MISCELLANEOUS.

New Zealand Spectator and Cook's Strait Guardian, Volume III, Issue 197, 19 June 1847, Page 3

MISCELLANEOUS.

Tailoring Machine. — The Boston correspondent of the Worcester Spy, (American paper) writes as follows :—": — " I have been examining a new machine for sewing, which has recently been invented and constructed by an ingenious mechanic of Cambridge. So far as I am informed on the subject, this is the first attempt to construct a machine of the kind, and it appears to me to bean eminently successful one. The machine is very compact, not occupying a space of more than six inches each w ay. It runs with so much ease, that I should suppose one person might easily operate twenty or thirty of them, and the work is none in the most thorough and perfect mander. Both sid.es of a seam look alike, ap-

pearing to be beautifully stitched, and the seam is closer and more uniform than when sewed by bands. It will iew straight or curved seams with equal facility, and so rapidly, that it takes but two minutes to sew the whole length of the outside seam of a pair of man's pantaloons. It sets four hundred stitches in a minute with perfect ease, and the proprietor thinks there is no difficulty in setting seven hundred in a minute. The thread is less worn by this process than by hand sewing, and consequently retains more of its strength. The simplicity of the construction of this machine, and the accuracy, rapidity, and perfection of its operation, will place it in the same rank as the card machine, the straw braider, the pin machine, and the coach-lace loom machines." We understand that rats have in general increased of late years, especially during the last summer. In some places in Sussex that we have heard of, they are increased beyond measure, both in size and quantity. In our parish the vagrants have been unable to occupy their usual habitations. At and about Clapham, where the game has been strictly preserved the woods are iull of this vermin. A few days past a gentleman at Clapham, in turning over his mangel worzel, destroyed 105. The destruction of corn has been, and is now, daily very great. — Brighton Gazette. In a recent trial in Edinburgh respecting the copyright of Professor Stewart's famous Di- sertation, published in the Encyclopaedia, it was- stated in evidence that Mr. Stewart received £1,600 for the Dissertation, a larger sum than any ever paid to any contributor, being more than double the sum paid to Sir Walter Scott, who received twenty- five guineas a sheet. On the evidence of Mr. Napier, also, it appeared Ricardo, Jeffrey, and other emi- | nent men, never received more than twenty guineas a sheet. The Fires of 1846. — Mr. Braidwood, the Superintendent of the London engine establishment, has laid before the committee of the brigade his annual report of fires in the metropolitan district during the year 1846. The total number of workshops, warehouses, and private dwellings, that were entirely destroyed and considerably damaged by fire, was 258. The total number of* similar buildings that were slightly damaged by fire, water, &c, was 576, making a total of 834. The number of chimney alarms was 69, and lalse alarms 119,^aking in the whole 188, which shows a grand total of 1,022 — a larger number than has ever taken place since the formation of the establishment. Out of the above, there were fifteen outbreaks, which were attended with loss of life, and the total number of lives lost at the same was 23.