HERE AND THERE.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1206, 12 April 1895, Page 27

HERE AND THERE.

CONDENSATIONS, AND COMMENTS. » Magazine a writer, "who has an air of intimate knowledge with the inner aide of Russian court life, gives the following as the real cause of the late Czar's death : —" The Czar during the last year of his life was evidently suffering acutely from some heavy moral affliction. There can be no hesitation in attributing this moral suffering to the very painful disillusionment which ensued as the result of the discovery of the Smolensk plot, and of the circumstances connected with that nearly successful conspiracy. Among the numerous methods decreed against the unorthodox, one which entailed special hardship on a large number of respectable families wad the decision not to permit the employment of any but orthodox Russians in positions of responsibility on the railways. One of the last railways where this change had been effected was precisely that Smolensk railway where the plot was discovered to blow up the Czar's train. The disco vary of the mine was a mere accident; but the enquiries which followed laid bare a deeplaid, carefully-elaborated plot, in which the numerous conspirators were, without exception, orthodox Russian officials—the very men who owed their posts to the removal of the mistrusted Poles and Germans. The evidence of this fact was too Clear to adtorit of doubt, and in one moment all the Czar's fondest illusions were rudely dispelled, and the utter futility of the entire policy of his reign became manifest. It was a death-blow to the moral nature of the man. . . . AH his most cherished ideas and convictions were confuted and irrevocably shattered by the irresistible logic of facts j. and he felt himself left, a stranded, storm-beaten wreck, helpless and condemned. No moral recovery was possible. Nicholas I. died of moral mortification• Alexander III: shared the fate of his grandfather and model." This may be so, but unkind people have suggested that Alexander 111. owed his death more to his habitual indulgence in " deep draughts of champagne ' laced' with brandy " than to any moral affliction.

In Blackwood''. WHAT KILLED THE CZAR ?

As a rule the American "boss" politician is not a church-goer, but. one of the species has apparently been trying to serve both God and. MamWon. According to the New York Nation, Mr Piatt, the Republican " boss " who -wants to carry on much the same methods as his Tammany predecessors in JNew York, has been much disturbed on Sundays by unpleasant allusions from the pulpit to political corruption. Mr Piatt used to attend the ministrations of Dr Parkhurst, who would not allow him to take his ease in Zion "undisturbed by allusions to sinners nearer our day than Ahab or Judas." Mr Piatt, therefore, changed his "pastor," under whose gentler influences he "joined in the singingwith^his old-time zest, and settled back to thorough enjoyment of a sermon," which was "all about thei Walden3es." But;, alas! after the first " Sunday in which this soporific treatment was administered, Mr Piatt's pastor had some awknard things to say about the city management of saloons. There is no rest, therefore, for the disturbed soul of "Boss" Piatt, who will probably finally decide not to go to church at all.

A.TS ANGRY

Soke of Douglas Jerrold's pungent witticisms are given by Mr Spielrcann in his article on the Punch dinners in the Magazine of Art: —" Thackeray, we all know, was free enough himself in his criticisms of his own features, and his many sketches of his dear old broken nose are familiar to every lover of the man. Yet ho was not best pleased when he entered the dining-room a little late, and apologising for his unpunctuality through having been detained at a christening where he had stood sponsor to his friend's boy, he was met with Jerrold's pungent exclamation, 'Good Lord, Thackeray ! I hope you didn't present the child with your own mug!' And still less, when he heard that, on its being reported in the Punch office that he was * turning Roman/ simply because he defended Doyle's secession, Jerrold tartly remarked that 'he'd best begin with his nose.'" ' .

dottgh.as jbbbold's WIT.

Ik Harper for February, Mr Poultnsy Bigelow, who is always interesting, has a capital article on "French Fighters in Africa." Some of the details of the guerilla warfare with which the French have had to contend in Algerir and Tunis recall old stories of the Maori war times. Mr Bigelow gives an interesting picture of the Arab, unconquerable in his tastes and prejudices by European civilisation. Here is an extract: —" ' Never trust an Arab — not one — n ot even me. Such was the advice a friendly chief gave me/ said General , «and each day I realise more fully the value of that strange gift. The Arab has his nature, which is not yours or mine. He may live twenty years with you; respect and admire you; serve you faithfully, even spill his blood for you—but all that counts for nothing. The next year he may cut your throat.* lasted him if he was not satisfied with the progress made towards converting the Arabs to French ways. ' I have never heard of a real Arab converted to Christianity or French civilisation. In fact, the Arab remains Arab in spite of all the missionaries in Africa. It makes me smile when I hear of societies organised to convert Jews and Arabs/ 'But then/ I said, 'What is to become of this great - Franco-African colony if the Arabs are to remain hopelessly hostile ?' • The locomotive and the telegraph are our best allies here. Look at that map j you see our railway—our military policy. We

THE ARAB At WAYS AN ARAB.

must cut the desert at right angles with the coast; cut off one tribe of Arabs from the other; make their combinations dimcult —make ours easy. The Arab does not love us, but he is no fool. When he sees a train of cars running daily through his territory he knows that French troops can be mass'ed at any point on that line much more quickly than his own. "Where we have railways we have no insurrection/ I remarked that railways in the desert could hardly be a profitable investment. ' Investment !' said he, with emphasis. _' Who cares for cost when it is a question of national prestige ?'"

Me William Morris, the Socialist and poet, has just published a charming edition, printed at his famous Kelmscott Press, of 'course, of '• The Tale of Beowulf," translated, or, as the new phrase goes, " done out of the old English," by himself. A London paper gives the following lines as a good sample of Mr Morris' style:— Wore then a while on the waves was the floater, The boat under the berg, and yare then the warriors Strode up the stem; the streams were awinding The seas .'gainst the sands. Upbore the swains then, Up into the bark's barm the bright-fetted weapons, The war-array stately; then out the lads shoved her, The folk on the welcome way shov'd out the wood-bound. Then by the wind driven out of the waveholm Fared the foam-neoked floater most like to a fowl, Till when was the same tide of the second day's wearing The wound-about-stemm'd one had waded her way, So that then tbey thf»t sailed her had sight of the land, Bleak shine of the sea-cliffs, bergs steep up above, ,* Sea-nesses wide-, reaching; the sound was won over, « . The sea-way was ended: then up ashore swiftly The hand of the Weder-folk upon earth wended; They bound up the sea-wood, their sarks on thein rattled, Their weed of the battle, and God there they thanked For that easy the wave-ways were waxen unto them.* '■*

BEOWULF IN MODERN ENGLISH.

\ . A-N amn si nor "parson" story is told in the i Contemporary Review. A good-hearted curate, who firmly believed that God was continually working working miracles to enable him to help the needy, and who seldom had a coin in his pocket, though he was never devoid of N the fire of charity in his heart, was accosted one day by a beggar woman. He pleaded utter lack of money, and sadly turned aside; but, on the mendicant beseeching him to search his pockets, he hopelessly put his hand in one and, to his amazement and joy, found a fiveshilling piece there. "Another of God's miracles!" exclaimed; and then, addressing the woman, " This coin belongs to you, of light. Take it, and go in peace." Having told the story a few hours later to his worldly-minded parish priest, and suggested that they should ; both go down on their knees and render thanks to God, a strange, unpleasant light suddenly broke on the mind of the shrewd pastor, who exclaimed in accents not suggestive of thanksgiving: " Good God! are those my breeches that _you've on you ?"

A GOOD., " PARSON STORY."

Only the other day we read in an English Service paper of the indignation that had been felt in Portsmouth at the fact that a large number of shells were being made in France tul uac xu. British warships, and now we clip the following from the London Times : " Our Leicester say 3 that great indignation has been roused in the hosiery trade by. the, anouncement that large orders for cardigan jackets for the Indian army had been placed with firms at Leipsic without English manufacturers being allowed even to tender. There are hundreds of hosiery operatives in a condition of semi-starvation through changes in machinery, alterations in army and navy contracts, and in the methods of production. The military authorities disclaim all responsibility, the decision having been arrived at by a committee of officers in India. The Secretary of State for India will be asked to receive a deputation on the subject." /

MADE IN GERMANY

No wonder the New York ministers of religion are speaking: out against political and social evils in what the Americans proudly call "The Empire City." The'depths of New York poverty are something positively appalling. A Writer in the Century Magazine gives the following gruesome picture: — " But would our slums exist if we all knew about them and their fatal work—streets and acres of tenements in which decent living is impossible, which are as. poisonous to the souls as to the bodies of their inmates ? Would our present methods of manufacture and trade be permitted if we all grasped their deadly effect upon individuals, their deadly menace to the wellbeing of the community as a whole ? Do you know that amongthe 135,595 families, not persons, registered by the Charity Organisation Society as asking for help during a recent period of eight yeaismore than 50 per cent, were honestly seeking work and finding none ? Do you grasp the real meaning of 'no work' in families where a day's wage can but pay for a day's hard fare, and leave no penny over ? Can you appreciate the unspeakable danger, moral as well as physical, involved in the.fact that among 150,000 women who, in our town, earn their living, and often the liv-

" NETHET NEW YORK \"

ing of men and children, too, the average wage—not the lowest, but the average, where some are paid pretty well—is only 60 cents a day ? Have you tried to understand the tenour of lives like those of seamstresses who get from 20 to 35 cents a dozen for making flannel shirts and a dollar and a half a dozen for calico wrappers ? Or to fancy how it must feel to labour for such pittances in cold aad semi-darkness from four m the morning until eleven at night ? Or to estimate their purchasing power when coal must be bought by the bucket at the rate of 20dols a ton, and rent in the vilest purlieus must be paid at a higher ratio upon the invested capital than is asked on Fifth Avenue ?"

The Adelaide Steamship Company has purchased in London, through Messrs G-. S. Tuill and Co., two additional steamers for its trade on the Australian coast. The boats will be known as the Marloo and the Wollowra, the native names respectively for kangaroo and eagle. They were built by Messrs Palmer and Co., shipbuilders, of Neweastle-on-Tyne, at the latter end of 1891, and were originally intended for trading between Italy and Brazil. They are sister ships, with a gross register tonnage of 2524 tons, the dead weight capacity being 3500 tons on a draught of about 22ft. They are fitted up with triple-expansion engines, four tubular boilers, and steam twelve knots on thirty tons of coal per day. They are also supplied with refrigerators, for the carriage of meat and perishable produce.

THE AUSTRALIAN COASTAIi FLEET.

In Macmillan's Magazine for February Mr J. W. Root writes upon the Sexcentenary of the English Parliament. After considering the events up ' to 1295, Mr Eoot has this fine passage:—Enough has now probably been said to show how the course of events led gradually and inevitably to the Parliament of 1295. And as it was before that year so it has been since. What the English people have once justly and righteously obtained, they never again relinquish. Of a liberty once won it has been impossible to permanently deprive them. Occasionally it may have been suspended, when some calamity has rendered the people supine, or when some tyrant, bolder than his fellows, has temporarily seized the reins of power. But once aroused, all they ever possessed before has been the minimum of their demands, and upon it they have contrived to erect the structure of their future progress. Before a picture so noble the noise of party strife becomes hushed. The history of our land is the common heritage of all, rich and poor, great and small. We are proud of the past, and no less hopeful of the future; and we are stimulated in our anticipations of what our successors may become, by the remembrance of what our ancestors were, and what we ourselves are. Blind opposition to reform will prove no less disastrous than the reckless plunge into revolution. It is the safe course between the two for which we must ever be searching, resolute to tread the path without fear or dismay when once discovered.

THE STORY OF THE PARLIAMENT.

Says Mr Alex. Oliver, in Sydney Morning

Herald: —l do not think there is a Maoriland river that has not been supplied with trout by the Acclimatisation Society, which has been extremely generous at patriotic in stocking 1 their rivers. The principal trout they use is the brown trout, and he gets an immense size, far larger than in Britain, and is now becoming a salmon in his habits —that is, he spends five-sixths of his time in the ssa, which is not what the brown trout does in Britain. Nine-tenths of the trout in Maoriland are the brown species. The others are the rainbow trout, and a few rivers are stocked with the brook trout, and a few with Loch Leven trout. It is about a hundred to one when a man catches a trout that it will be one of the brown variety. They have got so big that they have got beyond the reach of the "fly"; that is, the "fly" fisher cannot get these fish, but the man with artificial minnow can catch them up to 201 b. From 121 bto 151 b are the common sizes to catch at the mouths of rivers and even among the breakers. They are very often beautiful fish, but, as a rule, the brown trout has got pink flesh, and is " muddy/' Tn Lake Wakatipu they will not take bait, and have to be caught by nets, but they are the best tasting in Maoriland. These, also, aro the brown trout. The Maoriland rivers have been so stocked with brown trout that it is impossible to introduce any other, for the trout has become cannibalistic, and devours all the weaker species. The very curious fact is that the brown trout is evolving himself into something that may become a salmon in time. A good many scientific men are of opinion that it may become a kind of Maoriland salmon. As. to salmon, they have introduced many thousands of ova into the likely rivers of the South Island, but the same is true in regard to Maoriland as in the case of Tasmania. After leaving their nurseries the salmon are not seen again. The fact is that these imported salmon cannot live in salt water above 60 degrees, and that temperature is, I think, probably fatal to the salmon, so that when the fish gets down the river, into the "parr" state, its instinct is to find salt water of a temperature suitable to its development. Not finding it, the fish goes south till it gets into currents or country from which it never returns. No true salmon has ever been found in Maoriland or Tasmania. The outcome of my investigations is this: It is absolutely money wasted to attempt to stock the Snowy Biver or any rivers of ours with salmon; but we may learn this lesson from Maoriland—that if we want a big salmonoid the brown trout will supply us with ona.

*EW ZEALAND BROWN TROUT.

Db A. Conan Doyle, the author of " Sherlock Holmes/' recently visited America on a lecturing tour. Before his return he, of course, was interviewed on leaving New York. " I have travelled as far West as Chicago and as far South as Washington," said Dr Doyle. "The city which pleased me most was Philadelphia. I did not find- that city so quiet as I have been told it usually is, but that may be accounted for by the fact that I visited Philadelphia on the night following the football match between the University of Pennsylvania and Princeton College, and I can assure you that I was not particularly impressed either with the ' slowness' or the quiet of oar ' Quaker Village/ as I am told Philadelphia is called. In fact, I found it about as noisy a city as I have ever visited, and I was justly surprised. I have been met most cordially by the people of this country, and I shall carry many pleasurable recollections of my visit. Your women are charming and your men are easy to get acquainted with. The men are not surrounded with that palisade of coldness that one meets with on the other side. In fact, it takes but a short time to become acquainted, and I already know more persons in this country after my nine weeks' stay than I would meet and know in a year on the other side of the ocean. I am greatly pleased with your clubs and with the literary men I have met. There is a genuine hospitality in the clubs which is very pleasing to a traveller. I have met many newspaper men both in New York and in other cities, and have formed many cordial friendships among them. Your ministers are much more tolerant than those of England." Dr Doyle said that he was not pleased With the American bar, referring to, the saloon. He said that in England all drinking was done at tables, but here one had to stand up to a bar and drink, pay, aud get out. There was no comfort in the American custom. He said that he had nothing in his mind at present in the literary line, but that Sherlock Holmes would not be reincarnated. He was dead for good and all.

CONAN DOYLE ON AMERICA.

The wonders of modern shipbuilding are marvellous indeed. What should we have thought », twenty years ago of a vessel that could travel twenty knots an hour, yet, lo and behold, here is one that can travel twenty-nine. We quote the London Times as follows ;—The official trial of the new torpedo-boat destroyer Boxer, built and engiued by Messrs Thornyerof t, took place on Friday off the Maplins. Six runs on the measured mile were made. The mean speed, was '29*17 knots; the total distance covered in the hours being 100-6 statute miles. This speed exceed that ever obtained on an official trial by more than a knot. The four vessels of the class — namely, the Daring, Decoy, Ardent, and Boxer, all built by Messrs Thornycroft, have each beaten the record in turn, and are now the four fastest ships in the world.

THE FASTEST SHI] IN THE WORLD.

The King of Corea was much impressed impressed by the telephone.

He immediately, at great expense, set about connecting by telephone the tomb of the queen dowager with the royal palace—a distance of several miles. Needless to say, though many hours a day were spent by his Majesty and. his suite in listening at their end of the telephone, and a watchman kept all night in case the queen-dowager should wake up from her eternal sleep, not a message, or a sound, or a murmur even, was heard, which result caused the telephone to be condemned as a fraud by his Majesty.

THE TELEPHONE CONDEMNED

In the Forum a Brahmin writer protests . strongly against Christian missions in India. As an Indian view of these mis- '. sions (expressed in print) is something 1 novel, we. give the following extract: —Let the aim of the missionary be to civilise and educate the savages and barbarians. To India send machinery instead of missionaries. Millions of people are kept back for want of education owing to intense poverty. Send good schoolmasters, mechanics, and scientists, and teach your practical arts to our people. This will cost you less than the missionaries. But let us be friends, and, as children of one God, forget all differences of opinion. You have your religion, and you think it the best. If it is the best keep it yourselves. But do not revile other religions. As for faults, other religions have faults, but so has your own. Let us pray Him whom you call Grod, and I call Brahma, to send us enlightenment and make us love each other without consideration of casts or creed. Christianity is best suited to the Western nations. As a religion we do not show disrespect to it, because every religion tends towards the same end—namely, salvation. Christ taught beautiful things; and if all His teachings were strictly followed, the whole world would be a Paradise.

A BRAHMIN ON JHRISTIANIT^

A southern paper, under the heading of « geography " " ****. Shots >" contains the "UF-TO-D4.TE I" f ? llowin g extraordinary effusion : Greedy Russia ! Wants India, and won't be satisfied till she gets is. Russian paper says she must possess the Pamirs, with southern boundary at the Hindu Koosh, eastern boundary at Kashgar, and western boundary at the Amu Daria. Great Scott! Kashgar is the boundary between China and the Pamirs, the Hindu Koosh practically commands Afghanistan, and the Amu Daria is a large na zigable river running from the Sea of Aral to Afghanistan. A Russian railroad has already been built through the centre of Afghanistan to the other side of the Hindu Koosh, and China is in a state of chaos. In a comparatively few days Russia could pour into India from both sides of ths continent two strong, well-equipped armies.

How would the Afghans go Well, they are not fighting men as a rule, but their first cousins are making a noise at Chital.

Oh, that' just this side of the Hindu Koosh ? Yes. But if the Afghans went one way or the other they'd be against the English. A Russian railroad has already been, built through the centre of Afghanistan! This will be news to the Czar !

The Comliill of nowadays has dropped back a good deal, and is far from being the high-class magazine it was when Leslie Stephen was the editor, and when Mr R. L. Stevenson's charming essays appeared therein. Nevertheless it often repays the "dipper," especially one with a taste for natural history. In the February there is a very pleasant article on " Birds in Winter," from which we take the following :—I have . never known a bird in this country, or in North America during the terribly severe winter of 1875-76 die of cold, but I have seen hundreds and thousands of birds dying and dead of starvation by frost and snow, deprivation of natural food. . . . No wind direct from the North Pole, over trackless and snow-mantled Greenland or Iceland, ever ruffled the equanimity of a pigeon on the furthest point of Scotland if it was not pinched for food or water. I have watched my pigeons during biting hurricanes—hurricanes that might have brought the tear to the eye of Friar Bacon's famous "Head of Brass " —perched on the highest ridge of their house preening their feathers and literally beabing in in the blast with evident delight. Nor do pigeons, like human beings, grow, more sesitive to cold as they advance in years —■

BIRDS IN WINTER.

When bones are crazed and blood is thin. Birds, I believe, never absolutely die of cold. I question if they even feel it as man does, and I attribute their invulnerability to the closeness and "warmth of their feathery covering, the peculiar texture of the skin of their feet and legs, the fatty plumpness of their flesh, the warmth and richness of their blood, and other purely physiological characteristics. If kindly disposed people, in the visitations of severe weather, take care to spare a little for the birds, the birds will take care of themselves—and be healthy, wealthy, and happy—and the robins and wrens, at least, will pay back with interest in floods of that melody which is indeed a " glorious gift of G-od" to the "poor man's choristers."

A mtist, M. Eagonneau, lias just discovered how to mako a plant grow from the seed in 30 minutes as much as ib would under ordinary circumstances in as many days. Heretofore Nature has shared this secret with theYoghis of India alone, and the method* pursued by these clever magicians in performing the trick have often been described. They plant a seed in the earth and cover it with a cloth. In a few moments the cloth begins to be pushed upward by the growing plant, which in a short time attains the height of several feet. Various theories have been advanced as to the modus operandi of this miracle, one of the latest being that the spectators are all hypnotised by the magician. During his travels in India M. Eagonneau saw this trick performed frequently, and noticed that the Hindoos always embedded tha seed in oil which they brought with them especially for that purpose. At last ha learned that they obtained this earth from ant hills. Now, as every one knows who has inadvertently eaten one of these industrious insects, ants contain a large proportion of formic acid, with which in time tb-> soil of their habitations becomes charged: This acid has the power of quickly dissolving the integument surrounding a seed and of greatly stimulating the growth of the germ within. After a little experimenting with this acid, the learned Frenchmen was able to duplicate perfectly the Hindoo tiick. His further researches have led him to believe that this discovery may V>e profitably applied to agriculture. By infusing ants in boiling water acid as strong as vinegar can be obtained. M, Eagonneau has achieved the best result 3 and most perfect growth by using eart/i moistened with a solution of 5000 parts of water and one of acid.

THE PLANT TRICK.

Some of Mrs Field's reminiscences of tit a ■late Oliver Wendell Holme j, now being" published in an American magazine, are very interesting. The geni; 1 "Autocrat" had an excellent; memory. " Just forty yeaj 3 ago," he once told Mrs Field, "I wt<3 whipped at school for a slight offencewhipped with a ferule right across my hands, so that I went home wit a a blue mark where the blood had settled, and for a fortnight my bands were sti'TT and swollen from the blows. The other dti 7 an old man called at my house and enquired for me. He was bent, and could ju:- b creep along. When he came in he sai u, ' How do you do, sir; do you recollect your old teacher, Mr ?' I did, perfectly t He sat and talked awhile about indiffereuU subjects, but I saw something rising in his throat, and I knevv it was that whipping. After a while he said, ' I came \ 9 ask your forgiveness for whipping yvu once when I was in anger; perhaps yc 1 have forgotten it, but I have not.* It had weighed upon his mind all these year.) I He must be rid of it before lying down lo> slesp peacefully."

A MEMORY OP A WHIPPING.

A man who was wrongly convicted for burglary, and actually served four months of his period of penal servitude before the mistake was discovered, has complained to a London Magistrate that the Home Secrotjary was unable to grant him compensation. . ■ - The celebrated Sphinx, the figure of the crouching monstrosity near the grer.,fc Pyramid, is 172 ft 6in longp and 52i't kigb,