The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1884-09-20 00:00:00

EPITOME OF NEWS.

BRITISH AND FOREIGN.

Of 1664 *tures exhibited in the Royal Academy this
year, 203 have been sold at prices ranging from a guinea
to £lOOO.

Sir W. Thompson has arranged to deliver a series of
scientific lectures at the Johns Hopkins University in
Baltimore in October.

The value of cheese imported into the United King-
dom in 1883 was £4,890,400, as against £4,749,870 in
1882.

Reports from various districts in the south of Scot-
land state that the honey harvest is the best known for

The statue of Sir Bartle Frere, which is to be erected
in the Thames Embankment Gardens at a cost of
£2700, has been entrusted to Mr. Brock, A.R.A., who
will execute it in bronze. It will be 11 feet high, and
will stand on a granite pedestal near the statues of
Tyndale and Outram.
The latest census taken in Roumania gives the number
of inhabitants as 4,424,961, of whom 2,276,558 are males
and 2,148,403 females. Classified according to their
religious creeds, there are 4,198,664 Orthodox Greeks,
134,168 Israelites, 45,152 Roman Catholics, 28,903
Protestants, 8734 Gregorians, 8108 Armenians, and
1323 Mahomedans.
The "City Press" states that so far the London
Central Fish Market has not proved a financial success.
The accounts just issued by the City Corporation show
that the receipts for the past year amounted to £2063,
while the expenditure for that period was £9109, leaving
a deficiency of £7046.
Several raids on betting houses have been made in
Paris, and the police have determined to allow no
betting to be carried on in the cafes or other place of
public resort. No attempt will, however, be made to
interfere with ready-money betting on the racecourse.
The total number of Canadian boatmen required
from the Ottawa district to the number of two hundred,
for service with the Nile Expedition, have now been
secured. In addition to these, ninety will be sent from
Winnipeg, sixty-one from three Rivers, and fifty from
Caughnawaga.
A statue of Alexandre Dumas is about to be erected
at his native town of Villers-Cofferets. A subscription
list has been opened to which the Count of Paris was
one of the first subscribers. The artist who has been
entrusted with the work, M. Carrier-Belleuse, has
offered to do the work gratuitously. The inauguration
will he the occasion of a great literary festival.
Information has been received from the Director-
General of the Egyptian Post-office to the effect that
money orders may be issued in this country on Waddy
Haifa (Upper Egypt) under the same conditions as
those issued on other places in Egypt.
The Earl of Devon on Monday unveiled a window at
the west end of the church of Copton, St. Mary, Devon,
to the memory of the Rev. J. N. Lightfoot, the late
vicar.

The death is announced of the Rev. Canon Milton,
vicar of St. Paul's, Manningham, West Yorkshire, and
hon. canon of Ripon, at the age of 80.
A boiler in a flour mill at Morton, Illinois, exploded
on Monday, killing four and fatally wounding three
persons. The mill was burnt.
On Monday afternoon the boiler of a cotton com-
pressor at Fzifaula, Alabama, exploded, killing five men,
setting fire to the buil-ling, and burning 300 bales of
cotton. Several persons were injured.
An inquest was held on Tuesday evening as to the
death of a farmer named Poland, whose body was found
in a field near Rostrevor, county Down, his face being
covered with blood and a large stone lying beside it.
An open verdict was returned.
Early on Tuesday morning an axle of a travelling
crane, attached to a South-Western goods train, broke
between Lydford and Tavistock, and an empty truck
and a guard's van were thrown off the line. The line
was much damaged for about 100 yards, and was not
cleared for passenger traffic until nine o'clock.
From the Ist of April to the 13th inst. the Exchequer
receipts amounted to £34,467,809, as compared with
£1,570,356 less than the £36,039,165 received in the
corresponding period of last year. The expenditure
up to 13th inst. was £35,289,252, being £2,204,940 less
than the expenditure for the similar period of 1883.
The balance in the Bank of England last Saturday
amounted to £4,897,93, and on September 15, 1883
were £4,717,720.
The number of Bills of Sale published in England
and Wales for the week ending Sept. 13 was 270. The
number in the corresponding week of last year was
231, showing an increase of 39, being a net decrease in
1884, to date, of 556. The number published in Ireland
for the same week was 9. The number in the corre-
sponding week of last year was 12, showing an increase
of 3, being a net decrease, in 1884, to date, of 573.
On Tuesday, an extraordinary accident, by which
several thousand pounds' damage was done, happened
at the Central Mill, Oldham; the engines got beyond
control and ran at great speed, the consequence being
that the shafting turning round with terrible velocity
got twisted against the ceiling and brought a large
portion of the roof down. About twelve mules, repre-
senting many thousand spindles, were smashed by the
falling masses. The operatives, thinking the mill was
falling in, escaped as best they could, some getting out
by means of the fire escape. The scene was one of
indescribable confusion, but all got out without any
injury.
A soldier named Jacobs, of the Devonshire Regiment,
stationed at Newry, was sentenced to a month's im-
prisonment with hard labour on Tuesday, for having
stolen a revolver. The prisoner said he stole the
revolver in order to shoot himself in consequence of
the tyranny to which he was subjected in the regiment.
At the Royal Observatory, Greenwich, the mean
reading of the barometer last week was 29.978 in. ; the
lowest reading was 29.27 in. on Sunday morning, and
the highest 30.15 in. on Thursday morning. The mean
temperature of the air was 60.5 deg., and 2.2 deg. above
the average in the corresponding week of the 20 years
ending 1868. The mean was below the average on
Sunday and Monday, but showed an excess the re-
mainder of the week. Rain fell on Monday to the
amount of 0.05 of an inch. The duration of registered
bright sunshine i.i the week was 32.9 hours, against
37.8 hours at Glynde-place. Lewes.
In London last week 2604 births and 1373 deaths were
registered. Allowing for increase of population, the
births were 5, and the deaths 1, below the average
numbers in the corresponding weeks of the last ten
years. The annual death-rate from all causes, which
in the four preceding weeks had steadily declined from
21.2 to 19.9 per 1000 further fell last week to 17.8.
During the past eleven weeks of the current quarter the
death-rate averaged 21.7 per 1000, against 21.1, 18.5,
and 19.2 in the corresponding periods of 1881, 1882, and
1883. The 1373 deaths included 9 from small-pox, 11
from measles, 23 from scarlet fever, 22 from diphtheria,
27 from whooping-cough, 16 from enteric fever, 1 from
simple continued fever, 126 from diarrheea and
dysentery, 2 from choleraic diarrhcca and cholera; there
was not one from typhus.