LATE ENGLISH NEWS.

Westport Times, Volume VI, Issue 964, 23 April 1872, Page 2

LATE ENGLISH NEWS.

'i v he Jews have reason to be proad of the elevation of Mr Jessel. It is a great privilege to serve one's country; and it is a special subject for gratification that, in a profession iu which intellect is the whole standard, a post of sirdi distinction should have been offered to a Jew. The Premier of England has shown that religious opinion is no bar to political service; and we consider that the new appoint' ment is alike honorable to him and to Mr Jessel, and also to the profession and to the community to which tba new Solicitor-General belongs. The reason why Australian wool is rising in price in the Loudon market is the decrease of the home growth from 105,000,0001b in 18G8 to 145,000,0001b in 1871, say equal to 60,000 bales. Another reason is the decrease in the American growth from 177,000,0001b in 1863 to 14(5,000,0001 b in 1871, say equal to 100,000 bales ; total decrease for England and America, 160,000 bales. There must also be a decrease in the French jield of wool, on account of the sheep slaughtered during t nfl war. Mr Matthew Greatbead, of Richmond, died on January 7. He wasjn the 102 nd year of age, and was born

at High Coniscliffe, near Darlington, on April 23, 1770. He entered the Lennox Lodge, No. 123, of Freemasons in the year 1797, and was a member of the lodge seventy-five years. At the annual appointment of officers for the lodge he was appointed Inner Guard. Mr Grreathead before his death had the honor to be the oldest Freemason in England, and was supposed to be the oldest in the world. A Chatham Island correspondent writes to a contemporary :—-It may interest the curious to know that our extensive lagoon is margined on one side with smooth, hard crystalline limestone rocks, all of which are as copiously inscribed as the walls of Sennacherib's palace. The characters are of the rudest description, in basso relievo, not unlike the carvings on old runic monuments, and some are as sharply cut as if done but yesterday. The aboriginal natives are utterly ignorant of these characters, or for what purpose, or by whom they were thus graven on the rocks, no traditions relative thereto having been handed down. Messrs Bailliere and Co., of Melbourne, have succeeded in procuring in Hull a complete file of English papers from 1799. The file is composed of the ' Morning Chronicle' from 1799 to 1820 and then the 'Times' takes up the continuance. The journals are bound in volumes, and most of them have already arrived in the colony. A few volumes have to come to hand to complete the dates from 1799 to 1871. As showing the difference in journalism of the past and the present, we may mention that the account of the battle of Wateiloo in the 'Morning Chronicle' takes up only about a third of a column. After the account of the battle follows a list of killed and wounded, occupying nearly a column. The whole matter is compressed into a space that to us of modern days seems incredible. Many a column would be now occupied with so important a battle as that of Waterloo. Our forefathers were, however, compelled to be satisfied with what they could get.