MISCELLANEOUS EXTRACTS.

Southland Times, Issue 931, 10 April 1868, Page 3

MISCELLANEOUS EXTRACTS.

" Hard Times" in America.— TheNew York '• Tribune" says :— " Winter bas Bet in early and sternly; the markets are glutted with fabrics which are selling at low prices ; 1867 has been a hard year for manufacturers and merchants generally, because of the steady decline in the price of goods, which constrained ! them to sell for less than the cost of stock so that there is generally no profit on the year's business, and often a serious loss. Then the cotton crop has failed in large districts, and is, on the whole below an average, while it sells for scarcely half its price a year ago. The corn crop also is below the average : hence high prices for bread and meat, with no corresponding advantage to the farmers who cannot buy goods so freely as they have done. So business slackens where it does not stagnate, and thousands are out of work. We have complaints of consequent suffering and rapine in Louisiana, which was desolated by floods in spring, by yellow fever in summer and autumn, and badly damaged by the army worm; while thousands vainly seek employment in this, and we presume in nearly or quite every other city. Hence a very general anp well-founded cry of hard times.' ' Mttltum in Pabyo — Another Caiilfoknian Intention — John Mott, an ingenious mechanic of Danville, Contra Costa County the patentee of " Mott's Eevolving Plough," has recently received a patent on an invention which in a very small compass combines half-a--dozen tools constantly required by farmers and ranchmen, and intended to obviate the necessity of carrying a whole kit of tools into the field. It may be described in brief as a " vyce-wrench." It resembles a common screw-wrench in shape, but it is also so constructed as to serve for a vyce as well, and the lips are so formed as to admit of its being put into a cavity or opening to turn a screw where a common wrench could not be used. It is also so constructed as to be used as a hammer and nail-claw, and to some extent as a hatchet, and in the handle a gimlet, punch, chisel, file, &c, are carried, ready to be used whenever required. In case of the breaking of a plough, wagon, harness, or any agricultural implement, this invention would enable a man to repair damages in most cases without going to the house or shop, thus saving its cost in valuable time almost any day. An unbroken railway communication is now open from the Atlantic seaboard to the Rocky Mountains, a distance of more than 2000 miles. The line passes over the Mississipi and Missouri rivers on bridges— at Eock Island on the former, and at Omaha on the latter — so that, if necessary, the entire journey can be performed in the same carriages. The Philadelphia papers have been discussing the propriety of Sunday evening concerts. They are about to inaugurate the practice in that city. In Boston the Sunday performances of oratorio, in which Madame Parepa-Rosa takes part, are attended with great success. — The Orchestra.