The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1875-05-15 00:00:00

our foitilon Corrtsfoatitt.

' (We deem it right to state that we do not at iI times
Lientity ourselves with our Correspondent's opininals

The May meetings find the religious and benevDlent
community of London in the full swing of activity.
Most of these gatherings take place at Exeter Hall, a

very large building with an unpretending entrance on
the north side of the Strand, not far from Charing
Cross. It is so called, not from the ever faithful
city on the banks of the Exe in Devonshire, but be-
ause it stands upon the property of the Marquis of
Exeter. The acoustic qualifications of Exeter Hall
are well known to all who have ever entered it; and
the perfect manner in which a speaker can be heard
contrasts favourably with the way in which a voice is
lost in the Howse of Lords, where the sound seems to
dribble away without producing the effect desired by
the peer who is addreesing the House. Some of the
May meetings are distinctly denominational in their
character, such as for instance the Church Missionary
Society, the Weslyan Missionary Society, and others,
which attract a considerable number of persons im-
mediately connected with the religious body whose pride
they are. But there are others, which appeal to the sup-
port of all sects. Take for example the British and Foreign
Bible Society, at whose anniversary meeting the
Archbishop of Canterbury, the President of the
Wesleyan Conference, and Mr. Spurgeon, appeared
on the same platform, and spoke to the resolutions.
At the gathering of the National Temperance League yon
may see Lord Shaftesbury and Cardinal Manning work.
lug together for a common object. Great, however, as
are the resources of Exeter Hall, it cannot accom-
modate all these meetings. Some of them are held at
the London Tavern, in Bishopsgate-street, quite the
ether end of the town and in the very heart and
centre of the city. Hard by the street of Bishopsgate
are those of Gracechurch, Fenchurch, and Thread-
needle, with the rich and prosperous thoroughfare of
Cornhill, and these again are in close proximity to
the streets of Leadenhall, Lombard, and King
William, the latter introducing you to the living
tide on London Bridge. Other of these meetings
take place at the City Terminus Hotel in Cannon.
street, a palatial pile erected by the South Eastern
Railway Company, and vieing in splendour and the
convenience of its arrangements with the Midland at
St. Pancras, the Great Western at Paddington, the
Grosvenor at Victoria, or the Charing-cross. Either
the " Cannon-street" Hotel or the " Lor,don" Tavern
is very convenient for City people; but for the metro-
polis generally Exeter Hall is a more central position,
and for an exclusively West-end audience there are the
Hanover-square rooms. Many of the organizations
have stories of progress to tell which must be cheering
to their supporters; and it is abundantly evident that
the ships of Great Britain, as they make their passage
over the bright blue waves of the Indian ocean, the
ruffled surface of the Atlantic, and the calmer waters
of the Pacific main, perform a work apart from the
idea of war or from the spread of trade and commerce.
They carry with them that which tells of civilisation
and of missionary enterprise, sent by the people of this
busy land to less favoured populations dwelling in the
distant corneri of the earth.

-
No seven weeks in the whole year seem to flee away
more rapidly than those between Easter and Whitsun-
tide. It see-ms an incredibly short time since the
last Bank Holiday; yet here we are again on the
threshold of another. The festival of Whitsuntide
was, I need scarcely say, appointed to commemorate
the descent of the Holy Ghost upon the Apostles;
and in former ages newly-baptised persons, or as they
were called cateehuraens, were accustomed to wear
white garments on Whit-Sunday. Hence the term
Whitsuntide--the time when the brilliant sunlight
made the wearing of a white dress appropriate.
Ascension Day, the Thursday preceding Rogation
Sunday, is observed to some extent by both Housee,
of Legislature. The Lords do not meet at all on that
day; while in the Commons, the Committees, which
usually assemble at noon, do not begin their sittings
until two o'clock in the afternoon, the theory being that
from twelve to two honourable members are attending
Divine service at St. Margaret's church, close to West-
minster Abbey. The committees then go on from two
until sir, notwithstanding the sitting of the House.
St. Margaret's church, where her Majesty's Faithful
Commons are accustomed—or at all events are ex-
pected—to assemble on Ash-Wednesday and Ascension
Day, is very near indeed to the venerable Abbey,
which must have seen a goad many Parliaments out
in its day. It was as old as St. Paul's is now when
the first assembly of knights, citizens, and burgesses
took place in 1265, and had stood for 500 years when
Queen Elizabeth first ascended the Throne. What
changing scenes in London life have its crumbling
towers looked down upon! It was six centuries of
age when the great fire which devastated the City in
the reign of Charles 11. laid old St. Paul's level with
the ground; and to-day, although there has been a
long spell from the time of its being founded by
Edward the Confessor, its chimes still send forth the
hour to the fleeting crowds who are so constantly
moving about at its base.
The energy and enterprise of the Post Office has
long passed into a proverb. Go to the chief office in St.
Martin's-le-Grand on any evening at a few minutes
before six o'clock, and you may obtain some idea of
the enormous mass of business transacted within the
building. Posting letters, newspapers, book-packets,
and parcels goes on of course all day long, bat it is
not until about five minutes to six that there are any
signs of excitement. The spectators muster in con-
siderable force, but a way is kept by one or two active
members of the City police, an official of the depart-
ment, with a brilliant red waistcoat, standing by the
receptacle to assist any panting youngzter who
struggles up the steps at the last moment with an in-
ordinately large sack of newspapers, which fortunately
for him are tumbled in just as the final clang is
sounding out upon the crowded pavement. At the
last stroke of six, no matter who may be rushing
breathless up the street to save the post, the boxes are
simultaneously closed with a bang which must be any-
thing but Pleasant hearing to the lively youths who
with handfuls of important correspondence have stopped
just a minute or so to admire the photographs in the shop
windows of Cheapside or Newgate-street. The develop-
ment of the Post-Office has been simply marvellous.
It seems strange to U 3 now to read that no farther back
than the reign of Edward IV. riders on post horses
went stages of the distance of twenty miles from each
other in order to procure for the King the earliest
intelligence of the events which passed in the course of
the war that had arisen with Scotland. The Post.
Office is now one of the most important departments
in the State. Its head is a Cabinet Minister; its
revenue is that of many a foreign State; and it carries
not only letters, newspapers, and books, but it is a
huge bank of deposit for the humbler classes—a medium
for the transmission of money in which the most
implicit trust is placed by the people, and for the
sending of intelligence bp means of the telegraph to an
extent which, even ten years ago, could have entered
into the hearts of few to conceive.
The conflict between the House of Commons and the
Press has formed one of the most remarkable features
of the present session. It has cropped up again and
again; in fact, it has been generally recognised that it
is quite time for a settlement to be come to. Blom
than two centuries ago, when there was no newspaper
press in this country, the House made a very stringent
rule against the publication of their proceedings in any
form. That rule was a wise one at the time, for it
was framed in the interests of liberty of speech and
freedom of debate. Queen Elizabeth had once taken
upon herself to lecture Mr. Wentworth for what he
had said in the House of Commons, and for the same
offence Charles I. actually caused Sir John Eliot to be
cast into prison, where he died. The House therefore
resolved that, upon any single member calling atten-
tion to the fact that strangers were present, the whole
of the galleries should be at once cleared, and that the
publication of the debates was a breach of privilege,
punishable with the heaviest penalties. We have
all seen how this rule, which is no longer
applicable to the altered circumstances of to-day,
has been enforced this session? An Assembly,
which decides every other question by the voice
oi the majority, is in this matter fettered by a
regulation 200 years old and more; for neither the
Speaker nor the House has the slightest power to keep
strangers in, if one hon. gentleman likes to clear them
out. As the reporters come under the description of
" strangers," out they must go, so long as this rule is
enforced. The Press, which has now become a mighty
power in the land, merely asks the House of Commons
so to modify its rules that it may not be excluded at
the caprice of an individual member; but that if ex-
ception is taken to the presence of strangers, the ques-
tion, like any other, may be put to the vote. That is
not an unreasonable request, surely. Parliament is an
omnipotent power, but it is entirely through the Press
that its influence is exercised.
The Mansion House may well be described as the
centre of charitable organisation, as well as the seat of
tivichospitality. In the Egyptian Hall—a splendid
spirts:lent—the Lord Mayor very often presides over
a meeting for the ad v cemen t of some good cause,
surrounded on the platform by men of all shades of
opinion in religion and politice. How best to employ
and provide for the blind, or to supply instruction to
the deaf and dumb—such is the class of object which
crowded meetings in the Egyptian Hall assemble to
promote. How thoroughly representative are such
assemblies may be gathered from the fact that one day
last week the cause of the deaf and dumb was pleaded
not only by the Chief Magistrate himself, but by the
Duke of Westminster, Lord Granvilie' the Marquis of
Lansdowne, Lord Houghton, Sir Charles Trevelyan
Mn Kirknaan Hodgson,
M.P,and Mr.
Rothschild. A list of subscriptions, =ranting to

Leopold