The North-Eastern Weekly Gazette. — 1893-12-09 (Stockton-on-Tees, Cleveland, England)

DECEMBER 9, 1893.  with • specific against diphtheria The breakdown of Dr. Koch's consumption cure will, howmake onlookers sceptical of the efficacy of he now specific until incontestable proofs have been given.  Tun North of England tuts a large business connection with Scandinavia, and a considerable pwtion of its population is of S:andinaviart extraction. Many of our readers, therefore, will feel a Tial interest in the news published this week that swetlen and Denmark wero on Tuesday emnected by telephone, and that King Oscar exchanged greetings with King Christian along the wire.  THZ Casimir-Perier Cabinet submitted their programme to both Houses of the French Legislature on IVo ;day. In the Senate the statement was received "with a eettain coldness ;" in the Chamfer of Deputies it elicited enthusiastic cheers from all the benches, excepting those on the Extreme Left, where sit the men who have sympathy with the Socialist doctrines, which the Ministers pledge themselvva to fight.  WHILE M Casimir.Perier, the ex-President of the French Chamber of Deputies, has become Premier of the Republic, M. Dupuy, the ex-Premier, has become President of the Chamber. The Republitazi journals hail the Ministerial declaration made on Monday as thoroughly consonant with the aviratiois of the country, and a favourable reception is also accorded to it by the Conservative organs. The Opposition journals, however, are bitterly hostile ; and unfortunately the first divisions in the Chamber do not show that the Parliamentary foundation of the Government is at all se,..ure. .  Tits Bu7er State settlement of the Siam quoetion seems to have been acr.e. pted by Siam and China, ait well as by Britain and France. The neutral territory is to he occupied as a protecto: ate by China. It is expected that a Frontier Delimitation Commission will forthwith proceed to map out the confines of Ilr:tish and French territory, and the strip of buffer land given to China, which will mostly come out of Siamese country. The Commission will consist of English, French, and Chinese officials, with a staff of engineers.  ANOTHER South American war is threatened. The people of Peru and Ecuador have quarrelled, and the Peruvians, the stronger nation, are eager for An appeal to arms. They made a most bellicose demotration in Lima on Monday night, and the exoitement became sogreat that the Government felt it neeessary to call out the military. The President likewise interposed with soothing words. Addressing the crowd from the window of the Palace, he promised, if diplomatic negotiatlons were unsucm.sful, to sail on the nation to do its Silty on the field of battle.  M. T/UCOUPIS, the now Greek Minister, has asked Mr James Samuelson, of Liverpool, to proceed to Athens to investigate the financial and general condition of Greece. Mr Samuelson is well informed on the political ar.l industrial affairs of most of the countries referred to, which he has visited several times, and he will have the advantage in the course of his enquiries of consulting the Foreign Office Cormier report on trade and finance recently made by Mr E. F. G. Law.  THE rains are descending in Matabeleland--and Lotaugula is not yet captured. Major Forbes is, however, still on the track of the fugitive king, and he is hopeful of securing him. Whether or not Lobengula escapes Dr. Jameson is satisfied that the war is ended. He is now proceeding with the disarmament of the natives throughout the country. If the Matabele quietly surrender their arms it may be assumed that their pride as well as their military organisation is completely broken.  Tits Zanardelli Cabinet at Rome is now cornplated; and the financial situation is also on the whole more hopeful. It is stated that the Credito MAiliare has received offers from foreign financial groupe for the formation of n new institution securing the provincial connection and facilitating the liquidation of the present concern. Unfortunately at the moment when a turn for the better is reported from Rome, news is to hand of a 3nancial disaster at Florence. Messrs Dufresne Brothers, an old-fashioned banking house in Florence, suspended payment on Tuesday, Signor Emetaz, the manager, has committed suicide.  A , we have more than once indicated, the instahility of the French Ministries is fatal to any enlining external alliance. The Grashdanin, a St. Petersburg journal, which is said to reflect the opinion of the Court of the Czar, published this significant statement the other day :—" Thit Russian fanati,a who rave about a Franco-Russian alliance ought to remember that only a few days after the convocation of Parliament the Ministry fell which did most for the Franco-Russian rapprochement. This is a bad omen for the duration of this really unnatural alliance, and a new proof how unreliable an allianoe with France is, and how -risky it is to conclude an agreement with • Ministry of that State, as one is never sure how long it may stand at the helm, and with what sort of people one will then have to re.;kon."  PTVZ MEM' CLZ iLAN WS message toCongresswhich was issued on Monday morning shows unbending fidelity to, and a lively confidence in, the policy which was identified with his name at the last Presidential election. It encourages friendly relations with Britain. It remmmends the authorisation of the building of one battleship and six torpedo boate. At the same time, however, the President is careful not to stimulate a hasty or reckless expmditure of public money in the carrying out of a heroic naval programme. "While," he says, "I am distinctly in favour of consistently pursuing a policy of building up a thorough and efficient navy, I cannot refrain from making the suggestion that Congress should carefully take into account the number of unfinished vessels on our hands and the depleted condition of our treasury in considering the propriety of an appropriation at this time to begin new work." The chief feature of the address, however, is its insistence on the urgency of tariff reforms. The President emphatically declares that reform is imperative, and he clearly shows that the present system, though it may be helpful to the capitalists, is injurious to the great mass of the population. "Only," he says, 'the necessity of our revenue justifies any tariff other than that of federal texation"—a sentence which recalls the contentions of the Cobden and Bright party when the battle of Free Trade and cheap food was being fought in England.