The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1875-01-16 00:00:00

Our yoan orrtspoubtni.
47,4. i it right to state that we do nipt at all timeCi
vt,,,..--zti.graelves with cuzr-Correspondent'siopinions.l
111
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Alexander Dumas, in one of those numerous novels
of his, makes a hero aspire to be a count, a marquis,
a duke, or may-be a Lord Mayor. To the French people
the chief magistrate of the City of London, has always
been the greatest personage in the realm, next to the
sovereign. He is far above any of the ministers, the
Lord-Chancellor, the Archbishop of Canterbury, or

either of the judges. It is he whose annual procession
on the 9th of November fills the streets with admiring
crowds, and who hospitably receives foreign sovereigns
with great state at Guildhall. A halo of astonishing
magnificence seems ever to surround him:- The
Parisians have now bad an oppertunity of seeing the
Lord Mayor and Sheriffs in their midst, and they are
not likely soon to forget the impression produced by
the spectacle. The State visit to Marshal MacMahon
and to the Grand Opera on the same day, made up a
combination of glittering carriages and gorgeous liveries
which delighted the people of the French capital. Mr.
Sheriff Shaw came out with liveries of scarlet and gold,
and Mr. Alderman andlSheriff Ellie with g,reen and gold.
The Lord Mayor's new ear of State, drawn by six horses,
and with its panels all ablaze with gold and purple; the
footmen, with their padded calves; the trumpeters,
with their rose-coloured silk stockings and velvet caps;
the head usher, with his cocked hat ; the sword-bearer
and the mace-bearer, in their antique costumes,
attracted such a multitude into the streets of Paris as
had not been witnessed there since the days of the
Empire. The sight must have reminded the gazing
throng of a time of sunshine long passed away, before
the Palace of the Tuileries was a wreck and the Rue
Royale was in ruins, and when the statues representing
the chief cities of France in the Place de 13 Concorde
.included Strasburg-, over whose battlements the tri-
colour has now ceased to wave!
The Metropolitan Railway has been described as a
continuous station running underneath the streets
of London. You seem no sooner to have started from
one point than you arrive at the next; and a run of
three minutes, such as that from King's-cross to
Gower-street, is deemed a long one. A journey upon the
line
presents an ever-shifting panorama, although the
outlines of the picture vary but little. There are
I.l.everywhere the same hurrying se owds, the
' activity on the part of the officials. "Going on there,
sir? Look alive, please! Are you right behind?
Right away !" And then, after a stoppage of only
thirty seconds, the train resumes its journey, its gas-
lit carriages flashing through the dark tunnels, and
.the engine entering the next station at the rate of five-
and-twenty miles an hour, at which speed it easily
pulls up in the length of the platform. Upon this
line, which is little more than five miles in length, the
enormous number of forty millions of passengers have
been carried in a year. It is already connected with
the Great Western, the Great Northern, the London
and North Western, and the Midland systems, and
the extension to the Great Eastern terminus is now
completed. This will be an immense convenience to
travellers in the eastern counties, who will no longer
be compelled to take a cab at Bishopsgate when they
happen to be in a hurry to get into the city.
One of the laws which is likely to be improved in
the coming session is that which relates to the elee-
tion of County Coroners. By an aneient statute this
privilege is confined to freeholders, so that a man
possessing a freehold of even forty shillings is entitled
to a franchise from which householders paying rates
and taxes on a rental of £5OO is excluded. There does
appear something anomalous in the fact that while
the latter possess voles for members of Parliament,
they are deemed unfit to assist in the selection of the
best men to fill the office of coroner. The large rate-
payer has as great an interest in the efficient discharge
of the Coroner's duties as the small freeholder can
have; and if he is qualified to elect a member of the
Legislature, he ought to be fit to help in the choice of
a Coroner.
A practical hardship has just been brought under
the notice of the Chancellor of the Exchequer. Under
the present law the collection of Queen's taxes in
rural districts may be forced upon private individuals,
le who are allowed three half-pence in the pound for
e their trouble. If, being fully occupied, they appoint
a depte,y, they are responsible for his defalcations,
should he be guilty of any. The Chancellor of the
Exchequer, however, promises to consider whether
some better arrangement cannot be made, and mean-
time there will be a general agreement in the view
expressed by Mr. Bright that it would seem to be
enough for a man to pay his own taxes without being
compelled to give up his time and submit to the dis-
agreeable work of collecting those of gime hundreds of
his neighbours.
Some surprise has been expressed at the comparative
smallness of the fund vow being raised at the Mansion
House for the mitigation of the suffering caesed by
the loss of the C'ospatrick. Unhappily, however, there
is but little room for the exercise of any considerable
amount of charity. Had the four hundred and sixty
odd victims who perished in mid-ocean consisted
solely of husbands and fathers, whose wives
and families were thus thrown helpless upon
the world, the response to an appeal for assistance
would have been ready enough. But where husband,
wife, and children all find one common grave, the case
widely different. No doubt many of the emigrants
left relations behind them, to whom, had they pros-
pered in New Zealand, they would sometimes have
sent remittances, but these instances would scarcely
form a substantial fousdation for the dispensing of re-
. lief. Where crises of real distress arise—such as when
Paris was upon the brink of starvation, and Bengal
was in danger of being devastated by famine—there is
no hesitation about the liberality of the British public.
Those who have paid a visit to the House of Lords
will have noticed the stately ceremonial which always
accompanies the entry of the Lord Chancellor. There
are any number of officials in attendance upon his
lordship, including his principal secretary, the gentle-
-I'. man of the chamber, the trainbearer, the pursebearer,
the macebearer, and the Porter of the Great Seal.
r Some curious 'information concerning the ancient
and still existing formalities of legal procedure
are contained in the annual report of the Com-
missioners appointed to inquire into the adminis-
trative departments of the Courts of Justice. For
instance, there is the Porter of the Great Seal, who
does not lose sight of it at all by day, so important is
its custody considered to be. Every dignity granted
by the Sovereign
.passes under the Great Seal, and
it is therefore easy to conceive how essential it is that
it should be kept safely from those who are inclined to
break through and steal. A forged patent of•nobility
under a purloined seal would not be a pleasant busi-
ness. Some Chancellors have been so careful of the
Great Seal that they have never slept with it away
from their bedsides. A new seal is struck with the
accession of every incoming. Chancellor, his predecessor
retaining that which he used whilst in office.
In the same report a strong testimony to the value
of printing, as applied to the work of public offices, is
borne by Mr. Reeve, the Registrar of the Privy,
Council. This gentleman said he had a strong opinion
that there ought to be no manual copying in any of
our great State departments. He had no writing
clerks, for he 'never had anything written beyond a
short letter. The moment a document was at all long
he had it printed; for he was convinced that on ac-
count of convenience, dispatch, economy, and every
other motive, all public business ought to be done by
the printing office. Mr. reeve thought it a barbarous
piecce of antiquity to have any public documents
written, with the ei cc eption of such as were very short
and inconsiderable. There ought to be several copies
of them, and printing was the most economical way of
multiplying such copies. The Commissioners agree in
the main with Mr. Reeve, and think it likely that in
the Departments of State generally the adoption of a
system of printing documents or letters where more
than six copies are required, might be attended with
economy as well as with advantaee in respect of speedy
execution and accuracy.
The next annual meeting of the Association of the
Chambers of Commerce will take place at the
"Westminster Palace Hotel," on the 23rd, 24th,
and 25th of February. Among-t the guests who
have already accepted invitations to the dinner
given in connection with this meeting, are severa
Cabinet Ministers. The discussions at these gather-
ings are of almost imperial inportance ; yet
as a rule very little space is afforded to them by the
majority of the daily papers. The reason of this is
sufficiently clear. Parliament is then sitting, and has
just got into the swing of its work after a six months'
recess. The subjects before it are new, and absorb a
considerable proportion of the paper. If the Chamber
. of Commerce assembled when the Legislature was not
in session, it might have three or four columns a day,
whereas, under the circumstances, it cannot now get
one.
Those who have had occasion to pass through St.
James's-Park will often have noticed the stalwart pro-
portions of the Foot Guards. They are picked for
strength, stamina, and health from the entire popula-
tion. You may see any number of them about the
entrance to the Royal Horse Guards' gate, and in the
solitary watches of the night they may be seen mount-
ing guard near the Government offices and at the
Palares of Buckingham and St. James's. Yet the
army medical department report shows that these
splendid troops are much leas healthy than the regi-.
meats of the Line. The eanseet,thisainamaly.iseaid
to be the incessant night work that falls upon the
Guards, and it has been suggested either that
their strength should be inerßased, or the
amount of sentry duty lessened. On tne vitiate, now-
ever, the health of the bulk of our ;unitary forms has