TOPICS OF THE DAY.

Press, Volume LIII, Issue 9445, 17 June 1896, Page 4

TOPICS OF THE DAY.

Pjsoplui who bew|itsVff\\ . A - <*many have reaiftSr |or c 4p»', Remarkable the shortness /qf'^Wftjt, .^," Memory. memories, "will • £ "• envy of the ttev. Glittle*^' Ofark'e capacity for rememberings ;• faculty is almost a. tine qjia non for and Mr Clark probably owes no little'β^fg , great euoceaa on the platform to hie possef^;." sion of a memory whioh appear* to nearly^,-r approach a talent. He gives /'pMof ..fljf Jtiji\ '. : - ability in this, respect whenever neJee|otttV , but; what he himself believea was thefmoffe" ~*■ singular , example of his povrar of f! = -; he describee to a recent interviewed > T f ,- ; and hie wife, in 1892, went iot;>.,a : j»on<|on ' ; / restaurant and eat*down at a table.Beir_£o a, man whom--Mr Clark' reoognisjjfl. al» once. " You don't remember mc, Mr tHark/'tatf J: the individual. ••Oh, yes, I ,-•s>■£ .J...: responded Mr Clark, ,r y6u were the Mfcyet., of (Jilenage (South Africa), when-I.«*^ : there io 1879." « Wi.i'e thia vru goiegoaj|fe gentleman Mr Clark had known 'in came up from another ÜbK and~ " You.don'b remember mc, M> must ahake hands, though, aal am|o»t "Idid remember him, thoagh," « reverend gentleman, *' and told him ec; juab then a third gentleman, who had heard ue, got up from ao adjoining and said, • Well, I am anre you remember mc. When did you see mc f:-'f*^| ■} at once replied, *la the train Quebec and Montreal. You ahW«*tJ>:U mc your travelling bag, and I jjotlike ife. You are Mr Ruesell.* , was three men, unknown to each otuer, m& at widely diflforent times, and in ?}A*V '■ different parts of the world, all to be in that room." Our reader* *?iv' v -. agree, we think, that as a proof of V,. memory thie incidentlie bard to beat. •;M f l '-.. Clark it evidently better at, remembering the people he meets in the colomee than * V aome of our visitor*, whose memories, whe« : they do happen to meet a colouial at Horn?. .;! are said to be sometimes of the very shortest ?.$s description. Mc CUrk, by the way, an elderly man, leaus an «IwWJ busy and, we should think, Hchauaiing li*\ Hβ leotnrea on ap avar &%* five nights in the winUr.wMQu in out to the colonies foe out wicker, back, for mare leotnri«g. *<&!?:£& preaohw He-ie Iα gr<%t «q«e9t. J scribe* himself a« "asorb at anniv«m#£,j|

ebaplata to the Nonconformist bodies," and nli beat in that capacity is practically only bonded by tbe fonr seas.

Thk Millenial Exhibition $he now being held at BudaHaogariw Pesth, in celebration of the Exhibition, thousandth anniversary of tbe birth of Hungary as a nation, is probably the mo3t splendid affair of its kind that has over taken place in Europe. Undoubtedly one of the most interesting features of the great? show, alika to viiitori and to Huugariaua themselves, is (he village street which has been erected, Aonsittiug of a double row of houses, the purely Hungarian on the one stde, and thoee belonging to the nationalities which have Keen incorporated in Hungary in the course of a thousand years on the other. Included in the buildings in this street jj a Town Hftil, which it is safe to predict will becoma highly popular. A marriage register is kept in the Hall and itt certain dates three times a month any betrothed couple may be married, according to the civil cjremony, in the Exhibition grounds and have their names booked in this register. Furthermore, the Committee of the Exhibition invite the young couples, with all their friends, for a week's feasting god furnish them with carriages, horses, food, and living room. Tho Committee, it must be admitted, do not do all this from entirely disinterested motives. They reason, with tolerable certainty, that the festivities consequent upou these wed* dings and the picturesque scenes of country life will prove 'powerful attractions to visitors, who will thus j be enablod to witness old-time customs in the heart of tho city. The Committee no doubt also depend upon the bold advertisement which the exhibition will receive from tbe young married people when they return to their remote village home 3. Its glories will be thus told in parts of the empire which could hardly be reached by other means. Weeks before the exhibition opened it bod been arranged that the firet marriage to be thus psrformed would bs thfct of a Saxon couple from Transylvania, one of the most distinctive races under the sway of the Emperor. According to • recent writer, the Saxons brought all their furniture, their dresses, their kitchen utenlils to Transylvania, and built their houses According to the fishion of their forefathers Mven hundred years ago. They have not dropped one item of their customs, have not forgotten a word of their language, marry none but cone and daughters of tuoir own race, and work the land iv German fashion. There are 250,000 of them, and they do not increase, their families rarely exceeding two children. The millenial exhibition should derauoh good for Hungary, if only in the W»y of making snob various races as are btfdad up iv it better acquainted with oaoh often

The latest incident of inAn teres t in the trial of Dr. Adventurous Jameson and his officers, Bide. as chronicled in tho London papers, was the examination of the cyclist who took messages from the Reform Committee in Johannesburg to Dr. Jameson before the latter was defeated by the Boere. The oycliet in question, a Mr A.M. Rowland, a mechanical engineer in Johannesburg, said he was instrumental in forming a cyclists' corps in that city in December last. On January Ist he and another man, Celliers, were inttraotod to take despatches to Jameion, and ho concealed thorn in the L pin of the saddle tube of his m&ohine. He and his companion had to p»ss through Krugeratlorp on their way, and were stopped by the Boers, who ttave them deepatches, to , give $o ,one s ,oi the Boer commanders and also furnished them with

passports. The witness admitted that ho ' did not tell the Boera he Was carrying messages to Jameson. Aft«r meeting several baadeof armed Boers they came across the man for whom they were bearing deap»tohea,

and duly delivered them up, being warned

by the Boers not to fro too far as .they might fall into the hands of the English column. The whole country appeared to be alive with Boars, but after awhile the cyclists got through them and eventually met Jameson. The despatches do not appear to have been of great importance, except in so far aa they confirm the understanding between the Reform Committee and " Doctor Jim." Rowland was enabled to give the latter and his officers some, useful information aa to the number of Boera that had collected at various points on the road to Johannesburg, and he was then given a written despatch to ttke back to the city, which he concealed in the framework of Juabioyole.

~. Tub return jouJ&ey was Cbptnred probably rather irfftre full of by Boers, iucident than the oycliate altogether appreciated. They had' not gone far when they were •topped by half-a-dozen Boers who, said Rowland, " put cartridges in their rifles and got in the. way generally. They told us," b« added, " that we had been communicating with Jameson's column; they had been on the top of the hill aad had seen us." If bard swearing could have procured Mr Rowland aod his friend their liberty they Would soon have been free, but in' spite of taetr strenuous denials that they had been with Jameson, che Boere preferred the •vidence of their eyesight,. and took the

' y°uog meu prieoners. They also assured them that they would take care the English 1 ' did. not hurt them, but any satisfaction , -Which might have obtained from this assurance W an rather diminished by the unplea*

•»at and significant way with whioh the Boera tappeJ their 'rifles. Mr Rowland

' went on to describe the maroh with bis ', *. captori. The latter, for some reason, <> ■ Wanted Uie oycUttf to ride fcheh 'machines 'J ep the hills,, atad said they would shoot r , them if they did not do it, bob the young , men declared they were too tired—" though * Wβ could easily have done it if we had liked "—ud stolidly shoved- their bicycles

ap and down litlL At laat Rowland

■ mounted at the top of a hill, fend letting his , machine ran away with him upset it into a X Watar-oourse at the bottom. Aβ he lay in th* water he let the air outt of the Urte, and left the machine, with its ; ; hidden despatch, lying where i> fell. His

companion did the same, and more threatening* of murder from the Boers followed the , totioa. Eventually both men, after the ' action at Doornkop, managed to give their ' : Ctpton the slip, and reached Johannesburg

„• HMly. Rowliud afterwards searched for J»t« bicycle, but could not find it, and the Utt he hetrd was that a young Boer was > Ken (iding it, all unconsoioue that an important despatch was concealed in it. There h loffiething decided ly comical in the idea of a valuable piece of evidence in each an important caw being whirled round the Wuntry in thU faahion.