EUROPEAN NOTES.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 3917, 5 September 1874, Page 6 (Supplement)

EUROPEAN NOTES.

H.M.S. Daphne, on March the ISfch was cruising off Boyama Bay, north-west coast of Madagascar, when a slave dhow was seen After a few shots had been fired the Daphne captured the dhow on board of wliich 225 slaves were found These unfortuuate wretches were shipped at the Umpiza river, a few-miles south of the town of Mozambique, and were started tor Madagascar with only two days' provisions on board. Light winds and calms prolonged the voyage to eight days, so that the miseries endured were indi&cribable. After sailing for Zanzibar, the Daphne encmntered a cyclone, during which a quarter-master was washed overboard and drowned. Although every care was taken of the slaves, 31 died of dysentery.

- During the past few weeks, says the Liverpool Albion of June Bth, the princpal rivers in Perthshire have been at very low level, owing to the dry weather which has prevailed, and pearl fishing lias baen assiduously prosecuted. In the Tay, between Grandtully and Aberfeldy large numbers ot fishers have been prettysuccessful. During the past week some of them realised from £11 to £12 each from the pearls sold in Perth.

Miss Rye writes :■ A very curious fact m connection with the servant girl question has lately been pointed out to me, viz., that while in 1880 aboufc 10 per cent only of the female population of England was employed in domestic" service, now, in 1874, 20 per cent, of our women are so engaged, and yet fche country wants more help.

The sale of salmon at Billingsgate in the year 1873 comprised 30,181 boxes^ of fcootch, 8990 of Irish, 1165 Dutch, 811 from fcweden and Norway, and 1471 boxes of Evguh and Welsh salmon, making a. total of 42,623 boxes The boxes average 1121bs in weight, co that the total may be put at 2131 tons, showing an increase of nearly 50 per cent, over the quantity sold in Billingsgate ei<dit years previously.

Mr Jefferson Davis, late President of the Confederate States of America, was lately on a visit to England. He has returned to America.

; It is tne custom in Germany to announce engagements as well as actual marriages m the public prints. ' The-fol-lowing appears in the Dresden Journal with reference to such a notice :—" With respect to the announcement by which I at the end of last November, gave uotic4 of my being engaged tp the Dowager Baroness Zoe You Kotzebue^L am now obliged to state that tins relationship lias at her desire ancl to my great regret- been broken oft, because she did not find in my deportment that gravity which she had a right to expect.—Count Luckner "

It is at last decided that King Christian Vlll. will visit Iceland this year to be present at the- Thousand Years' Feast He will take with him two distinguished men of letters-Professor Warsaae, the well-known antiquary, and the poet, Carl Andersen. This is the first time fchat a Danish monarch has deigned to visit his most northern dependency.

A correspondent writes to the Times that a hailstorm of extraordinary fury burst over Lyons one Sunday in June Hailstones were picked up as -bi"- as chicken's eggs, and weighing in some°few instances 12 ounces to 14 ounces All the skylights and greenhouses were shattered, and houses in exposed positions had their windows and Venetian blinds smashed. Some people were wounded by the stones. All the crops within reach of *the hail are ruined, but the storm seems ta have-spent its chief fury over the town, lhe damage, done to the hospitals alone is estimated at £35,000.

Somo startling statements have been made by an inspector to the Consett (England) Board of Health as to the condition of the dwellings of the poorer classes. On visiting several of the houses the_ inspector says he had almost been sufiocated on account of the overcrowding m one instauce there being 22 persons huddled together in a single room.

A ' singular action was lately heard in the Courfc of Queen's Bench iv London, to recover the sum of £500. The plaintiff, whose name is Hampden, has become famous in connection with the question whether the earth id fiat or round, and the defendant is the editor of the Field newspaper. In support of his theory the plaintiff* made a bet of £500 with Mr Wallace, a member of the Royal Geographical Society, the money bein°deposited with the defendant, and the question was whether ihe conditions of the bet had been so complied with as to authorise the defendant to pay the money over to Mr Wallace. The subject has led to much litigation and criminal proceedings. The question arose whether this was a contract by way of a wager, and came within the 8 and 9 Vie, and, as the point turned on the correspondence, a nominal verdict was taken for the plaintiftj subject to a special case.

Frogs are worth at wholesale in NewYork Idol, to Sdols. per dozen pairs of hind legs, the frog being cut into and the skin stripped off over the feet. The only difficulty in breeding them is in keeping a pond carefully protected from hawks, snakes, coons, &c. Millions of tadpoles hatch out every spring, but by autumn there seems to be but a few dozen left. Canada ships tliousauds - to New York annually.—Epicure.

„ ,c Ul^erstand that the essays' which the late Mr J. S. Mill left behind liim in manuscript,, on "Nature." " Theism " and "The Utility of Beligion," will be published this autumn, probably in October.—Daily News.

In England and Wales there is one priest to every §8Q Roman Catholic?, a'ncj' one monk |o every 1490," With reference to the number of nuns there are no data furnished by Komau Catholic authorities, but at the time of tho lasfc census we find tliere were 2474 " nuns, sisters of charity, of mercy," <fee., 152 of whom were "under twenty years of age."

Mrs Harriet Beecher Stowe is writing a new novel, entitled "We and Our Neighbours," which is to deal with the temperance question, whicli has been exciting so much attention in Ameriga. Messrs Croissant and Jkotoiiniere, Paris, hav <? patented a procoas for obtaining valuable' colouring matter from sawdust, bran, and various waste substances. When such materials are heated with caustic soda and flower of sulphur, a sulphide of sodium is produced, and this, reacting on the organic matter, effects its dehydrogenation, with evolution of sulphuretted hydrogen. The result is said to be a valuable dye-stuff, having strong affinity for organic fibres. By varying tb,e proportions qf the materials used, a variety of tints may be .obtained from one and the same substance.