The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1878-05-25 00:00:00

EPITOME OF NEWS.

BRITISH AND FOREIGN,

"We understand that the declaration against war
lately advertised in our columns has obtained 220,000 sig-
natures.' —Monday's Times.

One of the largest merchants of Berlin has expressed
the opinion that it is absolutely necessary that Germany
should, in her turn, invite all the nations to a universal
exhibition, to take place in the Prussian capital.

The flags in Paris displayed in the streets on the
epening of the Exhibition are estimated to have cost
£BO,OOO, more than 40,000 houses being ornamented by
fifteen or twenty flags apiece.

It is not quite true that the price paid by the
Nineteenth Century to Tennyson for his line ballad of "The
Revenge' is the highest paid in our time to a poet. Lie
ballad contains 120 lines, and the author has received for it
300 gs., or £2 12s Bd. a line. Mr. Robert Bonner paid Long-
fellow, for the "Hanging of the Crane," £.BOO. That poem
contains 200 lines, at which rate the poet received £4a line.
For " Tithonus," published in an early number of the
Cornhill Magazine, Tennyson received 100 guineas, or Ll 9s.
a line, and Tom Moore much exulted in receiving a guinea
a line.—Court Journal.

Fourteen cases of suicide were registered in Lon-
don last week, or six more than the corrected average
number.

Peace is now in the ascendant at Court. This, I
believe, is due to the wise councils of the Crown Princess of
Prussia.—Truth.

Five thousand refugees assembled on Tuesday in
Constantinople and sent a deputation to the Porte asking
relief, as all their provisions were exhausted and sickness
was prevalent amongst them. The Porte promised to supply
them regularly with rations.
- - - -

-
A Chinese book 111-.9trative of the present famine is
now being circulated among the natives of the unaffected
districts in order to arouse their sympathy. It is called
"Illustrations of the Extraordinary Famine in Ronan, Fitted
to draw Tears from an Iron Heart," and contains twelve
ghastly pictures of the sufferings of the famine-stricken•
People are depicted in every stage of starvation and misery,
eating the roofs of their houses, the bark of trees, and even
dead bodies; while the final pictures show the magistrates
relieving the hungry by the aid of subscriptions from the
charitable.

At the annual meeting of the Sunday Society, Lord
Roseberry presiding, a resolution was passed in favour of
presenting a memorial to Sir Francis Grant, President of the
Royal Academy, asking for the opening of the collection of
pictures on one or two Sunday afternoons during the pre-
sent season.

Mr. Gladstone, in declining an invitation to attend
a meeting at Newcastle-on-Tyne, says :—"1 must give atten-
tion to the best of my power in London and in the House to
the very grave questions raised by the despatch of the Indian
troops to Europe without the consent of Parliament, which
seems to show that freedom at home requires our care as
well as and in conjunction with freedom abroad."

The Royal Agricultural Society of England have
received the consent of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners to
the occupation by the society for the purposes of the agri-
cultural exhibition next year of the piece of land-100 acres
in extent—at Brondesbury or Kilburn. belonging to the
Commissioners, and the necessary agreement is being pre-
pared.
A mushroom measuring nearly 1 yards in cir-
cumference has been sent to the Agricultural Society of
Cilarente.

A tribe of Sioux Indians will arrive at tho Jardin
d'Acelimatation, Paris, in June.

The ship Sir William Wallace, 968 tons, Captain
Colville, sailed from Gravesend on the 18th that. bound for
Townsville, Queensland, and had on board the following
number of emigrants, viz., 39 married men, 38 married
women, 133 single men, 52 single women. 58 children
between the ages of 12 and one, and nine infants, making a
total of 323 souls, equal to 291 statute adults. The single
women are under the charge of Miss Macallister, Dr. Ryan
acting as surgeon-superintendent.
- - -

There were 2,514 births and 1,380 deaths registered
in London last week Allowing for increase of population,
the births exceeded by 180, whereas the deaths were 68
below, the average numbers in the corresponding week of the
last ten years. The annual death-rate from all causes, which
in the five preceding weeks had steadily declined from 27.6
to 20.2, further fell to 20.1. The deaths included 48 from
small-pox, 28 from measles, 26 from scarlet fever, 12 from
diphtheria, 102 from whooping-cough, 22 from different
forms of fever, and 21 from diarrhwa.

Mr. Archibald Forbes lectured in the Skating
Rink at Sheffield, on Tuesday evening, to an audience of
about 500 oersons. He was most warmly received on enter-
ing the hall, and was repeatedly applauded throughout the
lecture.

Mayfair says that the Emperor Alexander leads a
sad life. The fears that he has had for years of falling a
victim to the assassin's knife or bullet have redoubled since
the case of Vera Zassulitch gave an impulse to the revolu-
tionary party, and they say that he never leaves his bedroom
in the morning without looking sadly around him as though
he felt he might not re-enter the place alive. Wherever he
walks or drives a strong body of policemen are dispersed in
a cordon around him, and at intervals mounted gendarmery
and members of the secret police keep an anxious watch
over the Nihilism they fancy they detect in every face in the
crowd.

A Missouri writer nays :—" If a boy ten years of
age starts on the Western prairie with ten sheep, and
permits them to multiply until he is twenty-one years of age,
he will then be a rich man." In the meantime, I presume,
the boy is to graze on the prairie with the sheep. This
writer appears to have very sanguine ideas as to the advan-
tages of farming, for, comparing the farmer's with the
mechanics's lot, he adds :—" When a farmer sleeps, his
stock and farm crops are growing, but Just as soon as a
mechanic lays down his tools he is running behind for rent,
clothing, and fuel." Yes; and when a farmer sleeps his
etock and crops arc often "going to the devil."—/kfark Lane
Xapren.

A fire occurred in Bucharest on Sunday. Turkish
soldiers were the first to reach the scene of disaster. They
rescued the moveable property, preserved every article from
being btolen, and nearly extinguished the conflagration before
the arrival of the firemen.

The Indian Famine Relief Fund, which has been
In course of collection at the Mansion louse for the last nine
months, and which has reached the magnificent and unpre-
cedented total of £515,200 or nearly six millions of rupees,
was finally closed on Monday.
In an address which he delivered on the occasion of
the laying of a memorial stone of a Congregational school at
Mold, the Duke of Westminster said that if European peace
was secured he thought it would be owing in a great measure
to the action of the Nonconformists.

Thirty -eight British and foreign wrecks were re-
ported during the past week, making the total for the
present year 566, which, compared with the corresponding
week of last year, shows a decrease of 266. Vessels and
cargoes were approximately valued at £360,000, including
British property, -L230,000. Among the latter vessels 14
were crushed in the ice at the seal fishery off Newfound-
land, each having, it is reported, from 1,000 to 3,000 seals on
hoard.

The Bishop of Carlisle, preaching before the Univer-
sity of Cambridge on Sunday, made a special appeal on be-
half of Addenbrooke's Hospital. Speaking to the students,
he dwelt upon the changes in the town since he was a rei-
dent, remarking that one change that had struck him was
the vast growth of athletic games. They appeared to afford
healthy exercise in a remark able manner, and he was not
going to object to them. But while they sought health and
exercise in boating, cricket ing, and racquets, let them re-
member in the midst of their enjoyment and robust health
that there was such a thing as sickness, and that they had
not to go far to seek it.

On Monday morning the Crown Prince and Princess
of Germany concluded their visit to the Queen at Windsor
Castle, and took leave of her Majesty prior to her departure
for Scotland, which took place in the evening.
London Bridge, it is said, could be lighted by six
electric lamps at a cost not greater than that of its present
gas light, with the illumination of a thousand times the
amount afforded at present.

No improvement in the iron and steel trades is
reported from Sheffield, and workmen are still very indif-
ferently employed. The demauT for all classes of merchant
iron is so quiet that prices, low as they are, show a-weaken-
ing tendency.

Efforts, it is said, are being made to procure the
renal of Midhat Pasha, but the Sultan will not agree to it
unless he is compelled.

The Socialistic press of Germany boasts no less than
seventy-five publications, with 135,000 subscribers; an in-
crease of eighteen in the number of the papers since last
year.

The absence of the King of Spain from the funeral
service on the 2nd May in commemoration of the rising
against the French in 1808 is commented upon severely by
patriotic Spaniards. The festival is a very popular one.

In London, on Monday, at half-past three o'clock,
a gentlemanly-dressed young man, about SO, committed
suicide in the Thames Subway by shooting himself. He
deliberately drew a revolver out of his pocket, and shot him-
self in the left breast. The passengers going through the
subway at the time were considerably alarmed at hearing
the shot, especially a young lady who was behind him at the
time. The body was not then identified.

George Hoskins, aged twenty-seven, single, a pri-
vate of the Ist Battalion of Coldstream Guards, met with his
death under painful circumstances at Eastbourne on Sunday.
Some young men were near the redoubt when one of them
lost his hat, which was carried by the wind into the water.
The deceased, who was standing near, offered to recover it,
and at once jumped into the sea. The current and breakers
were so powerful that, although the deceased reached the
hat, he was completely overpowered and sank suddenly. His
body was recovered during the afternoon.
At the end of last week about 1,000 weavers struck
work in a Glasgow mill against a reduction of 10 per cent.
Though the mill was opened on Monday morning none of the
strikers returned to work. Both sides seem determined, and
it is feared the resistance will spread.
In connection with the Exhibition the Paris hair-
dressers announce an international competition, in which
they will not themselves take• part, and for which they offer
as prizes two medals and a diploma.

The strike of joiners in the building trade at Run-
corn, still goes on, and, at a meeting of the men, it was
unanimously resolved to continue the strike until the masters
gave way.

"Nothing short of a cataclysm of nature," says a
New York journal, "can prevent the United States from
having such a harvest this year as will stand unequalled in
the country's history."

Lord Derby has announced his intention to contri-
bute £5OO, to be invested for the establishment of scholar-
ships in the Liverpool elementary schools.

The horse and bicycle contest at the Agricultural Hall,
London, which was continned during the whole of last week,
was brought to a close at eleven p.m. on Saturday night in
the triumph of M. Jesus Leon, the Mexican horseman, who
succeeded in riding 989! miles in six days of 15 hours a day.
Cann, of Sheffield (bicyclist), was second, 591 miles behind;
and White, of Wolverhampton, was third, 105} miles behind
Leon; while Phillips, of Wolverhampton, 14 miles further
off, was fourth.
The Italian war Minister has addressed a circular
to the chiefs of the army, calling attention to the fact that
officers married by a religious ceremony alone are not legally
married, and urging the necessity of the civil ceremony. It
will be remembered that the Pope has pointed out that the
civil ceremony alone constitutes legal concubinage. To
satisfy both spiritual and temporal heads, the double
marriage must consequently be performed.

It is very positively believed that General Ignatieff,
and not Count Schouvaloff, will be the successor of Prince
Gortschakoff. In fact, it is openly stated that Count
Schouvaloff has very little prospect of being chosen for the
post.—Mayfair.

The Emperor of Russia has conferred upon the
German Empress the New Russian Order for Nursing
Soldiers Wounded n the Field.

The following resolution has been passed at the last
meeting of the Guardians of the parish of Kensington
"That it be a recommendation to the several relief com-
mittees of this parish that in dealing with applications from
the wives and tamilies of men of the Army and Militia Re-
serve they should not treat the cases exceptionally, but in
the same manner as ordinary applications for relief, after
full inquiry has been made by the relieving officers into
each case."

Eighty thousand gallons of real water are used
nightly in the storm scene in Dinorah, at Her Majesty's
Theatre. This necessitates a gigantic tank on the stage,
and a similar receiving tank beneath, besides many square
yards of waterproof scenery.
The thanks of the Goverr.nent of the United
States of America have been recei- ed at the Foreign Office
for assistance rendered to ian American vessel by her
Majesty's ship Bullfinch, when in distress in the Bahamas.
A great feat in horsemanship has just been per-
formed in India by Mr. Louis Hyde Baker, attached to the
16th Bombay Native Infantry. He made a wager that he
would ride from Ahmednuggar to Dhond and back—a dis-
tance of ninety-six miles—in ten hours, using eight ponies
in the journey. He did the distance in seven hours, and
would have been faster but for losing time over changing
ponies, some of which were not in readiness to meet him.—
Vanity Fair.

The Mark Lane Express says that the abundant
rainfall hiss given rise to serious apprehensions, especially in
the Fen districts, where the growing wheat tends to run to
straw rather than grain, and from some quarters there are
reports of injury to the barley crop on heavy land. There is
still a prospect of a fair hay crop.

Oleomargarine is corning very much into favour
with the Americans, and the poorer classes greatly prefer it
to ordinary butter (says the Graphic). There are three
manufactories in the States: at New York, Baltimore, and
Philadelphia, and the compound was first sold in New York
last December, while by the rth of February so great was
the demand that there were over twenty oleomargarine
stores, all gaily ornamented with illuminated signs. A. Bill
has, however, been brought before the Legislature to stop
the manufacture and sale, the artificial butter being only
worth about a shilling per pound.

The regulations for the allotment of rewards at the
Paris Exhibition has been published. A sum of 1,500,000
francs has been set apart for this purpose, and the prizes are
to be apportioned by an international jury, consisting of 750
members. These gentlemen are; o begin their labours on
June 1, and complete them by September 1. The diatribu•
tion of the prizes is fixed for September 10, when more than
21,000 medals are to be given away.

The Indian coast defences have been taken in hand.
A Times telegram says that Madras is to be protected by
five batteries, armed with 63-pounder rifled guns. Batteries
will also be erected at various ports on the eastern coast.
Another battery for the defence of Calcutta is being con-
structed at Fungi, one of the narrowest points on the
llooghly. This will be armed with ten 9-inch rifled muzzle-
loaders, and will coves the torpedo defences. Bombay and
Rangoon are to be similarly defended,

- -
The up-express train to London while running
through Kelvedon (Essex) on Monday afternoon dashed into
a heavy meal-van, which was crossing the line at the moment.
The van was cut in half, and the meal, the mealbags, and
fragments of the van strewn on the line for a quarter of a
mile. The drivers and horses escaped with a few injuries.
The engine remained on the line, but was so much damaged
that another had to be procured, and the train resumed its
journey after about an hour's delay.

Madame (a Parisian lady, of course) asked her hus-
band for a new outfit. "My darling," he replied, "that
would make the third in two mouths, and times are so hard
that—" "You will kill me," exclaimed the lady, burstirg
into tears, "and my funeral expenses will cost you more
than a new dress I " " Ah, but I should have to bury you
only once," was the comforting rejoinder.—Court Journal.
On Monday the Home Secretary received a deputa-
tion from the National Agricultural Labourers' Union. ask-
ing him to use his influence to prevent the sale of charity
lands, and, in accordance with the Allotment Act passed in
the reign of William IV.. to provide for such lands being let
to agricultural labourers. Mr. Cross, in reply, expressed a
general sympathy with the system of field-gardens, but in-
timated that the matter was one for the consideration of
the Lord President of the Council, and advised the deputa-
tion to state their case to him.

One of the Parii journals relates a pretty episode
which took place on the day of the opening of the Exhibi•
tion. A member of the Italian Commission, a short while
before the arrival of the Marshal's guests, perceived that the
flag floating on the façade of his section carried no crape in
mourning remembrance of King Victor Emmanuel. There
was little time to repair the neglect, and the Commissioner
dreaded the censure of the Duke of Aenta. So without a
moment's hesitation' he addressed a lady wearing a long
black veil, explained the situation, and begged her to relieve
him from his anxiety. The lady immediately handed him
her veil, and when a few minutes later the cortege passed
by, the tricolour nig of Italy was draped with the sombre
signs of national bereavement.

Musurus Pasha had a conference with the Marquis
of Salisbury at the Foreign Office on Saturday afternoon.

People who can choose their own time for going to
the Paris Exhibition are asking when it is likely to be
least crowded (says the Pall Mall Gazette.) There is nc
reason to suppose that the flew of visitors will vary much
hi its course from that which it took in 1.867. Foreigners
will come and go according to their usual habits. The
Germans will be early, the English late, and the Americans
at all times. The Parisians themselves will be among the
first and the last visitors, and their summer absence will be
as marked as usual. The provincials will be occupied with
either harvest or vintage, and so take their trip early,
except in the case of those independent enough to think of
the children and wait for the holidays, which begin during
the first ten days in August.

An Admiralty announcement states that with a
view to affording the captains and commanders while on
half-pay the means of keeping up and improving their know-
ledge of gunnery, ticc , the Lords of the Admiralty have
decided to arrange a short course of instruction on board the
Excellent once in each quarter for such officers of the above-
named ranks as may wish to avail themselves of it. Each
course will last for one month, the number of officers being
limited to twenty. These officers will be provided with
accommodation at the college in the dockyard, and granted
the usual allowance in lieu of provisions. No officer will be
permitted to go through the course a second time in the
same year. The first course will commence on the 17th of
June next.

Mr. Henry Richard, M.P., has addressed a letter in
Welsh to his fellow-countrymen of the Principality. Be
points out the imminent danger in which the country now
stands in respect of the Eastern complication, and remarks
that it is in the power of the people to stay war by speaking
against it with such emphasis and unanimity that the Go-
vernment will dare not go against them, lie therefore
adjures the Welsh people to give immediate and effective
expression to their pacific sentiments.
Continental nations are rapidly taking advantage of
the new sea route to Siberia. Six expeditions will leave
Europe for Tobolsk and Yenesei during the current month,
,
one being German one Dutch, one Swedish, one Danish and
two Russian from Bt. Petersburg. But for the probability of
war several expeditious would have also left this country
for the Siberian rivers, the idea of establishing direct rela-
tions with the commercial centres of the great Asiatic de-
pendency of Russia being favourably regarded by several
leadiug Loncloa 31.erchants.—White/wil Review.