A RHYME FOR 1870.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume III, Issue 229, 26 September 1868, Page 2

A RHYME FOR 1870.

Sing a song of policy, Full of crafty tricks; Four and twenty counties In a precious fix; "When they'd spent their revenue; They all began to sing. •Let's have a central government, With Stafford for the King ! '

The Home News says: The Duke of Edinburgh has returned to us, and it is almost unnecessary to say that he has had the most affectionate and enthusiastic welcome. His filial duties discharged, he has been chiefly with his brother, the Prince of Wales, and has accompanied him to various public scenes. At the Opera the Duke made his first bow to the upper classes, aud the National Anthem was performed amid much plaudit, but his grandest reception was at the Crystal Palace festival where a concert, dinner, and fireworks were arranged in his honor, and where thousands on thousands seemed frantic with delight at beholding him. The Pope has issued a bull, summoning an (Ecumenical, that is universal, Council for December, 1870, when" he will have completed his 25 years of office, the longest term a Pope has reigned. His Holiness is not very explicit upon the subjects which the Council, the first of the kind which has been held since Trent, is to discuss, but there is ample time to prepare a programme. The bull was published to the sound of trumpets. The holding this council has long been a favorite idea with Pius IX., it will be a stately spectacle, and will afford happiness to a venerable priest. The missives have gone forth into all lands. On July 6, a young man named T. B. Gillow, 18 years of age, respectably connected, of Green-street, sear Faversham, was batting against the Bordon Club, at Bordon, a village rear Sittingbourne, where he was killed by the ball hitting him hard under the left ear, It appears that about half-past 1 the Green-street Club had gone in, and Gillow had made a very fine cut at the ball, when the bowler threw again, and the ball bounded from the ground. Mr Gillow turned on one side to escape the effect of the rebound, when the ball struck ou the jugular vein, and killed him at once. He was seen to fall and the game was stopped. Information being immediately sent to Sittingbourne, medical assistance was obtained, but unhappily the youDg man was found to be quite dead. A man of. color, stying himself *' the Great African Blondin,' has been amuseing the people at Beverley by walking upon a rope at an altitude of 50 feet. On 15th July, the performer commenced his perilous journey amidst much cheering. He had only traversed half the length of the narrow road, however, before the rope gave a sudden snap, and the hapless performer the next instant (with the balancing pole in his hands) was seen falling from his giddy height to the ground. The cries and shouts of the people present were distressing, and the field in which the poor fellow fell was immediately invaded by the people assembled, anxious to render him any assistance. The performer lay upon the ground, face downwards, with the balancing pole under him, apparently lifeless; but on the arrival of medical men it was found that he still lived. A cab was procured, in which he was conveyed to his lodgiugs, and on further examination it was found that he had broken one of his arms and wrists. He lies in a very precarious state. The Metropolitan Police are in future to have one entire day of rest in each week. As many of them as can will be allowed to take their holiday on Sunday. Further correspondence has been published regarding Sir Charles Darling, late Governor of Victoria. He absolutely refuses the grant of £20,000 to himself or wife, aud asks that his claim to pension take its natural course. The Secretary of State will act fairly to Sir Charles and the public service. The Parliament of Tasmania (says the Tasmanian Times), has done rnaDy acts in its collective capacity of which we have only too much reason to be ashamed. But the refusal of the House of Assembly, a few evenings ago, to agree to a vote of thanks to Lady Franklin, for the gift of Betsy Island to the colony, as a game preserve, may well cause a blush upon the cheek of every man who owns himself a Tasmaniau. In their anxiety to insult and annoy the oldest member, and one of the very few gentlemen in the House, soms 15 or 20 members deserted their seats, and thus offered a deliberate and scandalous affront to a lady, whose act of munificent courtesy to the colony they were invited to acknowledge with a formal expression of thanks . A more churlish act, probably, was never performed by any body of persons pretending to the position of gentlemen.

More than 2,000 colored people in the Southern American States have made application to emigrate to Liberia. The community at that place, which is on the west coast of Africa, owes its origin to the American Colouization Society. It was planted in 1822. For 25 years it remaioed under the supervision of this society, but m 1844, so strong had it become that the colooy assumed the entire responsibility of self-goven) merit, with the name of the ' Republic of Liberia.' There has been thus founded a new nation of independent free negroes, whose constitution, in its own language, imposes the obligation to regenerate and enlighten this benighted continent. Its po.puhitiou, of emigrants or American Liberians, numbers 12,000, but including the surrounding natives now under the jurisdiction of the little repuhlic > L - 20,000 of civilised natives, visit, or trade, or live in the colony. These all speak English, and have the English, and have the English Bible in their hands. Liberia has fifty churches — Methodist, Baptist, Presbyteriau, Episcopalian, Lutheran, Cumberland Presbyterian, and Congiegational — and in most of them regular Sunday-schools and Bible-classes. With the exception of a few white missionaries, the entire populalation consists of the colored race. In Liberia, the negro has a nationality ; all its offices, from the President down, are filled by such, and thus far the -government has beeu ably and judiciously administered. No white person can become a citizen, and the colored man thus demonstrates his power to govern himself. Slavery is entirely prohibited, and slavetrading, so common among the native tribes, is forbidden under penalty of death. It is said that autograph letters have passed between the Pope and the Emperor of Austria, in regard to the Concordat. The Pope, of course, wished the Emperor to resist the forms, but he was unsuccessful. He also refused to sanction the abrogation of the Concordat, and was disposed to visit the Emperor with his grievous displeasure, till the latter sent to the Papal Court the Hungarian Archbishop Haynald, who explained that, as a constitutional sovereign, he had no alternative but either to comply with the wishes of the Legislature or to abdicate. Pio Nono then consented to regard his Apostolic Majesty as no longer a reprobate, deserving excommunication, and is said to have even admitted that he was not responsible for an act forced upon him. by the pressure of events. The Bishop of Lichfield prior to his departure for New Zealand, was presented with a pastoral staff of silver.