Odda and Ends.

Otago Witness, Issue 1460, 8 November 1879, Page 7

Odda and Ends.

(Compiled for ihe Otago Witness.)

If English agriculture is to retain anything of it 3 old pre-eminence (says the World) there must be, along with lower rents, such alterations in the existing system of landtenure as will give security of possession for a reasonably kngthy period to the tenant, and guarantee him full value for all the capital he puts into the soil of which he does not otherwise reap the benefit. Tho Governments of the earth, and the authoritie3 of the churches, aro awaking up to the fact that a system of coercion never did any good, and never will succeed in the counteraction of error, or in the establishment of truth.

The great map of the moon upon which Dr Julius Schmidt, of Athens, has been at work since 1367, shows 32,856 craters and ring- like formations on the lunar surface ; and 348 rills and clefts.

The Home Post Office will soon have for sale a new double postal card, to be used by those who desire an answer in a hurry. At each end of the card there will be a stamp. One stamp will be used when the card is sent, and the other when it is returned with an answer.

Prince Leopold is in his 27th year ; and It is confidently said by thoso who ought to know, that he will be created a Duke before the end of the year. This will bring up the number of Royal Dukes to six, counting the Prince of Wales, who sita in the Houbo of Lords as Duke of Cornwall.

An lowa law remits a certain percentage of taxes for five yearß on every acre of fruit, and for ten years on every acre of forest trees planted within the state and kept alive. 75,000 acres have been planted and £200,000 dollars remitted. -^ The liquidators of tho City of Glasgow Bank have paid in full, with 5 per cent, interest, those creditors of the Morton estate whose claims were secured on this year's wool clip, the possession of the collateral securities held by those creditors baiug requisite to facilitate the liquidation proceedings.

The International Fine Arts Fxhibition at Munich, an event held once in f jur yeara, is a suc3eßs, except in co far as England is concerned. Twenty-eix Belgian painters are zepreßented on tbe walls, and but two English, and of these one Is Bavarian by origin, and the other Dutch !

The World says :—": — " If we could only sea ourselyt s as others see us, we should not be long discerning that oar position in regarl to Free-trade is ludicrous and absurd."

Mammoth City, Mono counby, is between 10,000 and 11,000 feefc above the sea level. Though within the regions of perpetual snow, the winters are spent comfortably, and last winter's work was hardly suspended for a day. The hird times through which wo are passing (says a California writer in the Rural Press) have this peculiarity, they began with the farmers and are breaking them up root and branch, while the r merchants, bankers' and money lenders are firm and strong, and will only b« broken up, if at all, by the failure of the farmers.

In a complete chart of the mo:n, representing it as it appeared when seen with a magnifying power of six hundred. Tho number of Graters, according to Dr. Sir Julius Schmidt, would be increased to 100,000. " The eminent Indian Administrator," says the World "the man who ruled proviuces several t mea larger than the United Kingdom; who organised a considerable section of an empire ; who evolved order oufc of cbao3,— proves, with scarcely an exception, a failure wli9n he addresses himself to the affairs of his native country." On Monday last it was just 50 years sines tho first locomotive solved the problem of railroad transportatit n England still leads the van in Railway matters. The swiftest ruus are between London and Dover, London and York, London and Hastings, where the average reaches 50 miles an hour. In Belgium some trains travel as fast as 42 miles

It seems now fairly established, says the Chemical Review, that Botrytis infestans, the parasite which occasions the potato disease, ?s the same which give 3 rise to diphtheria. The capital employed in the building of the railroads of the worli amounts to £3,750,000,000. An enormous capital for a single industry not yet much older than the average life of man.

Bishop Oolcnso sent messengers to King Cetewayo about the 25th of June with a request for the return of tha late Louia Napoleoa's sword. The Zulu monarch acoeded to the request and returned tho sword on the 30fch of June.

The cathedral of Cologne is expected to be finished in 1880. The fioiala which are to crown the towers have been begun. The corner stone of the cathedral was laid In 1248, and work has been done on the structure nearly every year since. At the American Convention of Hebrews, which recently "closed its cession, the industrial question rece vsd great prominence. It was determined that indignent Jews should be aided in settlement upon agricultural lands in the West,

An address of condolence to the ExEmpress Eug6nio expresses the sympathy of many residents of Natal " on the occasion of the death of the young and valiant Prince, your son, fallen in the flower of his age, a victim to hia sentiments of devotion to a noble cause."

When old-established houses are falling credit is destroyed, and there is no certain way of di\e niiuing who is to bo trusted. The consequence is that capital, always timid, locks itself up. It is an old saying that there is nothing so cowardly as a million of dollars, unless it be two millions. The late war with Russia has apparently net diminished the gross luxury of the Sultan and his Pashas in Constantinople. Their extravagance is as notorious as ever, their harems being crowded with slaves. There is much suffering among the lower classes of the resple and the inferior officers. ' •

Advices from Alexandria represent that the King of Abyssinia claims the whole of tho strip of coast ceded to Egypt in 1877, and also several towns, and the territory in which they are situated. If his demands are rejected, war is apprehended. In watches, surgical instruments and mathematical and astronomical apparatus, says tho Revue Industrielle, French workmanship has deteriorated so much that the attention 'of the Government has been directed to tne subject. In the social Science Association, at San Francisco, Frederick Douglas read a paper on the negro exodus from the Gulf States. He regards it illtimed, a disappointment, mistake and failure, and holds the South to be the beat market for the black man's labour. President Greener, of the Law Sebool of. Howard University, controversed these propositions, and replied to the arguments of Dougla".

The foot and mouth disease has broken out among the cattle in Berne and Jura, Switzerland. There is also much scarlet fever among swine in Canton Schaffhausen, and pleuropneumonia is increasing in AlsaceLorraine.

The dimensions of the skull of the masfcodon discovered in Orange county, New York, are as follows : length 3 feet 11 inches ; width, 2 feet 3^ inches ; height, 2 feefc 5£ inches ; weight, 400 pounds. The head contains eight molar teeth, .i complete set. The skeletocis 16 feet high, and29feet long.

A national society is to be formed at Philadelphia at the coming conference on the negro exodus from the South, for the purpose of supplying tho coloured people in tho future with accurate information of importance to them.

It is interesting to read in the Berlin correspondence of the London Times that " Al-sace-Lorraine may be said to have become thoroughly reconciled to its new political existence."

Miss Rye has just made her 32nd voyage across the Atlantic with a cargo of " wastrels," or street waifs — girls collected from the highways of London. These girls are taken to Canada, and placed in respectable families, and in almost every instance have obtained comfortable homes and led virtuous lives. The work has been carried on for about 10 years. Tho Comte de Chambord is sketched aB an upright, punctilious, rather indolent gentleman, who sooner than risk taking a wrong step will take no step at all, but remain seated,

With equal capacity, industry, and thrift, the young man who learns any trade will achieve a reasonable competence sooner than the young man who Fticks to clerking j while the chances for materially improving one's condition are more numerous in the trades than behmd the counter or at the desk.

The first TO3es imported into England were the rose of the Netherlands and the musk rose of Italy. The significance of the rose is "silence." Tn the days of Pops Clement VIT, roses consecrated by him were hung over confessionals as the Bymbol of silence. The lotusfiower also signifies " silence." Madama Adelirja Patti is now 36 years old j Mad araeCarlottaPatfci-Munok is 39; Madame Nils3on 32.

Dr Rsa Welt, a young Viennese lady, has shown herself to be so learned and practical that she has been appointed by her University — th.it of Bern — assistant lecturer to Profe=aor Pfliger in the branch of ophthalmology, in which she has made very advanced studies.

A great sensation has been caused in Sheffield by the announcement that a firm of cutlers in the town, the chief portion of whose trade is in America, are about to abandon their work in Sheffield and commence operations in, the United States. The statement is that they are pursuing this step 3imply to escape the prohibitory dues levied upon English goods.

To guard against the entire less of Hebrew characteristics, as far as practicable, the leaders of the race in all countrie s have been most active during the last quarter of a century in the dissemination of Hebrew literature.

The Turks are tall, well built men, generally spare and active. The great oharaoteristic that distinguishes them from the Gretks is their proud bearing. They all have a certain reserved expression on their faces, evidently thinking well of themselves.

The crowding of the British markets with American cheese is producing some very remarkable effects, especially in Scotland. For Glasgow and other large towns the supply is far in excess of the demand. Should this state of affairs continue, the results cannot fail to be serious to Scotch dairymen. Red snow is teen this year on a lofty sum« mit near Mount Stanford, in the Sierra Nevada. For several acres the vast drifts are a beautiful pinkish tint to the depth of three or four inches. It is a beautiful Bpeotacle, One explanation of it is that myriads of minute organisms cover the surface. Broken glass was at one time considered as worthless as spilt milk, but the demand for articles of daily use manufactured of glass has become bo great that it would be difficult to supply it were it not for the facility with which old glass can be converted into new.

Another link is to be forged in the golden chain of international r soon filiation by the erection of a monument in the Abbey Church of St. Peter's, Westminster, to the late Prince Imperial,

Gadßhill Place, the residence of the late Charles Dicken3, which has been so long in the market, has been sold to Capt'.iu Austin Budclin, of the 12fch Kent Artillery. 'Mr Gould, the Boston sculptor, i 3 engaged on a heroic statue of the great Sandwrch Island King, which the Government of that country has ordered in bronza for the public square in its capital city. The deepest running stream that is known is the Niagara River, which, just under the lower Suspension Bridge, is 700 feet deep by aciual measurement.

Dr. James Guthill, an Edinburgh physician, uaya that when solid nitrate of silver is freely applied to an ulcer, a tough film is immediately formed, and the ulcerated surface is for the time being apparently dried up, or sealed up.

Paris has finally agreed to^'tbe national teaching of drawing. There are to bo established 153 schools for boys, 38 for girls, 44 classes for adults, four schools for men, and four for women. Besides the se classes tho city also proposes to open lectures on art.

A Russian physician, M. Malarevsky, struck by the prevalence of short-sighTednesa among literary men, proposes that books should be printed in white iok^in black paper, and he has made experiments vfitli fifty persons which tend to confirm*his view. "The Poor Clergy Relief Corporation" is a British charity that last year assisted three hundred and fifty-seven impecunious preachera to the extent of from £5 to £30 each. The Bishop of London is the President,

Of a grand total of 94,842 men in tho British army, 62,860 belong to the Church of England, 20,872 areJSoman Catholics, 7,125 Presbyterians and 3,955 of other denominations.

During the Franco German war, the French and German Jews were both loyal to their respective countries. But at the same time they were eiill true to their religion. Queen Victoria has no more loyal subjects than English Jews. American Jews are equally patriotic to the Stais and Stripes. A great tenants' rights meeting was held in Mallow, Ireland recently, and was addressed by Sir Joseph M'Kenna and other members of Parliament. Twenty thousand people were present. Resolutions were pissed calling tho attention of the Government to the distressed condition of Ireland, and suggesting the establishment of a system of State relief and the general abatement of rents.

Railroads have entirely changed the con« ditions of productions, They, with steamships, have enabled thinly settled localities of the world to product immense crops upon virgin soil, and compete with and triumph over the denser population but worn out soil of older Europa ' If 50 yearß of steam communication have produced such an astonishing result, what may we not expect at the end of a second half century ?

The laat six years comprise four of the worst harvests which the Briti&h Islands have experienced for many years past — four seasons in which the product of wheat ws.s one-fourth or lesa below tho average. The previous twenty-four years present only four seasons so bad as these, and they were separated by intervening good harvests. Mr E. W. Judge, of Woodbridgc, Conneo. ticut, is reported to be the owner of a valu« able relic in the shape of a oamp-table übp by Oliver Cromwell. When Mr Judge ol tamed it, several years ago, it was in the exact condition aa when last seen by Crom,* well,