The Dorset County Express and Agricultural Gazette.
Dorchester, Dorset, England, 1872-08-27 00:00:00

Varoet Cnnntq(Egan

TUESDAY, AUGUST ID, 1872.

NOTES OF THE WEEK.

" London is desolate," sport is turning ont
better in the Highlands than had been antici-
pated, and the Ariuy is gathering for the
Autumn Manoeuvres. The Queen tact Balmoral,
the Princess of Wales at Copenhagen with
her children, and the Prince on a cruise along
the French coast in the Duke of St. Alban's
yacht. He dropped in at Trouville • day or
two ago and in strolling the sand, of course met
M. Thiers and spent half an hour with toe
vivacious old man in chit•ohat. His Royal
Highness returns to take part in the Autumn
Manteuvres, and these over be is to pay his
promised visit of last year to Mr. Stark Her
Majesty is to pay • visit to the Duke and
Duchess of Sutherland at Dunbrobin Castle in
the first week of September.
A vacancy has occurred in the representation
of Preston by the death of Sir 'thorn.. liosketh.
Bart. Sir Thomas ham sat for the borough over
ten years se a Conservative, but till '6B the
Conservatives shared the representation with the
Liberals. In '6B the Liberals tried to grasp
both seats with Mx. Lees and Lord Edward
Howard, the present Lord Howard of Glossop,
but the Conservatives headed the poll with
about 1,200 votes out of a constitutency of
nearly 12,000, five-sixths of which were polled.
The Liberal, will now test the constituency
afresh. Preston is • good sample constituency
j to try the Ballot upon, for the roll of electors
' exceeds even the population of Pontefract.
The disgraceful faction fights in Belfast show
that the Party Proceaeious act must be re-en-
acted ; indeed there seems to be no choice
between that and adopting the suggestion of the
Times to give every legal party procession an
armed escort. Of the two expedieuts, the former
certeguly appears to be the inure effectual, as it is
the cheaper and more convenient; for protect-
ing • procession at the time of its occurrence
would not prevent faction fighting afterwards,
but probably stimulate it. But, whatever be
the course taken, the Government mallet
avoid trying some means to prevent the recur-
rence of such outrages.
An illustration of the advantage of the annual
agricultural returns as a basis for computing the
I yield of the harvest and the imports of foreign
corn required has been afforded in the estimate
I made by Mx. C•ird in • letter to the Times to
September last year. He then stated that, even
with a late harvest, this year an impott of
11,000,000 gra woul.l suffice; but that, ea we
might fairly reckon on an earlier harvest, we
should probably find little more than 10,000,000
gra enough to bring us to the new orop. the
actual imports for the year to the let of August
last have been 10,000,000 gm of wheat and
flour.

The agricultural dinners in the counties
bordering on the metropolis commence in • few
days. Buckinghamshire, Bei luinire, and Oxford-
shire are in the habit of declaring themselves,
through their representative* at thaw vather-
tugs. Mr. lieuley has more than ouoe sounded
a key-note in Oxford county, and some of the
most memorable of Mr. Disra,eles speeches have
been delivered at high Wycombe. Aylesbury,
and &JOWL, when the farmers had assembled
over a friendly haunch of venison, after' a show
of short and lung-horns, tuangel-wurtzels, and
reaping machines. But it is not expected there
will be any political utterance of importance at
any of the " agriculturala' this autumn. The
topic of the day will be taxation, local and
imperial. The "county party" have some reason
to be afraid that Mr. Gladstone and his colleagues
in the Ministry intend something very revo-
lutionary in respect of rating, and there will be
by anticipation a denunciation of any measure
of the sort. The ablest, most experienced, and
most far-seeing Parliamentary stagers are of
opinion that the next session of Parliament will
not be • political but a social one, Toe Tory
leader, who generally sees so'ne ,iiii&LICO ahead,
was right when he suggested mat a policy of
" sewage" was the one which ought to be
taken up by any G Ivornment wishing to com-
mend itself to public support.
fhe weather of the past fortnight has been
all that the agriculturist" could wish—the exact
weather to ripen and garner crops in • and we
are glad to see the stubble and nothing but the
stubble showing over miles of country, whore,
a few weeks ego, the farmers were expecting to
see nothing but acres of wheat and barley
hardly worth gathering. The potato crop is
turning out the worst; •••-• ;ieuretary of the
Chamber of Agricultut, . ..; the crop
turning out a complete fkilui, rod involving
the country in a ken of nearly thirty millions
sterling. This, however, let us hops, is an
exaggeration; but the price of potatoes is
higher than it ought to be at this season, and
the supply everywhere is short.
The price of coal is still on the rise. But we
, have, WO hope, O&M the worst, for the iron-
masters are refusing to take fresh contracts
until the pries is brought down—end the rail-
ways are thinking of eocuointsing by adopting
the aero-steam apparatus, a sort of air-pump
applied to the engine, which reduoes the fuel
from 55, 40, and 35lbs, a mile to about seven
and twenty pounds, *ad prevent' soiling in the
boiler, a source of immense loss to railways—
mechanical engineers like Mr. Bramwell are
talking of turning the tide to acioount as the
motive power of manufactories, and the Belgian
coal-owners are sending us coal from Ghent to
Grimsby at 45. a ton cheaper than the
English colliers will sell it. The miners have
overreached themselves. Believing that they
held a power in their hands which could bring all
our industries dependent upon coed to a stand-
still in three days, they have pushed up the
price till it pays foreigners to bring us the
article which tilt yesterday they were purchasing
from us, and to undersell us in our market" ;
and the chairman of the London and North
Western Railway tells us that even the iron
and steel now in use at the works at Crewe are
of foreign manufacture I "These strikes have
opened up new souroes 'of supply and oompeti-
Lon, which otherwise might have remained long
unexplored, but which once opened will never
again be closed."

The principal railway companies, however,
hope to recoup themselves for the higher price
of coal and labour by increasing their rates. The
Great Northern, Greet Western, Great Eastern,
London end North-Western, and Midland—
that is, to say, all the great goods-carrying com-
panies having termini in London, except the
South-Western—had given formal notice of
"revised rates for the conveyance of merchan-
dise" to come into operation on the first of next
month.

The Chelsea tragedy has excited much atten-
tion. Two younic men arrived in London,
supplied with friends sufficient to help them to
make their way in the world, but spent their
substance as the prodigal son of old did, and as
prodigal 11004 have ever done, and then having
repented, in Continental fashion thought they
put everything straight by inflicting capital
punishment on themselves. They afford an
"awful example" of the c ,ipi,Nvienoes of a kind
of dissipation the-- is, ye lu4t, too commonly
pursued.