EUROPEAN NOTES.

Otago Witness, Issue 1189, 12 September 1874, Page 11

EUROPEAN NOTES.

H.M.S, Daphne, on March the 13fch, •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 which 225 slaves Avere found. These unfortunate wretches were shipped at the Umpiza river, a few miles south' of the town of Mozambique, and were started for Madagascar with only two days' provisions on board. Light winds and calms prolonged the voyage to eight days, so that the miseries endured Avere inducribable. After sailing for Zanzibar, the Daphne encountered a cyclone, during Avhich a quarter- master was washed overboard and drowned. Although every care was taken of the slaves, 31 died of dysentery. During the past few Aveeks, says the Liverpool Albion of .June Bth, the princpal rivers in Perthshire have been at very low level, owing to the dry Aveather which has prevailed, and pearl fishing has been assiduously prosecuted. In the Tay, betAveen Grand tully aud Aberfeldy, large numbers of fishers have been pretty successful. 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 in connection with the servant girl ques- ' tion has lately been pointed out to me, viz., that while in 18u'O about 10 per cent, only of the female population of England Avas employed in domestic service, noAv, in 1874, 20 per cent, of our women are so engaged, and yet the country wants more help. The sale of salmon at Billingsgate in the year 1873 comprised 30,181 boxes oi Sootch, 8995 of Irish, 1165 Dutch, 811 from cweden and Norway, and 1471 boxes of Eng'iah and Welsh salmon, making a total of 42,623 boxes. The boxes average 1121bs in Aveight, bo that the total may be put at 2131 tons, showing an increase of nearly 50 per cent, over the quantity sold in Billingsgate eight years previously. Mr Jefferson Davis, late President of the Confederate States of America, Avas lately on a visit to England. He has returned to America. It is the cußtom in Germany to announce engagements as well as actual marriages in the public prints. The following appears in the Dresden Journal with reference to such a notice : " With respect to the announcement by Avhich I, at the end of last November, gave notice of any being engaged to the DoAvager Baroness Zoe Yon Itotzebue, I am iioav obliged to state that this relationship has, at her desire and to my great regret, beeu broken off, 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 VIII. 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 that a Danish monarch ha 3 deigned to visit his most northern dependency. A correspondent Avrites to the Times that a hailstorm of extraordinary fury burst over Lyons one Sunday in June. Hailstones Avere picked up as big as chicken's eggs, and weighing in some feAV I instances 12 ounces to 14 ounces. All the skylights and greenhouses were shattered, and houses in exposed positions their windows and Venetian blinds j •smashed. Some people Avere wounded by the stones. All the crops within reach of the hail are ruined, but the storm seems to have spent its chief fury over the toAvn. The damage done to the hospitals alone ia estimated at £35,000. Some startling statements have been made by an inspector to the Uonsett (England) Board of Health as to the condition of the dvyellings of the poorer classes. On visiting several of the houses the inspector says he had almost been suffocated on account of the overcrowding, in one instance there being 22 persons huddled together in a single room. A singular action was lately heard in the Court of Queen's Bench in London, to recover the sum of £500. The plaintiff, whose name is Hampden, has become _ famous in connection Avith the question whether the earth is 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 being deposited with the defendant, and the quostion was Avhether the 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 Avay of a wager, and ■came within the 8 and 9 Via, and, as the point turned on the correspondence, a nominal verdict was taken for the plaintiff, subject to a special case. Frogs are worth afc Avholesale in New York Idol, to odols. per dozen pairs of hind legs, the frog being cut into aad the •skm 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 thousands to NeAV York annually.—Epicure. We understand that the essays Avhich, the late Mr J, S. Mill left behind him in ttianuueript, on "Nature," " Theism," fold "The Utility of Religion/ wiH i§

published this autumn, probably in October. — Daily News. (

In England and Wales there is one priest to every 580 Roman Catholics, and one monk to every 1490. With reference to the number of nuns there are no data furnished by Roman Catholic authorities, but at the time of tho last census we find there were 2474 " nuns, sisters of charity, of mercy," &c, 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, which has been exciting so much attention in America.

Messrs Croissant and Bretonniere, Paris, have patented a process for obtaining valuable colouring matter from sawdust, bran, and various waste substances. When such materials are heated with canstic soda and flower of sulphnr, a sulphide of sodium ia 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, hiving strong affinity for organic fibres. By varying the proportion of. the materials used, a variety of tints may be obtained from one and the same substance.