THE POPE.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume VI, Issue 153, 4 July 1871, Page 2

THE POPE.

To The Editor op the Nelson Evening Mail. Sir, — I had seen none of the remark* on " The Anathema Maranatha " ■when I 6ent off my rather loose letter on the subject, and have not yet seen the Rev. Mr. Garin's first communication It is gratify ing to find that the amiable, learned, head of the Eoman Catholic Church has not issued such a document as that which appeared in the Evening Mail of June the 1 6th. [ mentioned the former's universal popularity ; it serms by the following extract from a recent Blue- Rook on the affairs of Rome, that he was still belnved by his subjects when the despatch was written by Mr. Jerroise, the British liepresentative at Borne, dated September 15, 1870 :— " Having witnessed the ceremonies at Easter, when the church is chiefly thronged with a crowd of sightseers, the procession of the Corpus Domini, attended by all the peasantry within the reach of Home, the great Feast of the •yVpostles, St. Peter and St. Paul, and the crowds that attended the public Sessions of the (Ecumenical Council, I was indeed surprised by the sight of the multitude I found flocking over the Bridge of St. Angeloin carriages and cabs, as well as on foot — Roman Princes, midde class. ;v>d artisans (all with their families), ecclesiastics, jmd students. The Pope attended each day without ostentation, and I could not but be struck by the devotion of the people there assembled, as their voices with one accord echoed through the building the responses in the Litany of the Saints, ' Ora pro nobis.' There is, it seemed to me, a large mass of the people really loyal to their Government. Tn leaving the '•hurch the venerable Pontiff could scarcely make his way through the w crowds who rushed forward to embrace his hand." ( I am, &c, E. Tucker. P.S. — The whole subject of the Kingdom of f Italy, Victor Emmanuel, Garibaldi, Maz^ini and the ho9t of professed revolutionists, in the pay of the nun-whipping Russians, will be found fully expla ; ned in the Free Press in the library of the Nelson Artizans' Society.

A public meeting was held in Christchurch a few days ago to take steps for the establishment of a cloth factory there. The attendance was Bmall, and on this account, after some speeches had been made, the meeting was adjourned without anything definite being done. From Timaru exchanges, it appeanw that black swans are increasing T*ry rapidly on the lagoons to the south of the township. Lately, no less than 200 were counted in one flock. It is said that wild ducks, formerly numerous in the same lagoons, have almost entirely disappeared. From: the Natal papers we learn that Mr. T. Baines, the traveller, had arrived :>t Maritizburjr, and reported an extraordinary yield of gold from quartz crushing at the Northern goldfields. An Impostor named Wilson has been discovered uear Melbourne pretending to be the Messiah. The disclosures exhibit extraordinary credulity. A Plea, fob the. Thistle.— Mr. Macknight of Victoria,, carries his love of the thistle to a strange length. He \ regards with pityyxhe farmer who looks ' upon the thistle ys .a useless weed. His impression is that-.. the thistle may be cultivated with advantage ; that it is Fgr remainder of news see fourth page.

the, "pioneer" of* good husbandry, and gives his readlrs words from a letter from Mr. Mackfrsy, of Wellington, •which he trusts win be convincing : — «At. first the settlers imagined they ■would be completely f uined, and they used every means in theij" power to eradicate them, but without success, and they are now flourishing in alrdirections, and have proved a blessing instead, of a curse.Wherever they take possession of the soil, the fern disappears, and the settlers Bay, 'They throw out] a strong tap root, open up and fertilise the soil, and. encourage the growth* of grass, nnd in a few years die out altogether.' Large tracts of waste country havo been reclaimed by them years before they otherwise would have been, and are now good pasture for stock. This has not happened in solitary cases only, <8r under peculiar local circumstances, but is universal in its application, and extends over hundreds of miles of country. On one property I visited, belonging to Mr. Canning, one of the most enterprising and intelligent settlers in the province of Hawke's Bay, I saw the result of a number of very interesting experiments in grass cultivation. His property consists partly of undulating hills, resembling exactly those about Coleraine, and was covered with a thick growth of fern. One portion of a hill be ploughed and sowed with mixed grasses at the rate of two bushels to the acre; and on the other portion he burnt the ferns, allowed the thistles to take .possession of the ground, aud when they withered up after the first seeding, he sowed Hhe same quantity of grass seed over the withered plants as they stood, and the result which I saw was a better turf of grass than that which had been ploughed. He, says the thistle not only opens up and-.^eniilates the soil, and prepares it for. grass sfced, but it also protects the young growth from the stock until it has taken firm root in the soil, in the meanwhile affording the stock abundant food. When the grass is fairly established, the thistle disappears. I have ridden over about 600 miles of country, and inspected all the best portions of this proviuce as weJJ as Hawke's Bay, and every settler I have met with tells the same tale of the beneficial effects of this much-despised plant. They one and all regard it as the grazing pioneer of the country." The Spirits in Kussia. — The Russian Academical Gazette reports the result of a spiritual seance which Mr. Home lately gave in the presence of several learned men in St. Petersburg. Mr. Home having expressed a wish to convert them to spiritualism, the representatives of science agreed to attend a seance provided they might themselves choose the place in which it was to be held, and make all preparations they thought necessary. These were simple, but they completely answered their purpose. Seals were placed on the doors of the room in which the meeting was to be held, and a heavy glass table instead of an ordinary one was placed in it; On this table stood a lamp with a reflector, so that the ground under the table was brilliantly illuminated, and the slightest movementjmadeby Mr. Home could be observed. The medium having accepted the challenge under these conditions, the seance began at the appointed time. All present (two mathematicians, two chemists, a physiologist, and a doctor), seated themselves rouud the table, forming a chain upon it with their hands. In a little while Mr. Home announced that he began to feel the presence of spirits and that these were manifesting themselves outward.ly by the fluctuations of the flame of a taper standing on the table. It was replied that these fluctuations were produced not by the spirits but by the ventilator; in fact when this was shut the fluctuations ceased. The medium was somewhat embarrassed; but without losing countenance hastened to declare that he felt the presence of the spirits, which betrayed itself by the quick throbbing pulse. The pulsations were indeed extremely rapid, but one of the persons present explained that this phenomenon was owing to the tension which had now lasted some time, and to the high temperature of the room; to prove his words this person had his pulse felt after having declared that he experienced no sensation but that of fatigue, and the number of beats corresponded exactly with that given by Mr. Home. After these two failures the medium gave up the experiment with the table, and proposed to alter the weight of some object. A common bucket was then placed on a weighing machine. The company waited long and in vain ; no change of weight occurred. It was very late, everybody was tired — Mr. Home, perhaps, most of all — and the seance broke up. While taking leave, Mr. Home promised tp repeat, the experiment; but he gave out next day that he was indisposed, and therefore unable to keep his engagemenU—Pdll Metll Gazette.

A Maine paper reporta a spiritual marriage, asserting that at a recent " circle " a young woman asked if the spirit of her dead lover was present, and on being: answered in the affirmative, and told, moreover, that he wished to marry her, had a justice of the peace called in and the ceremony performed. The spiritual and spiritel bride now claims the property of the dead man. Antithetic Traits of the Scotch. — Steamboats aud Scotch engiueers are all the world over. An ancient chrouicler, now resting " wi' the mools, " but who lived contemporary with the first British steam vessel, relates that " Ac day as the Comet was padlin doon the water, she o'ertook a fly (passenger fast-boat) that was taigled wi' a cross wind. As the steamer was sliding caunily past, her crew began to jaw the captain o' the fly, and facetiously to order him to come along wi' his lazy craft. 'Get oot o 1 my sicht," was the indignant answer ; ' L'm jist gaun as it pleases the breath of God, and I'd ne'er fash my thoom how fast ye gang wi' your blastid devil's reek.' The "reek" has triumphed o'er the " bounie breeze and the flowing sheet, " and given to Clyde ironworkers a world-wide reputation. Mr. Disraeli's Sarcasm. — As a specimen of the rougher kind of sarcasm of which the Eight Honorable leader of the conservatives is capable, we extract the following from the Spectator : — On the I'pcommendations of Mr. Gladstone (said Mr. Disraeli, amidst great cheering) we have legalised confiscation, we have consecrated sacrilege, we have condoned high treason, we have destroyed churches, we have shaken properly to its foundation, and we have ejnptied gaols ; and>now we cannot govern a county, and must come to a parliamentary committee. He had found, as he supposed, the philosopher's ' stone in relation to Irish affairs, and no time aud labor had been grudged him, and no offence taken at the most startling measures ; and now the Right Honorable gentleman, after all his heroic exploits aud at the head of his great majority, is making government ridiculous. The following on "the rat plague" is from the South Australian Register: — " The army of the rats appear to have spread over a large portion of tha North, and Mr. G. L. Debney, writing to us from Mundowadana, on April 12, remarks that they are iv swarms, infesting every waterhol.e and spriug. The creatures are of the common brown variety, aboriginally termed my-ar-roo, and by the blacks, who consider the visifcatiou as a windfall, are^ regarded as a great dainty. The natives' state that they seldom visit that pirt of the country, the latest instance having been many years ago, and before the whites settled in the far North. On the last remembered occasion they came from the east and north-east, destroyiug ail the feed, and, after stayiug about six months, left as suddenly as they arrived. In sqmp places their, tracks cover the ground v {or miles. Our present informant remark's, that they seem chiefly to attack the grass roots, and although he has been more than ten years io the north, this is the first time he has seen them." A writer in the People's Magazine says : — Let me try to sdescribe the St. John, which plies on the "Hudson. It is 417 feet long, 80 feet wide, and has three decks. It is larger than the largest ocean Cunai\l steamship. Its saloons are furnished as sumptuously as any drawing room, haviog prints, expensive photographs, stereoscopes, &c, on the tables. It has bedroom accommodation for 600 persons, and will carry, they say, 3000. One saloon, surrounded with , cabins, that L looked into, was about 15© feet long, 20 feet high, and lit with clustered gas chandeliers. The dining rooms are elaborately provided with everything seen in a first-class hotel. Crowds of civil neg?oes in spotless white jackets, wait at the tables, which are ornamented with artificial fiowers. There are, of course, extensive kitchens, cellars, and ice houses. Ornamental fountains, or taps of iced water, are dispersed through the ship. There are bars, where you can order any kind of drink you please, hairdressers' shops, bookstalls &c, in these vessels. Large mirrors, spft piled carpets, the most exquisite cleanliness (even the door of the stokehole wwatg t of white panel, with white china handles^ and quite clean), entirely remov&the idea of your being on board a river fijteamer. Othar appliances for comfort and convenience are perfect. The washing apparatus is as good as that in'-'a> London^d^k/fflpuse, Smoking is strictly prohibited/ wffclpt in certain portions of the sbipl The arrangements for tickets, baggage, &c, are admirable. . There is no noise or bustle. -I ascended the Hudson to Albany in erne of these floating hotels. The pace afc^ich they move, through the l water is prpdfgious. r the jtide, Jhe one I was io would go twenty -five miles an-, hjour, N ; . ,• ,■t , ■ .•, , : ;-, ■[ •<• c \i :> v '■■