The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1878-08-24 00:00:00

our 'fon* CorrespoOtst

[We deem it right to state that we do not at all times
identify ourselves with our Correspondent's opinions.]

King Christian, of Denmark, generally pays this
country a visit when the metropolis is, to use a
fashionable expression, "out of town." Unostentatious
in his surroundings, and totally without assumption
or parade, he prefers the quietude of the cooler
atmosphere of August to the bustle and scorching
heat of Midsummer for his sojourn among the
Londoners. No longer does the royal ruler of the
Northmen come to England, as in the days of
Ragnor Lodbrog, on a bucaneering expedition.
The far-off chronicles tell us that Lodbrog was
killed in an attempt to invade our shores; and
certain it is that the wild marauders of the Northern
seas, upon at least one occasion, sailed up the
Thames, as far as what is known now as the
Strand, which was then washed by the waves of the
famous metropolitan river. There was no embank-
ment of granite to keep out the waters, and no raised
ground, as there is to-day, with rows of handsome
shops on Either side of a busy and important thorough-
fare. Danes' Inn and the Church of St. Clement
Danes, just west of Temple Bar, testify even now to
the memories of the olden times, and to the daring
nature of the incursion undertaken by the grim fili-
busters of the tempestuous German Ocean. But on
the 7th March, 1863, when the Princess Alexandra
made her entry into London, three days before she
became the wife of the Heir-Apparent to the English
Crown, no bells throughout the long line of her route
from the Bricklayers' Arms to Paddington, rang out a
more merry peal of welcome than those of St. Clement
Danes!

The King of Denmark is this time accompanied by
the Queen and by their eldest unmarried daughter, the
Princess Thyra. On the occasion to which reference
is made above, his Majesty had not yet reached the
throne, but was merely Prince Christian. The
sovereign of Denmark at that time was Frederick
VII., who had been separated from his first wife
in September, 1837, from his second wife in
,:eptember, 1846, and was afterwards married
morganatically to a lady known as the
Countess of Danner. That king died on the
15th November, 1863, and Prince Christian succeeded
him by virtue of the protocol of London, signed on the
Bth May, 1852, and of the law of the Danish suc-
cession. When the Princess Alexandra passed
through London on her way to Windsor, now half a
generation ago, she was accompanied by her father and
her two sisters, Dagmar and Thyra. Three years
after the marriage of King Christian's eldest daughter
to the Prince of Wales, Princess Dagmar was united
to the Czare witch ; so that, in due fulfilment of Nature's
laws, whilst one daughter will be Queen of England,
another will be Empress of Russia; one son will be King
of Denmark, and another is already King of Greece. It
would be difficult to find another reigningHotuse with four
crowns in one family, and two of them the crowns of
such empires as Great Britain and Russia. It may be
hoped sincerely that the satisfaction of the King and
Queen of Denmark at the prominent part taken by
their children in the governance of nations may be
without alloy; and that, so far as the future relations
of this country and Russia are concerned, the predic-
tions of trouble and complications may be altogether
falsified.

Parliament has separated after one of the longest
sessions in modern times; and, looking over the seven
months of its existence, two points strikes the mental
vision—the barrenness of results so far as domestic
legislation is concerned, and the absorbing interest
in foreign affairs. The mind of man is incapable
of adequately grasping more than one great sub
ject at a time; and, after all, Parliament is but an
assembly of men with like passions to ourselves. The
territorial aggrandisement of Russia, and the necessity
of protecting British interests therefrom, have for the
time proved more attractive subjects than the con-
struction of a scheme of county government, or the
recasting of our criminal code. These are legacies for
the next session, or as many believe, for the next Par-
liament. The chances and the improbabilities of an
autumnal dissolution have been keenly discussed,
although it should be borne in mind that the present
House of Commons has as yet two years more of life
in it, at the discretion of the Sovereign's advisers. It
can legally run two more sessions; and, as a matter of
fact, does not expire by efflux of time until the sth of
March, 1881, having been summoned to assemble at
Westminster on the sth March, 1874. At the present
time it has arrived at. almost exactly the average age
of the nine Parliaments of Queen Victoria's reign—
four years and a half.

How to make the best of a holiday is a question
which is just now paramount in the minds of thousands
of persons. It is remarkable to note how the holiday,
as an institution, has gathered strength in these later
days; and there can be no doubt that our ancestors,
who had not the wear and tear of life that prevail
now, neither anticipated nor required that temporary
rest felt to be periodically necessary in existing cir-
cumstances. Our forefathers went through life's
journey much more calmly and prosaically than
we do now, and were not compelled to seek a
few weeks of quiet once a year to brace them-
selves up for the battle of the next eleven months.
The experience of cur own times has suggested many
ways of passing the annual period of relaxation.
Some visit pleasantly one or two of the quaint old
cities of Flanders or Belgium, and listen to the chimes
that float away from the cathedral towers that seem
to tell of distant days and far-off times. Others so
plan a limited period of leisure so as to see satisfactorily
the sights of Paris. A favourite mode of spending a
month is by a walking tour, many a man of sedentary
habits believing that by this means he strengthens his
constitution. Too often he injures it by subjecting it
to too great a strain, and returns home fatigued, with
nerves shaken,to find himself the victim of an aggravated
attack of mental dyspepsia. A favourite holiday with
large numbers of those who are in populous cities pent
is a bath of sea air. The residents in crowded inland
towns have a well-founded faith in the vivyfying powers
of the sea, bearing towards the land an atmosphere
purified by its passage over thousands of miles of ocean.
It is as the breath of life to a pallid multitude, a reviv-
ing agency which man, with all his ingenuity, can never
hope to equal. Many a weary one listens to the deep
diapason of the sea not as the chanting of a dirge, but
as the voice of a mighty influence whose unresting
activity is a portrayal of the life which is imparted by
its health-giving breezes.

The fighting in Bosnia, where the Austrian army a
occupation has found its advance retarded by an unex-
pected resistance, keep before the nations of Europe
the troubles of a people which has had more than its
ordinary share of tribulation. As far back as 1463,
Bosnia was incorporated with Turkey; and as suc-
cessive ages have rolled on the Bosnians have made
many an effort to regain their independence. They
have, however, always been unsuccessful, the superior
power of the Ottoman Empire being invariably at
hand to assert its strength. Previously to the insur-
rection in Bosnia which broke out in 1875, and which
was the proximate cause of reopening the dangerous
Eastern Question, barely a quarter of a century had
elapsed since the quelling of a very formidable
rising in that principality. After having lasted
two years, it was quelled by Omar Pasha in
1851, a name very familiar to those who are ac-
quainted with the history of the Russian war of
1854. The Bosnians, who have so often revolted
against Turkish rule, do not seem to take kindly to
the idea of, Austrian domination; King Log did not
suit them, but King Stork is equally objectionable.
Bulgaria and Servia, Roumania and Montenegro are
independent, and the Bosnians see no reason why
similar freedom should not be extended to them. The
tendency of modern European history is, however,
rather towards incorporation, and the experience of
1866 showed how utterly impossible it was for one
weak state after another to hold its own against the
advance of a powerful and encroaching neighbour.
The chronicles of the Court frequently make the
announcement that a public man has been sworn a
member of Her Majesty's most °Honourable Privy
Council, and it may not be generally known that for
.
institution, as well as for an English navy, and the
division of the country into circuits forthe administra-
tion of justice, we are indebted to King Alfred. Well
might that wise ruler be called the Great, for he laid
the foundations of institutions which have survived
the vicissitudes of a thousand years. It was in 895
that Alfred first formed the Privy Council, when it
discharged the functions of State, now confined to
members of the Cabinet. In our day, however, a Privy
Councillor is not necessarily a Cabinet Minister, for
he attends only when he is summoned. He bears the
title of Right Honourable, and when named in
official documents is designated "our right trusty and
well-beloved councillor." The number of members of
this august body is practically unlimited.
The Volunteer Camp at Shoeburyness has broken
up, and the gunners who had been hard at work at
artillery practice and repository drill have once more
resumed their civilian dress, and subsided into peace-
ful citizens. If it be true that the Wimbledon com-
petition is looked upon by many riflemen who attend
it P.s a pleasant picnic, the tents being well filled with
neat cases of champagne, the fortnight's camping out
at Shoehuryness is as great a contrast to it as can well
be imagined. Those big guns which modern artillerists
have held to be necessary in order to pierce the
armour of an invading fleet involve very hard work in
handling them very different from handling the
Martini-Henry rifle upon the Surrey common. Just
as the Wimbledon meeting lasts during the first two
Weeks in July, so the Shoeburyness competition ocou-

pies the first two weeks in August; but in the ranks
of the artillery reserves there are many who would be
gl,ml of some experience at Shoeburyness at other seasons
of the year if the Camp were open. If our Volunteer
gunners are to be of any use, it would be by manning
the coast batteries and the forts along our shores; and
the more opportunities they have of practice, and of
being initiated into the real work of soldiering, the
better.

The Parliament of Science, as distinguished from
the Parliament of the Empire, generally begins its
session when the work of the more august body is
done. The British Association was called into exis-
tence at a time the most unfavourable to the success
of a purely scientific—body, at least so it was regarded
from a superficial point of view. It was in the
autumn of 1831, when the country was convulsed
from one end to the other over the question of
Parliamentary Reform, that Sir David Brewster,
Sir Roderick Murchison, and Sir Charles Lyell,
and other eminent men established an associa-
tion, the main object of which was to promote tne
intercourse of those, one with another, who cultivate
the interests of science. It held its first meeting in
the city of York on the 27th September, 1831, and
annually its gatherings have since been held in the
chief centres of population in the three kingdoms.
The foremost of our scientific men have presided
over its sittings Brewster, Murchison, Lyell,
Phillips, and others, all of whom have passed
away. A memorable meeting was that in the
City of Aberdeen in 1839, when the Prince Con-
sort was President, and delivered an address ably
and elaborately reviewing the progress made by
science during the previous twelve months. Her
Majesty, in her Diary, has given an amusing account
of the visit of the savants to Balmoral Castle after the
delivery of the Prince's address, none amongst the
joyous company having at that time any anticipation
of the mournful shadow that was so soon to be cast
upon the Queen's pathway in life, and to darken the
remainder of her days.