoted from his seat a distance of forty feet into the
bed of the rivulet. On being picked up a few
minutes afterwards by a companion he breathed his

A topographical plan of St. Petersburg, upon which
great labour and care have been exercised, is shortly
to be published. The plan is on the scale of 150
Pa) bnes to the inch, and not only shows the position
of the streets, squares, palaces, churches, and so on,
bnt indicates the different suburbs and their sur•
roundings. It is said to be most admirably executed,
while every attention has been paid to accuracy,

A son of Arabi Pasha is, according to a report from
Alexandria, about to enter the British army.
It is reported from Brighton that on Monday a boy
eleven years of age, a son of Dr. Stephen, of Kensing-
ton, swam from the Chain Pier, to the West Pier in
thirty•five minutes.

In Hamburg great preparations are being made to
cele')rate in June next the bicentenary of the birth
of the great musician, Handel.
Cub hunting has commenced in the West of England,
and some good sport is promised.

Llte statistics show that there are now 3,111,C06
scholars of both sexes attending school in Italy, being
the ninth part of the whole population cf the king-
dom,

An Italian paper puhii-hes a de.patch arnouncing
that a sulphur cave has fa.)l,=r3 in at Lercara Fiidda, in
Sicily. Several persons were killed by this oc2urr-3nce,
and among the injured was Mr. John Rose, the pro-
prietor.

The ship Banoicklaw, Captain Ure, left Glasgow on
the 14th for Queensland ports, having on board 461
emigrants. The steamer Duke of Buccleuch, Captain
West, left Plymouth on the 12th inst., also for Queens.
lard ports, with 710 emigrants.
At the Chester Market on Weineseay morning
magnificent magnum bonum potatoes were sold at
28. 9d. per hamper of 1261 b., or a little over a farthing
per lb. Reports from all parts of the country show
there is the largest crop on record.

The Government has decided to make a grant of
£13,500, ard give a loar of £27,000, towards the pro-
posed new Court-house buildings in Dublin.

In the church that is being built on the site of the
old slave market at Zanzibar a nainted window is to
be fitted up to the memory of the late Keith Johnston,
P.R.G.S., who died at Betsobero in June, 1879.
A "soldier of the 21st Hussars, named James Dalziel,
blew out his brains at eight o'clock on Sunday even-
ing while on sentry duty it the Royal Barracks,
Dublin. No explanation of the act can be discovered.
The Postal Gazette says that one of the officials of the
Postal Telegraph Department has just returned from
Norway, from whence he has purchased a number of
poles for use in the proposed extension of the tele-
graph service.
While Alexander Wilkinson, a "Steeple Jack," was
engaged in repairing a chimmy stack near Boness, Scot-
land, be fell to the ground, a distance of 200 it., and
was killed on the spot.

A telegram from New York as that Lord Aylee-
ford is negotiating for the purchase of a large cattle
ranch in Texas. Lie invites English farmers to settle
in that State, where they would be able to devote
themselves to stock-raising on a large scale and with
good prospects of remunerative business.

A notice was published in Tuesday's London Gazette,
that after the expiration of six days, the Speaker will
issue his warrant to the Clerk of the Crown to make
out a new writ for the election f a member for Man-
chester, in the room of the late Mr. Birley.
Prince Albert Victor of Wales left Balmoral on
Saturday afternoon, driving in one of the Queen's
carriages to Ballater, whence he prt.ceeded south in a
saloon carriage, attached to the express. On Sunday
evening the Prince left London and embarked at
Queenshorough for Flushing, en route to join the
Prince of Wales in Denmark,

The receipts into the Exchequer from April 1 to
September 15 amounted to £36,039,165, against
£35,233,43 in the corresponding period of last year.
The expenditure was £37,530,192 against £38,650,396.
The balance in the Bank of England last Saturday was
£3,470,142, and in the Bank of Ireland £1,247,578.
In London last week 2,438 births and 1,260 deaths
were registered. Allowing for increase of population,
the births were 97, and the deaths 121, below the
average numbers in the corresponding weeks of the
last ten years. The annual rate of mortality from all
causes, which had been equal to 170 and 166 per 1,009
in the two preceding weeks, was last week again 166.

A telegram from Alexandria says that the first ship-
ment to Liverpool of the new cotton was made on
Tueads,y. Reports from the cotton districts continue
to speak of a large crop arid good quality. The
ravages of the worm are apparently less than were
feared.
John Corteen, son of the surveyor-general of hiQh-
ways for the Isle of Man, was accidentally killed
whilst shooting over his father's land in Mangbold,
near Ramsey, on Tuesday afternoon. Deceased was
climbing aver a hedge when it gave way beneath him,
and the charge exploded and lodged in his chest. He
died in about three-quarters of an hour.

A. young lady, lately residing at Brighton, died a few
days since of consumption. Arrangements had been
made for her marriage to take place within a few
days of her fatal illness, and under these circnm-
stances it was decided to depart from the usually
sombre appanages of funeral rites, and the cortege,
which left the deceased's late residence about noon on
Tuesday, consisted of an open funeral car drawn by
four grey horses, the three coaches which followed
being similarly furnished.

A despatch from Brest announces that the French
steamship Ville de Cambrai struck the rocks of St.
Guenole, off Penmarch, on Mmday afternoon, at four
o'clock. The vessel sank almost immediately, but the
crew was saved. A child of twelve years old, who had
been booked as a passenger, was, however, drowned.
At Sheffield, on Monday, a largely-attended meet-
ing of South Yorkshire ironworkers, representing all
the principal ironworks in the district, decided to
demand an advance of 9d, per ton on puddling and
7i per cent, on other work.
The Duke of Bedford has sent a donation of £2OO to
the Metropolitan Provident Medical Association in
aid of the £5,G00 fund for the extension of provident
dispensaries in London in districts outside the circle
occupied by the medics' charities of old standing.
In London, last Saturday, a fatal accident occurred
to a young man named Dally, a telegraph engineer.
He was at work at the telegraph on the roof of No.
32, St. Swithin's•lane, 8.C., when he slipped on the
slates and fell off the roof through a skylight, dashing
out his brains.

Surg.-Maj. J. G. Rogers, A,M.D., has been ap•
pointed principal medical officer of the new Egyptian
army. The salary attaching to the post will be £l,OOO
per annum. SurgoMsj. Rogers has been acting for
some time on the staff of the British army of occupa-
tion in Egypt, and has been noted officially for his
services during the recent outbreak of cholera amongst
the troops in that country.

A Paris telegram says that a young officer in the
4th French Engineers has committed suicide in a
peculiarly horrible manner. Unstrung at the idea of
having to face a court-martial for some trivial fault,
he tied a belt filled with dynamite round his waist,
and applied a match. He was literally blown to
pieces.
Mr. J. Payne Collier, the Shakespearean critic,
died at his residence, Riverside, Maidenhead, on Mon-
day, at the advanoed age of ninety-four. Mr. Collier
was born in London in 1789, and his grandfather, who
was descended from the famous Jeremy Collier, was
one of the medical attendants on the household of
Queen Charlotte.
On Friday in last week, while engaged in pulling
a rope attached to some coal sacks at a wharf at Rich-
mond railway station, James Ryan, aged 35, foreman
to a coal merchant, lost his hold, and fell beneath a
heavily-laden coal waggon, the wheel of which went
over his chest, killing him instantaneously.
The traffic receipts of the railways in the United
Kingdom for the week ending Sept. 14, upon a mileage
of 16,6274, amounted to £1,407,791, being equal to
£Bl 134. per mile. For the c,rresponding week of last
year the receipts were £1,419,171, the number of miles
open 16,422?, or £B6 9s. per mile. A comparison of
the two weeks shows a decrease in the total reotipts of
£11,380, and an increase in the number of miles open
of 204 i.
The additions to the Zoological Society's Gardens,
Regent's-park, London, during last week included a
white-fronted capuchin from South America, pre-
sented by Miss A. Tanner; two common marmosets
fre,m Brazil, presented by Mr. H. H. Forbes Eden ;
three Mexican deer from the Island of Santa Cruz,
presented by Captain Edwin Cole; a Getulian ground
squirrel from Morocco, presented by Mr. Geo. D.
Cowan; a grey ichneumon from India, presented by
Captain W. F. Small; a common squirrel (British),
presented by Master C. B. Webster; two stink-pot
terrapins, a Penney-Ivry:llan mud terrapin, a Mississippi
alligator, a sharp-nosed crocodile from Florida, pre
Rented by Captain E. Cole; a common chameleon
from North Africa, presented by Mr. F. L. B. Payne ;
a white-fronted capuchin, a black-faced spider monkey,
a pileated jay, a spotted tinamou from South America,
two ruddy finches from Siberia, a jackdaw (British),
four eyed lizards (South European), purchased.