The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1868-11-28 00:00:00

1

Total

years after him 'M. de Candolle, of Geneva, described
about 40,000 kind of plants, and he supposed it possible
the number might even amount to 100.000. Well,
have these 100,000 kinds of plants ever faded to bear
the right kind of seeds? Have they ever deceivedais ?
Ilas a seed of poppy grown up into a sunflower! Has
a sycamore-tree ever sprung from an acorn, or a beech'
tree from a chestnut? A little bird may carry away
the small seed of the sycamore in its beak to feed its
nestlings, and on the way may drop it on the ground.
The tiny seed may spring up and grow where it fell
unnoticed, and sixty yearn after it may become a mag-
nificent tree, under which the flocks of the valleys and
their shepherds may rest in the shade.—Ribbent's
Gardener's Magazine.
TRIAL FOR POISONING IN SW:TZERLAND.—The
Geneva journals announced a trial destined to
create a great sensation in Switzerland. The accused,
a nurse named Jeanneret, is charged with poisoning
not fewer than nine different persons, whom she had
within the space of six months been engaged to attend.
The substances used were belladonna and atrophise,
an extract of the same ,• and to obtain them she
simulated a partial blindess, for which they are em-
ployed as a remedy. The woman appears to have
had a monomania of crime, as she neither ribbed her
victims nor derived any benefit from their death; she
is even said to have nursed them with great tenderness.
She was at length detected by a French painter
named B--, whose wife she had attended. Mdme.
B -• after showing symptoms of poisoning, recovered;
when the accused, finding that she was suspected.
absconded. ...She was, however, subsequently traced
and arrested ea unexpectedly that she had not time
to conceal the poisons she had in her possession, and
all of which are in the hands of justice.
CHARMING GOOD FOR A SCALD !—The child of
a Devonshire labourer died from scalds caused by its
turning over a saucepan. At the inquest the following
strange evidence was given by Ann Manley, a wit-
ness :—" lam the wife of James Manley, labourer. I
met Sarah Sheppard about nine o'clock on Thursday
coming on the road with the child in her arms, wrapt
in the tail of her frock. She said her child was scalded;
then I charmed it as I charmed it before, when a stone
hopped out of the fire last Honiton fair, and scalded its
eye. I charts ed it in the road. I charmed it by
saying to myself, 'There was two angels, one of them
bring fire and the other frost; in frost out fire, ,tc.' I
repeat this three times; this is good for a scald. I
can't say it's good for anything else. Old John Spar-
way told me this charm many years ago; a man may
tell a woman the charm, or a woman may tell a man,
but if a woman tells a woman or a man a man, I con-
sider it won't do any good at aIL"
Time LATE MAPQCII3 OF HASTINGS.—Bas Life
states that by his will the Marquis of Hastings left all
his colliery property, his house in Grosvenor-square,
Craven-lodge at Melton Mowbray, and all his plate,
jewellery, and furniture of every description to be con-
verted into money, and the proceeds to be invested for
the benefit of the Marchioness for her life ; but in case
she should marry again, then to be divided among the
children of his sister, Lady Marsham. The settle-
, mad of the Marchioness, which amounts to £2,1100
. per annum, is secured on the Rowallan estate. The
Earl, it is said, is likely to be disposed ef by private
• contract. The remainder of his homes will shortly go
to the hammer at Tattersall's.
THE LATt ST REMKDIr OUT—From his speech
at Aylesbury, it may be inferred that Mr. Disraeli
think's Ireland's "clamp climate" has a great deal to
do with the atmosphere of misery in which that
country is mostly enveloped ; and that "a melancholy
ocean" is the cause of its sea of troubles. Most op-
portimely, according to the Pall Mall Gazette, " an in-
genious Frenchman has patented an invention by
which he supplies artificial climates, tempered to order,
to invalids, tropical steatrepacket companies,
Cannot the ;ngenious Frenchman be induced to try
his wonderful invention on invalid Ireland? Will not
Mr. Disraeli head a new subscription for a new climate
for her?
I MORMON Pordcy.—The Mormons have resolved
1 on non-commercial intercourse with the Gentiles, and
the establishment of trade co-operative societies among
I themselves. The reasons for this exclusiveness are
1 presented substantially in the following fashion :—lt
is the avowed design of the Gentile portion of the com-
l. muffity, when the railroad is finished, to outnumber
2 and outvote the Mormon portion, and thus control the
local and general politics of the territory. This, the
Mormons account, would be tantamount to a renewal of
1 the troubles of Missouri and Illinois, twenty-five and
1 thirty years ago, and, in fact, would presage another
1 Mortnon exodus. In order to prevent, if possible, any
1 such tragic consummation, and to retain a foothold in
the valleys of the Great Basin, which they proved
capable of self-sustaining settlement, the Mormons
have determined that they will sustain only their own
people in this territory, withdrawing their usual Cus-
tom from the Gentile merchants, and bestowing the
whole upon the Mormon merchants. The policy of
such a measure had been urged many times previously,
but never no generally nor so strenuously as of late,
nor as there ever been manifest so decided nor so
general a disposition to accept and to act upon such a
policy as of late.
GALLANT TO THE L %ST !—Mr. Bernal Osborne
was never in greater " form " than at the official de-
claration of his defeat al Wednesday. Was there
ever a " acene " witnessed on any political stage like
16 the following ?
" I think "mid Mr. Osborne, "yon have chosen a goof
loan in c0,,,,e; 'tyro& ane that If he had "tier
„ principles put could let IEIOI 0 otter reinen!Ative
I tout like his principle., ;1t
soilt olive, -viol laugiit. i-. And
fern the moment when I gas-two of the handsomest, two of
the best, and two of the most whining ladies of Great
Britain cooling into this town—l mean Lady Clifton and
Mrs. Wright— loud cheers —I wrote to my wife saying it
was 'C I" with sic. More laughter and slicers. Gen-
.; tlemen, I have heard something of bribery at an election,
4 and Mrs. Wright turning to that lady, I accuse ton of having
won the ticonle with the witchery of your smiles, and I as-
: su,e Lady Clifton of having made her husband what he is
hy her a bodily, ways." .Loud and prolonged cheers In
which Mr. Osborne stooped and kissed Mrs. Wright's