CURRENT TOPICS.

Lyttelton Times, Volume LXXXI, Issue 10310, 31 March 1894, Page 5

CURRENT TOPICS.

Dr Jolm Maclntyre, president of the British Laryngologioal Association, and demonstrator of anatomy at Glasgow Eoyal Infirmary, delivered an interesting lecture the other day on “ Hoarseness and its Significance,” before the Insurance and Actuarial Society of Glasgow. In the coarse of bis remarks. Dr Macintyre said that"* hoarseness differed in its nature according to the cause producing it, and by means of the phonograph it was possible to recognise and classify the differences. Cases had come under his notice where insurance had been effected within a comparatively recent period, and where very slight alterations in the voice were the only physical signs present, but these, although insignificant, could only suggest a fatal issue within a comparatively short time. It thus seems likely that the phonograph will become no mean ally of the stethoscope.

A telegram in a Melbourne paper of a. recent data eaya Sergeant Tevlin received a letter yesterday morning, in which was enclosed the bey of the Seymour Library. The letter stated that the librarian intended to commit suicide, and hie body would ba found inside the library. The sergeant, with Dr Fitzgerald, made a search in the building, bat could not find the expected lifeless body. Coming out they saw the man coming rkown the street. When asked by Sergeant Tevlin what he meant by writing such a letter, ha stated that he wished to withdraw it, as he bad changed his mind, and did not intend to destroy himself. It is probable further action may be taken in the affair, which caused quite a sensation in the town, as the person referred to was well known, having been a resident for over twenty years.

A sensational event occurred on the steamer Waroongo, near Albany, a few days ago. A man named J. M/Cabe, who booked at Melbourne with bis wife and three children, came on deck, mounted the bulwarks in the coolest manner possible, and jumped overboard. He was seen to go over by two passengers who gave the alarm. The steamer was stopped and a boat lowered, but it failed to discover M’Cabe, though a careful search was made. The boat returned to the chip, and was lifted to the davits, and the steamer proceeded on her voyage, when a man aloft called out that he saw something in the water. The captain took a eight with his glass, and saw M’Cabe. The boat was again lowered, and proceeded to M'Caba, who was floating buoyantly on the water. As the boat approached him he called out cheerfully “ Floating like a cork.” When picked up he had been in the water for one hour and ten minutes. He was little the worse for his immersion. He bad been kept afloat by his top-ooat ballooning when going overboard. It is understood that M’Cabe has been out of employment for soma time. Since hia miraculous escape he has been watched. *

' Great distress reigns this winter among the lower classes all over Spain. In the suburbs of Madrid, says a correspondent, about four thousand unemployed workmen, most of them with families, assembled on a recent Saturday and sent deputations to the mayor and governor, who did their best to promise relief. They were only in a position, however, to employ a few hundred of these men on State and municipal public works. Hundreds of unemployed flock every Saturday to the square before the Town Hall in Madrid in hopes of getting either a little money or a ticket promising one week’s employment oa municipal works. The authorities and the Press at Cadiz and in other parts of Andalusia attribute the spread of brigandage chiefly to the distress among the rural population. The Civil Guard has displayed such activity that they have captured almost all the alleged authors of the crimes at Benoacaiz, Los Arcos and Grazelma. The peasantry are so much terrorised that they do not assist the police. The chief of the brigands escaped from the Los Arcos prison in broad daylight on the very day his victim died of his wounds.

The return of a long-missing eon to hie mother has occurred at Ne wcnstle-on-Tyne. About twelve years ago a boy, named Ralph Swailee, five years of age, strayed from his parents, people in humble circumstances, who, despite all their efforts, failed to recover him, and concluded that he had fallen into the river and been drowned. Years passed, the father died, and the mother moved into another part of the city. One night recently a strapping youth, in the uniform of the sth Fusiliers, entered the house, and stated that inquiries he had made led him to believe she was his mother. The woman quickly and joyfully identified him. The man’s account of his disappearance was that he had been found wandering by the police in a neighbouring borough and sent to the workhouse 1 , where ho remained some years. He afterwards worked on a farm, then went to sea in a fishing smack, and finally enlisted. Hearing incidentally from a recruit that people bearing his own name had lost a sen, he made inquiries, with the above result. The son expects shortly to be sent to India. Mrs Swsiles, however, has determined to petition the authorities, asking them, under tho peculiar circumstances of the case, to allow her son to remain in the district.