Widnes Examiner. — 1896-07-04 (Widnes, Cheshire, England)

NOTES A) NEV.  The North-Eastern Railway Getnpanyanuounce a new departure in connection with facilities for railway travel, 'i‘; being arranged to issue, from Ist July, books of coupons for 1,000 sniles of travel, which will enable the purcha.er of a book to' travel ler twelve months in any directiou over the North-Eistern .eyetem until the coupons are exhausted. The arrangement is limited to first-class passengerseand the orice for each thousandmile book has been fixed at £5 Si., or abeu:7. lit per mile,which is a reduction of about 20 per eent.froln the ordinary eret-class fare. Tickets will be available until the cud of twelve months from tee last day of the month in which the issue is made. The tickets are only available for the personal use of the.purchaser and of his or her family and guests. . . It is easier to sympethiee With .741r.flenniker_fleaten's jubilant gratifieation at his latest victory over the " Cifcumlocteieri Office " than to understand why the postal reform he has just succeeded in securing should ever have been rendered necessary. Fr S9lllO inexplicable 'reason, pircels have been sent to Japan by the British Post Office in German ships, and for some still .more mvsteriene reason, they were at one time forwarded, in the first place, to Hemburg or Bremen, thoughthe• German meii ships to Yokohama c Mat Southampton. Some time ago, "stung by reproaches," as their indefatigable critic puts it, the Eaglish Pest Office decided to dispense with the voyage to Germany, and parcels for Japan are now put on board the mail steamers at the Etiglien part. This ;Res an encouraging concession,and'Alr.Reatoii has the satisfaction of announcing thet arrangements have been adopted udder which p ircela. for Japan will from next October be sent no longer by German but by Ea ships. The victory seems to have ma•le. Mr. Heaton very cheerful, and be write:. hopefully te the " Tinies " about the scheme for a parcel pest convention with the 'United States, which everyone must hope will soon be ado Wed.  One of the queerest eases of suicide on record is just reported from Gong Kong. wheaz it occurred a few days since. A very harrible plague is raging there, and it necessi:ates the employment of a, number of coolies , for -sanitary work. One of them who had been imprisoned with others for taking bribes, took his piiniahment so --much to heart that he hung himself in his. cell by his hair. Twisting his queue round his neck ha attached it to a ventilator, and with a drop of a single foot managed tfi dislocate his neck. The Empress Eagenie, who will return shortly to England to enjiy her IA ijesty's haspitality at o;barne has been visiting the scenes of her childhood in Spain. A few years ago there were mtlly ire G'-ana,da wao remembered her Mojesty'a father, the Count dl GIIVIVII3 Mantij i Youtocarrero, a v-iry hairisome Spinish ()Meer, who fell in love with the 6eautiful- 7.-Aisa Kirkpatricc, dauatiter of our. Consul at Milaga, married her and brought her to Grin 'Ala, where the future Empress of the French and her sister, the Duchess of Alba, were bore. The C )unt hail been terribly wounded about the face and head in the Peninsu'ar wars, and was literally " minded ".witlagald plates, at large scalp waun.l being disguised with:a plaqu of addiand ano-her Wound its tha jaw was also coated " with the same precious metal!! Natalitst inding.he was afiati loaking inan,and his wife was exquaitel beautiful. Toe Emorta4a. wha had not been in Granatla for many years, recagnised.. soma- of her nf,i friends, and Was delighted by her visit .to her birthplace. A large firm of Irish linen manu'aeturers, having .failed, or einsing its stock to be soil off in Landon. Toe expiaaation of the f ilure will be read with interest. This firm. SilV3 the aanouncement " extensively engaged in the Irish linen trade, are compelled through the late Anarchical and disturbed state of Ireland, and the °Onfusion of the public mind with regard, to forthcoming events, which ocea-done a complete want of ztability of trade—to euspend payment, the result of which has been to bring Lbsa:d-aaaiblislied firm to bankruptcy." " The confusian af. the pualic triliod with reg-ard to farthcaming even tt; " an nm•3sinfr, commintary rip so the -claim of the T iriN that wilful they are in offite the minds of all men of businemi are at ease.  I The vrrk of Mrs. Stowe, who has just died at a great age, prerits ays the " IYlanchrster Guardian " one of the ms t c,:ifiosi.les of iecent literary history. N-ita grtmt rer,ah ti 3 oroduced,by her writings, or by her one( tto-i,us lock, an (..lioct probably wider -and more interc-4-, it lastArl, than any othef‘ writer of the century has- vecrial. Time, it must be eoalessal, has clawed 44 Uuci, Toaa:i Cabin " sadly in its ciatch. Everybody can uoilit out now its shortcomings in accuracy of social p )rtraitor ,1 aud in style. .Bit there is a kind of book whi,..h—partly by the intensity sf the feeling that shines through them and partly ,by their. sineular opportuneness in il':roduc.ing the public at the right moment to feelings Or c-inclu*ions en the verge of whieh he public was- consciorpth rig—sometimes' achieve a success scarce y intelligible to the reader sch.,, in later clays,tr,es to find in their workinanship the secret of their first popularity. One cannot give EalCh .work place in the first rank of literature, but a second-rate wrier never achieved a first rate popularity under mr.cinnstances which li4a.ve so little to be regretted and so -much to he glad of as the popularity ..of Mrs. Scowo's famous story. '  A correspondent, of the "Tempi "has interviewed tip Emperor Menelik, who showed him ;A bulky okl.ket 'of letters received by him from Eiirope and other par i.i; of the world. There were hundreds of letters•congratula,ing him on his victories. Many of the writers wer,:— anxious to enter his service. Au Enc4liehmaa•addressed him as "My dear Neu." Inhabitants Of Trieste dirliking Itily sent him an address in verse. Swiss. admirers reminded him of their own litrugle of indenendence. Germans and Austrians ridiculed' • their • Iralian allies. Schoolboys begged for Abyssinial peistage -.tamps. Jews offered to float Ethiopian .bonds. An ustralian clergyman sent him long quotations from the Bible. A French girl sent him a prayer. which cured all diseases and warded off all fhe correspondent .ilso saw French caricatures of Menelik and of Signoi Crispi, over which his Maj-.sty iwal very merry. Wen complimented upon his hospitable treatment of hi 4 prisaners, he remarked that though the fr.Jians might have depicted him as a savage he had in this r6spect simply followed Abyssinian usages.