The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1875-02-06 00:00:00

THE STOTTBDRIDG-E OBSTSIMER.

court or camp, with courtier or soldier—an example
that &genial companion might be a Christian gentle-
man. But a Christian clergyman need not be la
member of a separate class, or a stranger to the
common interests of his countrymen ; yet, human,
genial, layman as he was, he still was not
the less—nay, he was still ten times more—a pastor
than he would have been had he shut himself out from
the haunts of men. As an instance of this, witness the
tears of the rough- peasants of Hampshire as they
crowded round the open grave to look, for the last
time, on the friend of thirty years, with whom also
mingled the passing hunter and wild gipsy wan-
derers, who mourned for the face they should no
more see in forest or on heath; witness the grief
which afflicted this venerable church which in two
short years he had made his own, and all felt that
he had found a place worthy of himself, and in him
the place found an occupant worthy to fill it. HA
was a spiritual teacher and guide; and they claimed
for him what he never would have claimed for him-
self, the character of a profound theologian. One
of his fixed, permanent, . overruling persuasions
was the firm belief, in various ages forgotten,
often derided, sometimes severely discountenanced,
that the main religion of mankind and Christendom
consisted in the strict fulfilment of the duty to man
which was the will of God. The Dean then quoted a
portion of a sermon delivered by the Canon before
going to America, in which he upheld the goodness
of God, and, in conclusion, said that, in answer to one
who had wished the Canon "Long life," he replied,
"This is the last thing that I desire. As one grows
older one acquires more and more the painful con-
sciousness of the difference between what has to be
done and what can be done, and one sits down more
quietly when one gets on the wrong side of fifty,
and one lets others start up and do for us the
things which we can no longer do for ourselves."
But it was, the Dean said, the highest pleasure
that a man could have who had gone down the
long bill, and to his exceeding comfort to believe that
younger spirits would rise up after him and catch the
lamp of truth out of his hands before it expired; and
carry on to the goal with swifter and more even steps
the lamp as it fell from his hands; and then it was for
them to hand it on with increased light to the genera-
tions which were yet to come.

An anthem followed, the words of which were by
Dean Milman, commencing "Brother, thou art gone
before us, and thy manly soul is flown ;" and as the vast
congregation left the Abbey, the "Dead March in
Saul "was played.

[From Punch.]
CHARLES KINGSLEY.

BORN AT HOLNE, DEVON, JUNE 21, 1819; DIED AT
EVERSLEY, HANTS, JANUARY 23, 1875,

BORN in green Devon, nursed by her blue sea,
His heart, fed on her fairness and her fame,
Beat true to out-door life and nature free,
And thrilled to great deeds of our English name.

If Saxon e'er was Saxon to the core— .
In hate of wrong, in trustfulness of right,
In strong man's sympathy with strength, nor more
In good man's love for good, as in God's sight—
This man was Saxon ; Saxon too his love
Of wild things and wild sports by wood and weld:
To ride, shoot, speak the truth, he ranked above
Most arts, as did the Persian chiefs of old.
Out of a youth unfettered, frank, and free,
Came swift strong manhood, not without the storms
That clear the sky, if they stir up the sea
To level barriers and gives shores new forms.
His faith in good, his trust in God's great ends,—
Or so he deemed them,—urged him fearless on,
Through tracts of strange thought and new toil, while friends
Frowned on the rashness that so wild had gone.
Not knowing what true needle, lead-line, chart,
Guided him, sounding on his trackless way,
Till in feality to that manly heart
Destroyers learnt to build, scoffers to pray.
He felt, and told, the ferment of our life ;
Showed the Same leaven swelling, fast and far,
In later Egypt's Alexandrine strife,
New faiths with old creeds then, as now, at war.

He raised strong Saxon Hereward from death,
In his grey shroud of mist from mere and fen;
Called up the England of Elizabeth,
With Drake and Raleigh, chiefs of Devon men.
Led us from Western combes to tropic isles,
Where giant cosmic forces have dwarfed man;
Taught us to trace, in Nature's frowns or smiles,
At home, abroad, signs of an all-wise plan.
Life, teaching, preaching, all tuned to one key,
Of cheerful trust in God and hope for mess;
Of faith that Earth more near to Heaven would be,
If from no height gained we fall back again.

A Churchman stanch, yet whose church-door stood wide
For Christians of all creeds to enter in.
A village Pastor, though on every side
His flock ranged far as voice or pen could win.
Lightly let who will rate a life so sped,
Of sympathies so sweeping, faith so wide,
England has juster measure for the dead
As she stands mourning at his coffin's side,
And notes how short the life so well employed,
Its thread cut mid-way Efty and three score,
And counting all he felt, toiled, loved, enjoyed,
Scarce grieves to think his cup can hold no more.

globe, the lecturer showed how, by the explora-
tions, sufficient and abundant confirmation had been
given to the previously held opinion that there was
extending around the poles a wide area of siliceous or
flint deposit, formed from enormous accumulations of
the dead skeletons and shells of diatomaceous plants
and radularia--invisible organisms which lived on the
top of the sea and existed in such numbers as to cover
it and the ice foroniles with a scum. So far also as
the examination of the Atlantic and Pacific oceans
had extended, it showed that the whole of that sea-
bottom was covered for many thousands square miles
with a deposit of unknown thickness, also built up of
the dead skeletons of the globiturinm, which existed
on the surface, and in this deposit, from ten to twenty
per cent, consisted of siliceous, the remainder being
calcareous organisms. This calcareous deposit had
been traced along the Gulf of Mexico and the Coast of
Florida, and was found also on the west coast of Aus-
tralia, and the south point of South Africa. From
Teneriffe to St. Thomas two great valleys stretched
overing an area vastly greater probably than that of the
British Isles, and the distance of the bottom from the
surface was nearly 19,000 feet. In this area the sea
bottom was absolutely different to what it was any-
where else. It consisted of a very fine red mud, in
which not a trace of the shells of the globituriim, or
of other calcareous organisms, was to be found,
although in the shallower water around this calcareous
deposit existed, and the sea above was absolutely
swarming with globiturinw. There was nothing, of
course to prevent the shells from descending. What
was still more remarkable was that, as the water
deepened from the shallow parts where these shells
were found deposited, they came upon them broken
into fragments, eroded and worn, as if something were
dissolving them, until the red clay was reached. The
researches of Mr. Buchanan, the chetrist on board the
Challenger, showed that when the calcareous deposit
was treated with weak acids which removed the lime a
deposit of one or two per cent, of red clay remained,
exactly like that obtained from the great depths. It was
stupendous to think of thousands of feet of rock being
formed from the accumulation of the shells and skele-
tons of invisible animalculte, but when they thought
of the wide area he had spoken of, covered to an un-
known depth with what Professor Thomson strikingly
called the ashes of these organisms, the idea became
almost overwhelming in its vastness. Nor did he
(Professor Huxley), after mature consideration see any
other explanation for the phenomenon than tLat sug-
gested, viz., that this red clay was but the residuum of
the skeletons of the globiturinas. Bat having esta-
blished the fact that certain things did occur, they
could be made the basis of deductive reasoning, with-
out knowing how or why they occurred. Supposing,
then, that they had a globe everywhere covered with
water, and that there were no dry land at all to
be affected by the motion of the waves, and from
which sedimentary rocks could be formed, the sea
surrounding the two poles would be covered with a
thick layer of these invisible animalcul, constantly
raining down their skeletons on the sponge spicules
at the bottom, and forming a siliceous deposit, wnile
in the intermediate zone a calcareous or limestone de-
Posit woald be forming in the same way. Thus it
seemed by the mere operation of these lowest forms
of life, in a globe altogether covered by se, they
might have five or six different kinds of rock formed
on the sea bottom. The most striking possibility
which had come out of these researches was to his
mind that they might have not only limestone an 4
flint rocks—that they already knew—as the product
and expression of this organic life on the surface of the
sea, but what they did not know before—clay
rocks also. Summing up the bearing of these
discoveries on geologic problems, Professor Hux-
ley contended that in all the ages there was no
indication of any other agency at work than
natural causes; no evidence in that brief
period of time registered by the succession of
stratified rocks, of natural forces having a greater in-
tensity than now. Hutton first refused to admit the
interposition of strange and catastropic influences when
it was possible to explain formations by such causes as
they knew to be in operation at the present time. That
belief in natural causes, when afterwards supported by
Lyell and others, was opposed as sapping the very
foundation of religion and morality, but Sir Charles
had had the good fortune to see the heresy of his
youth become so completely the truism of his old age,
that even his admirers sometimes forgot his vast share
in bringing about that result. The Professor's address
was frequently interrupted by applause.

EPITAPH ON THE LITE EMPEROR OF OHINA.
All China mourns the loss of one so young
In speochless sorrow—she has lost her TuNG.—Punch.

among themselves upon the question of submission is so
great, that it is really beyond the power of any person, how-
ever well informed he may be, to prognosticate from any-
thing like reliable data when the struggle may close. The
only certainty about it is that both masters and
workmen are moved by the same detetermined spirit,
and that the change from a strike to a Lock-out
has introduced elements of complication which are
not calculated to facilitate a solution. The two parties
confront each other, the workmen manifest no sign of a
desire for settlement, and She -difficulty is how to bring
, them together. There would be no, difficulty, we believe,
in obtaining the intervention of gentlemen living in the
district, were they sure of being heard by the workmen;
but the probability of their being regarded as emissaries
irons thiemployers deters, them, as th e faintest breath of
a suspicion of that nature would be sufficient to frustrate
the best Intentions. The question is so essentially a work-
man's that some thoughtful persons entertain the opinion that
there can be no hope of successful action of any kind a hich is
not undertaken by workmen rising spontaneously from their
own ranks, and commanding the confidence of their fellows
But it is too early to expect such voluntary action as this,
because, whatever may be said of the existence of number-
less cases of severe privation among the ironworkers, the
colliers in the mass—and it is with them that the settle-
ment has to be effected—have not yet felt the pinch of
distress severely enough to be driven into this course. In
fact, the idleness of ironworks colliers will hardly have
commenced until next Saturday, when they will receive
their final pay, and the employers, on the other hand, have
but risen, as it were, from the Council at which they deli-
berately committed themselves to the present measure. So
far from entertaining any notion of giving way, they have
gone the length of considering the probable case of one of
their number being too weak to go through the struggle
to the end, and a resolution has been passed that all mem-
bers who require assistance shall obtain it from the funds
of the Association, now amounting to a very large sum.
Everything, therefore, confirms what we have previously in-
dicated—a resolution on both sides to make the contest
decisive. The cost of the fight to both masters and work-
men was stated in round numbers in The Times yesterday.
When ills added that the weekly output of coal at the
collieries now stopped reaches ordinarily to nearly 400,000
tons, it will be evident at a glance that this lock-out must,
within a short space of time, exercise an important
Influence upon every other mining district in the kingdom,
and cause a temporary advance in the price of coal. A
great amount of feeling has been created among the work-
men by a statement which was industriously circulated in
the month preceding the strike, and is now revived—that
the masters had broken faith with them. That charge
was based upon a resolution passed in the month
of August last, wherein the masters agreed that no fiirthur
reduction should be enforced without apr ous consulta-
tion with the representatives of the workmen "at a
conciliatory meeting like the present. The workmen
placed one construction upon this, the masters another.
The workman intrepreted it as a concession of arbi-
tration ; the masters meant it to be nothing more than the
resolution literally expressed—a " conciliatory " meet-
ing. The meeting was held on the 29th of December, when
the condition of trade was discussed. The employers quoted
the prices which they actually obtained, and the delegates
the prices current in the trade journals and lists. It was
proposed that the books of a given number of firms should
be submitted for the examination of a sworn accountant,
with an arbitrator to decide between them, whose decision
they would accept. The employers rejected this proposal,
but the Chairman made this offer to the men—that he
would submit to the inspection of any two of them in
whom they had confidence the actual contracts into which
he had entered, and not only those, but the correspondence
which led to them, to vouch for the veracity of his figures.
The Dowlais Iron Company made a similar offer in 1873, and
their contract books were brought specially from the London
office and kept at the Dowlais office over two months for the
purpose of enabling any such examination to be made, but
no one ever came to look at them. The Chairman com-
plained to Mr. Halliday, who was present among the
delegates, that he had been making a charge against the
masters for which there was no foundation. The moment
his attention was drawn to it, Mr. Halliday withdrew the
charge with a courteous expression of regret that it had been
made in the absence of fuller information. As this retracta-
tion has not been made public before, we now refer to it, in
fairness to the employers, and as an answer to the charge
which is still being made. In the midst of so much
gloom, there is one gleam of sunshine in the fact
that the ironstone miners are working. They will not
be stopped. They have been associated with the iron-
workers in past reductions, and as they are dependent upon
neither collieries nor ironworkers, work has been secured to
them at Cyfarthfa. These men attempted a resistance to the
first reduction, and were out about two months. They then
applied for work, but the difference with the iromnaster
having obliged Mr. Crawshay to blow out his blast furnaces,
he told them ironstone was not required. If, however, they
chose to work upon the wages of 1871—that was, 30 per
cent, below the highest point which had been reached, and
he level to which the present reduction of 10 per cent.
brings colliers' labour—they might go on. They accepted
the offer, and have been working with regularity ever
since. Although the ironworks have been at a standstill
all the time, and the colliers are now reduced to a similar
condition, they will be kept going, no matter how long this
struggle may last. We have the fullest authority for saying
that Mr. Crawshay would have kept his ironworkers ,
similarly employed had they met in the same spirit, and ,
have stocked iron to the extent of a hundred thousand tons ,
rather than they should have been thrown out of employ-
reent Further, to show that the old feeling in the 'lron
King' is not utterly extinct, he made more than one effort
to conic to an arrangement with the Association for the em-
ployment of his ironworks colliers alone, but the Union ques-
tion cropped up and became an insurmountable obstacle.
Cyfartha, therefore, with the exception of the Ironstone
Works, is in the same position as all the rest of the iron-
works, with one furnace only in blast.
"There have been many rumours abroad of acts discovering
tendency on the part of the workmen to be riotous ; but,
o far as our inquiries have gone, we have been unable to find
any foundation for these allegations. The young men in
colliery districts are at all times frolicsome, and it would be
strange if they were not so now, with so much time on their
hands. But, so far from there being any apparent desire ta
pass the bounds of the law, on the present occasion, as in
1873, the demeanour of the masses is quiet and good-
humoured, as one might expect to find under far more
pleasant circumstances."

Referring to the strike, The Times, in their Money
Market Article on Tuesday, said—

_
"it is stated that no appreciable effect upon the market
for the new iron rails has been experienced to-day as a con-
sequence of the Lock-out in South Wales. In an active state
of the demand, such a sudden curtailment of supply would,
as in former years, have created excitement, and have given
an upward turn to prices in the unaffected district of Cleve-
land, to which a transfer of orders would, in all probability,
in the course of business have been made. Nothing of the
kind had, however, transpired on the London Iron market
up to the close of 'Change this afternoon, nor is any pressure
for delivery of iron, at all events, anticipated, even should the
Welsh colliers and ironworkers remain for some time idle.
The American demand for British railroad iron has ap-
parently become defunct, and, as the chief impetus in our
export trade has generally originated from that quarter
as Spring opens, its absence this year can only be counter-
balanced by the wants of Russia, India, the Australian
Colonies, and other countries. It is satisfactory to learn that
many iron rolling mills in the North of England would be
ready to start at once upon any fresh rail orders that could
be secured even at cost price, so that no public works need
be suspended in any part of the world from the untoward
silence of the metallurgical industries of South Wales, arising
out of the existing labour struggle. The rates demanded
free on board at Middlesborough, Hartlepool, and Stockton-
ou-Tees vary from £7 is. to £7 10s. per ton, according to
specification, for new iron rails, on the London Iron-market
this evening."

The Correspondent of the Standard writes :7-_.

"Going over the Dowlais Iron Works to-day pdondaYi
where 11,000 men are in ordinary times employed, but where
the lock-out has now led to nearly complete cessation of
work, I was gratified to find the excellent feeling existing
between employers and employed, and the care which is
taken of the 'best interests of the workmen. Schools, medical
attendance, and a fine reading-room, are provided for all,
and good dwellings for most of the men None of these
benefits will be forfeited during the lock-out. Admirably
organised provident societies exist, and a savings bank, the
company undertaking the care of the funds, but leave the
men to manage their own affairs. All the men concur in
sincerely regretting their enforced idleness, and are anxiously
looking forward to some arrangement being arrived at ; but
when that will happen not the best-informed man in the
district seems capable of offering even a guess."