The Birkenhead News and Wirral General Advertiser. — 1893-07-08 (Birkenhead, Merseyside, England)

SATURDAY, JULY 8, 1893.  In a letter to the Midlothian Liberal Association, the Premier points out the vast importance of the fact that the Irish Government Bill is about to be passed by a House of Commons specially elected for the purpose. He thinks that 'a great political issue" will be raised by the appearance of the Bill in the House of Lords. Whatever may be the fate of that Bill, the Premier is " confident " that -," British measures of great value" will be passed this year, "unless they too should be proscribed by adverse influences "in the House of Lords.  Mr. Chamberlain's zig.rag course as Home Ruler and Unionist is a peculiarly interesting study in political meteorology. "If Nationalism means Home Rule," he wrote in 1884, "1 have no objection to make in principle, and am only anxious to find out exactly what it means." Mr. Chamberlain then goes on to make provisos. Home Rule, on the one hand, is not to mean separation from England. On the other hand the Home Rule which he desired was to be "local government more complete, more popular, more thoroughly representative, and more far-reaching than anything that has hitherto been suggested." For instance, he wished that the land question should be handed over to an Irish board "altogether independent of the English Government's influence." With it was to be handed over the education question and the power of raising and spending taxes for strictly Irish purposes, so that "the Irish people would have entire independence as regards all local work and local expenditure."  The Time, states :—" There is a general belief in political circles that at the close of the present Parliament a peerage will be conferred upon Mr. Stuart Randal. Should this anticipation be realised, it is probable that Mr. Gladstone's Welsh admirers will invite him to stand for Montgomeryshire at the general election. Other journals, however, deny that Mr. Gladstone has any Wen. tion of resigning his seat for Midlothian."  The Ramsgate magistrates have committed William Noel for trial on the charge of wife murder. The .witnesses for the defence in. eluded persons who were present in the Sunday School with Noel on the day of the murder, and they state that he conducted the work of his class with his usual calmness and cheerfulness. The police theory is, of course, that this was exactly the conduct that might be expected from a man who had committed a cruel and deliberate murder and had endeavoured to make it appear that the crime was the work of a housebreaker. The case is altogether a very extraordinary one.  The shook of the disaster to the Victoria and her crew of gallant sailors has scarcely diminished when there comes news from York. shire of a colliery disaster, whereby about 140 men have lost their lives. The explosion occurred in the Coomb's Pit, Thornhill, about noon of Tuesday. Search parties have succeeded in rescuing several men and boys. A relief fund has been opened, and it has been decided to add to it the amount which was to have been expended atDewsbury in celebrating the Royal wedding.  Lord Randolph Churchill is fast hemming a master in political Billingsgate. Speaking to the Carlisle Unionists oa Wednesday he said the proposal to discuss thirtyeight clauses in twenty days was the proposal of either a lunatic or s traitor. Mr. Gladstone was becoming more wild and reckless in every ststemant he made. Fiction did duty for facts, and imagination for argument. He had never seen a blacker combination of fraud, duplicity, evasion, suppression, and denial of fade notorious to all.  According to present prospects, many of the root crops are likely to tail. Wheat is the best of the cereals, but, says "The Agrioni. tang Economist," even that does not indicate an average yield except on the richest and deepest soils. In regard to all the spring.eown corn the case is much worse. A great deal of the seed corn remained in the land without germinating for some weeks after the seed that did sprout had shot up plants. In come. quenoe of this the corn has come away in two shares, and while some ham shown signs of ripening nearly, the other has been only just growing above ground. There will be an immense diversity in realisations, even in wheat, this year, while in respect to barley and oats the outlook ix still more diverse.