The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1881-01-15 00:00:00

ttillisrti altrOUS

HOME, FOREIGN, AND COLONIAL.

THE VALUE OF RELIGIOUS EDUCATION.—At the
opening of a school at Lambeth to accommodate 500
infants, the Archbishop of Canterbury said that this
country must uphold the religious education of its
youth if it wished to maintain its character as a reli-
gious nation. They should endeavour to spread the
light of knowledge in the age in which they lived,
and they coold not do better than commence by edu-
cating their infant children. He did not believe that
any sensible father or mother would wish to give their
children secular knowledge alone. Secular knowledge
was a very good thing; but he did not believe they
could train the minds of little children without
giving them distinct motives to regulate their conduct,
and these could not be obtained from a purely secular
education.
AVERAGE PRICES OF BRITISH CORN.—The follow-
ing are the average prices of British corn for the week
ending Jan. 8, as received from the inapectors and
officers of Excise :—Wheat, 435. 4d, ; barley, 31s. 6d. ;
oats, las. 10d. per imperial qr. Corresponding
week last year :—Wheat, 465. 2d.; barley, 365. Bd. ;
oats, 20s. lid.
WEATHER FORECASTS.—The report of the Meteoro-
logical Council to the Royal Society for the year
ended 31st of March last has been issued. Among
other information it gives the result of its warnings
and forecasts during the year. From this it appears
that out of 509 warnings given 50'5 were justified by
subsequent gales, and 25.1 by subsequent strong winds,
while 206 of the warnings were not justified by sub-
sequent weather; 28 per cent, of the forecasts are put
down as complete successes, 47 per cent. partial,
20 per cent, partial failures, and 5 total failures, giving
75 per cent, of succesato 25 of failure.
RAILWAY ACCIDENT IN FRANCE. A serious rail-
way accident occurred on Monday morning at two
O'clock on the Eastern line. At 200 yards from the
station of Al6zy, near Château Thierry, a luggage
train of 16 trucks ran into a passenger train coming up
from Ardennes. Ten travellers, whose names were
not then ascertained, and three of the company's ser-
vants were extricated from the wreck of four carriages
in a most lamentable state. The driver of the pas-
senger train and the stoker of the luggage train were
killed. The conductor of the luggage train was
severoly injured and his condition considered des-
perate. Most of the sufferers were conveyed to the
hospital at Chateau Thierry.
THE IRISH AT HOME AND ABROAD.—The attach-
ment of the Irish peasant to the soil appears to be
limited to the soil of his native country (remarks the
Pall Mall Gazette.) According to some official returns
published by a contemporary this morning out of
every thousand Irish immigrants in the United
States only eighty, or less than ten per cent. betake
themselves to agriculture,. The remaining 920 settle
in great cities, the factory towns, and the mining dis-
tricts. Hence, of the seven million Catholics of
America an overwhelming majority is to be found not
on the land, but in the urban districts. These figures,
which are probably approximately correct, seem to
indicate that the land hunger of the Celt is due rather
to the lack of other means of earning his bread than
to any preference for agriculture.
THE CAXTON MEMORIAL—The Citizen states :
About £250 has been subscribed for the memorial
stained glass window proposed to be placed in the
Church of St. Margaret, Westminster, in commemo-
ration of William Caxton, and a number of leading
printers and publishers of the metropolis have been
invited to join the General Committee.
A FINE STREAM !—An American joker, who was
also a landowner, advertised for sale a farm, with a
fine stream of water running through it. Shortly
afterwards a gentleman called to see the farm, and
having gone over it, visited the owner, to whom he
said, "Well, I have been over' the farm, but cannot
find the fine stream of water you mentioned in the
advertisement." "The stream? why it runs through
the piece of woodland in the lower part of the
meadow," was the reply " What ! that little brook ?
Why, it does not hold much more than a spoonful. I
am sure a bowlful of water would cause it to overflow.
You don't call that a fine stream do you?" " Why,
if it was a little finer you couldn't see it at all," re-
sponded the owner.
A GOOD BEGINNING.—An American journal says
We took a reporter on trial yesterday. He went out
to hunt items, and after being away all day, returned
with the following, which he said. was the best he
could do :—" Yesterday we saw a sight that froze our
. muscles with horror. A hackman driving down
College street at a rapid pace, came very near run-
ning over a nurse • and two children. There would
have been one of the most heartrending catastrophes
ever recorded had not the nurse, with wonderful fore-
thought, left the children at home before she went
out, and providentially stepped into a drug store just
before the hack passed. Then, too, the hackman,
just before reaching the crossing, thought of some-
thing he had forgotten, and, turning about, drove in
the opposite direction. Had it not been for this
wonderful occurrence of favourable circumstances, a
doting father, a loving mother, and affectionate
brothers and sisters would have been plunged into the
the deepest woe and most unutterable funeral ex-
pense." The new reporter will be retained.
,PAINTINGS BY HOGARTH.—In London, last week,
two pictures painted by Hogaith were put up for sale
at Messrs. Bullock's auction rooms in High Holborn.
The subjects were two interiors, " The Student" and
The Death-Scene." They formerly beloaged to
Charles Dickens, whose wife was Miss Hogarth, and
it was said that, though unsigned, they had never
been out of the possession of the Hogarth family and
their connexions. They were knocked down at £BO,
it being understood that the reserve price was not
reached in the biddings.
TARING PRECAUTIONS.—UnasuaI precautions have
been taken at Chester Castle to prevent a surprise
similar to that experienced during the Fenian rising
in 1867. In consequence of instructions from the War
Office to exercise the greatest vigilance over the safe
custody of the immense amount of ammunition and
stores contained in the magazine at Chester Castle a,
staff of workmen have been busily engaged barricad-
ing a large number of windows. The spare ammuni-
tion belonging to the city corps of Volunteers, and to
a number of corps in Lancashire and Cheshire, has
been removed to the Castle, and such portion of
ordnance stores at the Castle as was at all in an accessible
condition, has been removed to safer quarters and
double sentries posted. A detachment of the Bth
Regiment, consisting of two officers and 58 men,
have arrived from Manchester for the purpose of
augmenting the garrison, which has been considerably
reduced of late owing to the anxiety of the authorities
to complete the full complement of the battalion of the
22nd Regiment, located in the south of Ireland.
THE ELECTRIC LIGHT IN NEW YORK.—Broadway
is to be lighted for the distance of a mile by the Brush
electric light says Engirjetring.) A central station
will be established in West-street, where a Corliss
engine of 25-horse power will be installed to 'drive the
two electric generators required to furnish the current.
Twenty-two Brush lamps will be employed, each
giving a light of 1,000 oandles, or about 100 gas lamps-
The lamps will be elevated on iron lamp-posts 20ft.
high, and having projections to act as a ladder to the
man who attends the lamps. The experiments will be
carried on at the expense of the American Brush Com-
pany, and for the present the conducting wires will
simply be hung overhead from post to post. There is
no doubt but the mere lighting will prove a success and
the only point to be determined is the cost, which the
company are confident will be less than that of gas.
Edison's incandescent lamps are also to be tried in
another district Of New York.

ICE FATALITY. —A sheet of water, called The Lake,
at Wavertree, a few miles from Liverpool, was on
Monday night the scene of an ice fatality. About
nine o'clock, while about half a dozen persons were
skating over the deepest part, the ice broke and the
skaters were immersed. Assistance was speedily at
hand, and all were rescued with the exception of Mar-
garet Smith, -22 years of age, daughter of a master
wheelwright and blacksmith resident in Wavertree.
She seems to have been drawn under the ice, and her
body was not recovered for a considerable time.
A NEv7 INVENTION. —A tAdifornia inventor has
made a machine fo- Dressing and drying potatoes so
that they will keep for years, yet preserve their
natural flavour (says the Pictorial World). Isio
chemicals are used in the operation of curing, every-
thing being done by a simple machine capable of
pressing 600 bushels of potatcee in twenty-four hours.
The machine not only presses the potatoes, but lays
them on a tray in a concave form, with the hollow
side down. After the pressure they are put into a
drying apparatus, where they remain for two hours;
then they are ground into coarse meal resembling
cracked rice. The first shipment of these preserved
potatoes to Liverpool last year brought a large profit.
The average price of potatoes in an Francisco is
about 25 cents a bushel; dried, they brought in
England 455. a hundredweight.
_

THE HIPPOGRIFF.—The fabulous animal the Hippo-
riff, alluded to in Lord Carnarvon's letter to Mr.
John Bright, is thus described in Ariosto's poem of
Ctrlando Furioso, rendered in the old translation by
Sir John Harington
" The beast he rode was not o art,
But gotten of a Griffith (griffin) and a mare,
And like a Griffith had the former part,
As wing and head, and claws that hideous are,
And passing strength and force, and ventrous-hart,
But all the rest may with a horse compare."
INTENSE COLD IN AMERICA.—A correspondent in
Ohio writes :—The other day I shot a duck and hung
it weitside. Next day it was frozen so hard that I
broke it in two over my knee. I wanted to exercise
my mare, so went for a ride, which I found afterwards
was madness. The glass was seven degrees below
zero, and there was a positively awful wind. I had
on thickest underclothing, thickest suit, pea jacket,
fur gloves, and long boots' but after I had ridden a
mile I felt just as if I had nothing. on at all; my
knees would hardly hold on so cold were they, and the
wind having made my eyes water, my eyerlds froze
together. Then I turned round and made tracks
right away home. I'll never try another ride at zero.
A VEGETABLE FOR ALL HOUSEHOLDERS.—A Corre-
spondent writes to Land and Water: "Get some
swede turnips and place them in double rows and
cover with coal ashes. In from four to six weeks they
will have sprouts from 41n. to 6in. long, which should
be dressed like seakale. If a little manure is put
under the turnips they will sprout faster. Any house-
holder can thus grow spring vegetables, nearly as good
as seakale, as the turnips will sprout in a garden, in a
yard, or in a cellar. In a garden is best, as two or
three successive sets of sprouts can be gathered. The
turnips ought to be set at once."

DISASTERS AT SEA.—The Bureau Veritus has just
published the following statistics of maritime dis-
asters reported during the month of November, 1880,
concerning all flags :—Sailing vessels reported lost-
-107 English, 35 Norwegian, 33 German, 24 Dutch,
17 French, 13 American, 13 Sliedish, 9 Danish, 4
Austrian, 4 Italian, 4 Russian, 3 Spihish, 2 Portuguese,
1 Greek, 8 of which the nationality is unknown—
total, 277. In this number are included•five vessels
reported missing. Steamers reported lost-19 English,
4 German 3 Norwegian, 2 French, 1 Austrian, I.
I Dutch, 1 talian, 2 of which the nationality is un-
known—total, 33. In this number are included five
steamers reported missing.

THE FIGURES 1881.—What has only occurred
once in a centurf for eight hundred years occurs this
year—viz., the two middle figures being the same and
the first and last figures the same. Thus in 1881 two
B's are the middle figures, and the first and last figures
the same. This occurred 110 years ago—namely, in
1771, before that in 1661, and so back to the year 1001.
This coincidence will not again occur bill 1991; but
eleven years afterwards—namely, in 2002, we shall
have the same relative position of figures. No year
for 110 years before has been, and no year for 110
years to come will be, so circumstanced.
SUPPORT OF THE GOVERNMENT POLICY.—At the
annual meeting of the Plymouth Liberal Association
on Monday night, the following resolution was unani-
mously passed, and at once telegraphed to Mr. Glad-
stone :—" That this meeting hails with extreme plea-
sure the announcement by Her Majesty's Govern-
ment of their intention to introduce measures for the
redress of Irish grievances; and it further expresses
its sincere hope that the Premier will receive the
united support of the Liberal party in his endeavours
to do full justice to the Irish people, and so effect a
permanent settlement of this grave question."

TRAINING OFFICERS IN THE GERMAN NAVY.—In
the German Navy this is how young officers are
trained. In the first place they learn practical
seamanship on board a small sailing frigate which
cruises during the summer in the home waters. This
course over, they go on board another vessel—steam
and sail—for a lengthened cruise extending to from
eighteen months to two years. When that vessel is
under sail the cadets do any work that has to be done
on deck; when it is under steam they work in the
engine-room. They are instructed while on board in
navigation, steam seamanship, naval architecture,
naval administration, the manner of keeping a ship's
accounts, and English and French. They work the
guns themselves, and, in fact, learn to do everything
they can be learnt by actual practice as well as in
theory. When they return from this cruise they will
have to go to a naval college, where they must pass
another examination before they obtain a commission
as second lieutenant.

WASTED WATER POWER.—The success with which
the electric light has now been adapted to lighting
public buildings and thoroughfares, and the probability
of its being made applicable for domestic purposes,
suggests the desirability of turning attention to the
utilisation of the power now running to waste from
many rivers in the United Kingdom (says the
Engineer). Electricity might be generated near rivers
and waterfalls, and transmitted direct to the neigh-
bouring town, or air might be compressed there at a
very low cost, and transmitted to towns to work air
engines for driving dynamo-electric machines. In
not a few cases the rise and fall of the tide might be
economically utilised for lighting towns by electricity,
as by means of suitable reservoirs and constantly
acting turbines, power could be obtained much more
cheaply than by means of steam-engines. There are
few rlaces on our coast where the tide rises less than
10ft., and from one-half to three-fourths of this might
be utilised in working turbines continuously.
"HOSPITAL SUNDAY" AT LIVERPOOL.—Last Sunday
was the day appointed for the simultaneous collection
in the various places of worship in Liverpool and the
neighbourhood on behalf of the local medical charities,
and there were few churches and chapels in which
collections did not take place. The Bishop (Dr.
Ryle) preached at the cathedral church of St. Peter in
the morning and at Christ Church, Waterloo, in the
evening. So far as reported, the collections realized
£2,871, against £2,819 from the same churches and
chapels last year. These collections form but a small
part of the total amount raised. The largest
,indi-
vidual collection reported was at the Unitarian
Church, Renshaw-street, where £549 was contri-
buted.
AMERICAN AND CANADIAN FOOD.—There was a
large increase in the arrivals of both live stock and
fresh meat landed at Liverpool last week from the
United States and Canada, the total being 2,008
cattle, 122 sheep, 378 pigs, 11,767 quarters of beef,
1,448 carcases of mutton, and 1,125 carcases of pigs.
SURPLUS APPLES IN AMERICA.—A singular sight
may be seen at New Jersey—leafless apple trees still
laden with fruit in consequence of the unprecedentedly
large crop, which was too abundant to be gathered
(says Land and Water). The cider mills are so over-
loaded with fruit that hundreds of bushels of apples
lie rotting on the ground, the number of presses not
being equal to the demand made upon them. Apple
jack is almost as cheap as rater; in two small coun-
ties more than 100,000 gallons have been distilled.
Farmers in Connecticut have offered their orchards to
whoever will go in and pick for five cents a barrel- in
fact, they are thankful to get the trees cleared, as they
I will be weakened by this unseasonable retard.
KISSES AS PAY.—A serious legal complication is
troubling a neighbouring town (says the New York
Herald). A lady obtained a summons from a justice,
who accepted a kiss in place of his fee, but when the
papers were to be served the constable declined the
duty because, his fee being included in the SIMI
waived by the justice in consideration of more accept-
able pay, he got no money. Of course the justice
cannot divide the kiss with the constable, for all of it
went in the first instance to where it would do the
most good. Besides, if the constable is a fellow of
proper spirit, he will never be satisfied with part of a
kiss, particularly when the article comes at second
hand and from a man, too. The lady might pay the
constable's fee in casb, but then she would. be en-
titled to receive back from the justice a pro-
portionate amount of the fee of which he
unfairly retains the whole' and there, again,
would occur the annoyance of the indivisibility of a
kiss; the justice would probably be willing to return
the entire fee in kind, doing it several times over, so
that there should be no mistake, but this would make
matters worse, for then the dispenser of law would
have had no fee at all, and the summons would be
worthless, for no such paper issued by a court has
binding force until the fees are paid. The case is one
that staggers cold intellect; it will have to go to the
Supreme Court, there to remain on the docket until
woman suffrage fills the bench with ladies; but if the
justice who issued that summons has any regard for
his ears he will do well at that time to have them
safely tucked away under the. daisies or inside of a
vault. Women have very distinct convictions about
men who have to pay for kisses.
THE FACTORY AND WORKSHOP ACT.—The Londox
Gazette, of January 7, contains a notice continuing
until December 31. 1882, a special exception from the
regulations as to the hours of employment of young
persons and women in the case of "non-textile
factories, in which the only processes carried on are
the processes of calendering, finishing, hooking, lap-
ping, or making up and packing of any yarn or cloth,
or any of such processes."
THE SITE FOR THE WORLD'S FAIR.—The site which
is proposed for the World's Fail., to be held in New
York in 1883, has many historical associations con-
nected with it, remarks the Daily News. Inwood was
at one time covered by a forest, but during the War
of Independence it became the scene of some of the
events of the Revolution, was occupied by English
and American troops in turn, and all the trees were
burnt down. In 1776 Washington entrenched him-
self at Inwood, which was attacked by Lord Howe,
and held the place for more than a month against the
British General. During one of the engagements
400 Hessians were killed and were buried where they
lay. The ground which forms their grave has never
since been broken, and will not be now; for it lies
five hundred feet away from the grounds which are to
be occupied by the Exhibition. Apart from its
associations Inwood is an exceedingly beautiful situa-
tion for the World's Fair to be held in. The Harlem
River winds slowly by, and Inwood ridge and the
Hudson Hills give picturesque variety to the land-
scape. Of the old forest unfortunately nothing now
remains but au apple orchard.