English and Foreign Items.

Hawke's Bay Times, Volume 15, Issue 779, 18 April 1870, Page 3

English and Foreign Items.

At Pugwash, Canada, a short time ago, the house of a family named Crowley havtaken fire, all the inmates except three small chi'dren had escaped; but these were sleeping upstairs, and the fire below made it impossible to reach them. Finally, the mother's screams from without awakened the eldest, a daughter not twelve years old, who came to the window, and was urged by her mother to throw herself out; but she answered, " No, my brother and sister must be saved." She then returned through the heat and smoke twice, and after throwing the two young children 1 from the window, she let herself drop to the ground, a distance of 16 feet, and when she roae, said, "I'm done, mother; but I have saved my brother and sister from being burned up." The little heroine, terribly burned, shocked with the fall, and chilled with the exposure, died early the next morning. We learn from the Liverpool Mercury, Bth January, that " an occurrence of an exceedingly painful character has taken place at luvergowrie. The other night a

man named Jawes Cummings, laborer, residing at Mylnefield., had been drinking somewhat freely in a public-house in Invergowrie. About 11 o'clock he left with the intention of proceeding home. Between two and three o'clock loud screams were heard by the servants in Invergowrie farm, as well as by the cottagers in the locality. A general turn-out was immediately made, and aa the shrieks continued there was no difficulty in ascertaining whence they proceeded. It was found that a man bad got into the marsh to the south of the old church at Invergowrie. Lights were quickly procured, and those on land called out to the man to come to them. He said he could not, and implored their aid. In the meantime, the tide was gradually rising. Great excitement prevailed, and many schemes of rescue were suggested, but none of them were found practicable. At length a rope was obtained, and the man was warned that it was to be thrown to him. Se\ eral attempts were made to reach him with it, but unfortunately they all proved abortive. Ultimately one of the men belonging to the farm resolved to attempt to reach the poor fellow, and for that purpose had a rope tied round his neck, to the end of which those on shore held on. He proceeded to within a few yards of the spot, but failed, in consequence of being unable to get through the marsh, to accomplish his design. The tide continued to rise, and, shortly after he returned, the wailing, which had been most heartrending, was heard no more. Gurgling sounds, such as would be caused by a person suffocated by water, and making the last straggles for life, were heard. Those who had assembled, believing all was over, and that they could render no further as sistance, went home. They revisited the place at daybreak, and then the body, which proved to be that of Cummings, was found. One of the limbs was embedded in the mud so firmly that the united strength of three men wa3 required to extricate it. But £ov the claye\ character of the bottom of the marsh, doubtless Cummings would have been got. It is believed that Cummings, who was not acquainted with the locality, having only gone to live there a few weeks ago, and being also under the influence of liquor, had lost his way. His body was taken home. Deceased belonged to luvernesshire, was about 30 years of age, and was married. It will interest naturalists to learn that there has been lately added to the Zoological Gardens of Hamburg, a litter of animals unique in the world. Some months ago a Lithuanian lynx escaped from a travelling menagerie at Altona, and £2O reward was offered for its capture, but in vain. Recently a sentry at Kiel observed a strauge-looking animal leaving the mouth of a large gun on the ramparts, and shortly afterwards re-entering with a duck in itjaws. Assistance having been procured, a net was spread over the muzzle of the gun, and the missing lynx was recaptured, together with a domestic cat and a litter of three young ones. The offspring of this curious and hitherto quite unprecedented cross of breeds are now in the Jardin des Plantes of Hamburg, and have been visited by many naturalists. The directors of the Zoological Garden at Paris have offered 5,000 f. for a single specimen. We may conclude (says the Home News) that another nuisance has now been finally abated. Our readers will recollect that in the autumn we devoted considerable space to an examination of Mrs Beecher Stowe's charge against Lord Byron and his half-sister, Mrs Leigh. Since that time the controversy, if so it may be called, has raged with greater on less severity, but we. awaited the publication of Mrs Stowe's promised final proofs. They have arrived at last, and they are absolutely worthless, because they all tell the other way to that desired by her, and taken with new letters of Lady Byron's, which have appeared in the Quarterly Review, they show that at the time when the criminality was Eaid to have occurred, and for years afterwards, Lady B,yron could not have believed in what she is alleged to have said to the American lady. The Times, which at first thought that a damning stain had been fixed on Bvron's character, and that it would be impossible to read his books any more, now reviews the whole case, and is for acquittal. The Quarterly has always been loyal 4 o Byron,! and poor Mrs Stowe comes in this week for a tremendous castigation, inflicted, we believe, by Mr A. Heyward, the translator of " Faust." and a veteran critic. We now hope to hear no more upon a subject which ought never to have been touched, seeing that there was no one's character at

stake, while great pain was .caused to the descendants of Mrs Leigh, and all society was set talking on a topic Iwud nomwandum inter Christianas.

Miss Annie Lockhard, well and favorably known as an actress on the colonial boards, died on the 18th November at Salt Lake City. The following offer to compound a felony appears in the shape of an advertisement in a recent issue of the Sherborne Journal: —To Klepto-maniacs.—The gentleman who walked into the shop of Mr ——, jeweller, of Sherborne, on January 10, and carried off—doubtlessly by mistake—an entique watch of no possible value to him (not being gold), a pair of brass ear-rings, and a brass chain, is hereby informed that if he will kindly return the articles ten shillings worth of stamps shall be sent to any address he may like to name and no ques tions asked.

The Spectator says;—A lad of sixteen arrived lately at Rome, and eagerly petitioned for an audience with the Pope When it had been granted and he found himself in the presence of his Holiness, he made this simple speech—"l had a swelling in my leg ; the dostors told me' I must have it cut off. A pious lady, just come from Rome, gave me a new but successful remedy—it was a bit of one of vour stockings. I applied it to the swelling, convinced that I should be restored to health —for our Saviour refuses nothing to his Vicar. In a few days I was com- i pletely cured. I have come to thank you and to enlist in your army." The best part of the story is the Pope's answer, who, it is well known, is afflicted with swellings of his legs. "It is extraordinary," said Pius IX, " that my stockings have cured you ; they do not produce the same effect on me who wear them."

An illustration of sharp and brutal practice on the part of some Wliitechapel thieves wasgiven on the 12th January at an inquest on the body of a poor man who on Boxing Day fell upon the slippery pavement and fractured his skull. Although he was apparently dying at the time several ruffians pounced upon him, tore open his pockets, and robbed him of every penny. The victim of this outrage survived his injuries ten days. A verdic' of Accidental Death was returned.

A gallant deed (sajs an English paper) was performed by Capt. Wake, E..IST., of her Majesty's ship Mars, the other day, when one of the boys, on coming out of the boat, missed his footing and fell overboard. Captain Wake stripped himself of his coat, and did not hesitate a moment iu taking a leap of some twenty-six feet, reaching the boy jußt in save him from a watery grave. We hear that a young lady has had the whole of her hair cut off in broad daylight in Westbourne Grrove, one of the most crowded streets in London. The theft was so cleverly performed that she was quite unconscious of it until her return home, although her bonnet-string was cut through and her net divided into three pieces. It is said that the practice is becoming common, more especially in omnibuses.

An unusually fine specimen of the genus "Cockney" was caught and submitted for the inspection of the magistrates at the Willenhal Police Court on January 14. This gentleman had never seen a swan, and espying one in a hVd, innocently supposed it to bo a wild bird, and shot it. The justice considered that, although the opportunity to study Nature herself might have been denied, he should have found a spare moment for Buffon's Natural History. He fiaed the ignoramus 2s 6d, and ordered him to pay a guinea for the bird. An inventive and good-natured Frenchman, who witnessed the great petroleum conflagration at Bordeaux recently, suggested a new mode of harbor defence, as follows ; —" In case a hostile fleet should bombard a port, all that would be neces sarv would be to pour several hundred barrels of petroleum on the water, at ebb tide, and light it. Wooden ships would be burned, while on iron ships the crews would be roasted.

Ninety four debtors were released from Whitecrosa-street Prison under the new Act to abolish imprisonment for debt, which came into operation on the Ist of January. It was supposed that it would have been necessary to apply to a judge at chambers on the Bubject, but Mr Constable, the keeper, acting on advice, took a different view of the new law, and opened the prison doors after twelve o'clock on December 31, 1869. As many as ninetyfour inmates were informed of their privilege ushered in by the New Year, when

sixty-three took their departure, and thirty one asked to remain a little longer and took their leave during the course of the day, with thanks to the consideration, shown by the governor. Among the number who left was an old man named Bar* nacles, who had been a prisoner under ait, order from the Admiralty Court since the7th of April, 1843—upwards of 26 years;. On January 21, Mr Hodgson, jurt., of of Scarnpston Mills, East Hiding, went out to shoot small birds. At his first shot the gun burst into scores of pieces, some of which were picked up at fifty yards distance. Strangely, Mr Hodgson escaped totally unhurt. After the explosion he held the stock of the gun in the right hand* and the end of the barrel in the loft! Mr Ruskin has written a letter to a contemporary, on the subject of field-sports, in which he says:—"Eeprobation of foxhunting on the ground of cruelty to the fox is entirely futile. More pain is caused to the draught-horses of London in an hour, by avariciously overloading them, than to all the foxes in England by the hunts of the year, and the rending of body and heart in human death, caused by neglect, in our country cottages, in any one winter, could not be equalled by the death pangs of any number of foxes. The real evils of fox-hunting are that it wastes the time, misapplies the energy, exhausts the wealth, narrows the capacity, debases the taste, and abates the honor of the upper classes of this country ; and instead of keeping, as one of your correspondents supposes, ' thousands from the workhouse,' it sends thousands of the poor both there and into the grave. The athletic training given by fox-hunting is excellent, and such training is vitally necessary to the upper classes. But it ought always to be in real service to their country ; in personal agricultural labor at the head of their tenantry, and in extending English life and docuiuiou in waste regions, against the adverse pow• ers of nature. Let them beonie Captains of Emigration ; hunt down the foxas that spoil the Vineyard of the World.; and keep their eyes on the leading hound, in Packs of Men."

Lord Portman recently met with an alarmiag accident while out hunting. The hunting party were crossing some fields near Blandford, Dorsetshire, when Irs lordship's horse, in approaching a descent in the bank by the side of the road, mado a sudden spring, striking the rider's face with its head, and throwing hitn violently on the pommel of the saddle. His lord* ship was at once conveyed to his home, and the family surgeon, Mr Bracot. sent for, who at once found it necessary to perform an operation. Mr Paget, of London, was also telegraphed for, who, on arriving, considered the operation a most successful one. For some time his lordship's life was despaired of, but he is now progressing favorably. The recent execution in Paris has revived the old question whether death instantaneously follows upon the severance of the head from the body. In a letter to the G-oulois Dr Pinel asserts that decapitation does not immediately affect the brain. The blood that flows after decapitation oomes from the large vessels of the neck, and there is hardly any call upon the circulation of the cranium. The brain remains intact, nourishing itself with the blood retained by the pressure of the air. When the blood remaining iu the head at the moment of separation is exhausted, there commences a state, not of death, but of inertia, which lasts up to the moment when the organ, no longer fed, ceases to exist. Dr Pinel estimates that the brain finds nourishment in the residuary blood for about an hour after decapitation. The period of inertia would last for about two hours, and absolute death would not ensue till after the space of three hours altogether. If : , he adds, a bodiless head indicates by no movement horror of its situation, it is because it is physically impossible that it should do so, all the nerves which serve for the transmission of orders from the brain to the trunk being severed. But there remain the nerves of hearing, of smell, and of sight, This theory has been ably controverted by a medical contemporary.

"Professor," said a student in pursuit of knowledge concerning the habits of animals, " why does a cat, while eatiug, turn her head first one way and then the other?" "Tor the reason," replied the professor, " that she cannot turn it both ways at once." George 1., having given a handsome sum to~ wards repairing the town hall at Coventry, it was remarked at its inauguration that the inscription over the centre doorway read "Anno Domini." Queen Anne being dead some time, the corporation, suggested an alteration, when it was unanimously resolved to replace it by "Georgio Domini," which they considered more appropriate.