MULTUM IN PARVO.

Otago Witness, Issue 1598, 8 July 1882, Page 7

MULTUM IN PARVO.

Bands of music are forbidden to play on most of the large iron bridges of the world. This is due to the well known phenomenon that a constant succession of sound-waves, especially, such as come from tho playing ot a good band, will excite the wire vibrations. At first these vibrations arc very slight, but they increase as the sound-waves continue to come.

Tho San Francisco Bulletin says that Charles E. Bucll, of New Haven, has patented a device which is .said to overcome the main difficulties of storing electricity, and promises to mako the electric light available for ordinary use. It is complained in England^ that the Universities themselves liavo long since abdicated their teaching functions. Moafc of tho real teaching, it is said, is provided by tho unauthorised and outside system of private tutors.

Torrential rains are reported from Brazil, where it is said that three towns have been almost destroyed by the floods. Many persons have been drowned, and great distress prevails in the flooded lowlands of the Rio province.

Roman railroads are now to be under State control. They are to be administered by a council, whose dicisions on all matters of importance will be subject to review by tho Minister of Public Works.

Tho Marquis of Lome lias been presented with an address for transmission to tho C^ueon, signed by 50,000 Canadian women, congratulating Her Majesty upon her escape from assassination.

Tho schools in Egypt, Syria and Palestine are attended by increasing numbers of Moslem children; and as many as 3000 Mohammedan girls are now found in Christian schools in Syria alone. Tho net profit of the Paris Electrical Exhibition was 325,000 francs. This sum is to be expended in the erection of a laboratory for experiments in electricity, attached to the telegraph and General Post office in Paris. Mr Longfellow was not a church-goer. 'His family have sittings in the College Chapel at Cambridge, and have been attendants there, it is understood that in his religious belief he was in sympathy with his brother, Rev. Samuel Longfellow, a Liberal Unitarian. A number of young Chinese officers have just arrived in France for a course ot study. They speak French ilueutly, and are .shortly to be admitted to the Ecole Polytcchmque, l<> lib. Cyr, and the Ecole Forestiere. It is .said that they are also to visit England and Germany during their stay in Europe. The gout has taken possession of Spurgoon again, this time .very violently. Ho is unablo to walk, or even to stand, and is constantly suffering intense pain. Dr J. D. Thomas, of Adelaide, is engaged in researches, in which he is assisted by the Governments of South Australia and Victoria, with the object of proving the truth of his theory that the provalenco of hydatid disease in human beings and tho lower animals is proportionate to tho number of dogs kept in a community. The census of Calcutta shows that, including natives, Eurasians and Europeans, there are 30,400 professing Christians in that city. Of this number, 11,095 are Roman Catholics, BG7B belong to the Church of England and 18G9 to the Church of Scotland, 857 are Baptists, 857 Methodists, 092 Independents, &c. Only 29 are classed as Unitarians and Theists, and 49 Agnostics. A statue of Mr Gladstone is to be erected at the east end of London, in Bow road, one of the main thoroughfares. The locality is_ occupied largely by the working classes. It is the gift of T. A Bryant, a manufacturer of matches. It is in bronze, and is said to be an excellent likeness. It is London's first statue of the Premier.

Nobility and poverty : Sir Horatio Henry Wraxall, of England, died in an insane asylum the other day completely destitute, a charge upon a London parish. The title goes to his brother, M. N. W. Wraxall, whose son, now heir to a baronetcy, was educated at a workhouse school in Brighton and was afterward apprenticed to a pawnbroker. Longfellow wrote ' Excelsior ' on the back of a letter he had just received from Charles Sumner, and wrote it at a single sitting.

It is stated in an English journal that :\i a recent sale of rabi'Tlhe enormous .sum of £40 was given for one of those little animals. Of course it was a rabbit of famous breed, but it seems an exorbitant price tv pay for so insignificant an animal. Ono cannot wonder that a large sum should be paid for Jumbo when a rabbit fetches so much.

At an entertainment lately given in Washington to gentlemen only by the Chinese Miniater, the centerpiece of tho supper table was a Chinese pagoda three feet high, tho walls of violets, jasmines and hyacinths, the roof and balconies of pansios, and tho projecting' corners decorated with flowering maple buds to represent lanterns.

One of the ladies at a recent fancy dross ball in Paris was attired as a witch, with a hideous mask and long elf-locks of gray hair, while on her shoulder sat an immense black cat, which surveyed the scene with all due feline dignity and composure, not in the least alarmed by the laughter and uproar of the crowd. On her other shoulder was perched an owl, but that was stuffed.

Ten years ago there was but one of tho New Hebrides Islands that could be called 'Christian, and now they are all open to the Gospel. The missionary work in the Gilbert Islands dates but a few years back, yet tho people are rapidly becoming converted to Christianity. The progress of the Gospel among tho islands of the Pacific is something without a parallel, and is still going on, although almost every island has a different dialect.

Hearing recitations, Colonel Parker says, is not teaching, by any means. Teaching is the bringing of new ideas into the mind through objects, classifying ideas, comparing them, and combining them into new creatures of_ the imagination. All that a teacher can do is to lead the child's mind to act, to acquire knowledge. Rote learning is simply inculcating stupidity, both in pupil and teacher. It will be a happy day for the public schools when all teachers arc made to understand these plain truths. According to tho directory of the lorty-sev-enth Congress, there are in that body 293 members : 195 lawyers ; 1!) professional politicians ; 3 railroad officers; 1 capitalist ; one clergyman. There are sixty-five members representing tho useful employments of tho country, as follows : 17 merchant's ; 11 farmers ; 12 editors ; 10 manufacturers ; 5 physicians ; 2 civil engineers ; 2 miners ; 2 mechanics ; 1 metallurgist. Tho useful employments are t>Ull woise reprof-pul'-d in the Senate, as the following hhows. Theio are seventy-six members, wlu^e professions are as follows : 57 lawyers ; 5 bank officers ; 3 railroad officials ; 3 professional politicians. Of theuseful professions there are 11 : 3 merchants ; 3 manufacturers ; 2 miners ; 2 general business 5 1 farmer ; 1 editor. John Bull, who disposes home-made currant wine, has been drinking tuns of it, brought over from France under another name. Perhaps, too, the French product was better than the English vintage.