The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1856-1888, 1870-05-07
FOREIGN MISCELLANY.

Foreign Miscellany.
The Messagerics Imperiales steamers, witt
|. the India, China and japan mails from
France, now pass through the SueZ Canal
The average daily number of American
travellers who stopped at the Grand Hotel du
Louvre, last year, was lO7; OF Engllshmen
% and Of German, IS.
a German woman living in Chicago has
had four husbands within the period of Is
months. The first ran away, the second
hanged himself, the third shot himself, and
the fourth was drowned. Whose turn next
A missionary from China reports that the
population of that country has been greatly
Over-estimated. Instead of 400, 00O, 600 peO-
pie there are probably not over 250,OO0,OOO.
He adds that the late wars have diminished
the number of the people.
The Bishop of Metz is the p%relate who
presented a gold pen to the Pope, as an offer
ing from his diocese, and who, when Plus IL.
graciously remarked that il should be used
to sign the DEGREES of the council, touched a
spring in the handle and produced a thousand
franc note, saving " You see, Holy Father,
that nv diocesans have not forgotten 10 sup
ply the paper also"
The great ports of the Mediterranean, &C.
noa, Venice, Marseilles and Trieste, with
Odessa III the Black S9a-aud, no doubt, all
the little ports along with those-have been
touched with new life by the Suez Canal,
and the prospect of a large cotton trade be-
tween Bombay and the old European West.
Genoa has already ordered a magnificent
steamer TO be built at Jarrow, in England,
for that trade.
At a gaming room in Antwerp a man sat
down and won 1000 ducats, which he did
not take up. 1t turned out that he was dead.
The man in charge of the table then raked
up the gold, saying that it belonged to the
bank, as no engagement could have been en-
tered into with a corpse. The heirs of the
deceased are not convinced OF the soundnesS
of this reasoning, and they have commenced
an action for the recovery Of the sum.
SUNDAY LAws-Lord Chelmsford has in
troduced in the British House Of Peers a bill
10 secure a better observance of Sunday. 1t
restraints and in some cases, entirely prohibits
trading on the Lords Day. He read statis-
tics showing that over ten thousand shops
were kept open on Sunday in London alone.
The Lord Chancellor thought the bill would
deprive laborers of recreation to which they
were entitled on Sunday, and doubted the
wisdom and efficacy of the measure.
Inc CeION Vi G8N pl ISSuSu OIOGlS
for work to begin immediately on the new
Notifications of Alexandria. This, it seems
to us, is even worse than purchasing iron
cIads, and will no doubt call forth the prompt
interference of the Sultan. The Sovereign
Is forever protesting against the actions of
the Khedive the vassal returns sauve an
swers, promises obedience with conditions
almost impossible to the nominal master,
and thA goes on worse than before. An
open rupture between Abdul ASST and Ish-
mail Pacha is only a question of time.
LIFE INSURANCE BUSINESS IN New YoRK.
The sixty-one life insurance companies
doing business in the State of New York,
including resident and nonresident, return
for the past year their premium receipts at
$50, 05S, 129. From this income and the in
terest on their investments they paid TO in
sured, in losses by deaths, the sum of Sl5.-
3SS,946, and III expenses Sl5,692, 1872.
The amount paid to the insured and that
paid for effecting the insurance are about
equal for the year, and both combined are
about three-eighthS of the total receipts of
the companies for premiums for the year.
Dispatches from New York show that. in
stead of the extensive failures that have been
predicted as a consequence of the fall in gold, |
the importers and jobbers actually find 1t op-
crates as a stimulus to trade. AS the import
trade and prices have steadily conformed to
the gold standard, as fast as gold falls their
goods fall in currency price. This is no in
convenience to the importers, as they get the
gold prices as If gold had not fallen,
and, at the same time, is Il stimulus 10 buy
as the same sum in currency goes a great
way further in making purchases. The Sc
cret OF making business brisk is to sell accord
ing to gold prices, and fall as gold falls.
TRICKS OF CHINESE SMUGGLERs.-San
Francisco CAstom House officers have to look
sharp for opium, which pays for smuggling
IN account of a duty of one hundred per cent.
The last steamer from China brought over
several hundred dollars worth of opium which
t was intended should pay no duty. 1t was
ound IN a heavy chest, most innocent look
whose thick sides were hollow and filled
With the drug. A consignment of Chinese
,aiis was also found to be made of opium
With a shell of wood forming the outside of
ach. Several dozen pairs of shoes gave up
heir contents, contained IN tin cases let into
he thick soles. A bundle of feather busters
led a lot, and one Monaghan was sr-i5ned
f his high waterproof boots to reveal his Ices
waddled in the precious drug.
AT LAsT.-The negro has progressed from
he slave-pen to the Senate chamber, and
ven in San Francisco the law has interfered
D protect the Chinese from the fists and
udgels of California rowdies. The San
francisco Chronicle records that one Curber
Tho knocked down Il peaceable C~hinawoman
Tho was passing along the street, and at !
to kick her when down, was arrested |
sentenced to six months imprisonment, J
ne Police Judge refusing TO accept a fine in 4
ell of the imprisonment, and proclaiming c
is intention of showing that the Chinese c
rights. A boy who struck a Chinese
sh-peddler merely to show that the peddler /
as a Cinnamon and that he was an Ameri- :
an, was also sent up for thirty days. i
In a Temperance speech in Philadelphia !
n Friday night, Vice President Colfax said :
lat " this was the anniversary of his connec- =
on with the temperance cause. Twenty +
We years ago, when he was just reaching c