The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1885-01-03 00:00:00

THE BATTLES OF THE SALVATION
ARMY:

The Salvation Army, in relating the incidents of its
"open-air battles" in 1884, states it has during this
year conducted in the United Kingdom alone no fewer
than 265,000 open-air meetings and processions. Few
disturbances of a serious kind had occurred, there being
a marked change in London and elsewhere in the treat-
ment the Salvationists received from the masses. They,
however, thanked God "They are not entirely left alone,
either by the lowest or the highest of the people.
Only a few weeks ago within a few miles of the
metropolis one of our ex-curate captains and a num-
ber of soldiers were rolled in the mud one Sunday
afternoon, their caps kicked away, and their meeting
entirely broken up, under the special direction of some
well-dressed men, who themselves kept outside the
crowd." Concerning the disturbances at Worthing
the report states that police protection was asked for the 1
sister-officers engaged in processioning, but it was
withheld, and ultimately, at the entreaty of the cap-
tain, leave was granted to her and her soldiers
to march out, "for," said she, "this must be
fought out, and we may as well do it now as at any
other time." In the end "the police—who, by a
little prompt action in the first instance, when a few
lads were allowed to do as they pleased, could have
effectually quenched the ardour of our adversaries—
had to suffer with us the result of trifling with dis-
order." In contradistinction to this is mentioned the
fact that "the authorities of Brighton were not dis-
posed to have their streets disgraced by scenes of
rowdyism, and the vigour with which the police and
magistrates suppressed the first attempt at this sort
of thing effectually put a stop to any further attempts
of the kind!' Hastings is mentioned as having
"striven with desperation for the leading share in
the army's persecution. It was beaten at law—the
Lord Chief Justice having quashed the conviction of
the major of the division for playing an instrument
at the head of a procession through the streets.
Stopped by Government—the Local Government
Board having utterly refused to sanction a bye-law to
legalise interference with the army—the authorities
of this town set themselves to stir up opposition
whenever they could, and to induce other corpora-
tions to unite with them in attempting to get an Act
of Parliament to put the army down.' The effect of
this, however, was to evoke "a warmer expression of
friendship towards the army in the councils
and watch committees of many of the
principal towns of the country than they could
have expected." In the United States, this year
is described as being "above all, one of desperate
fighting!' Hundreds of Salvation officers had been
arrested there and imprisoned for taking part in out-
door services. In Grand Rapids, Michigan, three
officers were imprisoned eight days, despite a protest
signed by ministers of every denomination in the
town. The assistant city treasurer gave a Salvationist
a card upon which the following was written, which
possibly explained the persecution of the army
officers: "The assistant treasurer of Grand Rapids
city vouches that the fines inflicted on persons for dis-
orderly conduct and drunkenness are applied to the
local school board, and that such fines before the
army came amounted to 1 dol. 32c. per child, but
since the army has been here the fines have decreased
to less than 35c. per head." Imprisonment was not
the only form of opposition the American soldiers
had had to encounter during the year. Desperate,
ruffianly attacks were made upon them in several
places, a pistol being fired upon them in one instance,
and officers were severely hurt by violent blows in
ot her cases. It is described as being no easy work,
because of the violence encountered, to establish
outposts in French villages; and at St. Julien the
meeting-room in a private house had been broken
into and wrecked by a mob. Although the British
Government "had not thought proper to say whether
they considered that any wrong had been done to her
Majesty's subjects" by reason of the violence with
which they were assailed in various Swiss cantons,
the Government had "at any rate done them the
service of publishing in the form of Blue-books the
N. ery decided statements made by Swiss journals and
citizens on the subject."

"My brethren," said Swift, in a sermon, "there
are three kinds of pride—of birth, of riches, of
t tlents. I shall not speak of the latter, none of you
being liable to that abominable vice."
First boarding-school girl: "I am so tired of walk-
ing along by twos and twos in this way. It's as bad
as the animals going to the ark." Second Ditto:
"Worse. Half of them were males."
"The only jokes women like to read are those
which reflect ridicule about men." "Yes," says a
Californian paper, "on taking up a paper a woman
invariably barns to the marriage column."
"Why, Georgie ! are you smoking!" exclaimed an
amazed mother, who came upon her little son as he
was puffing at a cigar. No, mamma! I'm only
keeping it lighted for another boy!"
A young woman once said to a friend, "I should
like to marry an engineer. "A civil engineer?'
asked her friend. "Oh, it would not matter much, I
would soon make him civil," was the reply.
"Do you think," asked Mrs. Reaper, that a little
temper is a tad thing in a woman?' "Certainly not,
ma'am," replied a gallant philosopher. "It is a good
thing, and she ought never to lose it."
INCURABLE.—Doctor (to patient) : "You must first
of all remove the cause of this nervousness; then the
co nplaint will soon disappear." Patient: "It's no
go; I should hive to kill my wife then !"
A little four-year-old said to his mother last
week: "Mother, I believe God thinks I'm dead."
"Why ?" asked the mother, somewhat astonished at
the remark. "Cause I haven't said ray prayers or a
I week."