ENGLISH EXTRACTS.

Otago Witness, Issue 43, 13 March 1852, Page 4

ENGLISH EXTRACTS.

Magnettsji. — Most extraordinary and inexplicable discoveries have been made, and are making, as experiments irrefragably prove, in regard to magnetism. They have been performed at Brighton, to the entire conviction of I persons of the highest Science, both foreigners ""j and British, and are yet altogether so incredible that we almost fear to allude to them as realities. They Will, however, come before the Royal Society, at its earliest re-assembling, and be stated in all their details. Meanwhile, what will our readers, and especially our scientific readers, think of the fact that the magnetic force runs in transverse direction's as it may be employed by the male or the female sex ; that is to say, that if in the hands of a male operator it proceeded from east to west, or west to east, the same current in the hards of a female operator would immediately change from north to south, or south to north, and cut the former line at about right angles. Thus magnetism is shewn to derive different influences from the two sexes ! But this is not all. A letter, written by a woman, weeks before, produces an effect upon the current of a like peculiar nature. And, again, any part of a dead animal, as the horn of a deer, a bit of ivory, and even a dead fly held in the hand of any individual in contact, stops the magnetic action, which silk, the material from living worms, does not interrupt. In fine, there are wonders the most astonishing in store ; and it does seem that we are indeed on the eve of what has been for some time prophesied, viz.. penetrating deeply into the profoundest secrets and mysteries of this pervading agent in the whole economy of the universe, the globe we inhabit, and the human kind.— Lonpox paper.

TnE Ret. Dr. Cahill ix Leeds. — Placards having been posted in Leeds announcing that the Rev. Dr. Cahill would lecture upon astronomy, considerable excitement was created among the Protestant portion of the community, and a resolution come to to bring his "reverence to task for his sanguinary epistles. This was anticipated by the Irish and Roman Catholics of the borough, who assembled iv numbers to take sides with the " doctor." Many of the persons present at the opening of the first lecture on Monday night were Irishmen and women of the lowest class, who had evidently been introduced for an object, and they peered impudently into the face of every stranger that entered, as though endeavouring to ascertain whether they were friends or not. liefore the commencement of the lecture, Mr. }\~. Whitehead, Chief Clerk of the Board of "Works, mounted a bench, and, holding Dr. Cahill's pamphlet in his hand, asked the " doctor" if he had written the following words, and printed them in a pamphlet addressed to the people of Ireland : — " There is not one Frenchmap, or one Frenchwoman, or one French child, who would not dance with frantic joy at the glorious idea of having the opportunity, before they die, of burying their eager swords, and plunging their crimsoned French steel, into the inmost breast of every man bearing the hated name of Englishman !" Immediately upon Mr. Whitehead rising, a yell was raised by the Irish present, and a Roman Catholic lawyer named Prest, and an Irish sharebroker of the same denomination, seized Mr. Whitehead, and dragged him across the room, amid the yells of triumph of the Irish and indignant protests of the Protestant English present, some members of the town council warmly remonstrating against this treatment. The lecture was afterwards commenced and gone through ; and, at its close, Dr. Cahill stated that he had been misrepresented by the English press, who had made him " glory" in the idea of the butchering of the English Protestants by the French. All he had done was to point out a fact — the state of feeling in France, as he had himself seen in his travels. On Tuesday morning, Mr. Whitehead appeared before the Leeds magistrates, and we believe an assault warrant will issue against that gentleman's assailants. It is currently reported that the matter, so far as Dr. Cahill is concerned, will not be allowed to rest here, as his lectures were to have been resumed on Wednesday. — Leeds Mercury.

Sins are like circles in the water when a stone is thrown into it — one produces another. When anger was in Cain's breast murder was not far off. .

In a recent number of the "Literary Gazette" it was stated that M. Simonides, a Greek •„ savant,' had discovered in the old papers of a Greek conVent an indication that the original MS. of the " Acts of the Apojstles" was buried in an island in the sea of Marmora. We now learn that a search has been made in the spot pointed 6ut, and that it has led to the discovery, not t)f the " Acts," but a copy of one of Aristotle's treatises, and a map of the islands. They : appear to have been interred by a monk about fee' year 1204.

An Honest Confession. — " You must not smoke here, sir," said the captain of a north river steam-boat, to, a man who was smoking among the ladies on the fore deck. " I rnusn't! ha ! — why not ?" replied the fellow, opening his capacious mouth, and allowing the smoke to escape slowly. " Didn't you see the sign ?—? — Gentlemen are requested not to smoke abaft the engine." " Bless your soul ! that don't mean me; I am no gentleman — never pretended to be — you can't make a gentleman of me, nohow you can fix it." So saying, he puffed away, and took the responsibility. — Boston (U.S.) Paper.

The "Tablet" (Roman Catholic paper) scouts the " Protestant impertinence" which seeks to " damn the souls of the Romans by building a church in Rome for the propagation of heresy !" The worthy editor thinks the erection of Protestant churches in Rome a very different affair from the erection of Catholic churches in London.

The English flag has lately taken possession of a small island near Siiily, which peered up over the surface of the Mediterranean some little time ago, then disappeared, and has lately been steadily rising. The lazy Sicilians lounged along the shore, and could not make out why two of our ships of the line kept cruising about the neighbourhood, till they espied, one fine morning, the British lion dancing merrily in the breeze over a tract of land which will probably prove very advantageous in a commercial point of view. — Atlas.

At the consecration of a Roman Catholic Chapel last week, at Hartlepool, by Dr. Wiseman, one marked feature in the meeting was the deliberate proclamation of the territorial titles of the bishops, to which each of them responded, and so defied the provisions of the new Act of Parliament. It will soon be seen whether they have done so with impunity. — Manchester Guardian, September.

A Proselytising- Roman Catholic said to a Protestant acquaintance Mho had been at the Exhibition, " Did you see the beautiful dresses of the Cardinal ?" " Yes,"' replied the Protestant ; " and I'll tell you what I saw besides. I saw the Bible translated into 120 languages/