The Potteries Examiner : — 1880-02-14 (Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire, England)

STATE OF IRELAND.-OFFICAL REPORT'  Corn ',pond:nee relative to measures for the relief of the distress in Ireland has been presested to both Houses of Parliament, by command of her Majesty. As early as September 8, 1879, the Local Government Board for Ireland issued a circular calling for reports on the state of the potato crop, the general harvest, the supply of turf, and the condition and prospects of the poor. These reports were forthcoming before the end of October, and, with small variation, they described the potato crop so deficient in quantity, poor in quality, and injured by blight, as to represent no more than half an average crop. An exception to the general poverty of the harvest was afforded by the oat crop, which was sverywhere good and plentitul. The supply of turf was lamentably deficient; for, though a great deal had been cut, it could not be saved, owing to the continuous rain. This failure of the turf supply and the prevalent want of employment were the main points urged by the Board upon the consideration of the Lord-Lieutenant. His Grace, on Nov. 14, transmitted to the Lords Commissioners of her Majesty's Treasury u copy of a circular mi-1 dressed, by the Local Government Board, to the boards of guardians, urging the importance of due provision, beforehand; to meet the coming pressure? andat the same time, suggesting a loan, to be adyawed in the first instance by the Treasury, and ! hereafter repaid, with the consent of Parliament, out of the surplus funds of the Irish Church, for encouraging the reap oy tient of people in the districts affected. Their loruships instantly concurred in the propriety of such a step; and in eight days from the date of the Lord-Lieutianun's letters notice to that effect was issued by the Commissioners of Public Works in Irehud, tinder instfuetions from the Treestay. By Jan le it was judged by his Grace that the time had arrived to enlarge and extend the facilities and advantages offered under the notice of -Nov. 22; and a Treasury minute, dated Jam 12, refers to a letter from Dublin Castle, setting forth the Lord-Lieutenant's views on the subject, and orders the writing of letters to the Chief Secretory for Ireland, the Board of Works, and the Irish Church Temporalities Commissioners, authorising the required advances. By Jan. 28, applications had been received for loans amounting to £284,314 ; and his Grace then proposed that the Treasury should for the present authorise a sum not exceeding half a million to be advanced for all purposes ef relhsf, without specifying how much is to be appropriated to sanitary and land improvement works, or to works indicate./ by extraordinary prenntment sessions. Their leidships agreed to this proposal, on the understanding that the utmost care will Fe taken net to exhaust the loan fund in extensive works at a few points, which will leave others unprovided. far.  The (*mat Council of the Canton ot Appenael, in Switzerland, have voted the re-establishment of capital punishment by a considerable majority. James Cooper, aged 40, has been sentenced, at Dublin, to fourteen years' penal servitude for forging aud tendering false £lO National Bank notes. Some workmen, while engaged in exsavating in uth Shields, discovered a stone coffin containing a skeleton in an excellent state of preservation.  The Rotherham Town Council have resolved to reappoint a committee, whose functions are to promote the Parliamentary enfranchisement of the borough. Efforts are being made to obtain a reprieve for the three prisoners ,entenced to death at the recent Lincoln Assizes, for the murder of George Rolt, at t;palding, in November last.  On Friday afternoon a fire broke out in one of the mills of the Lancashire Spinning Company, Oldham. The damage, £3,000, is covered by fnlI.