Odds and Ends.

Otago Witness, Issue 1418, 25 January 1879, Page 21

Odds and Ends.

[Compiled expressly for the Witness.} It is said that the Doan of Westminster (Dr Stwilej) when in America received an offer of a considerable sum of money if he would give a lecture on hia African Explorations in a Western city ! Sir Julius Vogel publishes in the London Times an extract from a New Zealand letter, ia which it is very correctly stated that Canterbury bnd will grow 30 bushels of wheat, 60 bushels of oats, and 15 tons of potatoes to the acre. The Sydney International Exhibition appears to be increasing in favour. Not only are France andltaiy to be largely represented, but a large number of German and Austrian exhibitors have applied for space. The able author of " Faith and its Verifi- j cations," in the Nineteenth Century, speaks of the pitiful cries of modern physicists as they raise their hands to what they deem a spiritual vacuum. The owner ot a thrashing machine informs the Marong correspondent of the Bbndigo Adverti3?r, that so far, in the Leichardt district, Victoria, the average yield of the wheat crop is U bushels per aore. Peaches are selling in the Sydney market at Is and Is 6d per case, aa dealers are unable to fchip them in consequenco of the strike. Jem Mace, the ex pugilistic champion, has two sons, who are preachers amongst the Plymouth Brethren, one of them being a young man of unusual promise and ability. A Children's Church has been established at Colliugwood, Victoria. It is attended by about 180 ragamuffins who, it is said, would be found m no other place of worahip if they were not induced to go there. A sum of no les3 than £23,000 was subscribed in New South Wales to assist Mr Morfc in his meat preserv.ng experiment. Mr Mort spent £10,000 more. Of the former sum £1,200 remains on hand. Cane crushing and sugar manufacturing are still going on vigorously throughout the Clarence and Richmond districts, Queensland. Several of the small mills have completed their work. Tha Melbourne Argus says that this has been tho worst year for business since 1854 and 1855. People have beea living from har.d to mouth. A London paper says that a thunderstorm, which renders telegraph wires useless for hours together, might at auy time plunge an electrica'ly-lighbed town into the darkness of blackest night. At a hiring fair for agricultural servants, held in Newcastle on Tyne, the wages of men suffered a reduction of £3, and women of £2, for the six months, as compared with those paid for the corresponding period of last year. Teaniel, the great caricaturist, is said to be an amiable, gocd, honest man, modest, retiring, and personally little known to the world. He is 58 years of age. The first tramway cars ever run in Scotland on tho Sabbath were 3tarted in November last by the Glasgow Tramway Company between Patrick and. Glasgow. Sixty- eight tons of stone from the Caledonian Reef, Charters Towers, Queensland, lately yielded 644 ounces of gold. The prices now rulingatthe Sydney cattle yards, Homebusb, viz. 20a per lOOlbs. for good beef, and lid per lb. for prime mutton, are anything but remunerative. The Bathurst, New South Wales' people were long clamouring for a railway, and now that they have got it they find that it is ruining them. Louis Bambarger, driver of Oobb's coach on the Gympie road, Queensland, was drowned in crossing a creek, and the horses were lost, in a late liood. Mr Mort, o? Sydney, who failed so signally in the meat freezing process, was guided in his experiments by a Mr Nicolle, who was too clever to ba practical. On a recent Thursday afternoon, Bishop Quinn, of Brisbane, administered the sacrament of conlirmation to over 250 children, and then -induced them all to take the teetotal pledge. In the article entitled Eve, in the new edition of tha Encyclopaedia Britannica, Prof. Smith, of Aberdeen, alludes to Adam and Eve as " the protoplasts" ! London Truth says that amoDgst the poor people employed on the stage, there is generally more "virtue" in proportion to their temptations, thau in any other class of the community. Elliot York, who accompanied the Duke of Edinburgh, ou his trip to Australia, is dead. He did nob live long to enjoy the fortune he got with the daughter of Sir Anthony de Rothschild. The Brisbane Week says that assaults on Chinamen were gradually be coming more brutal, and the last one was of such a horriblo nature as to shame the most bloodthirsty of savages. It nas lately been discovered that the New Guinea natives are rather backward in civili zation. After binding their onemws they cut them co pieces, bit by bit, commencing at tbe last vital part, and devour them. It is to be hoped that the style adopted by the City of Glasgow Bank, of making advances of hundreds of thousands of pounds to the directors, is rather the exception than the rule with joint stock banks. The Wellington Working Men's Club has sent to the Queensland papers a copy of a petition to the New Zealand Parliament, setting forth, the evils of Chinese immigration, and praying for the imposition of a tax upon them. It was ananged in Sydney to deliver a course of lectures on temperance and morality to the prisoners in Darlinghurst gaol, but the R. C. chaplain objected to the "ranters," and a great row was the result. For 27 years Mr Tenniel has been known as tho aitisfc employed in drawing the moat important illustrations of the comic journal Punch. He is now taking his first holiday. The laigest Sunday school in the world is at Stockport, England. The building accommodates about 4000, and tho school has branches which accommodate 1000 more. At one time it was confidently asserted that tho Duke of Sutherland was a ahnra holder in the. Glasgow Bank. The Duke is far too shrewd ;;, business man to invests any of hia fa pate capital Id an unlimited liability Company.

The Rev. Mr Q-. D. M Kay, one of the missionaries of the Presbyterian Church stationed at Formosa, Ohina, haß just married a Chinese girl, Miss Chang Mia Tsong. Swimming classes have been formed in Melbourne, under the Collingwood Board of Advice, and the other day 750 boys were receiving lessons at the Emerald Hill Baths. The tall figure of Tennyson, the poet, stoops greatly now. and the limbs are somewhat infirm, but the eyes are full of the old twinkle and fire. As horses did not decrease in value when the stage coach was superseded by steam, it is not improbable that carburetted hydrogen may retain a value even should Mr Edison's discovery prove entirely successful. John B. Gough had a most enthusiastic reception at the Metropolitan Tabernacle, London. That immense place of worship was crowded, and cheer after cheer rent the air for some time. Mr Ho, one of the secretaries of the Chinese Legation in London, is engaged in the task of putting Shakspeare into the language of Piccalilli and Chow Chow. Protestant Episcopal clergymen in the United States have an insurance fund, out of which, on the death of any member, his family receive not less that 1000 dols. An American who went to Europe to push the sale of machines, remarks: "Our moßt successful machines are often failures abroad aimply because they are too fast for the workmen of other countries." Larrikinism is rampant in Hobarfc Town, and complaints are general of the insufficieny of the police force. Several arrests, hewever, have been made. It is said that Mr Gough is under engagement to the British Temperance Le»gue to deliver 100 lectures, at the sum of 10 guineas a lecture (and expenses), while his price in America h four times that amount. From the reign of Henry 111. to the commencement of the present century, the price of bread was regulated by law, being altered weekly according to changes in the price of wheat. LidyAnne Blunt, whose "Winter Residence among the Bedouin Arabs" ia announced as in the press, is the granddaughter of Lord Byron. The Sydney Museum has lately received from Mr Broadbent, one of its collectors at New Guinea, a valuable collection of birds and mammals, natives of that island. Some of the birds are new to science. The Newfoundlanders committed a very mean act in cuttiDg the nets, and letting loose the herrings caught by the Americans on Sunday. The consequence is a serious fishery quarrel. Commodore Wilson enlivened Sydney with a sham battle, on the 31st December. The land forces, with the men from the war vessels, Wolverine, Sapphire, Cormorant, and Nymph, took part in it. The number of admissions to the Paris Show on the last day, a Sunday, was 122,000, According to the published estimates, the total number of visitors from the opening to the closing of the great show, was 16,032,725. It would seem that the theory that rust in wheat appeared only in very wet seasons is fallacious, as this, an exceptionally dry season, has been the worst for rust that has ever been known in Victoria. Jem Mace, the pugilist, keeps a public house in Melbourne, with one Thompson, another pugilist. Under pretext of "playing with the gloves on," the two get up regular prize-fights. A telegram in a Melbourne paper from Elmore district, Victoria, says of the wheat harvest : From reliable sources I learn the average will be about eight bushels per acre. The Eighteenth Congress of the Chnrch of England commenced at Sheffield on Tuesday, Ist October, the Bishop of York presiding, and some 2000 clergymen and laymen being present. A writer in the London Time 3 suggests that the whole British Empire should form a Customs Union ; that there be perfect free trade between its various ports, bufc that a heavy duty be imposed on all goods from outside. Canon Harper, at the Church of England Congress, deprecated abstaining from beer, and »aid that; on a hot day he found Bass's beer one of the best drinks, better certainly than milk, water, or cold tea.