ITEMS.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XII, Issue 214, 10 September 1877, Page 2

ITEMS.

Eight thousand Bulgarian refugees are starving at Sel vi. The services of Colonel Baker were secured byLieutcnant-General Mehemet Ali. He has gone to the front with three other well-known English officers.

The Austrian Government made a declaration through its agents that iv the present condition of affairs in the East the project of occupying Bosnia and Herzegovina is' abandoned. This is attributed to numerous move ments in Hungary in favor of the Ottoman empire.

Germau sentiment is growing hostile to England, and a high authority to be relied upon says the policy ns to the occupation of the Dardanelles will not be permitted. The Russians are concentrating iv great force on the Lorn river.

According to official news from Constantinople Mehemet Ali intends to convert Rasgrad into a fortified camp. The forces contratcd in the neighborhood consist of 18 battalions of infantry, 15 batteries of artillery, and 32 squadrons of cavalry, ia all 40,0 0. J '

The petitions in favor of the Local Option Bill, presented by Mr Fox, bear about 20,000 signatures.

Referring to the value of the stakes at Ascot, the Sportsmun says •— « Ascot is generally known as the Royal meeting, and there are good reasons, in addition to Royal patronage, why it should be so designed. At no other meeting are such princely sums given for competition. It may be stated that the winners of the races mentioned do not receive the money here indicted, as in mauy cases goodly sums go to the second and third horses, and in no instance have we deducted the sum subscribed towards the stake by those participating in it. Ou the first day £7270 were given to be run for exclusive of the Gold Vase; on the second £6450; third, £6376; aud ou the last dayj £4110; giving a grand total of £24,205 for the four days.

Colonel Baker, in his recently published work on Turkey, also reminds us that the Russian army has not yet encountered General Fever, as the season of the year for his deadly operations is only just commencing. These terrible agues "have always proved peculiarly destructive to the Russian armies. They are only prevalent during the mouths of July, August, and September, and then only on the plains ; the rest of the year is very healthy. An army moving through the country during these months can never be certain of the numberof men it can bring into line of battle . It may have 70,000 men to-day, and only 40,000 to-morrow, for while the hot and cold stage of the fever is raging it completely incapacitates a man for any kind of work."

A London correspondent writes: —Cardinal Manning's statement that druukeness is spreading amoug English women as well as men, has been since confirmed by numerous English newspapers. Thus life is poisoned at its very source; aud children imbibe, with their earliest nourishment, the subtle poison which will ultimately destroy them. It has beeu computed that there are in the United Kingdom about 500,000 drunkards, while the deaths from indulgence iv intoxicating liquors are estimated at 70,000 per annum in the mother country. Lord Shaftesbury tells us that six-teuths of all the cases of insanity in Great Britain and the United States are traceable to this cause; and it has been ascertained, by competent statisticians, that the increase of crime in both couutries is iv the exact ratio of the increase in the consumption of fermented liquors. Professor Leoni Levi estimates the actual loss of productive labor by drunkenuess in the United Kingdom to be not less than £69,0(10,000 per annum. It is only the contemplation of such facts as these that makes the intemperate utterarces of some total abstainers excusable.

The man of pills and ointment, Thomaa Holloway, is to the fore again, He has commenced tne building of a College for Women of the middle and upper middle classes onau estate of 95 acres situated within one mile of Egham and about 18 miles from London. It is intended to have a capacity to accommodate 250 studeuts, with private rooms for each. The building, with its furniture, is estimated to cost £250,000, to which Mr Holloway will add an endowment of £100,000. He has also erected at"a cost of £180,000, a sanatorium for the cure of mental disorders, and endowed it with £50,000. The Professor states that he has undertaken the establishment or endowment of these institutions, because he deemed it his duty to make some acknowledgement to the public for the means, which, through them, he now possesses. When a man can afford to dispense his charity iv his munificent way, it shows pretty plainly that advertising pays some people. When Holloway first started business in 1842 he speut £5,000 iv one year in advertising. In the present year it has reached £40,000. The Professor boasts that among his correspondents he numbers kings and princes. It is stated that under the crest, painted on his brougham, is the motto, ■* Who'd bave thought it, pills have bought it.