THROUGH OUR EXCHANGES.

Bruce Herald, Volume XVII, Issue 1691, 23 October 1885, Page 3

THROUGH OUR EXCHANGES.

• The Colonial Treasurer of New South Wales states £115,000 will cover the entire expense of the Soudan expedition. An amateur performer named Whelan had just responded to an encore at an entertainment given in Adelaide, when he dropped dead. The amount of money expended in fencing alone in the pastoral districts of Australasia is estimated at over 150 millions sterling. The German gunmakeis have their foundries filled with gigantic cannon for Turkish vessels and for Turkish coast defences. Twenty years ago the House of Commons contained only two teetotallers, but at present it has thirty-six members who have foresworn alcohol. A movement is on foot to bring out Mr Bradlaugh for a lecturing tour through Australia and New Zealand after the next general ©lection in England. General Grant, says a writer in ' Harper's Monthly,' was never known to utter a profane or impure word. The General was not by any means a perfect man, but we should like to know of how many famous soldiers the same could be recorded. It was said, as something quite exceptional, of a certain poet that dying he left no line which he could wish to blot. An appropriate inscription on Gjtent's tomb, and one as rare aa appropriate, would be — Here lies a soldier who never awore. A Stockporb gentleman, having written to Earl Spencer assuring him that he had the sympathy of thousands of the working classes for the manner in which he conducted the Irish Viceroyalty, has received the following reply:— "l did nothing but my duty. I have been held up to politicians as a

coercion advocate, but I have strongly advocated and helped to carry remedial measures for Ireland. I have certainly done my utmost to vindicate law, and it ia pleasant to get the approval contained in your letter." A pigeon race has just taken plac» from Dover to Plymouth, under theauspices of the Plymouth Flying Club, it being the last old bird race of tha season. The birds were liberated on Dover Oastle Hill at 4.45 a.m. The atmosphere was clear and cloudless, with no wind. The first telegram announcing the arrival of the winner in Plymouth showed that the bird had ! accomplished the distance of about 250 miles at the rate of somewhat over 1000 yards per minute. The second and .third prizes were carried off with" velocities of about 980 yards per minute. France of late has been terribly fertile ia the production of young criminals of : a most pronounced type, and within the past week or two several precocious murderers have been sentenced to various terms of imprisonment. The latest case is that of a young girl, who has just been condemned to 20 years* penal servitude in La Vendee for hay« ing murdered her father by beating out his brains with a wooden beam. To test the practicability of peasant proprietorship, 38 small plots of agricultural land were recently offered for sale at Colchester. Twenty per cent of the purchase money was to be paid down, the balance in instalments in ten years. No purchasers, however, were forthcoming, although the land was to be tithe free and the land tax redeemed. The 'Standard,' while praising generally the remarks of Sir M. 11. Beach at Bristol, wishes it could say as much for his observations with regard to Irish policy. We have, it says, no complaint to make about his reference to the value of Lord Spencer's services in Ireland. The recognition, though tardy and not altogether graciously conceived, was unequivocal. But a harder task remained, not nnessayed but unfulfilled. Was tho recent attitude of some members of the Cabinet compatible with the respect due to the statesman who saved Irish society? Everybody knows that it was not. Lord Carnarvon is now honourably trying to govern Ireland by his conciliatory speeches and friendly sympathy. We hope that he will succeed ; but how precarious is tho structure he is trying to raise, the frank warnings given to him by the Limerick deputation on Saturday suffice to show. But whether it is to stand or fall, not one stone of it could have been laid above another if Lord Spencer had not first of all cleared the ground. San Francisco papers report the death lately in that city, in the most wretched state of destitution, of a well-known character, Johnny Skae, who seven years ago was estimated to be worth ten millions of dollars. He was employed at Virginia city as an operator in the California Telegraph Company when the four Bonanza kings, Flood, O'Brien, Mackay, and Fair, were developing their operations connected with the efilver mines in California and Virginia city. They communicated with each other in cipher. Skae dis? covered the key to this cipher, and became aware long in advance of every one else of the marvels which were to astonish the public. All the money he could command or borrow he invested in shares of the two mines ; and when the allotment was finally settled, and public excitement had somewhat cooled, it was found that the telegraph operator was worth 3,000,000 dols. But he was not content, and speculated largely in much leas safe investments, so that when. the great commercial crash came booh afterwards it quite ruined him. He disappeared from view altogether until about a year ago, when a policeman in San Francisco found him lying on the street at night helplessly drunk. The man who some years before was worth ten millions of dollars, upon being searched, was found to possess only a few small coins.