SESSIONAL CURIOSITIES OF 1842.

Nelson Examiner and New Zealand Chronicle, Volume II, Issue 54, 18 March 1843, Page 216

SESSIONAL CURIOSITIES OF 1842.

[From the Atlas.'] Among the original and odd things which transpired during the session, and which have amused, if not surprised us, may be classed the following curious and singular petitions, presented at different periods to the house : — 1. Petition from Charles Bradley, a law declaring it blasphemy in any one who shall teach anything contrary to sound doctrine. 2. Petition that the house would devise means for the immediate relief of the whole of the unemployed portion of the community. 3. Petition for a law to regulate the hours during which the journeymen bakers shall work in Ireland, fixing those hours at between sue in the morning and six in the evening, 4. Petition from the Rational Society in Hampshire, for inquiring into the causes of and remedies for the present difficulties and dangers in which all classes are involved in Great Britain and Ireland. 5. Petition, praying that the form used in our criminal courts by a prisoner declaring whether he is "guilty" or " not guilty " may be abolished. 6. Petition for a law to compel the master manufacturers, out of the wages of their labourers, to make a provision for their maintenance in sickness, old age, and for the period they may be out of employment. 7. Petition, praying the house to prevent sheep stealing. 8. Petition from the British Smimming Society, praying that provision may be made for the comfortable accommodation of bathers, not only in the parks now existing in London, but in all which may be hereafter created. 9. Petition from Lorenzo Savona, complaining of not having been paid in 1799 N the full amount of the value of a quantity of wheat sold at that period to the chief of the camp of Harhar (Ha ! ha !), and praying the house to look after his interests. 10. Petition for the establishment of home colonies throughout the kingdom. 11. Petition from certain members of the press, complaining of the use of steam power in the printing of Government works. 12. Petition, praying that the feelings and wishes of the boroughs of the empire may be ascertained through the medium of the town councils, before any magistrates are named by the Queen. 13. Petition from George Benson, praying that all the established interests and classes in the country shall be called upon to make .a sacrifice for the prevention of sabbath desecration before railroad proprietors are required to sacrifice their interests. . 14. Petition from Alexander S. Braden for limiting the length of speeches in Parliament. 15. Petition from Bryan Millington, praying that himself and others who hold leases of land may be indemnified from the ill effects of reducing the sliding scale of duties on corn. 16. For excluding Roman Catholics, as well those now elected as those who may he hereafter elected, from Parliament. 17. Petition from Mr. Douglas, praying that the Government may be directed to insert its advertisements only in those newspapers which have the largest circulation. 18. Petition from Henry Alfred Cotton, requiring the immediate dissolution of the connexion between church and state. 19. Petition complaining that confectionary from the Channel Islands was not taxed high enough before its admission into Scotland. (This was a bitter attack upon the sweets.) 20. Petitions without end, praying that brewers' casks may be regarded as sacred property, and not be seizable for their customers' unpaid rent.

A Newfoundland Court of Law. — The court-house consisted of one good sized room, with apartments for the gaoler, and a cell or two below. A chair elevated on a platform of boards, with a table before it, was the seat of the judge, A table on the floor was set apart for the clerk of the court, and there were a few chairs placed round it for the use of the sheriff and the barristers ; a bench along one side of the room was reserved for the grand jury, and a similar one opposite for the common jury. If the latter wished to consult as to their verdict, they were led out of doors by the constable, and assembled on a rock close by, where they were locked up, in imagination, till they agreed. * * * Some of the addresses to the court, when the plaintiffs or defendants acted as their own counsel, as well as one or two of the verdicts of the jury, were sufficiently ludicrous, and caused afterwards great merriment; but they would lose all their humour unless accompanied by the voice and action, and the simple earnestness of the speakers. The judge's vessel was a merchant brig hired for the purpose, and fitted up fore and aft with cabins and apartments for the various law-officers, from the judge down to the constable. * * What would an English judge think of being shipped off with all the law-officers, barristers, lawyers, clerks, and constables, and sent cruising over rough seas and along wild shores for a month or two every year?— JukeJa Excurtiont. Exercise. — Mr. Curtis, in his work on the simplicity of living, strongly recommends exercise in the^pen air, and states that it is not only conducive to the preservation of health, but is, in many cases, the most efficacious means of bene-^ fiting those whose health has become impaired by neglect of the natural laws. He strongly urges the necessity of lessening the hours of in-door employment, and observes that the proposal for shortening the hours of business, now so generally supported in London and other towns, is one the adoption of which would prove highly beneficial to the health of a very large class of the community, and would not, he thinks, be any detriment to trade ; and further recommends that the banking houses be closed at four o'clock instead of five, adding, as a precedent, that all the banks in Dublin are closed at three.

The " Cyclr of the Seasons."— Mr. Luke*. Howard, F.R.S., of Ackworth, near Pontefract, who has carried on careful meteorological observations for 'about forty years, has published the" result of his observations through two complete* cycles of eighteen years each. The rertlt shows a very general resemblance between the two periods; and Mr. Howard is convinced that in every cycle there is a succession of years above the average degree of warmth, and a succession of years below the average. It is very agreeable to find that we have now just arrived at the close of one of the colder periods, and are entering upon one of the warmer ; and Mr Howard anticipates that this and several successive years will be genial, warm, and generally favourable to abundance of the products of the soiL The subject is^ ,not only one of great curiosity to the scientific but also of practical importance, and observations like those of Mr. Howard cannot be too closely conducted. His work is illustrated with engraved diagrams, which materially assist the reader in comparing the two cycles. The reader ought to be aware that in eighteen years the moon, the sun, and the earth, come into the same relative position towards each other as they 1 were in at the beginning of the 'period ; and the theory is, that the temperature, moisture, winds, &c, on our globe, are materially affected by the relative positions of the sun and moon towards her. — Leeds Mercury. Importance of Water to Horses. — Such is the effect a change of water has been known to produce in a horse, that in some instances even the loss of a great race has been with much show of reason ascribed to this cause alone: and careful trainers have even gone so far as to carry with a horse, on the eve of an important engagement, a supply of the water he has been accustomed to. — Whyte's History of the Turf.