MISCELLANEOUS NEWS.

Inangahua Times, Volume IV, Issue 96, 16 November 1877, Page 2

MISCELLANEOUS NEWS.

The following paragraph is from thft j Central Law Journal of Augu t 24 last, published iv St. Louis, America :— Mr William Downie Stew.art, a barrister of the Supreme Court of New Zealand, travelled through the United States (we believe} in the year 1,875, and, on his return home delivered a lecture to a society of law students,, iv which he instituted nvmy instructive comparisons. - I between the laws of America, England, I Scotland, and his own country. Considering the fact that this gentleman lives literally on the other side of the world from us, and that his observations of our laws and institutions were necessarily hasty, bis paper exhibits esemely few inaccuracies of statement. How the perusal of such a paper dissipates tho dreams of our boyhood !. How vividly it calls to our minds the fact that in a country the most remote from us in the globe — the Terra Australia Xn^ognita.-— which, in our youth, we were accustomed to associate ouly with the idea of tat toed savages, a great empire is in process of growth ; for there, in the most fertile of soils, the greatest of men have planted the greatest of languages and the greatest of laws. Sir Wilfrid Lawson, speaking at a banquet given by the Mayor of Carlisle to the corporation of that city, said : — *• The past session was more onerous and more wearisome than any session I ever remetu- . ber. It has now beooo&e a question of physical endurance. I suppose that m future, when we oome before our constituents for re-election, we shall not say we are sound politicians, but we shall declare that we are sound iv wiud nnJ limb. Tho public will not oiuvass our merits aud say, • How does he talk F but • How does he walk ?' We shall not p.uf? ourselves before the public as souud Constitutionalists, but as men who have sound constitutions, able to sit up for twenty-sis, hours at a stretch. You laugh, but J* am, sure that, joking and laughing apart, up, one in this room does not regret the performance of last session. '* There have been," Sir Wilfrid said, exceptional circumstances in which exceptional proceed* ings had resulted io produoiug the desired effect, as in the case of Mr Pliinsoll. There was, howover, something expiuua, dramatic, and alartmug about his performance Of the Home .Rulers there was nothing either exciting, alarming, or dramatic. There was really nothing more stupid than listening for iweiuy-six hours to all their twaddle, aud nothing less likely to produce the desired effect, if any effect be desired." A telegram from Geneva states that Mi? Lewis and Mr Paterson, with three guides, the brothers Knubcl, left Kermatt on Sept. 7th, to ascend the Lyskamm ; aU five were killed by the bursting of a glaoier. Mr Kermatt and Patersou were buried in the English cemetery at Zero matt. The guides were married men with families. Subsequent information stales, that the party lett the Kiffel Hotel, about 2 a.m. on September Sth, with three guides. As they did not return tliac evening, a party started next day to seewhether they had gone down the Italian side, but they returned with the news that all had perished, owing, so far as they* could make out, to the giving way of a, cornice of snow on the edge of the moimtain. The whole five bodies were preci-. pitated a distance of 3000lt or 4000 ft, and death must hove been instantaneous. The accident is the most terrible that has. ever occurred here, and a universal gloom is spread over the whole place. All the guides left wives with children, and a sub*, scription is being opened for, them. A telegram from Pesth states that another letter has appeared in the Han* garian journals from M. Kossitfh, who, asserts that the interests of AustroHungary and lurkey in the war ar,a identical, and that the ruin of the monarchy, is inevitable if it does not join wjth, Turkey against Hussia. Atter cop? demniug the policy of the Vienna Cabinet, which, he says, observes a neutrality favorable to the Russians and hostile to tho Turks, M. Kossuth advises the Hungarian Parliament to force theGovernment to pursue a policy in con<v formity with the unanimous wishes of the nation, which otherwise would find itself obliged to take into its own hands the. defence of existence. The Telephone is coming into use in ' New York, no less than five of the in« struments being now in operation in that city. One of these connects the office of" the Clyde steamship Hue with the. wharf from which its vessels sail, and another connects the piers of the Brooklyn Bridge* with the Superintendent's office, so that all the movements of the "travellers"' in carrying the wires across from pier to pier can be communicated and directed without the use of signall flags as at present. The current of sound in these telephones is carred by a single wire in, either direction. AU that is possible to do in ordinary conversation, between two-, persons sitting within two feet of each other in a room can be done at the distance of five or ten miles, or even a, greater distance, by simply raising the voice and speaking a little slower than., naturally. The Telephone instruments themselves are very simple* consisting of two wooden tubes, one of which is placed; at the mouth, the other at the ear. General Grants at the Lord Provost's, reception in Glasgow said— " Though I may not live to see a general settlement of national disputes by arbitration, it will not be very many years before that system, of settlement will be adopted, and the immense standing armies thafc are depr.es-. sing Eu?ope by their great expense will be disbanded. * The arts oE war, wiU b& almost forgotten in the general devotion*, of the people .to the development of peace-, ful industries. I want to see, and believe. I will see, Great Britain,, the,. "United, States and Canada joined .with a cpmmoa. purpose iv the advancement of civilization, and an invincible community of EnV glish-speaking nations that all the woicl^ Uesid.es cpuld not .conquer:,!'