The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1879-11-08 00:00:00

I

THE STOURBRIDGE OBSERVER.

changed, and they would no longer spend the miser-
able, dull Sundays of old times. They did not want
to break the Sabbath, but they did want something
more intellectual than the Sunday school. It was
said, again, that the working people had the Saturday
half-holiday. Well, people would not go on the
Saturday afternoon to places like the British Museum.
Perhaps one reason was that the working-man did not
like to appear at such places in his working-clothes.
He hoped it would be long before English workmen
ceased to wish to look smart in public. The fact was
that a man, as a rule, had only one Sunday suit, and
he did not want to wear it on Saturday. His next
text was,—
"As a means of enabling husband, wife, and children to
partake together of healthy instruction, giving food for
conversation and an elevating tone to the whole household,
I ask you earnestly to support the opening of museums on
Sundays."

That was from Professor Tyndall. Drawing a picture
of the way in which the Sunday afternoon was spent
in many families, the speaker enlarged upon the ad-
vantages which would follow from substituting some
more rational occupations in place of sleeping or
gossiping. People could not be hearing sermons or
singing hymns all day. Much good also would come
from the mingling and association of different classes
in the museums. His third text was from Professor
Huxley :
" I believe that the outcry that the opening of museums
on Sundays would tend to secularize the Sunday, and thus
throw work upon a Jugs number of people, is one of the
greatest shams ever brought before the public)."

In all countries, Mr. Rogers said, he believed the
tendency now was to go the other way and to observe
the Sunday more and more generally. The idea of the
Continental Sunday was abhorrent to the feelings of
most Englishmen, and he was disposed to hope that
the French would come to keep the Sunday more
rationally than many of them did at present. As to
the employment of people in the picture galleries and
museums, a few policemen alone would be required,
who could have their hours of duty changed. There
were many scientific men, barristers and educated
people who would not teach in Sunday schools, who
would yet be glad to give their services in museums
and picture galleries to replace the regular curators.
In conclusion, Mr. Rogers dwelt upon the import-
ance of the recent debate in the House of Lords on
the subject. For the most part, the members of the
House were men who thoroughly understood the
country, men of very good sense indeed, and when he
saw by how small a majority a motion for the opening
of the national museums wai rejected, he said, "Now
I am certain it will come."

QUARTERLY RETURN of MARRIAGES,
BIRTHS, and DEATHS.
The Registrar-General reports that in the United
Kingdom the births of 282 520 children, and the deaths
of 13#,771 persons of both sexes, were registered in the
three months ending Sept. 30, 1879, The recorded
natural increase of population was thus 143,219.
The registered number of persons married in the
quarter ending June 30, 1879, was 114,650.
The resident population of the 'United Kingdom in
the middle of 1879 is estimated at 34.156,113; that of
England and Wales at 25,166,36, of Scotland
3,627,453, and of Ireland at 5,336,324.

The birth-rate in the United Kingdom in the third
quarter of 1879 was 328 per 1,000, and the death-rate
162. The marriage-rate in the second quarter of 1879
was 13*5 per 1,000.

autumnal hues, and the faint music of the distant bells
accorded aptly with the solemn memories which a visit
to this scene of our army's peril must ever awaken in
English hearts. The Russian cemetery is said to
contain the bodies of 100,000 men who perished in the
Crimean war; the French cemetery, 18,000. The
former, with its fine church, cost £54,000; the latter,
£6,000. Sebastopol still remains in great measure
what the allied armies left it at the close of the war, a
collection of demolished forte, abandoned barracks, and
burned houses—a very picture of desolation. A solemn
service was being held in the principal church at the
time of my arrival—October 17—the 25th anniversary
of the day on which the bombardment began.—Believe
me to be, Sir, your obedient servant,
Sebastopol, Oct. 25.

C. W. GIJIBILTIR.

It may not be uninteresting to recal to the memory
of our readers that the battle of INICERMAN was
fought on the sth of November, 1854—now a quarter of
a century ago. The Russian army, numbering about
40,000, having received reinforcements, and being
encouraged by the presence of the Grand Dukes
Michael and Nicholas, attacked the British, 8,000 in
number, near the old fort of Inkerman, before day-
break, in the midst of a dense fog. They were
stubbornly kept at bay for six hours, when the British
were reinforced by the arrival of 6,000 French. The
Russians were then repulsed, leaving 9.000 killed
and wounded. The loss of the allies was 462 killed,
1,952 wounded, and 191 missing. Among the slain
were Sir George Cathcart, and Generale Strangways,
Goldie, and Torrens.— The Times of November 5 had
a leader noticing the anniversary of the battle, from
which we make the following extracts :

. . . . Inkerman was, in truth, insignificant neither in its
Immediate nor in its indirect effects. It left the Russian
army an army stilL Prince Menschikoff dld not secure his
anticipated triumph; but the forces he had not crushed
were unable to rout him. . . . . When the victory
and the siege are taunted with futility for not
having stayed Russian encroachments upon Turkey,
it is forgotten how lung these encroachments were
stayed in fact. If for more than twenty years Europe
had peace from Panslavonic aspiration.s, the Crimean war
and Inkerman axst have the thanks. Finality is unknown
in human affairs. The life of States as well as of men is
made up of years. Twenty years of tranquility from the
descent of the creeping glacier of Northern and Eastern
Europe are a gain whteh cannot be taken away. The respite
would not be despicable had it been a respite add nothing
more. Ent such respites bear interest. The world has
funded that interval of rest from one at least of its
disturbing causes, and is receiving dividends from it even
DAR Nations when they war now may esteem
themselves fortunate if at some stage or other in the
struggle they are not conscious of a cries of mortal agony.
Looking back at the Crimean war, men are inclined to
think it trivial because, if it deprived an empire for almost
the length of a generation of its power of aggression, it left
to it its power of defence.

That the battles and the siege were not useless outpour-
ings of human blood, but bore real fruits, a letter of the
Bishop of Gibraltar comes on the anniversary of Inkerman
to testify. The war was waged to rescue the Black Sea
from the condition of a Russian lake domineered over
by an impregnable fortress. The Black Sea, even
after Turkey has been trampled under foot by Russia,
is not a Russian lake; and the proud city of
Sebastopol remains, as the Allies left it, "a very picture
of desolation." Perhaps something may even be said in
favour of the inferior tragic splendour of a war which thus
no more than compassed its object in comparison with
the sublimer European contests of later years, which
have struck straight at the foe's heart Russia was
forced by the Crimean war to recognize the limits
of her power. She was not humiliated, though her
marshalled army could not annihilate a far inferior
force. How little bitterness that strife left behind it
appears in the protection the city of Sebastopol is ready to
accord to the graves of the warriors whose valour helped to
ruin its brilliant prospects. War has few kindly aspects.
Among the few must be reckoned any tokens of pious reve-
rence a ration pays to the gallant dead whom its invaders
have bequeathedto its oharge.

and importance of the days and the years that were
now passing over their heads. They were making
their future ; they were moulding the mind, mould-
ing the intellect, moulding the moral character of
the future man; and that in a degree which none
could well understand, which they must take upon
trust, but with the assurance that it was a pro-
position founded upon true knowledge of human
nature and upon universal experience. If they had
not got traditions in the strict sense of the word at
this early period of their existence, at least they had
recollections that were recollections of great value,
and which should and must operate as incitements to
their endeavours to prove worthy of the names they
bore, of the parents whom they followed, and of the
country to which they belonged. They were constantly
reminded in the daily worship in their beautiful
chapel, not only that they were there tor the purpose
of being trained to godliness and good learning, but
likewise they had set before them the name of one
who, for more than half a century, held up to his fel-
low-countrymen an illustrious, a consistent, an unvary-
ing example of single-minded devotion eo public duty.
(Loud cheers.) The general fame of the Duke of
Wellington and his character as one of the greatest
generals of modern times made of themselves
this connexion with the college appropriate. But
the other association referred to was one higher
still. Far beyond his military skill, his general power
of mind, and strong intuitive sense was the devotion to
duty which had essentially endeared him to every
class and every description of his countrymen, quite
Independent of coincidence with every particular
opinion he might have held, or of approval for every
act that it might have been his lot to perform. In that
devotion to duty they had the great secret of life. They
had also another precious recollection in their associa-
tion with Royalty. The career of the Prince Consort
was cut short when he had attained one half the age of
the illustrious duke; but he bestowed upon that insti-
tution an amount of thought and care—care not con-
scientious only, but tender, as was all his care for what
involved the interests of the country—which must make
his name ever a venerated name within those walls, as
It must ever be a name dear to the whole nation and
inhabitants of this island—at least as long as excel-
lence should continue to be prized among men. (Ap-
plause.) They knew, or they felt even before they
knew, what the Throne was ha this country; how the
Throne was to us not merely an ensign of power, but
a symbol of all that was represented by the name and
the idea of country, of all that attached us to the past,
of that which we ought to revere, of that which we
ought to love. Their association with Royalty was a
great, a oonspicuoue, and, he might almost say, a peculiar
feature in the position of the institution. There, too,
perhaps more than in any of the other of the English
public schools, certainly more than in many of them,
what might be called the modern spirit in English edu-
cation VIM represented. To many of their parents it
might have formed the great and capital attraction in
sending them there, and it suggested many subjects of
the gravest importance. Undoubtedly. the mode in
which the institution had been organized afforded them
peculiar advantages with reference to their professional
advancement and success in life. There was, in some re-
spects, a contrast between the old public school system
of this country and the new. The old public school
system of this country had one great and capital
defect--that it treated all the youth brought within its
range as if they ware intended for one and the same
destiny in life. It took too little heed, not only of the
differences of their coming careers, but what was yet
more important, of the differences of their several
capacities. It endeavoured to make all conform to
one model, which was called the classical model. But
with that great fault the old public school system of this
countryhad a great merit which might have been tally
enjoyed and brought to fruit and profit without in-
curring a fault, but a merit so great that it ought not
only to be remembered and recorded, but in none of our
reforms, in none of oar innovations ought we to run the
risk of losing the advantages that were connected with
It. That merit was that it kept in view beyond all
other things not merely the acquiring such information
as might be valuable in examinations, not merely the
adapting of faculties to professional success, but in the
highest and in a more inward sense the education of
the man. The knowledge acquired by his hearers had
two great aspects. Besides being a commodity which
was to serve the external purposes of life, knowledge
had a greater and a higher power; it was an educating
instrument. It was to bring out all their capacities,
not for the sake simply of the purposes they were to
serve them in life, but for their own sake. The whole)
of life was, after all, simply an education, and the pro-
fessions and businesses to which they might be here-
after devoted were only parts and portions of the edu-
cation. And then came into view what undoubtedly
must be admitted to be the danger of the new sys-
tem, of the modern spirit in education. He knew
not whether it was owing to our degeneracy, but
he was afraid it was the truth that we had a much
smaller amount in this 19th century of a disinterested,
ardent, enthusiastic love of knowledge for its own
sake than our forefathers had 500 years ago. But be
that as it might, it was the fact that our system of
education was now worked by a method of sharp
competition and immediate rewards. He saw all the
benefits of that method; he saw the great results it
had produced; but there was a peril in it, and It was
the peril of their believing when they had gone through
the examinations and obtained the prizes, and when
they were realizing professional BUCCeS3 as a conse-
quence of early distinction—that they should look upon
that success as the end of their education. It was not
the end of their education. The end of their
education was the effect it produced upon them-
selves, the state to which it brought and in
which it left them; and the distinction was a very real
one. His hearers were destined for many careers,
But rely upon it that it was not for one of these pro-
fessions alone, it was for all, that the benefits of edu-
cation were intended. They all rested upon the same
footing; they were all directed to the same end—the
end of giving glory to God by the performance of duty,
by the due use and full improvement of the faculties
which he had given. In this prooess those before him
were engaged. They were not the first generation of
scholars passed through Wellington College, but they
were among the first. He did not entertain any doubt
that as tho college had already taken so it would
permanently hold a high and honourable place
among the great institutions of the country. It
was in their power, by slackness in their work,
to disparage its position and to discourage those who
were labouring for their good; but it was also in their
power, by manful exertion, to gladden the hearts of
their teachers, to bestow upon them the most valuable
by far of all the rewards they received for their labours,
and to lay up for Wellington College such a store of
renown, founded upon true service done, that it should
be worthy in future times of the illustrious name which
It bore, worthy of the society of English public schools
into which it had effectually entered, worthy of the
country to which it belonged, and of the great duties
and great responsibilities which that country had to
bear.

After addressing the students at Wellington College,
Mr, Gladstone left by South Eastern Railway for
Hawarden Castle proceeding from the Reading
Junction of the Great Western Railway. The right
hon. gentleman took his seat in company with the
Bishop of Oxford, who had been attending the cere-
mony of laying the memorial stone of the new public
buildings at Reading. A crowd assembled on the
platform and cheered Mr. Gladstone.

On Monday night it was rumoured in Saltney, a
suburb of Chester, that the Right Hon. W. E.
Gladstone would arrive by the 10 o'clock Great
Western train from Wokingham. In a short time a
large crowd gathered at the station, and on the arrival
of the train a baud played "See, the conquering hero
comes 1" The crowd gave Mr. Gladstone an enthu.
elastic welcome, pressing forward to grasp his hand,
and heartily cheering him as he passed down through
open ranks to his carriage. Mr. Gladstone said the
welcome was very gratifying to him and he was very
much astonished. He had had no idea that he would
receive such a cordial welcome home from the people
of Saltney. He was pleased to find that he held such
a plaoe in their hearts, and hoped that nothing he
should ever do would forfeit their esteem. Mr.
Gladstone then entered his carriage, and drove away
to Hawarden Castle amid renewed cheers.

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