General News.

Thames Star, Volume XI, Issue 3738, 17 December 1880, Page 2

General News.

Mr Gladstone seems to hare, set a problem for the excisemen which they find some trouble in working out. I asked the manager of a wealthy brewery how the beer tax was working. He had, of coarse, some doubts as to whether it would ever work well; but certainly his experience proves that the representatives of the exchequer will need to be trained to their work. The collectors of the revenue entered his establishment and began operaflbns. They got puuled, desisted, consulted, and disappeared, say*--ing they would take a lesson from their colleagues who were engaged At the next brewery. They returned at two o'clock in the morning. '.* Hare you learnt your lessonP" the manager demanded. The reply was in the negative. "How were your colleagtsja^kLpingP" " Oh, we found them Bitting rnmrßi table after having 'had a try at it;' and they could do nothing but swear at the abolition of the Malt Tax." Of coarse, so long at they continue to sit and swear .they will not collect the revenue; but it is ridioulous to suppose that so easy a process as the testing of beer with a saccharbmeter and discovering its quantity by the ordinary methods of gauging is much more difficult, once learnt, than the estimation of malt v

A ghastlj story comes fronY&loueester* It appears that a lad was in the habit of sleeping near some lime-kilns, and though the practice was a dangerous one no one seems to hare interfered. The other morning a by-passer, smelling something Darning, had the curiosity to go out of his way, and saw what may be described as a very horrible light. The lad had somehow crept into the kiln, and the fire burning right underneath him had overpowered the sleeper _ by its fumes. He was, sitting against the ; side of the wall as if Me were slumbering,' his head slightly bent forward, and his hand in his trowsers'pocket. A.glance towards the fire showed that his legs had been literally charred to ashes. There is

something very horrible in. such a tale of want and destitution as this, which drove a human being to sleep in so dangerous"a place, common though suck practices may be; but there is something more horrible in >a death like this, which was so inftrt|H /v"°13 r courted, and whioh so surely and Fatally came. The Eavobed People.—Dr. S. Gibbon, medical officer of health for the Holborn district, in his report for the past year states that, whatever may be the cause, there is no doubt but tbat a Jew's life in London is, on the average* worth twice as many years as a Christian s The Hebrews of the metropolis are notoriously exempt from tubercular and scrofula taint. It is very rare that one meets with pulmonary consumption amongst them. | The medical officer of one of their large schools has remarked that their children do not die in anything lit© the same ratio is Gentile children; and in the district of ! Whitechapel the medical officer of health has reported that on the north side of the High Street, occupied by the Jews, the average death-rate is 20 per thousand, whilst on the south side, occupied by English and Irish, it is 43 p* thousand. As an illustration of the state of feeling amongst landlords in those parts of Ireland where the present agitation has taken ithe deepest root, a short time .ago we may mention that a Birmingham manufacturer s received from the vicinity of New Ross in order for a coat of mail for an Irish landlord resident in the neighbourhood. The letter containing the order stated that the applicant had been endeavoring to obtain the article in question ip several quarters, but had failed to meet.with anyone who could supply it. The firm ■. accepted the order. '"Hint to Mr Hollin^head.--The HalfGrown, Diatoonds* should be-fresented ?7 twice a day—at *wp and six. * Pofrit.—The Colonists who gave Mur-doch,-the Australian cricketer, a loving cup at the recent banquet,, might have made the testimonial much more appropriate, Why didn't they give him a "bowlP" ,