The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1874-04-18 00:00:00

EPITOME OF NEWS.

BRITISH AND FOREIGN.

The Bolton operatives, at a meeting held on Tuesday
night, decided to return to work A lock-out of fifteen thou-
sand has thus been averted.
_

From the fel io-ii;lith inst. the Treasury receipts
amounted to £1,018,578, as compared with £2,300.273 in the
corresponding period of last year. The expenditure has
been £5,368,080. On Saturday last the balance of the Bank
of England was nearly two-and-a-half 111010119 sterling.
Loot and Watcr states that 685 boxes of salmon were
received at Billingsgate last week, of which 505 came from
Scotland, 154 from Ireland, 32 from Ensdand. The remainder
were from Bens+ k and aweilen. In the correspondllll week
of last year 717 bozos were received.

The dispute about the wall in the Richmond ceme-
tery has ended in consequence f the intervention of the
Bishop of inchest er. His L-rdship wrote a letter to the
vicar recommending him to consent to the demolition of the
well, "only retaining sufficient boundary marks to show the
boundaries of the consecratedportions respectively, as pro-
vided in the Cemetery Act." With this recommendation the
I,IY has informed the Select Veatry he has vrillingly com-
OW4

Major Bait, aixo conducted the Artillery oiwrations
at the late Ashentee expedition, ie to receive the freedom of
the burgh of Arbroath on Saturday.

;dal Asi telegram to the Standard from Copenhagen
says that Hans Christian Andersen is seriously ill, and there
is little hope of his recovery.
The French papers announce the death at Exideuil
(Dordogne) of the Duchess disly, aged seventy, widow of
31arshal Bugeaud.
The first of eight schools now being erected by the
Bradford School Board was opened on 31onday. It has coat
£14,000.
'

In Berlin there is a young LI(ly belonging to a female
orchestra who plays on a tremendous wind instrument. It is
described as something like•the man pipe (the biggest) in the
largest organs that are constructed.
- - - - - -

-
The obituary of The ri WS of the 13th inst. con-
tains the deaths of six ladies whose united ages amounted to
524 years, giving an average of 87 y ears and exactly four
months to each. The following.are the respective ages-92, 85,
two at Bi, 89, and 94 years.
•

Tuesday (the 14th) was the lith birthday of Princess
Beatrice Maly Victoria Feodore, and celebrated at Windsor
with the customery rejoicing. In the morning and during
the day the bells of St. George's Chapel and the parish church
pealed merrily. Royal salutes were also fired at Windsor and
VirgtniaWater.
The Boston University has (says the Mirror) just
received a handsome donation—one hundred thousand
dollars.

This year the declared value of hams imported was
£223,149 ; last year, in the same period, a 1146,741.
On Saturday the dispute between the colliers and
colliery owners in Somersetshire was adjusted.

On Saturday a return to the House of Commons was
published of the mileage and expenditure in respect of high-
ways in district& According to the last account in England
and North Wales the milage was 69,348'5, and the expendi-
ture 1:82.4,740 3s. lid.

This year the declared value of horses exported was
i 229.529 of which £15,140 went to France ; and last year in the
like period, £27,720, of which £9,500 went to France.

Special services in Westminster Abbey were com-
menced for the aeason on Sunday that, with a full choral
sen ice, the congregation joining the choir in singing the
Easter Hymn, and with a sermon by Dean Stanley.

This. year the value of watches imported was
£106,345: last year in the three months, £5,225.

- .
A pastor of a Congregationalist church in Aberdeen
was once asked if he was an ludepoydeut minister. He re-
plied, "Far trim it. lam the minister of an Independent
congregation."

The workmen at Hennessy's brandy distillery at
Cognac are ou strike for an increase of pay of 50 centimes per
day and a diminution of one hour in their time The tie-
mends not having been acceded to the establishment has
been closed.

Five garotters were flogged on Monday at Leeds, in
the presence of refractory prisoners. The punishment was
borne by two of the men almost in silence, but the cries of
rho others were incessant, and they evidently suffered
severely. The prisoners who witnessed the ceremony ap-
peared deeply impressed.

- -
On Tuesday night an explosion of coal gas on board
the brigantine Johanna Ninth,lda, in the South Shields Har-
bour, killed the mate and injured three of the crew.

The Duke of Cambridge, in his report on the
Autumn Minimum. of 1873, takes occasion to recommend
that these military exercises be repeated on a large scale
every three years.

novel adaptation of electricity has just been
applied to several of the carriages of the London General
Omnibus Company lip a very simple piece of mechanism
placed sailer each seat of the passengers, a tell-tale or dial is
made to register the number of the passengers entering the
carriage and the distance which each travels. It is the n-
vention of sir Charles Wheatstone.

In all the garrison churches throughout Great
Britain special prayers and thanksgiving were offered up, on
Siinday last, for the successful termination of the Ashantee
war. Considerable sums were raised by collection for the
benefit of the widows and orphans of those who fell during
the campaign, and in aid of the wives and children of soldiers
wounded or stricken down by disease.

The value of clocks imported this year was £100,265 ;
last year in the same time £87,587.

The hotel waiters of the Quaker City struck the
other day at the dinner hour, and all the guests were waiters
for the time being.
The Kolnische Zeitung states that transfusion of
blood has been practised recently in Dresden in no less than
seventeen cases, and always successfully.

The march of civilisation is illustrated by the fact
that s 1,50) show was lately held at Mnrar. M Central milt&
It was announced on Tuesday that during a hurri-
cane on Monday the south-west coast of Ireland, which lasted
for twenty-four hours, the lee, cable ceased working. The
fault is itscertained to be only fifteen miles from the landing-
Mace, and consequently in not more than about fifty fathoms
of water.

The golden rain's head, from Coomaasie, presented
to the officers of the Royal Artillery by their comrades en-
gaged in the expedition, will be exhibited to the public at
South Kensington, with other Ashantee trophies borrowed
for the purpose from various sources, on the lit May, and
will remain on view for three months after.

On Tuesday afternoon two men entered a tank at
Oukhank oil Works, idicalder, near Edinburgh, in order to
remove a quantity of tar and other material which had ac-
cumulated in it. They were overpowered by the escape of
noxious gases, and several men who attempted to rescue
them were also overcome while descending the tank. Ulti-
mately all the men were brought to the surface by means of
hooks, but one of them, named Nelson, was dead.
The Berkshire Good Teruplars at Newbury, on
Tuesday, made a great demonstration, the occasion being the
quarterly meeting of the different lodges. After the trans-
action of the business, the officers of the various lodges
dined together, and in the afternoon a procession of great
length was formed, which perambulated the streets of the
borough. After tea a public meeting was held hi the Town-
hall

Some of the Prince Imperial's neighbours at Chide-
burst have subscribed for a birthday gift, which has been
prepared by Mr. Streeter, of 18, New Bond-street, London.
It is a beehive in the form of an inkstand, inlaid with
amethysts and surmounted by the monogram L. N." in
rubies and diamonds, the lid forming the Imperial eagle,
handsomely chased, and around the base are the different
colours in enamel. On the base is engraved "Presented to
the Prince Imperial by the Ladies of Chislehurst, March 18,
1874," but which they delayed doing until this week in con-
sequence of so many presentations being made on that day
and the work taking some time to execute.

The directors of the Midland Railway Company
have given a general advance of three bindings per week to
their roadside stationmasters. They have also decided to
supply their pottery, policemen. and other servants with
extra uniform, and to allow them four days' leave of absence
annually without ytoppage of pay.

• -
Judge Fox, judge of the 11th District of Arkansas,
recently committed Mr. Aldridge a lawyer, to gaol for con-
tempt of court. Ile was imprisoned for ten days, and on his
liberation he armed himself with a shot-gun, and went in
search of the judge. Meeting him in the street, Aldridge
exclaimed, "Now, Judge Fox," and fired. The judge fell
dead. This is the second judge who has been asaassinated
in Arkansas within the last six months.

The Workmen's Peace Association held its fourth
annual meeting on Saturday evening, in Loudon, under the
presidency of Mr. Edmond Realm. The Ashautee war,
which the chairman said he looked upon as having been
needlessly entered upon, was condemned both in its begin-
ning and termination, and it was hoped the Govermueut
would abandon its possessions on the Gold Coast and "other
useless places."

A terrible conflacrration, by which seventy-one build-
ings were destroyed, and seven persons lost their lives,
occurred on April lot at Millerstown, Pennsylvania, U.S.
One of the first edifices attacked by the flames was the
Central Hotel, the escape of the inmates being cut off. Three
of the guests and three servants were known to be burned,
and others are supposed to have perished. One of the latter
jumped from a third storey window and sustained frightful
injuries. The loss by the fire is very considerable, and is in-
adequately covered by insurance. Capt. Oliver, one of those
who perished, is a gentleman well known in the Pennsyl-
vania oil trade. The lire originated by the explosion of gas.

In North Western India, a lead mine has been
worked with considerable profit by a company of Europeans,
although great difficulty was originally experienced in pro-
curing lat our. This resulted from the existence of a super-
stition among the natives that all minerals are under the
guardianship of evil spirits called Jins (I' Directors).

At a quarterly meeting of the Nottingham Chamber
of Agriculture on Saturday, the Chairman, Mr. George
Stoier, M.P., stated that the foot and mouth disease, so far
from beiug stamped out, had reappeared in the district with
Intensity. A resolution was passed to the effect that the
Privy Council be requested to invest the local authorities
with the same powersforrepression of the disease which they
possessed previous to the revocation of the order of August,
1873. It was also resolved that the appointment of a
Minister of Agriculture was highly desirable.
•

- --
A Canadian paper states that recently, just before
the ice on the Richelieu gave way, a frame house of consider-
able size, and of the ordinary French Canadian rural style, was
put on runners at Sabrevois, and drawn to St. Johnn,• a
distance of eight miles, by ten yoke of oxen and four span of
horses. The house wan delivered in good order and con-
dition, and no difficulty was experienced in moving it, excep
some little delay in getting it round the corners of th
streeta

A remarkable meeting was held on the fair ground
at Knot Mill Manchester, on Sunday afternoon. The
speakers were working nuns wives : their theme, temper-
ance ; and they secured the attention of a mixed crowd of
loiterers while they descanted on the evils of drunkenness
and the blessings of teetotalism. Their speeches are de.
scribed as short, pithy, and sensible, and the effect of their
mission was a substantial gain to the ranks of pledged
abstainers.

The Daily Nors understands that the Premier has
recommended to the Queen for a pension of £lOO on the Civil
List Mrs. C. L Basevi, the mother of Captain Baseti, who
lost his life on the Thibet frontier of India whilst engaged
in exploring the mountain passes, and pursuing other scien-
tific inquiries.
On Saturday evening; during the representation of
Miss Braddon's play " tienevieve ; or. the Missing Witness,"
at the Alexander Theatre, Liverpool, an actor named
Stepbenson, who plays the part ol Beaupr6, fell and broke
his leg in two places. In the third act there is a sensation
scene, in the course of which BeauprC has to be rolled from
the ledge of an Alpine rock. Stephenson's foot slipped, and
he fell from a considerable height. Ile now lies in the Royal
Infirmary, hut is doing well.
"A well-known author was about to read a new
piece in the green-room of a London theatre, when, before
commencing, a young and charming actress, who is always
remarkable for the elegance of her toilettes, smirking, said,
' 31, dear Mr. --, is the part you have me ritten for toe well
within my power? ' Perfectly,' replied the author. 'You
have to change your dress seven times r "—Coo a Journal.

_
Owing to-di-sagreement with employers on the ques-
tion of the Saturday half-holiday, upwards of 2,000 men,
consisting of shipwrights, joiners, blacksmiths, and painters,
are now on strike at Sunderland. The masters have already
offered fitly-four hours per week The shipbuilders have
offered to submit all differences to Mr. Thomas Hughes, Q. C.,
but the men have refused to listen to them.

The Postmn-iter-General, in answer to a request by
the Post Office empluyes of London, il,at he should receive a
etr,tation with Reference to their grievances, has written
- urging them rot to persist is their endeaiour to obtain the
desired interview, as " the subject is at present receiving at. at his hands." Should no proposal of a character
favourable to their views appear in the forthcoming Budget,
the Post Office employes intend holdings conference to decide
upon their Cullise of action.

At Ginned:lois, a child of seven years old, who had
died the day previous, was being carried to the cemetery.
The desolate mother followed the coffin, sobbing and
.crying
bitterly. When the little shell was about to be lowered into
the grave a noise like a sigh was heard proceeding from it.
The coffin was at 1111 CC burst open, and the child was seen to
make an ettot to raise its head. This was the last dickering
of the flame, alas ! and the child expired after slew minutes
Is the arms of its mother, who, it is feared, Will lose her
reason.

During the week ending last Saturday, 5,443 births
and 3,450 deaths were registered in London and twenty other
large cities and towns of the United Kingdom. The natural
increase of population wan 1,903. The mortality from all
causes in these towns was at the rate of 24 deaths annually
to every 1.000 ',el-ions living. In the metropolis 2.420 births
and 1,327 deaths were registered, the former having been 8,5,
and the latter ?SS, below the average number, Thirty-six
persona died from meaeles, 14 berg scant fever, 0 from
diphtheria. 55 from whooping-cough, 29 from different forms
ot fever, 10 from diarrhom, and not one from small-pox ; thus
the deaths referred to the seven principal disersce of the
zymotic class, which in the four preceding weeks had steadily
declined from leB to 188, further fell last week to Lk. The
mean temperature at the Royal Observatory, Greenwich,
was 45 deg., and was slightly below the average for the cor-
responding week in 50 years, as determined by Mr. Oleisher, ;
the daily means ranged from 48 deg. on Tuesday to 42 deg. on
Saturday. Rain was meiwured on each day except Monday
and Tuesday, amounting in the aggregate to rather more
than the third ol an lath.

Among the literary treasures said to be left by Mr.
Sumner Is the Bible of John Bunyan. with the autograph of
the author of Pilyrinis Progress written in it.

A loan exhibition of enamels on metal is to be openea
in London next month.

According to the estimate of the New York Chronicle,
only 0,800,00.1 acres will be placed under cotton for the next
crop. This is 1,000,000 acres lees than last year.
A Reuters telegram from New York states that an
explosion has occurred on board the Polar Expedition
steamer Tigress. at St. John's, Newfoundland. Twenty-one
persons were killed.
The Westminster Gazette says •• a project is on foot
among some of the leading English Earlists to present
to charter VII. of Spain a sword, magnificent in design and
superbly ornamented."
. .

The result of the second batch of elections to the
Victorian larliameut is favourable to the Government.

The positi al of agricultural affairs, says the Mamirt,
continues favourable on the whole. Spring owing has Made
fair progress, under satisfactory auspices. The weather has
been rather cooler, but this has been very beneficial to the
autunnesown grain.
Otte of the coast towers, from which the Ashantees
were driven by bombardment, has been the scene of a start-
ling incident. A shell, which had not been exploded, was
picked up by a party of natives. Curiosity prodpted them
to experiment spoil it, and while so doing it burst, killing
live of them instantly

- - -
The Count de Jernemay has just died at Paris at the
age of 98 He narrowly escaped being one of the victims of
93, and remained 15 years in prison. The protection L,f a
relative of Fouquier-Tmville saved him from being con-
demned to death. The name becomes extinct with the
count, his only son having been killed during the late sai.

At Monday's meeting of the Miners' Conference a
resolution was sdopted urging the Tnides Congress Paoli,
mental), Committee notwithstanding their disappmval of the
appointment of a Royal Commission tin the laws affecting tho
relations of employers and employed, to do what they could
to obtain evidence for the Commission, so as to facilitate
their work and hasten legislation. -

A new flying machine is announced in the United
States. Steam is CA, motive power, and hy it four sets of
wings are moved. The machine is described as something
likes turret tower to a monitor, cariying above it a mast at
a vessel. will, spars attached and swinging around it, with a
balloon-basket suspended underneath.

The Earl of Harrowby has written a letter to The
Times suggesting that the provision of an abundance of seats
on the Thames Ilinliankinent would lie an inducement for
fanatics to seek for recreation in the open air, and woidd
thus tend somewhat to mitigate the evil of the crowded and
unhealthy habitations of the poorer population of the metro-
polis.—(The editor of The Times observes that one of the
wants of the Embankment is being now suppliud through the
liberality of :Mr. W. It. Smith, 31.P.]

It is stated that the revenues of the Duchy of Lamas •
ter have in twenty-live years increased from M2o.otiO in 1547)
to £59,0.00 (in 1872), the net payments to Her Majesty at these
two periods being respectively el 7,0517 and 5;40.0v0. Although,
the report adds, 'this last amount may not be continuously
kept up from year to year, there is every reason to believe
that it will very shortly be not only maintained but en
cemied." The present rood ition of the ti Itchy and its revenues.
the report says. •• cannot be regarded 88 otherwise than 88
most prosperous and progressive. Its, relations with its
tenants are upon a satisfactory footing, the farms are well let
and o ell cultivated, the house property is rapidly increasing
in value, and land is being brought under building operations.
which will materially enhance its present and prospective
value."

Many persons have lost their lives through in.
cautiously leaning against railway carriage doors which have
been closed but left unfastened. In order to prevent such
accidents the English railway companies have adopted the
practice of locking the carriage doors, a system which has
its dangers awl inconvenieneies. The French have ap-
parently hit upon a better plan. The management of the
North Railway are furnishing the doors icith springs which
simply prevent them from remaining closed unless really
latched.

' Gold is as plentiful now in Paris as the Easter red
eggs, and there is positive plethora of silver. We are turn-
ing up our noses at the liliputian five franc notes, that stood
by us in the hour of need ; but this is human nature.. It is
very certain that multitudes are out of employment, and
business-life dull. If you give an order you are beggedsir
wait the execution of other demands ; the railway vans rattli
along the streets as rapidly as express trains more numerous
apparently than heretofore, and charged with manufactured
goods Ho where you 11111 Y, there are crowds of mosey'
spending people, in the newest of toilettes and suits.
Spiting, ' which unlocks the flowers to paint the laughing
soil,' is perhaps unlocking the door of late hard times and
bleak houses so generally experieneed."—Coort Journal.
In London, last Saturday, a conference was held at
the Mansion House for the purpose of taking into considera-
tion the best means of carrying out on n more extensive scale
the collections made last year under the title of the Hospital
Sunday Fund. Since then a committee has been formed to
establish a Saturday hospital Fund, and it was the ostensible
object of Saturday's meeting, presided over by the Lord
Mayor, to make both committees work harmoniously: A
warm discussion or series of discussions took place, and the
meeting, after sitting Or two hous, came ins somewhat un-
satisfactory close.