SCOTLAND

Otago Witness, Issue 2509, 16 April 1902, Page 30

SCOTLAND

(From Our Own Correspondent.) EDINBURGH, February 27. A BITTER SEASON. If winter was slow to begin in earnest, it is equally slow to relax its grip. For .weeks we have had frost, or the piercing .winds which are still more trying to bear. Snow has lain deep over a great part of Scotland, putting sheep-larmers to much trouble and expense in feeding their flocks. In the Border districts great numbers of ibirds have perished from hunger. In the towns building work has been at a standstill, and this has told prejudically upon other trades, so that there are a good many men out of work. The severe weather has caused an exceptional mortality among old people, the deaths of many such being announced daily. There is also a good deal of disease prevalent, especially influenza, which is epidemic in some places. There has been a recrudescence of smallpox in Glasgow, and cases have also occurred m Dundee, with one or two in Perth and Edinburgh. Tim is the time that the scavengers in Glasgow have chosen for a strike, and what that city can be like without their attentions is a theme upon which the imagination is most unwilling to dwell. The one bright gleam in the wintry season has been the opportunities afforded to skaters and curlers, who have made tho most of them. 'At Stirling an ice carnival was held, and proved a great success. As usual, there have been a number of cases of drowning through careless persons falling through the ice. For a time there wa, a large expanse of ice along the southern 6hore of Loch Lomond, but it was not strong enough for skaters. On Loch Leven. however, there was skating for a time in the bay fronting Kinross.