The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1856-1888, 1873-08-30
Foreign Items.

The Bitter BITTEN.-Rarely does public SYM
pathy incline towards the Treasury when a sur
charge on succession duty is enforced, but n case
has Just occurred in which all will applaud the
Treasury's action. William May, a wealthy
farmer in North Cornwall, was recently sum-
moned by the Poor Law Guardians to support his
aged mother, an inmate of the workhouse. The
hardhearted fellow pleaded his own illegitimacy,
and putting his widowed mother IN the box, made
her publicly confess that he was born before she
married his father. The Magistrates, on this
ground, were Obliged to dismiss the
During examination, while asked whether, when
he inherited his uacle's property, he paid legacy
duty as his nephew, he refused to answer. Mr..
Morrison, NJ. p, reading the report of the case,
put the Treasury on the scent. and they have sur
charged May on the difference between the 3 per
cent. he paid as nephew and the 10 per cent. due
rs a stranger, with interest since 1856; the total
sum being sufficient to have purchased the mother
Il comfortable annuity for life.
GREAT OLD FELLows.-Marshal McNIahon, or,
as he is now by courtesy styled, Due Gle Magenta,
in full, Marie edmond Patrick Maurice de
McNlahon, the present President Of France, was
born in 1903. He is consequently only ~sixty-five
years old,-quite Il youth, compared with his
Foreign Minister, the Due de Broglie, who was
born in 1885, and is therefore of the matured age
of lightweight. Theirs, the predecessor of
Mcmahon, was born. in 1877, and is therefore the
junior of the Due de Broglie, by at least eight
yetTs- NIulLOIs wiz SIlll lives. Il ClOsc ODseTNST OF
French affairs, and n counsellor of the ministry
under all the Conservative governments, is also
the junior of the Due de BrOglie by two years.
These are wonderful examples of longevity, and
would GO to show that political life in France is
not, after all, SO wearing rs it Is regarded In other
countries
No three men have lived in any century, since
the Christian era began, who have preserved their
faculties and powers TO so great an age, after such
long ezerting and eyentful periods of service.
WHY BAILEY STAYS IN DANBURY.-Mr. Bailey,
the Danbury News man, having been again solicit
ted to 90 10 New York to live, writes as follows
in reply: 81 like this town, where | have lived
most of my life, and the town likes me-. My
small paper is only n weekly; but | own it, and
am content with the little but satisfactory indie
pendence that | enjoy. know I've gotten a good
deal of reputation lately; it won't be any less if
L stay here; and, if 90 TO New York. l am dread
fully afraid l should soon be an old story, and
dwindle down to an imperceptible point. Your
big city likes fresh oranges; but it very quickly
sucks them dry, and throws them away. | don't
want to be sucked dry right off so think I'll
remain where | am. I've seen from my country
home how clever fellows turn out who go to New
York with grand expectations. They gave up
something, and in the end found nothing. am
glad you want to have me come, and I'm gladder
that l don't want to come. Danbury, %insigniti-
can't village as 1t Is, is good enough for me; and
as | don't want 10 steal anything, or get murdered,
or get up 4 reputation for genius l respectfully
but firmly decline to pitch my tent in Gotham
An ingenious individual, with i turn for math-
ematics, has found that there is one pig to every
one ar. fOur-tenths men in the United States.
There is nothing singular at all that every man
should have a pig, but when four-tenths of 4
man buys n pig, the event becomes q matter of
deep interest to everybody who strives after a
higher civilization. The mind instantly pictures
this four-tenths of an individual getting home
with that pig, and bucking up against fences, and
s~plashing into the mud, and kicking at the
animal Just enough to miss it and swing off his
balance, and while we have a long array of pro-
ceedings to show that no whole man ever drove a
pig in the right direction, We can well believe
that four-tenths of a man wrestling with that
animal would afford n spectacle that would be