NEWS IN BRIEF.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume III, Issue 115, 9 July 1875, Page 12

NEWS IN BRIEF.

The Cuban insurgents are very active in secluded portions of the Islands, burning many plantations and worrying Valrnaseda generally. Owing to unusually heavy snows, the Swiss Canton of the Grisons was recently for weeks cut off from communication with the outside world. The ' Berlin Post ' (ministerial journal) warns the people that war is likely to come, and hints at a projected Austro-Italian alliance with France. The military enrollment of destitute persons in. the grasshopper regions of Minnesota, numbers 9,154, of whom 4,237 are under twelve years of age. Officers in the British army will no longer be allowed to exchange from one regiment to another, in order to escape service in corps ordered abroad. Sunday, April 11, was like a summer day — in New York and vicinity at least — while on Tuesday, April 13, there was a heavy snow storm, worthy of December. It is reported that the Berlin Government intends to prosecute the German subscribers to the Carlist fund for fomenting a rebellion against a friendly power.. The police court at Stockton, Cal., has been idle for a month, not a single case having been brought before it. There have been great changes in California since 1849. The American parties engaged in making the observations of the transit of Venus have accumulated an immense amount of material, both mathematical and photographic. A bell tas recently been cast into Germany weighing 50,000 pounds. It was made from cannon taken from the French during the l?-te war. It is for the Cathedral Church at Cologne. A Savoy paper says that, the watershed at the tunnel having been adopted as the Franco-Italian boundary of Mount Cenis, Italy will have to cede to France about 450 metres of ground. It is said that the old law forbidding intercourse between the Pope and Catholic clergy of Prussia, except through the Government, will be re-enacted, and Papal authority wholly suspended. The Paris 'Moniteur' (semi-official) declares that France is unanimous for peace as a paramount necessity. She is not conspiring against any one. The French press generally concur in this opinion. The British House of Commons, on April 7, by a vote of 152 to 187, refused to order to a second reading a bill to enable unmarried women to vote at Parliamentary elections. Mr. Disraeli voted with the minority.

Since the publication of Gen. Cabrera's manifesto to the Carlists, 244 officers have left the service of Don Carlos and entered Prance. Of these nine were generals. Many others have surrendered to the Alfonsists. The celebration of the centenary of the battles of Lexington and Concord on April 19, -was a grand success. There were processions, orations and banquets. President Grant took part in the celebration at both places. The Chicago Adventists assembled there on the night of April 20, in a private way, and waited until nearly morning, with their white robes in readiness, for the expected end of the world. Then they quietly dispersed. Sir Michael Hicks-Beach, Chief Secretary for Ireland, stated on April 13, in the House of Commons that the law in regard to the bearing of arms in Ireland would not interfere with the American riflemen who are going there. In opening the Catholic Church at Kensington, England, on April 9, Cardinal Manning said he regarded his trust as a commission of warfare ; for he believed the church was approaching the most fiery crisis of three hundred years in its history. _In reply to a petition from the Catholic bishops protesting against the recent ecclesiastical laws, the Emperor of Germany has expressed his regret that the bishops should cause a disturbance by disobeying laws which were always obeyed in other countries. An English paper announces a new industry in London. A man advertises himself as "waker up and window tickler, from three to seven." He wakes those who wish to get up early. Window tickling is waking without ringing the bells, by means of a long pole with which he taps on the window pane. Five cans of gunpowder, placed in a basket, were left in the vestibule of St. Francis Xavier's Church in Cincinnati on Saturday night, April 17, and material outside the basket fired. It was discovered by the sexton and thrown in the street, where four of the cans exploded. The only explanation offered is that it was put there to destroy the machinery of the contractor who is completing the tower. It is Btated in the 'Scientific American,' on the authority of Dr. Revillout, that lemon-juice, used as a gargle, is an efficacious specific against diptheria and similar throat troubles. He has succea»f ully thus employed it for over eighteen ye irs. Young Napoleon, placed at the head of his class at Woolwich in riding, comes honestly by his skill. His father was one of the finest horsemen in Europe, and sat his horse as though a part of it, while his mother, in her younger days, was not far behind her husband, as every one knows who has seen her in hunting parties at Fontainbleau. Jqg*, We understand that Miss Ida Greeley, daughter of the late lamented Horace Greeley, founder of the 'New York Tribune,' is engaged to be married to Colonel N. Smith, of Kentucky, His Eminence the Cardinal Archbishop of New York it is said will perform the ceremony, which is to take place in the fall, when MiBB Greeley returns from her contemplated European tour. A Genoese Marchioness, who keeps her name a secret, has recently made the Holy Father the donation of two-thirds of her great wealth to be paid annually to the Holy See, as long as the present troubles of the Church last, The amount will be 50,000 francs each half year. Thiß is indeed a noble example and worthy of the apostolic ages. An exchange says : " Archbishop Manning recently remarked that he had long sought for some instances of invention or discovery by a woman, and the best he had been able to find Avas Thwaites's soda water, an improved make of soda water invented by a Miss Thwaites of Dublin, an amateur chemist, which drove all other kinds out of the market." The will of an old man, who died recently in Brussels, tells how he once found a valuable diamond in Asia, which he concealed in a cut in the calf of his leg, where he made an intentional wound. The apparent misfortune procured his release from the mine, and he was made immensely rich by the sale of the gem, which is now one of Rvusia's crown diamonds. There are it is said 41 theatres, and 400 actors and actresses in London, and 200 theatres, and 2,000 actors and actresses in the "United Kingdom. Women compositors ai'e not such a modern institution as many imagine. In 1794, one Deltufo established an office in Paris, where the fair sex net up type, and turned out several pamphlets and books. Deltufo petitioned the Assembly even to he allocated a portion of its printing, aa by bii_ reform he restored men to agriculture and the army. The democratic party in Italy is breaking with Garibaldi. It does not approve of his Tiber and Campagna improvement notions, or of his visits to and from the King and Princes. Mgr. Simeoni, the new Nuncio to Madrid, left Eome on the 19th. Senor Benavides, in the name of his Government, placed at the Nuncio's disposal a ship of war to convey him from Bayonne to Santander, where he will disembark on Spanish soil. A' Female College is to be built at Yeddo by the Empress of Japan. It is intended for the education of young girls who wish to devote themselves to the career of teachers. A Naval relic of some interest — the sails of Nelson's flagship, the Victory — has been found in Chatham Dockyard. The sails bear the name of the maker, and the date September, 1805, and are pierced with shot holes, one of the largest having ninety, and the maintopsail sixty holes. The Victory was paid off at Chatham after the battle of Trafalgar. A centenarian was married recently, according to the ' Echo dv Parlement,' which states that a lady of Coire, aged 103, has just been united to a bridegroom of 60. This was the bride's fifth spouse. Carrier piegons in France continue to attract more and more attention, and a tower 75 feet high has been erected in the Paris Jardin d' Acclimatisation as the head-quarters of the carriers used for conveying military dispatches.