The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1886-04-17 00:00:00

ur Ennbon olorrespoubent.

rffe deem It right to state that we do not at all tinlell
dentity ourselves with our Correspondent's opinions.]

A very few days and the Easter holidays will
be upon us. The unusual lateness of the period
of their occurrence this year will be one of their
most marked features, and it will be a very long
time before they will be again so long delayed.
Inconvenience arises from this difference of time
between one year's Easter and another, and in
certain business affairs it proves so great that the
idea has been mooted in more than one quarter
that it might be well to consider whether, in
regard to holiday purposes, Easter might not
be made a fixed, instead of a movable feast.
The thought' which flashes to the mind imme-
diately such a suggestion is thrown out is that
this would be impossible of realisation, but
that is scarcely so. In Prussia it has been
decided that, for certain specified uses, Easter
shall be considered to fall practically upon
the same date every year, and what can be
done there could, if thought necessary, be done
here. Of course, it may be replied that
the necessity, is not sufficiently great to
justify a change in the mode of reckoning
which has been adopted for so many centuries,
and that is a fairly arguable point. But the in-
convenience which has arisen from the fact that
this great annual holiday season falls a month
apart in various years has been such as to call
men's attention to the matter. The one thing,
however, which would probably prevent any
alteration from being attempted is that the
Christian community is by no means likely to
change the date of keeping Easter merely to
satisfy distinctly mundane considerations.
Now that the regulations for the Wimbledon
meeting have been issued, volunteers will begin
to look forward seriously to the great Rifle
Meeting which since 1860 has done so much to
stimulate good shooting in the force. The rules
do not greatly differ from those of last year, and
in cases where they do, it is for experts to decide
whether the alterations are improvements. But
the main point which will strike the public is
the evidence which is now again afforded of
the popularity of the meeting, not only
among the volunteers themselves but with
the outside world. Some years since
there seemed distinctly a chance that
this popularity would be lessened, for with
increase of years scandals had crept in, and it
needed a decided effort on the part of the
Council of the National Rifle. Association to
purge the meeting from certain dark blots which
had grown almost into a canker on the system.
Nowadays, however, there seems less to grumble
at than ever there was, and this year's assembly
on Wimbledon-common promises to be as suc-
cessful as any of its predecessors. No one who
knows the history of the volunteer force will deny
that this annual gathering has done much to
stimulate the shooting powers of the men. It
has done something else which has been almost
as valuable, in that it has given an esprit de corps
to the service which perhaps nothing else could
have done. It has formed an annual rallying
point for volunteers from all parts of Great
Britain, and even for riflemen from beyond the
seas; and although it may, in some of its
aspects, provoke the cynic to the reflection that
it partakes very largely of the nature of a picnic,
there are other points of view from which its
real value as a permanent institution can be
seen.
Englishmen are often thought by foreigners
to be a phlegmatic race, but the enthusiastic
manlier in whieh the Abbe Liszt has been received
should 'do something to remove that impression.
To a vast number of those who welcomed him to
our shores Franz Liszt could have been but a
name; and yet, so vivid is his personality, so
great the service he has „rendered to music, that
he was greeted as warmly and with as true sin- I
cerity as if he had been intimately known to our
musicians, both professional and amateur, all the
days of his life. It had been anticipated by•
some that, after the homage that had been paid
him in Paris, Liszt would find the English wel-
come comparatively ccld: but how far it has ex-
ceeded expectation may be judged from the fact
that, though he had intended staying only a
week among us, he has been induced by -the
warmth of his reception to lengthen his
sojourn in London to a fortnight. And,
as if to add brightness and grace to the reception,
the Queen invited the venerable musician to
Windsor Castle, where he played before her ,
Majesty as, sixty years since, he played before
her uncle; George IV. Liszt is, in fact, a con- 4
necting link between the old and the new gene-
ration. Kissed in his earliest youth byßeethoven,
he lives to-day to teach us a simple but striking
lesson'ef `continuity in genius and• progress in
art.
When those who to-day are young shall find
their brows white with age, the extraordinary I
scene presented in the House of Commons a few I
nights since, when the Irish Government Bill
was introduced, will remain in their memory as
impreeedented, and probably even then un-
parallelled. -A hundred pens have told how, at
dawn of day, members assembled to secure seats
in order to hear a speech which could not begin
for at least eleven hours after the first had en-
tered the Hulse, and those who were'
present when that speech was made, whether
they were on the floor of the Chamber or in the
galleries, are not weary of relating the incidents
which marked out that night as a great historical
occasion, and as one which the longest Parlia-
mentary.- memory could not parallel. One
indirect effect of the unusually crowded nature
of the gathering is likely to be that it will give
impetus to the movement in favour of enlarging
the chamber. It has been pointed out again
and again that there is something ludicrous in j
the idea of electing 670 men to seats in a House j
which provides sitting accommodation for a far
less number; and although much is to be said
from certain business points of view in favour of
a place of meeting which shall not be over large,
little can be urged in favour of one which is
obviously over small. As a matter of fact, it is
the question of expense which stands most in the
way of erecting a new House of Commons.
Feasible prans have been prepared by which this
could be done without really adding to the
structure of the Palace of Westminster; but the
Treasury stands in the way, and as long as succes-
sive Chancellors of the Exchequer are obdurate,
so long will no new chamber be built.
Second-class carriages may not be doomed to
complete extinction, but it may be taken for
granted that their number will grow less as time
goes on. Eleven years ago the Midland Railway
Company swept the whole of them out of their
system, despite the prophesies of disaster which
were freely lavished when the step was taken.
The Great Northern Company followed the
example last year on several of its branches, and
now the directors of the Caledonian line have
come to the conclusion that, as regards. a great
portion of their system, second-crass carriages
have had their day, students of- statistics know
that, while the receipts from third-class passengers
have vastly increased within the past ten years,
those from the second-class have largely decreased,
and the process has been, so regular that it led
to the almost irresistible conclusions that the
main body of long distance travellers either went
first or third. The running of empty carriages
is a wasteful process to a railway company, and
in these times of severe competition, when every
item of loss has to be closely scrutinised to find
whether it cannot be turned into a gain, this kind
of thing was certain sooner or later to find its level.
And so, though there may be difficulties in the
way of all railway companies following the bold
example of the Midland, and doing away with
second-class- carriages altogether, it is pretty
certain that the number of these carriages will
be greatly limited in coming years.
No long time will now elapse before the Royal
Academy Exhibition for 1886 will be open to
the public, and we shall then be able to
see for ourselves whether the rumours are well-
founded that, in consequence of the unusual
length of the winter, striking pictures are scarcer
than usual.,
...There are grumblers who say that
the exhibition for yeers past has not been of so
brilliant a character that it can afford to be much
duller; but the general public always enjoy the
Academy, and any marked Palling off would not
only be noted but deplored. The falling off, if
any there beewill have to he in quality, and not
in quantity, for the number of pictures sent in
has been almost appalling in its magnitude. How
many disappointed artists there must lee can be
gussed when, from the total of pictures sent in,
is substracted the number for which the Academy
cannot find wall space. There are consolations
in these days which .did riot formerly ex'st for
the disappointed artist, other galleries haying
been opened in which his wares can be displayed.
But, after all, there is only one Royal Acaci • my.,
• k. F. R.

-
When an Irishwoman feels sorry for her hhshand
k her be.aal. goesvity pat
Th4o-143,,(011 451 Ne • Vitifrifil;K-Wrot,"
Country N.Y., who received ;Aro .43 g. or an act, or
kindness to az elderly lady in New York city, has '
received eleven letters asking her hand in marriagv.
This goes to show, among other things, how ra?,nY
men there are in the w,rld who are-ready to fall in
lore with a kind-hearted womar