MISCELLANEOUS.

Lyell Times and Central Buller Gazette, Volume VI, Issue 291, 18 September 1886, Page 3

MISCELLANEOUS.

Lord Randolph Clmrcliill received an anonymous donation of £2OOO " towards the good cause, from a friend." The money was handed over to the Conservative Party fund. London newspapers report the sale of the Scarborough Aquarium, Which cost £IOO,OOO within a few years, for £4500, probably the biggest shrinkage in value of a show place on record. At the banquet given by the members; of the Victorian Bar, to Mr J. L. Purves, Q.C., on his attaining silk, the guest related his early experiences at the Bar, saying that it was ten years before ho was able to earn his bread and butter. He urged junior counsel not to despair if they did not succeed at first. Statistics show "that one-quarter of all the insanity in the world, and in Paris one-half is caused by drink. In the Department of the Seine, in France, there are six times as many lunatics as there were in 1801, while the population is only three times as great. The chief of the physical causes producing mental disease is excessive drinking, which is responsible for 562 cases out of the 1007 admitted in the year. The unusual spectacle of a clergyman forgetting the text of the Lord's Prayer and breaking down in the attempt to repeat it before a congregation occurred in the church of the Rev Dr Deems* in New York recently. The Rev E. D. Jones, who has spent ten years as a missionary in China, was, owing to the fact that he had spoken the Chinese language for so long, unable to remember the text of the Lord's Prayer in English. A gentleman placed a bag containing forty sovereigns in a cupboard at Bangor The next morning both bag and money were missing. Suspected persons were watched by the police ; but at length it was discovered that a rat

was the culprit. The woodwork being removed, the bag containing thirty-five of the missing sovereigns was discovered in a hole four feet from the cupboard, the remaining coins being found further down the animal's retreat. Perhaps the strangest domestic pet ever heard of was recently exhibited at meeting of the British Association by Sir John Lubbock. It was a tame wasp, which had been in his possession for about three months. It now ato sugar from his hand, and allowed him to stroke it. The wasp had every appearance of health and happiness ; and, althougth it enjoyed an " outing " occasionally, it readily returned to its bottle, which it seemed to regard as a home. Suicides by monarchs have been rare in modern times. The most recent case, aside from that of Ludwig, King of Bavaria, was that of Abdul Aziz, Sultan of Turkey, who opened a vein in his arm in 1876. In 1868, Theodore, Emperor of Abyssinia is said to have shot himself. In 1820 the King of Hayti escaped capture by committing suicide. Charles VII. of France starved himself to death. Dr. Drysdale, after visiting Paris, declares himself a believer in M. Pasteurs's hydrophobia cure. Only one in a hundred persons bitten by mad dogs has died after undergoing M. Pasteur's simple treatment. With the exception of the prick with the finepointed injection syringe, patients, it appears, have no other annoyance to complain of, as there are absolutely no symptoms, and 10 punctures on 10 successive days are sufficient. The fall in the price of land in England is illustrated by the fact that a plot of land bought for £SOOO, or about £2O an acre, by the late Archbishop of York, has just been disposed of for a little over £4 an acre. Land, indeed, is now so cheap that cautious people on the look-out for good investments are again beginning to look to it, in the belief that in a few years they will turn their money over again. The Kirghese and Cossacks who dwell on the Orenburg Plains take great delight in wolf-hunting. They mount there fleet little horses and set forth armed with heavy clubs. When the snow is deep and does not have a firm crust a wolf is easily run down, as he sinks into the snow at every step and soon becomes exhausted. He finally sits down on his haunches and quietly waits for the fatal blow of the club.

MISCELLANEOUS ITEMS.

A million and b half of people have visited the Colonial Exhibition. A hoy has lately been entered for Harrow .school- for the year 1900. Two mail trains collided in Bavaria, killing- sixteen passengers. Sleeping-cars with bathrooms have now been placed on a Canadian railway. A man has received six months for supplying false news to the Times. The night express now makes the journey from London to Edinburgh in eight hours and three quarters. Four lives have been lost in the Alps, two gentlemen and their guides having fallen into a crevasse of the glacier. Governor Hill has signed the Bill limiting the term for which a man may be imprisoned for debt in New T York to six months. The Empress of Austria, having been forbidden equestrian exercise by her medical advisers, has sold her fomous stud, and will not hunt again in Ireland. London Hospital Sunday Fund has done better this year, as the result of the special appeal to the public. The result is a total of £21,5000, against £17,500 last year.

The Boston Common Council lias adopted an ordinance rendering it incumbent upon builders occupying streets for building purposes to provide a covered way on the sidewalk for pedestrians. Messrs Krupp have secured a contract from the Chinese Government lor the supply of 1500 tons of steel rails, the price, including freight, being 25/ per ton below the lowest English offer. A "lady" in New Orleans caused the arrest of a policeman for calling her a ''woman." The Judge, after carefully deliberating, decided that she was a woman, thus aggreviating the insult. The venerable battalion that served under the first Napoleon has been losing by death about 185 of its numbers annually. There are now but 740 of them left, and each receives a life pension of 250f. Mr J. T. Morton, of London, offers the English Presbyterians enough money to pay all expenses of two ordained and two medical missionaries to China. The offer includes salaries and expenses for three years. Experiments in Austrian garrisons prove that where the floor of barracks are painted with tar the collection of dust in cracks is prevented, and there is a consequent diminution in irritative diseases of the eye. There is also a great diminution of parasites. ' One of the last requests Hobart Pasha made to his wife was, "Let my grave be in Turkey." The widow, a young Englishwoman of only 27 years, accompanied the body to Constantinople, returning directly afterwards to England.

Fire-crackers are made by Chinese convicts hired by manufacturers from the Government at three cents a-day, the work being done inside of the prisons. The paper is made of bamboo fibre. Each cracker is filled, rolled, and pasted by hand, with astonishing rapidity. In great Britain there were, in 1836 about 143,000 Roman Catholics. The number is now computed at 2,000,000. In Ireland there were, in 1g37, about 6,000,000, now there are about 3,500,000. In the Colonies everywhere Roman Catholics have increased. Statistics, however, are not obtainable for a comparison. From Darmstadt the suicide is reported of Major Kallrein, who, on December 9, 1870, stormed, with 54 Hessian soldiers, Castle Chambord, defended by 3000 Frenchman, and succeeded in capturing 250 prisoners and five guns. Major Kallarein suffered from an incurable disease, and this so preyed upon his mind that he shot himself. Amongst the Liberal candidates at the last general election in Great Britain, were two natives of India. Mr Dadabhai Nooroji, who accepted an invitation to contest the Holborn division of Finsbury, is a member of the Bombay Legislative Council. The other Candidate was Mr Lalmohun Ghose, an able exponent of the views of the educated natives. An official report on the German jute manufactures states that such progress has been made in working up jute into attractive guises that this material is now the real component of most of the " real Algerian curtains positively imported from Algiers," of the " genuine cloths of Smyrna," and of the " undoubted tapestries of Teheran and Herat.