NEWS BY THE MAIL.

Thames Star, Volume VII, Issue 2637, 21 June 1877, Page 2

NEWS BY THE MAIL.

(compiled feom the home news.)

The journals of Madrid give details of aromatic tragedy in that city. In the street Caballero de Gracia is a shop of fancy articles kept by a man named Gasso and his daughter, a young woman of some talent; as a writer, and who edits a journal of fashions on her own account. She had been sought in marriage by a clerk in one of the-Government ° offices, .but her father opposed the union apparently from selfish motives, for the shop belonged to the daughter, to whom it had been leftr by the ""mother; Her desire to accept the matrimonial offer made td her was a frequent subject of quarrel between her and her father, and a tew days back the man went into her room early in the morning while she was'still in bedf and after endeavoring in vain to induce her to promise to abandon her idea of marriage he fired a revolver ' at h.er, the ball lodging in' her head, and then blew out his own brains. The unfortunate'young woman was take* to an hospital, but the extraction of thafrallet was an operation so dangerous thn none of the surgeons would at first attempt it. She then contracted marriage in extremis, made a will in favor of her husband, and received the Sacrament, but according to - the latest accounts hopes are entertained of saving. her.- - -.-«-.- -• > - A' correspondent of thr PalU Mall Gazette writes from Copenhagen-, as follows :—-'Some time-ago I gentyoathe particulars of an impudent-robbery by which His Majesty the King had been the victim, and now-1 hare to relate how Prince Waldemar, the .youngest* brother - of-the Princess of Wales, has beeir.made the victim- of his kind-heartedness.; It appears that some time ago a person, under the pretence of wishing to sell some, curious .coins, had., obtained access to His -Royal.Highnesii,ltfhais iiffeftthusiastic collector of rare coins, medals, and antiquities, and' who, I am informed, possesses a very rare collection already. The coins offered. for sale . were valueless,' but the Prince ''good'hatyrldly showed the person his own collection and ' dismissed him. MA-;- few;. ~;days afterwards, .having , evidently -watched his <?; opportunity, the: man himself again,- and . being recognised by the porter was; allowed to enter the castle, where, [telling the valet of the Prince that he came to attend an appointment with .his Royal Highness, he was incautiously allowed to enter the Prince's apartments, and quickly profiting- by the occasion, and having/remarked' wb\ere the Prince kept his gold medals, some of which are unique, one single onto having been struck, he broke open-the drawers and left the place; carrying away a large number of gold coins' and 'medais. The Prince on his return at once discovered the robbery, and-information was sent to the police, who fortunately.recov,erednK*t' of the stolen property.".

The great walking-match has ended in . a defeat for Weston, who accomplished 510, while O'Le^ry, his opponent, covered 520 miles in six days. Both, men felt the effects of their long-protracted "effort severely, and it seemed,, more-ihan...once as if Q'Leary was suffering from" conges* tion of the brain. -The trial- of strength, and endurance was, of course, tremendous, but the new athletic craze isno.tone that 1 fire's ' the imagination.' If * rival pedestrians: were to try - conclusions on the Queen's high road, between London and' Edinburgh, taking a reasonable time about it and walking under natural conditions, it would be a good deal more interesting than the endless plodding round weary laps in the Agricultural Hall with the assistance "of nourishment and stimulants which they would have to forego if they were competing.with each other in the open.

Of. late some. of : the, newspaper's | tare given in their columns reports' of 'a" £erUin/ 1 Great;Turf,Swindle." The case 'Came kb an end on" Mbtiday, April 23, when the. several actors in the drama of fraud were sentenced to-periods vaiying from fifteen years' penal servitude to eighteen'- months'' imprisbnrilSntV The case itself lay in a nutshell. One of the gang induced a lady in Paris to part with upwards of £13,0C3 -in different sums, sending the. money, pot ostensibly to/himself, but to an accomplice, who professed to be acting 88 a betting ".agent." Happily for the French lady, - the men were arrested with the money.of which they had swindled Madame Goncourt, almost intact, upon them. ' .'..;!"•■>

A disclosure of Russian cruelty, which will suggest to some minds the,Sinope affair of '53, has just been made in a Parliamentary paper obtained 'by Mr O. Lewis, apropos of the treatment of the Fniat Greeks in Poland." On the ground that these were gradually being trans* formed ipto Botnan Catholics, the Russian authorities determined to step in and reassert the loyalty of their co-religionists to Oriental Christianity., .Colonel.Mansfield, the British Consul-General at War* saw, was oh the "spot and "saw" how 'this was effected—by the whip, the shot, the knout, the' lance, 1 and- the gaol^ Tjiose who refused to sign the declaratia^%ropos'ed by the Russian authorities rebwred from the Cossack whip—every adult man 50 blows, every woman 25, every child - 10. On^ woman received 100. On Jan. 1, 1875, Colonel Mansfieldjreports that" the details of the antagonism.between^the authorities and the peasants have been most | harrowing. In one village a peasant ! suffocated himself and' his family with - i charcoal rather than have bis. child bap* tized by the Government popfe. The pea- ' "sants tvere assembled and- beaten by the CossaJrs until the military surgeon slated that more would endanger life; they were then driven through a half-frozen river up to their waists into the parish;' ofturyfi through files of soldiers, where their names were entered in petition's expressing their boundless devoiiqn .to their august Sovereign Libeiitor, and-their readiness to walk in the course traced out by his. powerful Imperial will;! ", Such is the pious zeal with whichLHoly Russia propagates Christian orthodoxy. The death has just.occjrred of one of the daughters. of Robert Southey— namely, Mrs Hill," who died a few days sinpo at Leamington, in the sixty-ninth year of her age. This lady, to. whom?tbe poet often affectionately alluded id his correspondence as his " Little- Bertha," was born about 1808, when: her father had lately settled down at Keswick,-4tnd was busily employed in various literary enterprises, including the foundation of the Quarterly, the preparation for the " History of Portugal," and contribdtfons to the Edinburgh. "Annual Beglst^." Before her father's death she gave her hand to her cousin, the Rev-. Herbert; Hill, Head Master of King's School,

■■/Warwick, who, in 1845, edited his father- - in-laws latest and posthumous work, " Oliver Newman: a New England tale," with other " Poetical Remains." It was this gentleman's father, another Ecv. Herbert Hill, to whose good -offices Southey stood largely indebted in early life, and who sent him to Balliol College with the design that he should take orders in the Established Church.. A painful scene appears, by the account given of it in the Stirling Journal, to have occurred on a''recent Sunday in a parish church near Gartniore, in that, county. The minister, who is in the habit of'warn ' ing his congregation on special occasions against the machinations of the Evil One, : was delivering a discourse on his favourite theme, when suddenly a large windowblind and roller behind the pulpit lost its hold, falling right over the preacher, and completely concealing him for a time from his flock. In its descent the roller smashed a number of window-panes,, and the clatter of the falling glass added panic to the already terrified condition of the enshrouded preacher. Ignorant of the cause of the sudden darkness, and horrible' noise, he thought that he might have exceeded the. bounds of discretioniihis^ denunciations of the devil, who had^thereupon "arrived hastily in person bent on retaliation. A frightful shriek of "I am gone 1." - echoed through 'the church, and, the maddened preacher with one byundcleareci the pulpit, nor ever stopped until he < reached, the extreme corner of the edifice;! It may be well imagined that the suddenness of this alarming incident and its dramatic nature exercised a most powerful effect on the nerves of all who witnessed it.! Fortunately'there was nogeneral panic, or the consequences migHt'have been serious ;;but the story should be a lesson to those ministers _who touch upon the delicate question of the personality of the devil to retain their self-possession under any circumstances, and not leave the pulpit unless absolutely , ejected from it by force. On April 14 the wife of Captain Cox, of Efiingham Hall, was, accompanied by a page, driving a pony in a two-wheeled carriage in the direction of Guildford. On passing some unenclosed land the pony, a spirited animal, bolted. Mrs Cox found she had no control ©ver the animal, but with great presence of mind she kept her seat, and called to the page, who was in the rumble behind, to do the same. The pony, at a curve in the road, went straight in the. direction of a disused and unfenced chalk pit, which was of the .depth of seventy feet. Over the brow of the pit the animal plunged, Mrs' Cox and the boy still clinging to the vehicle.,.-Some tangled brushwood and stunted timber sloped down from the edge of the pit, and in these the wheels and ironwork of the carriage became temporarily hung, holding the vehicle suspended. - The pony broke from the shafts and fell to the bottoni of the pit, breaking its two forelegs, and sustaining other injuries. Two men who witnessed the accU . dent lan to the assistance of the lady, who, with the boy, was extricated from her perilous position uninjured. - The pony - was so injured as to necessitate its being slaughtered on the spot.