The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1876-11-18 00:00:00

ran STOURBRIDGE OBSERVER_

truth of the lesson which the poet sought to convey. Ile
admitted, Wiped, tMr. premLss that "ale learning is a
dangerous .ellielog," but he denied the ,spoet's conclusion
that onaslis.' must drink deep or taste not the Pierian
It was not the c,4se that because "a little,
saruing was a dangerous thing," therefore, p...0p1e might"
not to:try to acquire what learning they could. Mita moil
not tisk true lesson of the poet. It was not the :tittantits!
le
but thescnitdit th yof e learning that was importers' - (Real,'
hear) C.lt Was the manner .in whicla‘people -- cquirbtl,
learpinse 'and . the edescioutiess a ,ttirreal x. - t -ow
-slue to which it was important for them to • ct their
sation. No learning would be of any real and true
eood unless it were accompanied with humility. By
humility, however, he did not mean faint-heartedness
orself-aistru,y or indolence. elle meant true humility, which'
wOuld enable a man to avoid-two ereorsviz , that of believ-
ing 'that .the acquisition of a little ivas the acqhisition of a
whole teiNnee, or that of despising other sciences than that
which he lesd himself studied. People ought to be careful
sot to be puffed up by what-they had learnt. Again, they
_night to endeavour to avoid that which he believed wsasvery
mush-the bane of the present day. He meant an undue
excitement in regard to subjects of study, - ltlanyS matters
were spoilt at the present day by an unfortunate -tendeney
to extreme excitement, desire for display, desire to
get on rapidly, and to attract attention, and s--constant'
desire to avoid whatever is dull, which, after all, was
the bane of all true learning. A man would never learn
anything if be wanted to be only amused. It was very ,
well to be amused at the beginning of a. subject, but 1
If a man expected that all learning was amnsement and.
would throw it up the moment he found it dull he would
never make honourable progress. (Hear, hear.) Even in
the matter of education they could no"cs -be entirely free from 1
excitement. All this prize-giving, examinations, and compe-
titions of one class or another which were continually going
on around them had the effect of carrying their minds away.
Therefore he warded them to learn with asilduity, with de-
termination to make themselves master of their subject, and '
not to be driven sway from it because it was dulL 'DA not I
let them be led Into the error of attending to theiwork I
they undertook merely with reference to its practical
utility to themselves. No doubt . that was a greatt
point ; but anybody who only took ut, h -Study likely'
to be useful in his own walk in life missed the more huts
portant object, that of the cultivation of the mind generally,
the cultivation of his nature, and the improvement of the
faculties God had given him. (Cheers.) Let them remora, •
in connexion with this the fable-of szEtop. ...When the • ,
man told his Bons that if they would dig in the vineyard they
would find treasure, they dug it all over, but,festmektsa gold{
or sliver. The digging itself was the treasure which the
father meant. (Cheers.) That which was a. lesson to .thoaes
who were to be taught might also be of use to the teacher
Teachers should endeavour so to arrange the education they
had to Rive as to avoid the dapgerasyltiali he'sliad poilitest
out, While he warned them on the sableot at- bus:antis
Ice must warn those who took part in edtscatlethatteri
against anything approaching to flatteity. =alto was.
too much tendency in the present day to ditteithework
ing classes. (Hear, hear.) It was necessary, perhaps, at
fEctitieieneta etno"suerel; :My- ITerriln)l;l-iroTsZieFilen
into account, and had in them that stuff of whioh gsed"
and wire men were made. But this might be meat too
far. They must not flatter the working classes, but should
do that which was much better for them and more honour-
able to their advisers—namely, to tell them the truth
whenever that could be done. (Applause.) - There was
another point which those connected with education might
fairly lay to heart. The progress of the educational move-
ment in the last half century—or, perhapr, still more in
the last quarter of a century—had been such as to go a
long way towards enlarging the views of persons and
classes of persons who were tsught, and also towards extend-
ing the subjcts which might be taught. Some time ago
there was little idea of teaching anything beyond literary
and Scriptural knowledge, with, perhaps, a certain amount
of arithmetic and elementary mathematic's, and when they
saw the great range of subjects which bad been shown that
evening, they* must see that the educators themselves had
been taught, and induced to extend a larger range of know-
ledge to those to be educated. (Hear, hear.) Let them
beware that they did not give so much attention to new
utilitarian studies as to neglect the older subjects. Let thetas
see whether they conld not be harmonised together. IA
them-see whdthek grbater use could not -be made ot,
educational institutions so largely spread over the country,
and whether they could not be drawn together to a whole-so--
as to complete the education of the nation. (Applause.) The
old institutions of the country, the
,great UnLversitieb al'
land, were being brought Into their proper plice-as the 'gro !
governing wheel of the machlne of education in England ; and
he was glad to see that other Institutions were bringing them-
selves into cooperation -with the Universities. The Uni-
versities were opening their arms to receive them and to
make arrangements for giving them the benefit of their
experience and wider views. Long might they continue to
be useful, and long might the education of Eugland e. be pre-
served with that great governing wheel of This University
system regulating the whole machine. (Loud cheers.)

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EWS.

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CONSTANTINOPLE, Monday.
You will be glad to learn that everything is now as
good as settled. Russia has withdrawn all her awk-
ward del:Ilan& and the influence of England (supported
as she is by Austria and Germany) is all. powerful,
Sir Henry Elliot has submitted a scheme to-the Porte
which is now under consideration.

You will not be surprised to hear after reieiving my
dispatch of yesterday's date that we are on the eve of
a great European war. Russia (supported by. Ge.rrintny
and Austria) insists that what she de'
granted 'irithin fotiFilit'd:tvienti hours. _
that the scheme submitted yesterday by Sir Hei
Elliot to the Porte has been withdrawn, at the '

CONSTANTINOPLE, Tuesday imindsome piemaL, oak&
- - • - - olcuouely in-Urge I

I ce.asec.
I Doctor

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IVincent, a_
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A PRINTERS ANN IVERSARY. —Th—e Stationers'
Company have granted the use of th.ir hall for the
purposes of the celebration in June. 1877, of the 400th
anniversary of, the. introduction of printing into Ecg-
-Ist 1
TREASURY WIND FALLS. ---The Solictors' journal
states that within a space of eight days pensions
amounting in the aggregate to upwards of £5,000
have fallen into the Treasury by the deaths of Sir John
Stuart, lste Vic-Chancellor, and Mr. Hugh Wood
and Mr. P. W. Rogers, C. 8., late R2gietrars of the

Court of Chancery.
'.. EDIToRrai. BAIT.—A paper "out Wezt " has
the following notice: "All notices of marriage where
no bride cake is sent will be set up in small type, and
poked in an outlandish corner of the paper. Where a
_handsome piece of cake is sent, the notice will be put
conspicuouely in large leWrs ; when gloves or qthc:r.
bride favours are added, a piece of illustrative poetry
will be given in addition. When, however, the editor
attends at the ceremony in person and kisses the bride,
..11 have especial notice—very largetyrrerand- the
most appoepritt,! pintVy Pitt 9.sii. t?.hAged, borrowld,
or stolen:"- ,
ANAWKWARD QITEbTION.— Scene, Fleet-str et
during the ppsingiof tip; A:ord May9r's show.—Lit le
Girl at -Virinaw. Who
..are those gentlimen in ie
furred gowns, mamma?--Mamma • (looking.r4,2
gramme). They They are "Aldermen," my'darlint'w o
have not passed the chair."—,Little Girl. And w y
haven't they passed the chair, mamma?. Were they
,
too big tp get by,?—Ttay..
A. " NOWT," INCIDENT.I--A1: amusing inci-
dent occurred lately at the eStablisbment a well•known
London publisher (says the eoure Journal). The 1
manuscript of a novel was sent to him BQ hermetically I
sealed in a tin box that it could not be extracted with- 1
out a hammer. The clerks who received the_box,con-
jured up in their minds an idea that it contained.
dynamite, and consequently, after much perturbationl.i
the box was deposited unopened in a dark cellar, where'
it remained for several months, and where probably it'
would have continued to remain had not the author,
who lives in a remote part of the world unexpectedly
made his appearance in the British metropolis.
SUICIDE AT OXFORD UNIVERSITY.—An inquest
was held on Monday afternoon. before the University
Coroner on the body of Mr. Thomas Heathcote Wynd-
ham, MA., fellow and tutor of Merton College, who
had committed suicide in his rooms in. the College, on
Sat,. Lbw, aftcLuoon, by blowing Ont his brine with a
fowling-piece.. Evidence was given showing that
,de•
ceased had been rather depressed during the past week,
ttilci one of two ),etters found-by the side df the body
yq,s.repd... It; had been directed to Dr. Aciaodi_ de-
-4Red s medlOal adviser,, and was as follows :--"Dear
Aclatid, I must be put into a lunatic asylutn.
Pi
Pease put me n.—H. Wyndham." The other letter,
addressed to lady to whom the deceased had been
engaged, was not produced. A verdict was returned
"that deceased destroyed himself while in a state Of
unsound mind." The •dedeased gentleman bore a high-'
character in his College. for his devotion to his vv.:irk,
and had given a lecturelo 'his pupils within two or
three hours of his body-being discovered:

TREASURE TROVE xi SIVEDEN.—A Copenhagen
correspondent writes :—ln the diatrict of Loftahana-
mars, close to the Swedish town of Vestervik, a most
interesting collection of ancient Russian coins, to the
number of 610, in good condition, and several more
badly preserved, have been discovered at a little*
diatance below the surface of the earth. The large
number of these rare coins shows the extent of the
commercial relations which existed some thousand
years ago between Sweden and the interior of the
present Empire of Russia, where Swedish colonies
were ekteblished all along the great rivers, down to.the
Black• Sea, .It is now also an established fact that
when Scandinavia became Christian most of the
pilgrims to the Holy Land proceeded thence through
Russia, where the original commercial Swedish
colonies for several centuries retained their native
tongue.
ITED STATES PENSION LIST. —The gnnual
report of the Commissioners of Pensions shows that at
the end of June, the close of the fiscal year 1875.76,
thcra were 231,821 pensiooe on the roll. The army in-
valid pensions were 105,498, and there were 104,885
pensions of widows and minors. The number of sur-
vivors of the war of 1812 borne on the roll at the close
of the year was 15,875 showing that 1,669 had died in
the year. The amount paid for pensions during the
year was 28,351,599 dole.
LIKE AND LIKELY. Mistress :‘ "You'rp
going to your brother's wedding today, aren't you,
Martha? "—Martha: "Yes, 'm, and I was agon', to
ast you, 'm, if—yer see we're much o' the same 'eighth,
.an' figger, and completchon, and style, es they say—if
• yer could lend me a go wnd to go in ! "—Pan.
AN IMPLEASANT SITUATION. —A working mail
named Duesie, who went into the country to amuse
himself, has just met with a lugubrious adventure,
which would have gladdened the heart of Edgar Poe
and others of the same sombre ilk (remarks the Court
Journal). He fell into the water at Melun, and was
fished out for a dead man. The body was immediately
carried to the Morgue and laid on a slab, where it *as
left safe and sound. On the. following rnorning,judge
, of the surprise of the dead-house keepers on entering
the place and finding the corpse of the previous night
walking about! Poor Pierre Dussls, it appears, had
had a fit of lethargy, which ended in the middle of the
night, and he awoke to find himself sarreunded with
corpses; whose. fioeiety h'e wea.i.foraed fikepP pntil the
Motgue was unlocked some hours after.
"SAILING DiRECTIONS."— Old Gent. (in th'
vicinity of the Docks). "Canyon direct me to Ch
in° firna2 9" A nni an f: iViarinter ChBAA afle
Le's see, 'mind's about _Nor .West by .alothe,-90
keep the Sun on your Weather Bow, and yop'll us
about fetch--e"i [Old Gentilineries or 1--Puzach.
SMALL PEOPLE.—Not long VerOre hi death
Canon Kingsley drew attention to the surprising
number of small yoang men to be seen in a London
crowd. According to him, it was a sign of the deterio-
ration of the race. But there are two ways of looking
at everything (remarks the Court Journal), and, for
the comfort and satisfaction of small people, we would
point out that it might almost he taken as an indication
of intellectual progress. Many—we might almost say
most—of the great men of history have been of short
stature, from the days of that ancient philosopher who,
asthe story goes, was so diminutive that he had to carry
lead in his pocket, to prevent is being blown away.
Canute .the Great, for example, was a singularly
small man; Napoleon too was little; Nelson had no
height to boast of; and the great Cond,3 was short
enough. Hildebrand Gregory the Seventh the
mightiest of all the Popes, was also quiteu diminutive
person. . Then amongst men of letters, poets, and
philosophers, Mentaigne, the essayist, was little; so
was Pope—"a little crooked thing chat asks ques-
tions ; " so was Drychn ; so was Dr. Watts, wh9
Insisted, as we all know, on the mind being the stature
of the man • and so was Scarron, who alluding at
'once to his ill-healtb, and his little 'size, called him-
self an "abridgment of human miseries." Will any
one, after such names as these—and the list might be
indefinitely extended—look down on little men with
disdain? "
OLD AMERICAN PSALM Boo4.—The Boston
(Massachusetts) Globe gives an account of the sale, at
a recent auction in that city, of the famous Bay Psalm
Book. The first bid offered was 100 &is., and it ran
rapidly up, and was finally struck off to Sydney 54
Ryder, a "bookseller of Providence, for 1,025 doh!:
The book was the first ever printed in America, and
bears date Cambridge, 1640. It wastorkinally the
property .of.the-Rev.. Riohard Mather:eon° of its
authors, and given to him by Thomas Prince, who in
rpm bequeathed it to the Old South Church. This
gbopy is in the original binding, old 'calf, and is abso-
lutely perfect as regards the printed matter.
COOKERY SCHOOL.—Mr. Buckmaster delivered
the inauQural address at a school of cookery in St.
,Mary's Hall, Ramsgate, on Saturday, before a very
large audience, chiefly ladies. The Rev. R. Elwyn,
the vicar, who eiesided, expressed a hope that arrange.
meats would soon be made for teaching the elder
girls in all elementary schools. No subject, he said,
was of so much importance in tho home of a workingman
as a knowledge of cookery, and he wasglad to learn
that all the girls up to the fifth and sixth standard in
the Ramsgate schools-would receive lessons from Miss
,a highly qualified teacher from the National
ig School of Cookery at South Kensington,
a course of twelve demonstrative lessons on plain
cookery, and a course of twelve lessons on high. class
cookery and artisan cookery would also be given. He
was also glad to know that the effort had been cheer.
fully supported by the ladies of Relegate, and the
Rev. .T. M. Braithwaite had been indefatigable in his
exertions to make thesschool a-success.
FARMING IN SOUTH.WEST LiNCASERRE.—ThEi
revelation respecting -the' position of farmers afforded
by the recent Board, of Trade returns is (the Liverpool
Mercury says) causing sown alarm. The depreage4
condition of agriculture is scarieg many farmers id
various parts of the country into converting their walk,
ing stock .to rolling stock. In many of the southern
counties, newspapers are full of farm sales and farms
to be let, and the number of holdines given up this
season is very large; farmers have had unpropitious
seasons and had returns, high labour, and heavy local
taxation, added to which landlords are raising rents to
a serious extent. On one farm in East Kent the rent
has this year been raised from £520 to £B7O. In this
part of the country a great contrast is observable;
tenant right and freedom of contract is the rule. Con-
siderate and intelligent landlords take a personal inte-
rest in their estates, or delegate the management of
them to practical men, who not only know how t
farm, but see that others do so properly, and, whil
studying their employers' interest, lend a helping haa
to the industrious and striving tenant. A larger breadth
of wheat than usual has been sown under most favours
able circumstances
.pna hem', iThe warlike
rumours induce fanners to think prices will very much
, _
Improve.
THE MINISTER AND THE TEAMSTER.-0110 of
the members of the Meilfordia conference, recently
held in Detroit, says the Free Press, was out for a.
walk at an early hour one morning, and encountered a'
strapping big fellow, who-was drawing a waggon to th
blacksmith's shop. "Catch hold here and help m
down to the shop with this wagon and buy the
whisky; "'called the big fellow. "I never drb&k,"
solemnly replied the good man. "Well, you can
take a cigar." "I never smoke." The man dropped
the waggon tongue, looked hard at the member, and
asked : 'Don't you chew ? " "No, sir," was the de-'
cided reply." You must get mighty lonesome,"
'mused the teamster. . "I guess I'm all right—l
, feel firstrate." . " bet you even that I can lay
-you on your back," remarked the teamster. "Come
-now, . let's warm up a little." "I never bet."
.." ell let's take each other down for fun then.
. You are as big as I m, and I'll give you the under
hold." "I never ia av e fun," solemnly answered the
member. "Well, I'am going to tickle you anyway.
we go I". The teamster slid rip and endeavoured
to get a neck hold, but he only just comnienced to
e fool about .when. he was lifted clear of the grass and
slammed 'against a tree box with such force, that he
gasped half a dozen times before he could get his breath.
" Now you keep away from meal', exclaimed' the
minister, picking up his cane. "Bless me if I don't!"
replied the teamster, as he edged off. "What's the
use in lying and saying that you didn't have any fun
In you when you're chuck full of it! Blame It you
wanted to break my back didn't you,

y, Okkahiro
leads digMr, 17 it! SI
6 Its Brfiforf, 14 in Vir
:ham, 12 heSalifax, &c, —Pall '
, [From Punch.]
HE LikTEST
.1? I
#.-trotn our own Cerimond.en
•