biglam/hmd_newspapers huggingface dataset:
The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1881-05-21

THE RIVAL RAMS!

In a spectacular piece produced some weeks ago at
the Wallner Theatre, of Berlin, two handsome rams
were engaged as "supers," and gave nightly satisfac-
tion to crowded houses by the grave and amiable
conscientiousness with which they performed the parts
assigned to them (says the Daily Telegraph). When
the play was withdrawn, the stage-manager resolved
in an evil hour to take them home and put them up in
his kitchen until the following morning. Shortly after
daybreak the manager's cook, whose duty it was to
prepare her master's morning cup of coffee and take it
to his bedside, fulfilled this useful function with her
accustomed punctuality, but unfortunately omitted
to close the kitchen door behind her. The rams,
impelled by natural curiosity, followed her into
the drawing room, through which she had to pass
in order to reach her master's bedchamber. While
casting a sheep's eye round the handsomely-
furnished salon, they suddenly found themselves in
the presence of two other rams ; at least, such was
the impression conveyed to them by the reflection of
their own forms from the polished surface of a huge
mirror adorning one side of the room from floor to
ceiling. No ram that respected itself could be ex-
pected passively to endure so exciting a rencontre.
Accordingly, the manager's guests, after deliberately
taking the measure of their own doubles, lowered their
horns and rushed to the fray. So terrific a crash en-
sued that the panic-stricken cook let fall the breakfast-
tray with a shriek of consternation, and the manager,
his slumbers thus rudely broken, sadly contemplated a
scene of ruin and destruction. He is stated to have
expressed his conviction that accommodating rams
with a night's lodgings in a private house is an inju-
dicious pra:ltice.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1881-05-21

DEATH OF A FRENCH ADMIRAL.

The Paris Correspondent of the Daily Hews writes :
Admiral la Ronciere le Noury's death leaves a
blank in Parisian society, which he much fre-
quented. The Admiral was a Bonapartist, without
being at all a party man. His father was one of the
heroes of Eckmuhl, where he captured twelve cannons
and two Austrian battalions, in doing which he lost an
arm and received nine ballet-wounds. Napoleon
found him riddled like an old flag that had waved on
many a field of battle. When he recovered he was
too mutilated to resume active service, but was
given the command of the military district of
Turin. There the late Admiral was born in
1813. In the navy he showed himself on many
occasions a gallant officer. After the Crimean war
he accepted the command of the Imperial yacht La
.Reine Hortense during a voyage which Prince Na-
poleon made on board that vessel into the Polar
regions. The cool courage of the Admiral was tested
in the course of the expedition by icebergs and a
water spout. When he returned he was sent to his
native town to negotiate the marriage of Prince
Napoleon and the Princess Clotilde. The Admiral,
as head of the Geographical Society, introduced to
the Presidents of the French Republic the different
celebrated explorers who have visited Paris within the
last ten years—Cameron, Stanley, Nordenskjold.
He had a passion for geographical science,
botany, and zoology. He and M. de. Lesseps were
very close friends, and the Admiral favoured the Suez
and Panama schemes with all the power of his purse,
which his uncle, the Baron le Noury, filled well in
leaving him his properties in the Eure as well as his
title. I never met a more obliging person than the
Admiral, whose manners nevertheless were cold and
undemonstrative, but quite free from hauteur. He
was a zealous and munificent patron of lifeboat and
humane societies, of sailors' homes and refuges for
shipwrecked people. Admiral La Roncii)re le N oury
did great things in a quiet matter-of-course way, and
was utterly indifferent to the praise of the world or its
blame.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1881-05-21

"iltg STOURBRIDGE 013 SERVER

AN INTERESTING GUN.

The Governor of Cyprus has sent home, for the
Museum of Artillery at Woolwich, a heavy gun,
believed to be one of the oldest pieces of ordnance in
existence. It i ef cast-ii•on and weighs 25 cwt. The
manufacture is probably Venetian, and the ancient
weapon is well shaped, in the form of a cup or goblet,
the mouth being wide and deep to hold a large stone
shot, while the narrower pedestal is hollowed to re-
ceive the powder charge. A round stone, weighing
about t 3 cwt., has been sent with the gun, and it
is suggested that this is the kind of missile fired
from it, as proved to have been the case with
similar guns in England. One which it some-
what resembles is already in tho Rotunda
at Woolwich, having been found in the Moat
at Bodiham Abbey, and specimens of the stone
cannon-balls are already in that. museum. The gtiii
from Cyprus is in nmeh better preservation, and has
apparently suffered little decay. The cup, or mortar,
is nineteen inches deep and eighteen inches across,
and the external diameter is twenty-six inches, which
allows four inches for thickness of metal. The powder-
chamber, seven inches across, extends some thirty
inches in a tunnel behind the mortar, and terminates
in a vent or touch-hole going off at right angles, and
fully an inch in diameter.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1881-05-21

• - _ • - - -* -- • - ---
-

ADDRESS

Sir Robert in spite of much scorn.
• Repealed the high duties on corn.
But Allcock's C ,rn
Has who! , re-peel'd
The Corns that in anguish were borne.
Alleoek's Corn Plaster have no equal as a cure suds
reliever of.Corna. They always give satisfaatisa

Act,irre • otnth v., )4, !1719tir 1-5."*.1 t, 0,1 R".

PUBLIC NOTICES.

Lately Published.—Seventh Edition.

STAMMERING, STUTTERING, LISPING,
ac., Their CAUSES and CURE;
By Um. ABBOITS,

Physician to the Dispensary for illations of the Sp,cch

"This is the only special work upon the 91111 FICA of
Impediments of Speech, writtenty a qualified mtdic,l
man for many years. It is calculate to improve our
knowledge of a remarkable group of uffections."
cal Review.

U I.stica by GEO. PITMAN. 149, GOWER FTRI.I: "
LC,NDON, \V. C.
Price : sent Post-frits for 26 stamps. -

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