The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1874-12-26 00:00:00

11115a1lancous
HOME, FOREIGN, AND )NIAL.

COVI

AN ARGFMENT FOR Mtutics—Dr. Marvin,
Professor of Psychological Medicine in thsiNew York
Medical College for Women, h%s been delivering a
lecture on insanity before the New York Liberal Club.
In stating the oases of insanity in crowded cities, he
Bay, : -
over population is a predisposing cause of insanity Man
`bt a busy animal. Ills days and nights are tilled with plans,
and schemes, awl latioura He has, 1.1 society Ir now 1,111•
'Muted. to pluck his fortune from the teeth of his brother.
Ile lives by circumventing some one. Union his bargain is
a sharp one it is no bargain at all, Strength of mind and
holy is abrolutely necessary, for the victors; is to the strong
But all men are not strong. Many are unequal to the
struggle for life, and Lobe weak is to be crushed. They fill
our asylums, they fill our poorhouses. they fill the most
lonely and neglected of our graves But shall we murmur
at the awful decree of Nature? Shrll 'we lift our little voices
against, heel No ! Iteuellion would Ire melees A wisdom
greater than our own Is at the heart of the universe—a
wisdom that never errs, is pitiless, and in the end just. It
Is well for the race that Pip Wong conquer, and what is wtll
ftir the race is right. Wts eveh a blessing to the weak that
they are defeated. No great, calamity could befall them
than the triumph of their imbecility.
- -

• Ore Coal, FIELDS. —The coal raised from
the'ruines of the United Kingdom in 1873, amounting
to 128,680,131 tons in all, and constituting the largest
quantity ever produessl in a year, came from the fol-
lowing districts :-62.102,566 tons' approaching half
the entire quantity. Was raised in the north of Eng-
land, viz. in the Yorkshire district, Lancashire, and
the four 'English counties north of these; 23,490,875 !
tons, or betwhn a 'fifth and a foarth of the whole, !
came from midland counties—Stafford, Derby, Not- i
tingham. Worcester, Salop, Chester, Leicester, War-
wick; 13,913,623 tons, nearly a nioth of the whole,
from Wales, South Wales supplying not far from five-
sixths of the Weiss coal; 6,749.264 tons, not quite a
nineteenth of the whole, came from the south-western
district—Somerset, Devon, Glocester, Monmouth;
16,857,772 tuns, consideratly over in eighth of the
whole, from Scotland; 135,731 tons from Ireland.
MORE RAILWAY REFORMS. —OR and after
1 January 1 there will be considerable alterstions and
reductions in the fares charged by the Great Northern,
Manchester, Sheffield, and Lindanshire, and L indon
and North Western Lines, between all towns and places
where there is competition. The fares will be—first-
clam, lAA per mile; second-class, lid. ; and thiril-class,
Id. This is a great reduction as compared with the
present rates, which are in some instances as much as
23. per mile first class. In local fares there will be no
material alteration at present, but they will shortly be
revised, as as to remove any possible anomalies as
between such stations and the competing points.
Return tickets will be continued as at present, but an
important feature in the new arrangements will be that
third-class season tickets will be for the first time avail-
able ai well as first and second. All new third-class
carriages will have separate compartments; and the
Manchester, Sheffield, and Lincolnshire Company, and
possibly the Great Northern, will run carriages en the
Pullman system, but with considerable improvements,
between the principal towns on their lines.
- -

I

A PITIABLE CASE.—Atk Irishman arrested for
highway, robbery, on being brought before a magistrate,
asserted that he was more entitled to be pitied than to
be punished. " Pitied exclaimed the justice, while
his eyebrows arched with more than ordinary wonder
and contempt, "and on what account, pray
" Sure, on account of my misfmtune." " Your mis-
fortune, indeed! What ! that we have caught you,
I suppose ?" " Oh, the jintleman that's brought me
here knows my misfortune well enough." But the
gentleman was as astonished as the magistrate him-
self, and as incapable of understandin the culprit's
meaning. "You will own, I suppose," said his wor-
ship, "that you stopped this gentleman on the high-
way ?" " ! yes. I did that same." "And that
you took from him 1150 in bills ?" "And there your
Honour's right again." "Well, then, you perplexing
vagabond, what do you mean by your misfortune ?"
"Shure, and the money wasn't in my pocket above a
week, whin the dirthy bank sthopped payment, and I
was robbed of iviry shillin'."
THE TOWER OF LONDON. —Mr. Charles Ritchie,
of 33, Queen's-gate-terrace, has received the following
reply to applications that the Tower should be opened
to visitors' without payment :
" Treasury Chambers, December 12 —Sir,—l am directed
by the Lords Commissioners of lier Majesty's Treasury to
Inform you that their Fliiancial Secretary, Mr. Smith, has
communicated to them su the ggestion which you recently
brought before him for the free opening of the Tower of
London on two days of the week, Monday and Saturday, and
I ant to say that their l,rdships are wiling to take this sug-
gestion into their consideration, and will communicate with
you again so soon as they shall have arrived at a decision
' In the meantime they trust that you will understand that
they do not wish to be considered as in ally way pledged to
adopt your proposal, seeing that they are not at present Ins
position to form an opinion upon it. They are merely ready
to institute inquiries into the subject, and when they have
obtained such information as may be necessary they will
proceed to consider whether it would be for the public
advantage that the Tower should be open to visitors on
certain days withoutspayment.—l am, sir, your obedient
servant, WILLIAM LAW."

A Liconer or WAR.—In the United States at
the end of the last fiscal year, on the 30th of June,
1874, there were 102,457 army invalid pensioners on
the pension roll receiving $10,058,377 a year;
107,516 army widows and dependent relatives, receiv-
ing 1113,537,196 ; 1,551 navy invalid pensioners,
and 1,785 widows and relatives; 17,620 pensioners,
survivors of the war of 1812, and 5,312 widows of the
soldiers. The total number of pensioners of all classes
on the 30th of June, 1874, was 237,241, a decrease of
2,170 during the year; the aggregate annual rate of
pensions of all classes was $26,254,071 10c., a de-
crease from the preceding year of $5,645. The roll
contains the names of 410 widows and soldiers in the
Revolutionary War,
ONE WAY OF M IKINO MONEY.—The DaVy
News says :—"During the late war, a one year Volun-
teer, who had served eight months in the Prussian
army and three years in a London bank, formed an
1 ingenious plan for profiting by the rate of exchange
I as proclaimed by the German chiefs with the view of
facilitating commercial transactions between invadrra
and invaded. He had disoovered that one-eighth per
cent, too little was allowed for the Prussian thaler,
and three-eighths per cent, too much for the Bavarian
gulden. If, then, be had had no military duties to
perform, and had carried with him an immense capital
in ready money, he would have been able to make
handsome profits by exchanging some millions of gulden
for francs, and these francs again for thalers. War,
however, is not favourable to delicate finan.dal opera-
lions; and the speculative volunteer as he marched
towards Paris, found no opportunity of putting in
practice a scheme which, he plaintively remarked,
might have enriched him without impoverishing either
France or Germany. The idea conceived by this
enterprising warrior has, in a modified form, been
carried out at New York, where a gentleman, with a
genius for petty monetary affairs, has made a large
fortune by buying small change when it was cheap
and selling it when it was 'dear. Every morning be
drives round with a waggon to the newspaper shops
and other retail places of business, where small coin is
plentifully received, and buys up the accumulatiops of
cents at the rate 0f.97 per cent. for copper and 99 per
cent, for nickel. He then disposes of his metal to
pawnbrokers, who have need of small money, but not,
it appears, such urgent need an to make them ready to
pay for it. They are willing enough, howel er, to
accept it and to give bills at three months for its full
value. Thus the speculator changes cumbersome
copper for good marketable paper, and gains a small
percentage on the transactions of each day. He has
not engaged in the highest branch of finance; but he
is said to have.already cleared thirty thousand dollars."
A WOMAN'S EXPLANATION.—A young gentle-
man called on a lady friend last Sabbath evening, says
the Terre Haute Express, and repeating the usual
question in such CaSeP, "What's the news?" she re-
plied, "Oh. nothing, only [had a run around on nay
finger last night, and did not sleep a wink, and when I
got up in the night for the pain-killer, I stumbled over
the coal scuttle, and there was a dance in the next
house, and they didn't let anybody in our house sleep
all night, and Sib's birthday was to-day, and Willie
says she ate turkey just one hour and ten minutes, and
I gave her just 24 licks, and I owe her twelve more,
and I read the Bible, and the Bible history, and got
Sunday-school lessons and been to church, but I didn't
go to Sunday-school, and read the Saturday Night and
the Mail and the Sunday Express, so I guess I am
posted. Do you think we ought to go to church?
Let's stay home this evening, I feel I'd like to listen to
you talk to me." And then, attorney like, she rested
the case. -

--- ---
ROYAL NAVY. —A return has been issued
(obtained by Lord IL Scott, M.P.) showing the
number of boys, seamen, and coastguard fleet men who
were borne, rated, or left the service in the year
1873 4. The number of first class boys entered for
the first time on board Her Majesty's ships in the
year was 230, and of second class boys, 2,615. The
number who left the service from various causes was
577. On the lot of April last there were 3,537 first
class boys in Her Majesty's service, and 2,860 second
class boys. There were in the year 3,039 bond
fide who were rated from hosts. On the let
of November last them were 18,949 bond fide sea-
pen serving in the fleet, including pensioners anti men
in India troopships. The number of coastguard fleet
men on shore on the let of April was 3,723, and in the
year 2,880 bond fide seamen left the service, of which
709 weie invalided and 822 deserted.
MONUMINT TO CAPTAIN COOK. A commu-
nication from her Majesty's ship Scout states that a
mensal, nt has been erected on one of the islands of
Pacific to the memory of Captain Cook, who was
killed by the savages of Owhyhee, ninety-five years
ago. The ceremony took place on the 14th of No-
vember, in the presence of Major Wodehouse, the
English Commissioner, and the captain and officers Of
the &out. The monument is an obelisk 25ft. hi4h, had
Mounted on abase Bft. square. It is of concrete, and
beam the following inscription :—"ln memory of the
great circumnavigator. Captain James took, It N., who
discovered these islands on the 18th of January, A.D.
1778, and fell near this spot on the 14th of Fehmary,
A.D. 1779. This monument was erected in November,
A.D. 1874, by some of his fellow-countrymen." The
architectlwas Mr. IL Liebman, of Honolulu (late of
Northumberland, Englaad'. It is erected on a suit-
able spot (which the Scout's company selected on their
first visit in April, 1872), about 100 yards from the rock
on which the captain fell. A monument, consisting
of blocks of lava, was erected at the spot souse years
ago; but it had fallen down.