NEWS IN BRIEF.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXV, Issue 9190, 20 October 1888, Page 1 (Supplement)

NEWS IN BRIEF.

Thirty regiments in India will be with the Martini rifle by the end of the year. * • The spire of Salisbury Cathedral, rifling to a height of 404 feet, is the highest in England. The Queen has written stating her readiness to become a patroness of the Welsh National Eisteddfod next year at Brecon. A movement is just now being set on foot for the erection of a gigantic statue of the Maid of Orleans in a prominent place in or near Paris. Egypt was the inventor of the alphabet), the cradle of letters, the preacher of animism and metempsychosis, and, generally, the source of all human civilisation. The inventors of the Volapuk language appear to be labourers in the temperance cause. For the word drunk they have contrived the equivalent, dlinkadik. The Hereditary Grand Duke of Oldenburg, who is staying at Heligoland, jumped into the sea a few days ago and saved the lives of some persons whose boat had capsized. A contingent of Socialists with red flags marched to Clerkenwell Green, and the action of the Cork band in refusing to play the National Anthem was eulogised in speeches. The clergyman, the doctor, the lawyer, the soldier, the peasant speak different dialects. Each is in possession of a technical vocabulary, and a characteristic manner of expression. Potato blight has made its appearance in Limerick and Clare recently, and in several districts has developed to a serious extent. The champion and flounder crops are principally attacked with the disease. Mr. Lushiugtcn, the magistrate at the Thames Police Court, the other day made an order condemning 150,000 tins of sardines, which had been damaged through the recent fire at the London docks. Amsterdam has become more and more more the principal tobacco market in Europe, in consequence of the excellent quality of the Sumatra tobacco, which is sought there by buyers from all parts of the world. The clergy of the diocese of Bath and Wells appositely celebrated their Diocesan's 80th birthday by presenting him with a gold and sapphire episcopal ring, together with an illuminated address and a cheque for £170.

They do things expeditiously in the States. An lowa colonel has just been notified by the War Department that his claim of £8 8s for the loss of a horse in the Mexican war has been allowed. The claim was filed in 1848. Catherine Goodwin, headmistress of St. Mary's Church School, in that town, was ordered to pay £1 15s 6d at Birkenhead, recently, for assaulting Alice Ball, a pupil, aged nine, who had made six mistakes in a dictation exercise. Patrick Henessy. proprietor of the White Hart Inn, Brook-street, Stepney, pleaded " Guilty" at the Thames Police Court td adulterating ale to the extent of one and a-half gallons of water to the barrel o{ thirty-six gallons, and was fined £5. William Walker, aged 38 years, employed as a lion-tamer at Price's menagerie, exhibiting at Armley, Leeds, was admitted into the Leeds Infirmary, suffering from injuries to the leg, caused by the bice of a lion while going through the usual performance. A retired German officer, named Fritz Killian von Hohcnburg, who is engaged at Nice as a teacher of languages, was arrested in the act of sending by post a box containing a Lebel cartridge. The police subsequently made a search at his residence. All the candidates for the American Presidency are said to be in favour of woman suffrage. President Cleveland, when he was Governor of New York, signed several Bills giving local franchise to women, and said he expected these to lead to full legislation on the subject. A man named Gamier has been arrested at Paris for firing at M. Tournouer, an employe in the passport department of the German Embassy. He stated he wished to revenge his father, who died in 1845 in consequence of infirmities contracted in 1806 for which the Prussians were to blame.

We have particulars of a terrible tragedy which occurred at Prairie Centre, Ottawa, Illinois, resulting in the death of eight young men. A ball was being held in a house at Prairie Centre, when at midnight two young men fought about a partner. The men present took sides. Knives were freely used, and eight persons were stabbed to death. A schoolmistress and some young girls, resident at Broadford, county Limerick, could scarcely have comprehended what they did when they sat to be photographed with some policemen. Had not one given evidence in the prosecution of a clergyman under the Crimes Act ? Threatening notices posted on the chapel gate have warned them of their crime.

At the London Court of Bankruptcy, the first meeting was held of thecreditors of Alice Stuart Brown, of Sackville-street, Piccadilly, and of Ramsgate, whose liabilities amount to £6467, of which £3500 are expected to rank, the deficiency being accounted for to the extent of £1420 by losses through gambling. The assets are generally put down at £15 3s Bd. The persistent refusal of Lord Salisbury to sell or lease a suitable site at Hatfield for the erection of a Wesleyan chapel has, say the London correspondent of the Manchester Guardian, at last been defeated. Within the last few days a capital site has been secured in the centre of the town, at a cost of £800, and building operations will be commenced as soon as the Connexional requirements are complied with. A tragic death has just been reported from Her Majesty's ship Carysfort, in the Mediterranean. Two seamen were undergoing punishment in the cells, and the corporal of the guard should have visited them each hour to see that all was right. He went at two a.m., and found one of the prisoners dead and the other insensible. The cells in question are situated in the hottest part of the ship, close to the engine, below all the decks. Death was due to suffocation.

The Inspector-General of Irish Constabulary has received the following letter from . Sir Henry Ponsonby relative to the Constabulary J übilee Fund :—"Osborne, August 8. Dear Sir, —Having laid your letter before the Queen, I am commanded by Her Majesty to assure you that she will have much pleasure in contributing to the Royal Irish Constabulary Fund, ana has desired me to enclose a cheque for £50 as her dona* tion to that fund.—Yours faithfully, K. F« Ponsonby." 1

It has been estimated by Professor Kirch* hoff, of Halle, that the language most spoken on the globe, for the last thousand years at least, is Chinese, for it is without doubt the only one which is talked by over 400,000,000 of the human race. The next language most in use, but at a very great distance behind Chinese, is Hindustani, spoken by over 100,000,000 Then follow English (spoken by about 100,000,000), Russian (over 70,000,000), German (over 57,000,000), and Spanish (over 47,000,000). Justice Field, at the Merionetshire assizes, congratulated the county upon its exemption from crime, there being only one criminal case to try. He hoped, moreover, that Merioneth would maintain its good character, as the influx of gold had been corrupting elsewhere. That was a matter of history. Spain had been ruined by gold. He hoped the Welsh virtue would be able to withstand the influence of the new conditions, and that when he again came to the circuit he would find the Welsh as virtuous as ever.

The French Government has resolved to fix one uniform time for the whole of the country. This will be " Paris time," which for the future will be adopted in railway stations and public places all over France, and it is to be called L'heure nationale. On the frontiers, however, there are to be quadrants marking both the Paris and the foreign hour. At the present moment three different systems of marking the time are in vogue in France. The new system will nob come into operation until May next—that is to say, at the opening of the Universal Exhibition. » The organ of the London Spiritualist Alliance, Light, in its forthcoming number, announces the marriage of Mr. Laurence Olipliant with Miss Rosamond Dale Owen >; daughter of the late Robert Dale Owen, sometime American Minister at the Court of Naples, whose works are among the best; known in the literature of spiritualism. The present Mrs. Oliphant is herself favourably known both in America and England. She is a granddaughter of Robert Owen, the celebrate,d ; *Socialist author. After tha formality Mr. and Mrs. Oliphant proceeded to London. s After some visits to friends in' the country, and a short stay in Paris, ''hoy, will depart- for Mr.' Oliphant's residence n Svria. - .