The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1881-09-17 00:00:00

EPITOME OF NEWS.

BRITISH AND FOREIGN.

cost

Talking of electric lighting, Mr. Edison has estab-
lished a school of electricity for workmen in New York,
where explanatory lectures are given weekly.
The Royal Polytechnic in London was closed on
Saturday night. There was a large attendance of visitors,
Including many of the former directors and lecturers. A
special programme was prepared for the day, embracing
several of the old entertainments. It is forty-three years
since the institution was first opened.
A new swimming apparatus has, according to a
Toronto paper, been invented across the Atlantic. It con-
sists of a light frame, carrying a float and longitudinal
shaft, the latter having at one end a small screw propeller.
The swimmer reclines on the float, and grasping a hand-
crank in each hand, and placing his feet on two foot-cranks,
proceeds rapidly and easily, with his head comfortably out
of water
A quantity of bees, the ultimate destination of which
Is Ontario, were received last week from Cyprus by Messrs.
Pitt and Scott, 44, St. Paul's Churchyard, London. They
were let out near London for a fly, and afterwards repacked
and forwarded to Quebec, riA, Liverpool, by the Allan mail
steamer Sardinian, which sailed on Friday. The bees are
packed in a number of small boxes, partly covered with per-
forated metal, and are provided with honey and water. A
similar consignment of this unusual freight was successfully
conveyed to Canada last year.
The Indian Trade and Navigation Reports for the
first four months of the current financial year show that
the imports,—excludlng treasure and Government stores
were 3.11.28.126 rupees' against 3.48.29.771 rupees in the
corresponding period of last year. and 2.59.18.323 rupees in
1879. The exports were 5.97.73.013 rupees, against 6.19.65.972
rupees in 1880, and 4.44.87 918 rupees in 1879.
Good reports come from the champagne districts as
to the quantity likely to be produced, estimated at 7E to 80
million bottles, and if it had not been for the late heavy
rains the quality would have been that of a grand annee.
The apprehension of a famine in Algeria next winter
Is beginning to cause the Government some anxiety: As a
preliminary measure, the French Ministry of the Interior
have placed at the disposal of the Governor-General a sum of
600,000 francs, to be devoted to assisting those inhabitants
who have suffered most from the drought. In order to
mitigate the effects of the high price of grain, it is also
determined, in case of necessity, to create labour-yards
(chantier), in which work will be found for the indigent, both
colonists and natives.
On Tuesday Sir John Humphreys held an inquiry
at the Town-hall, Shoreditch, London, concerning the death
of Emma Tyroe, aged 45, wife of a shoemaker, which occurred
under the following singular circumstances. Deceased, it
appeared, enjoyed good health, and on Sunday last was
having a supper of potatoes and fish, when her throat or
windpipe got blocked up with a piece of potato, and she was
suffocated before the doctor could arrive. Dr. Ladell stated
that he had made a post-mortem examination, and found
death due to asphyxia from the cause mentioned. The jury
returned a verdict of "Accidental death."
The United States Treasury reports for the fiscal
year ending June 30, 1881, show that the Government
revenue amounted altogether to 360,782,292 dollars, including
198 million dollars from the Customs and 135 million dollars
from the Inland Revenue. The expenses were 260,712.887
dollars, including 62,608,741 dollars for interest on the debt,
60 million dollars for pensions, 16,686,677 for the navy,
10,463,460 dollars for army expenses anti harbour improve-
ments. The surplus, which will be devoted to the reduction
of the debt, amounts to 100,069,405 dollars.
Operations for raising the screw steamer Dania, ot
West Hartlepool, which has been lying sunk in Shields har-
bour for about a month, were resumed at low water on
Saturday with nine powerful centrifugal pumps and the Tyne
Commissioners' steam tug Commissioner. Large quantities
of water were discharged from the Dania, and in the course
of the afternoon she began to float. Towards evening she was
drawn by seven tugs to the south side of the river, where she
was placed on the shore and safely moored.
Claude de Jouffroy is to have a sbatue erected to his
memory as the inventor of steam vessels about 1751 (says
the thenceum) M. de Lesseps, at its last sitting, brought
before the Academie des Sciences a report in favour of
Joutfroy's claim. This was adopted, and the French Govern-
ment have resolved to grant a subvention for erecting a
statue in Franche Comte. It should be remembered that
David Ramseye patented in England an engine for propelling
ships by steam in 1618 and in 1630.
A French Volunteer Corps has been formed at
Marseilles. The members wear a very plain uniform, and at
present only practise bayonet exercise with an alpenstock.
On Monday morning, a boat accident occurred on
the Surrey side of Cannon-street-bridge, London, resulting in
the loss of two lives. It appears that two youths, named
Thomas 3lanser, and 'John Fulcher, left home about ten
o'clock for the purpose of taking a walk. Both the youths
were engaged as letter-sorters in the General Post Office, St.
Martin's-le-Grand. While they were proceeding along
London-bridge it was suggested that they should take a
pleasure boat, which they did at the nearest stairs, and pro-
ceeded towards Cannon-street-bridge. The craft came
vielently athwart the abutment of the bridge, the con-
sequence being that both the unfortunate boys were pre-
cipitated into the water and drowned, notwithstanding
efforts made to rescue them.
The additions to the Zoological Society's Gardens,
Regent's Park, London, last week included two Mal-
brouck monkeys from West Africa, presented by Mr. H.
P. Sherlock; a 'Central American agouti, from Central
America, presented by Mr. J. E. Sharp; two spotted cavys,
from South America, presented by Dr. Portella ; a Macaque
monkey, from India, presented by Mr. James W. Duncan;
two domestic pigeons, from Arabia, presented by Mr.
Reginald Zohrab ' • three common chamveleons, from North
Africa, presented b Mr. Alfred R. Rogers; two greater
sulphur-crested cockatoos, from Australia, deposited; a
black-headed calque, from Demerara, purchased. The addi-
tions to the Insectarium for the past week include Attacus
permyi, second brood of lame hatched ; also Attacus
cynthia, imago second brood, and the death's-head moth.
larva, presented by Master Kingchurch ; second brood of
ant lions (11yrmeleonz, and a brood of the edible snail, from
specimens presented by Lord A. Russell, F.Z.S , in April
last. -

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On Monday the Oxford Town Council adopted a
precept levying a rate upon the various parishes to meet the
cost of the recent Election Commission, amounting to
0,781 58. Bd.

The subscriptions towards the guarantee fund for
the exhibition of Irish manufactures proposed to be held
next year, reached the total of £12,505 on Tuesday last.

The Protectionists of New York are about to com-
mence an active agitation, with a view to stimulate home
industries at the expense of the import trade.

Commenting upon land tenure in Wales, Mr. W.
R. H. Powell, M.P., states that he trusts something will be
done to stimulate tenants to lay out more money in the
cigtivation of their farms. Any measure which will give
that greater security to tenants which they richly deserve
will have his hearty support.
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The Countess of Bective has promised to open a
Wesleyan bazaar at Bradford next month, an interesting
feature of which will be that all the ladies presiding at
the stalls will be attired in dresses made of Bradford fabrics
of new design.
It is stated that during last year 11,000,000 bushels of
maize were used in the United States for the preparation of
glucose' and that the product of 7,000,000 bushels, in glucose,
was used by lager beer brewers.
In the last financial year, the net produce of the
Land Tax and House Duty was £2,739,918 13s. llid.
Hansom cabs, precisely similar to those with which
Londoners are familiar, have just been introduced for the
first time into Bombay. The novelty is stated to have been
well appreciated both by natives and Europeans.
The Paris Correspondent of The Times writing on
Monday, says :—" The statue mania shows no signs of abate-
ment. Yesterday at Palaiseau there was unveiled a statue
of Joseph Bare, the boy of 13, killed while charging the
Vendee insurgents at the head of the French Cavalry. The
Convention gave him burial in the Pantheon, commissioned
David to paint his herioc end, and talked of placing an en-
graving in every French school. His collateral descendants
figured in yesterday's procession."
In acknowledging the receipt of a political song sent
him from Sheffield, Sir Stafford Northcote writes from The
Pynes, Exeter, Sept. 9: "There was a wise man of old who
said, 'Give me the making of the people's songs, and I will
give you the making of their laws. I certainly accept the
doctrine so far as to believe that good songs will do a great
deal more than speeches."

"Mr. John Bright is inclined to throw the blame of
any absurd reactionary feeling in favour of Protection, on
the weather. The Sun, he says in effect, doesn't understand
politics. Evidently the Sun isn't Bright."—Pund.
The Dominion line steamer St. Louis sailed from
Liverpool en Tuesday with 366 farmers and their families,
bound for Texas; there were also 13 saloon passengers for
the same destination. The majority are stated to come from
the North of England.
gal..
Presi

"Few mortals probably have maintained a more
allant and determined fight with Death than the present
eresident of the United States, and none assuredly have had
their struggles recorded more copiously for the benefit of an
Interested world. With Englishmen the feeling of interest
is especially warm, most of us desiring to make amends for
former quarrels with our over-theivater cousins."—Graphic
An official statement shows that the number of
members and adherents of the Society of Friends in Great
Britain has now in round numbers reached 20,000. Sixteen
years ago there were only about 17,000. Since .that time,
despite losses by emigration, there has been a slow but
steady increase. The increase has chiefly been in the
cities.

The ravages caused by strong drink among the Rus-
sian working classes has led to the appointment of a special
commission, which, under the presidency of Baron Rosen,
held its first sitting on the 6th inst. An increase in the tax
on spirits and increased severity in the punishment of drunk-
enness are among the suggestions made at the meeting.
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Speaking at the annual dinner of the Over Agricul-
tural Society, Lord Delamere referred to the subject of
agricultural distress and to the clamours for measures of
relief. He was inclined to think that not much could be
done in the way of relief by legislation. The causes of the
present state of things lay far too deep for humanity to
deal with. We had had a number of consecutive bad
seasons, and he believed that if the next three seasons
should prove as good as the last three had been bad,
the agriculturists might hold up their heads and do very
well again.
The Admiralty, recognising. the importance of the
Paris Electrfbal xhibition, have Instructed Mr. J. Farquhar-
son, one of the examiners of dockyard work, a couple of
officers attached to the Vernon torpedo school, and Mr. Lane,
who has charge of the electric workshops under the 'hid
Constructor at Portsmouth, to visit the exhibition and
report upon the various systems.
The Standard says that Hughenden Manor has
been let for a term of 11} years from Michaelmas, to Sir
Samuel Wilson, well known in Australia for his munificent
benefaction to the Melbourne University of £30,000, and for
the successful introduction of salmon into Australian
waters, which he accomplished in 1877, after repeated
efforts and at his own expense. Sir Samuel received the
honour of knighthood in 1875.
The present season in the Highlands is said to be
one of the best known for many years. Tourists are un-
usually numerous, sportsmen arrive in crowds, and the shoot-
ing lodges are exceptionally well filled.
Shortsightedness in Germany appears to be spread-
ing to an alarming extent, particularly among school
children. No one who has lately visited Germany could
have failed to notice the remarkable increase o ;persons
wearing eye-glasses, and official reports show that a large
pmportion of boys and girls attending school suffer from
myopia, the proportion increasing as the children enter the
higher classes.
Through the breaking of a piece of iron of the
home signal at Huddersfield Railway Station on Eaturday
night the red slide failed to show in answer to the signal-
man's lever. The London express, coming up, ran into a
goods train, smashing the end of one waggon and damaging
the express engine. Fortunately none of the passengers was
injured, but traffic was somewhat delayed.
The Fair Trade Conference held in London under
the auspices of the National League, concluded its sittings
on Saturday, and many of those who had taken part in the pro-
ceedings dined together in the afternoon. Sir Algernon
Borthwick described Free Trade as a policy which, carried
to its logical conclusion, would squander the accumulations
of the past, extract those of the present, and discount those
of the future. Mr. Sampson Lloyd explained Fair Trade to
be freedom not only to purchase the products of other
men's labour, but freedom to dispose of the products of
their own.
Meetings were held on Monday at Muchalls and
Banchory, Kincardineshire, at which resolutions were
passed in favour of land reform and a general and sub-
stantial reduction of rents. Committees were formed to
carry out these objects.

Louis IV., Grand Duke of Hesse, was born on Sep.
tember 12, 1837, thus completing his 44th year on Monday.
His Royal Highness beeame Grand Duke of Hesse on the
death of his uncle, Louis 111., which took place on June 13,
1877. The Grand Duke has, besides four surviving daughters,
an only son, Prince Ernest Louis,' who was born on /s ov. 25,
1868, and is heir to the grand duchy.

"Handling the ribbons" is the favourite occupa-
tion of French ladies this season, and every afternoon at the
various Gallic watering-places hosts of fair drivers may be
seen "conducting" with more or less skill pony-chaises,
basket-carriages, or little village-carts. Ladies also affect a
decidedly masculine style of costume, navy blue being the
favourite hue at Dieppe, and bright red at Trouville.

Friday in last week was the 59th anniversary of the
birth of Prince Napoleon Joseph Charles Bonaparte, who
was born at Trieste on Sept. 9, 1822. He is the only sur-
viving son of Jerome Bonaparte, King of Westphalia, the
youngest brother of Napoleon L, by his marriage with
Frederika Caroline, Princess of Wurtemburg, being in fact
the lineal heir of the Napoleonic dynasty, combining in his
person the claims of both the First and Third Empires.
Prince Napoleon married, on January 30, 1859, the Princess
Clotilde, eldest daughter of the late Victor Emmanuel,
King of Italy, and has two sons and a daughter by this
union. During the regime of his cousin, Napoleon 111.,
Prince Napoleon fined the offices of Minister of the Colonies
and Viceroy of Algeria.

A quaint procession of cripples took place the other
day in Paris. The dean of the Parisian lame beggars was
dead, and the halt and maimed of all kinds followed him to
the grave,—a miscellaneous collection of some 200 blind,
lame, one-armed, and variously deformed beings. Father
Viller, the deceased, had lost both legs, but for thirty years
crawled up and down between the Boulevard Haussmann
and the Palais Royal, earning some 10s. daily. He had put
by a nice little sum, and was always ready to help his neigh-
bours, while he has now bequeathed his savings to the poor
of his parish.

_
Mr. Bright, writing to a Sheffield gentleman on the
subject of Free Trade and Reciprocity, says that the recent
bad harvests have caused a general falling off in our home
trade. It has not been foreign Tariffs, or Commercial
Treaties, or what other Governments have done, which has
been doing us harm; it is the diminution of the wealth of the
country by the reduction in the produce of the soil.
From the report on the total result of the cocoon
harvest in Italy it appears that there was an increase of 10
per cent. in Lombardy and Venice over last year's yield;
that Ctineo 1,323,620 lires worth of cocoons have been sold.
The Romagna and Tuscany show a decrease of 10 per cent.,
Naples and Sicily of about 50 per cent., and the cocoon
harvest in general in the whole of Italy has been 20 per
cent. below the previous year.
The letters and newspapers received in London on
Monday morning via Naples, per Orient line steamer
Cotopaxi, bear Adelaide dates of 11th August, their trans-
mission having thus occupied only 32 days, including 36
hours in passing through the Suez Canal. This is the shortest
time in which mails from Australia have yet been delivered
in London.
There were seventeen British and foreign wrecks,
of which seven were British, reported during the past week,
making a total of 1,144 for the present year, or an increase
of 218 as compared with the corresponding period of last
year. The approximate value of property lost was
£4,000,000, including British £1,000,000.
At the Glasgow Chamber of Commerce on Monday,
Mr. William M'Evfen, chairman, said it was matter of in.
difference to this country whether the French Treaty was
renewed or not, and it would not do for us to sue in forma
pauperis for a renewal of this or any other trading conces-
sion. If other countries did not see it their interest to
admit our manufactures, no effort of ours would be of any
avail. It would be better to leave countries to find out for
themselves what wai fer their own advantage, and to meet
hostile tariffs by free imports.

The herring fishing practically closed at Peterhead
on Saturday. The average for 728 boats is 133 crans, as
against 247 crans for 608 boats last year, but this year's
catch is above the average of years prior to last. Seventy
thousand barrels have been exported, as compared with
119,000 last year.

On Saturday an inquest was held at the Board-
room, Mount-street, Grosvenor-square, London, as to the
death of Mr. John Mahon, a retired barrister, aged 77. The
deceased was found on the morning of the 6th inst. lying on
the floor of his room in his nightshirt quite dead by the land-
lady. Dr. Sablien stated that when caleu 114 found that
deceased had been dead several hours. He appeared to have
been seated in an arm-chair, and overbalancing himself got
his neck fixed between one of the bars of the fire-guard and
a leg of the chair. Deceased was suffocated through pressure
on the windpipe. A verdict of "Accidental Death" wt..
returned.
At a meeting of the Committee of the Farmers'
Alliance on Monday it was resolved that a Land Bill for
England and Scotland, or the outlines of one should be pre-
pared by a Special Committee of the Alliance, and a Com-
mittee was appointed for the purpose. Resolutions were
also passed to hold a Conference in November to discuss
this measure ; condemning Reciprocity and Fair Trade, and
• declaring that if Protection were restored the first interest
to suffer would be agriculture, and expressing sympathy
with a e farmers of Aberdeenshire in their efforts to obtain
a reduction of rents and a Land Bill for Scotland.
Mr. Bulwer, M.P.' delivered the last of a series of
electoral addresses in the Corn Exchange, Cambridge, last
Saturday. Mr. Pell, the chairman of the Conservative party,
In introducing the new member, said that a movement was
on foot for securing some protection for British mannfac-
tares, and the end and aim of Mr. Bulwer in Parliament
would be to see that protection was not granted to one class
while others were left out in the cold.
The Queen drove on Monday afternoon to Braemar,
accompanied by the Duchess of Edinburgh. the Duchess dr
Connaught, and the Dowager Marchioness of Ely. The
drive was continued to the than of Dee and the Falls of
Quoich. At several points on the route crowds of spec-
tators assembled, and the reception of the Queen was of the
moat loyal character. The Queen returned to Balmoral
shortly after six.
evoTwhne
PCr sn
ot
el eo fof
eßvnireainteyndbuuvirngg,
tthhee
military headquartersmanceu of
vres ntohwe
utovyricnyinatecreosunt. t The
ognositulge ownasneearreolttezdehdonevi,
nisgathpelale6o
In the year 1627, during the Thirty Years' War, it contained
Rantzan, who was Danish Governor of Schleswig-flolstein.
thofcehnits
a garrison of Scotchmen under Dunbar's command, and was
then besieged by the Imperial army under Wallenstein.
Notwithstanding the heroic defence the Austrian guns soon
laid a breach in the strong fortifications, whereupon the
castle was taken by assault, and all surviving defenders put
to the Mord. In 1643 the castle was recaptured by the
swedes undcr Toratenson, a.nd in the followinst year it sur-
rendered to the besieging Danes.

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