General News.

Thames Star, Volume XVI, Issue 5098, 20 May 1885, Page 2

General News.

" To fling away the Soudan," said Sir Samuel Baker, "is to .fling away the granary of the world; to abandon Khartoum is to surrender what will be the richest entrepot in the world. If the Soudan were in English hands, in a very few years you would be entirely independent of the United States for both cotton and corn. You hare no idea what a country it is; soil fertile beyond belief, an inexhaustible water supply, and the whole traversed through by two great highways. Many a time have I ridden through deserted districts in which the corn or dhurra was growing high enough to coyer the elephant, and that without the slightest cultivation. . ... . To tap this immense reservoir of undeveloped wealth all that is necessary is a a short railway from Suakim to the Nile and a decent Government. But to abandon it would be to open the vast reigon to be scrambled for by the filibusters and pirates of the world."

The Russian military paper Sret pretends that it knows why England specially wishes to have Herat at any price, and says the moment the English possess that place a great road will be made from the Caspian to India. The distance from Sibi.s in Beluchistan, where the Indian railway ends, to Herat is only about 430 miles. English messengers traverse it in four days.'Herat is halfway from India to Kurope. Whoever possesses it is master of this road. The English are prepared, the writer declares^ to give Russia Penjdeb, Maimenah, and Buleh, and in exchange will retain Herat. He thinks that England will never resolve upon a war at the gates of India, but Unsm must defend her rights in Central Asia by force of arms.

In the House of Lords, on March 20, Lord Thurlow moved a resolution in favor of opening the Natural History Afusuem at South Kensington to the Public on -Sunday, afternoon?. Earl Cairns doubted whether the working classes desired Sunday opening, especially as the electric light afforded opportunities for admitting the public on week-day evenings. On a division the numbers for and against were equal, sixty-four, and in accordance with established rule, the resolution was declared not to have been carried.

Herr Rudolph Falb, whose theory of earthquakes has for some years been much discussed in scientific circles, and whoso predictions have frequently been sub* stantiated by events, has just promulgated a new theory with reference to choke damp mines. He says that explosions coincide for the most part with earthquakes, and he predicts a rery critical state of things shortly, when, he says, the greatest caution should be obaerred in mines. The next dates when he anticipates danger are the 30th March, the 12th of June, and the 12th of/July.—Home Papsr.