OLLA PODRIDA.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 745, 11 June 1886, Page 5

OLLA PODRIDA.

A ROMANCE OP THE HOUSE OF COMMONS. A Parliamentary paper has just been issued which, the Daily News remarks, hides under prosaic appearance a charming little romance. Some time ago a paragraph went the round of the papers stating that Mr Dillwvn, M.P., had received a legacy of £2,000 in token of the respect and admiration of a lady whose name was not mentioned. The lady’s name was Mrs Helen Blake, of (Kensington, who died possessed of considerable wealth. Unfortunately the disposition of her property was made in informal manner. She had written out the draft of a will, but it was not duly executed, aud, as a matter of fact, she died intestate, her property reverting to the Crown. Among those whom she desired to benefit was Mr Dillwyn, whose name was put down for £2,000, and The O’Connor Don who was named for a similar sum. To neither of the legatees was the lady known. They had never seen her or heard of her ; and the first they learned of the favor they had found in her eyes was conveyed in a formal communication from the Treasury stating that, as Mrs Blake’s intention was unmistakable, the Crown was prepared to hand over the money. The particular grounds for the lady’s marked appreciation of the two honorable members were not even known. Possibly she was a frequenter of the Ladies’ Gallery in the House of Commons, which, in default of other clue to the mystery, may explain much. Mr Dillwyn is a decidely presentable man, and, rising at any hour of the night in Committee of Supply to discuss the national expenditure, might well attract the attention of an impressionable observer from the gallery. However it be, Mr Dillwyn has received his £2,000, minus legacy duty of £2OO deducted by a revenue department that has no sympathy with romance, and The O Connor Don has been equally benefited. PHOTOGRAPHY BY A LIGHTNING FLASH. From a communication by Professor E. J. Houston to the Franklin Institute it would appear that Mr Albert S. Barker of Philadelphia, has succeeded in taking two very fair photographic negatives of outside objects while illumined by no other light than that of a single lightning flash. These photographic views were taken at 7 p.m., while the night was excessively dark, the wind strong, and the rain heavy. The camera was placed in an open window, with the slide drawn. The lightning came in less than a minute, when the slide was returned. The plateholder was then reversed, and suitably placed for a second exposure. The plate was one of the highly sensitive gelatine films. Mr Barker developed the plates the same evening. From their behavior he estimated the actinic effect of the light to be equal to that obtained from an exposure of about one-three-hundreths part of a second in bright sunlight. The popular impressions as to the duration of the. lightning flash is that it is practically instantaneous. From the experiments of Wheatstone and others with the rotating disc, the durations of the flashes measured would appear to vary from I‘ool to o’oool second. Others estimate lhe duration of the flash as even shorter than this. It is a significant fact that, in the photographs of Mr Barker, the foliage shows unmistakable evidence of having perceptibly moved during the period of exposure, thus demonstrating that the flash was by no means instantaneous.—lron. CREMATING BY ELECTRICITY. In these days of enterprise and innovation it does not do to be surprised at anything new : but the following scheme is somewhat uncanny and blood-curdling. It ic proposed

to adapt electriciry to an entirely new use, namely, to cremation. At present details are scanty, and, while cremation by fire is not allowed, it is perhaps early in the day to talk of employing electricity for that purpose. The process is as follow : —The body being shrouded in sheets made of asbestos, is laid upon a frame composed cf fire-brick, while at the head and foot are large copper plates, to which the leads from specially constructed dynamos of large electromotive force are attached. The body apparently occupies the position of the filament in an incandescent lamp, and, upon the current being passed through it, would be instantly carbonised ; while as the air would have free access to it, the process of destruction, or rather decomposition, would be immediate. This process appears to have the recommendation of great rapidity of action, aud freedom from many of the objections to cremation in the ordinary way, and admits of several little improvements upon all recognised forms of burial ; it might be so arranged so that the next of. kin or the chief mourner should with his own hand press the knob sending the current through the body, and thus have the melancholy satisfaction of performing the last sad rites. Wedo not know the inventor’s name. A HORRIFIED CATA correspondent writes to Nature ‘ Last week, in connection with a study of carnivora, I obtained a cat from an acquaintance at a distance, and carefully dissected it in a room above our stable. When I had. finished the cat was, as may be supposed, hardly to be recognised. I cleaned the scalpels, placed them in the case, and took them to the house. No sooner had I put them down than I observed our own cat go and sniff all around the case with a peculiar look of intense wonder. I took the instruments away, and thought no more about it ; but a short time after I returned to the remains of the dissected cat in order to prepare the skeleton, when I saw our cat standing at a distance of about a foot from the dissection, and presenting an appearance of most helpless terror. She was trembling from head to foot, and in such a condition of evident horror that my presence had no effect upon her. After some moments she noticed me, and then darted away with a scared look such as I have never before seen. She did not return to the house that day—a thing quite unusual; but on the next day she returned and entered the house with a fearful caution, as though realising the probability that she herself might become a victim to science, and her whole conduct has changed. This suggests that the country custom of using dead birds, weasels, &c., as a scare to the like is not at all unreasonable, and it would be interesting to know whether others have noticed similar effects.’ THE PRESS ON THE SQUANDERED

MILLIONS. Whilst there is so special a necessity for economy, the process of squandering the people’s money is going on at an amazing rate, and again under a Government long pledged to ‘Peace, Retrenchment, and Reform.’ Although the prospects of peace are greater, instead of less than usual, an additional ten thousand men are being added to the Army. And although the Continental neighbors of Great Britain are fully engrossed with their own difficulties, and are friendly with this country, hysterical cries are still being raised by certain editors, officers, and other interested parties for a further outlay upon the Navy. And alb this in spite of the frequent scandulous revelations that some of the millions already bestowed upon both Army and Navy are not devoted to effectual armaments, but to pensions, experimental failures, and even ■jobbery. Nearly eight millions sterling are bestowed upon pensioners, many of whose claims to such appropriation are of an imaginary character. There is, however, one large outlay, which is a special scandal under present circumstances. This is the continued waste of British treasure in Egypt. A journal, which is not particularly favorable to economy, the London Spectator, remarks ‘ We are spending as was admitted in the Parliamentary debate of March 1, some four millions a year in Egypt; and not only is there nothing to show for it, but there is no indication that there ever will be.’ The French have been far wiser in that country. They have retained their interests in the Suez Canal, and their influence over the Government without wasting money or lives. They simply used England as a cat s paw ’ for both purposes. This country has spent twenty millions or more upon Egypt and the Soudan in a few years, and it is all worse than wasted. The British Government cannot effectually control either the rulers, or the finances, or the army, or the safety of Egypt. They have squandered enormous sums in those regions, which might have produced incalculable benefits at home. Twenty millions would pay for 200 ‘People’s Palaces at £IOO 000 each, scattered all over the United Kingdom. Even the four millions still to b« annually wasted in Egypt would suffice for more than fifty ‘ Mansion House Funds, of the amount just raised with difficulty. But the work of voting away the people s hardearned money, on Egyptian blunders and panic-mongering demands for more armaments, or rather more money, for experimentalists and other claimants to ‘ play with ’ goes on, in spite of all the lessons ot the patt and present. The Times remarks of the recent vote 3 in supply—‘The independent members strove to save pennies, while the official members contended, as m duty bound, for the uncontrolled expenditure of pounds.’ There is no effectual check on this departmental waste, by reliable audit or otherwise. The Times further observes, when some specially gross scandal arises, ‘ an official inquiry is made, after the well-known official fashion, which consists in setting the official cat to watch the official cream ; official regrets are expressed, and then every effort is made to hush the matter up.’ The London Echo also complains, and with good reason, that even the new Liberal members of Parliament are showing little practical interest in checking this waste. It says that when such ‘ take Government situations they also take to defending votes in supply, as ducks take to water. Liberals talk more about economy, whilst they do just as little as the Tories. Whilst the Liberals profess more, the prac-

tiae the same.’ Well, if the tax-payers do not more vigorously put pressure upon their representatives, at the polls and elsewhere, how and when can they expect more hopeful results? —Herald of Peace. WOMEN AS LAWYERS. Mrs Belva A. Lockwood, the lady American lawyer, says : —‘ The number of women studying for the legal profession is not large, but is steadily on the increase, and will be for those who have talent in this direction, because the pay is good and the study enlarging and liberalising to the mind. There are many more women to-day in the medical profession than in the legal. If the women of the country are given the ballot, the law will find many votaries, for the reason that three fourths of the United States Congress and most of the Cabinet have made law a profession. It is important that the legal student should first be a graduate of some thorough literary school before the law course is commenced. After this, three years of thorough legal study is usually required before admission to the bar. The change in the public sentiment is very rapid and very marked. In twenty States and Territories of the Union woman is admitted to ■ the bar, with all of the Federal courts and the United States Supreme Court open to her. AVERAGE DURATION OF HUMAN LIFE. If the death rates for the last few years keep constant they will show that the average duration of human life is increasing. Whilst under Dr. Farr’s life tables the mean duration of life, or the mean after lifetime of males at birth, was put at 39*91 years, the recent death rates warrant an increase to 41*92, an increase of more than two years, or 5 per cent. Similarly with females there is an increase from 41*85 to 45*25, or 3*40 years. Taking the two sexes together (the sex-proportion being fixed by that of the births of live-born children) the mean duration of a generation has been raised from 40*80 to 43*56 years, or 2*76 years. In other words one-fifteenth has been added to the expectation of life of every infant born. It is to be remarked that in order to arrive at a fair estimate of the average duration of life it is not enough to take the ages at_ death of those dying within a limited period of, gay -five years. For ■whereas the average duration o' life for a generation is shown by the death rate to be as stated above, viz., 43*56 years, the mean age at death of all the persons dying in the five years 1576-80 was only thirty-two. The reason of this is that the deaths of infants and children are so numerous, and that the first year of life yields the greatest number of victims.

A Bologne correspondent writes to the Times : ‘ Excavations in the Chancelade quarries, where it will be remembered a landslip occurred last October, burying a number of workman, has been carried on ever since for the purpose of unearthing the bodies. For many days after the slip was believed to have smothered the workers, smoke was seen to issue from the ruins. Soldiers and quarrymen, directed by a party of engineers, worked day and night in the hope of taking the men out alive. Ever since the work has proceeded, but of late the endeavors were not so vigorously plied. The diggers have now reached the actual spot where the men were engaged at the time of the accident, and on penetrating into a gallery cut in the stone the explorers discovered the body of a young man lying on the ground. Photographs of the position show that a dreadful state of affairs must have come about when the men uncrushed found themselves entombed. It appears undoubted that some of the men tried to prolong their lives by killing and eating their companions in misfortune. A few solitary arms and limbs have been picked up in their prison, and everything points to the fact that cannibalism was resorted to. The young man whose body was unmutilated seems to have survived the others, and to have died of hunger.’ The Insurance Record understands that the assurance companies interested in the policies on the life of Lord Aylesford have at length agreed on a method of settlement. The total amount was something like £BOO,OOO, and the policies were effected at ordinary rates in 1871. Lord Aylesford, who died on January 13 last, was living at the time at Big Spring, Texas, which is slightly south of 33 degs, and, therefore, beyond the prescribed limits allowed to policy holders. The general rule as to residence is that free limit ceases at 33 degs, so that living south of that latitude was no doubt a breach at least of the letter of the contract. Whether Lord Aylesford was aware that he was residing in a part of the world which rendered his assurances void is not known. The offices have, after carefully considering the matter, resolved to admit the claim, subject, however, to a deduction from the sum payable under the policies of an extra premium for residence in Texas.