MISCELLANEOUS.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 6753, 6 February 1892, Page 3

MISCELLANEOUS.

A remarkable case of stamp collecting came before a London Magistrate lately, a stevedore being charged with ; tooling 150,C10 anna stamps whi h had been shipped for India on a steamer. An argument in favour of technical schools is this: “ Boys are sent from school unmade, and without having any bend in the direction for which they are naturally qualified. This has long been a serious evil, that boys who leave eohool do not know what they are going to be and have not even any idea as to what they would like (o be. No choice has been developed in them, but a technical shool wit draw out what is in a boy, and this is the true essence of education.” Professor Ball gave an interesting lecture at the St Anne Assylum, France, on political mania. His argument is that meetings and even parliamentary discussions as they are carried on in France are dangerous to ill-balanced minds. To support his theory he brought forward a lunatic named Leclou who had abandoned all useful work for politics, and who quite recently had been a candidate at the municipal election. Leclou, who appeared quite lucid, gave a short resume of his political views, which, Professor Ball remarked, were only a little more incoherent than those nightly set forth in Anarchist and other meetings, Mr Q-. Bernard Shaw says that the working classes have so far saved £12,030,000 as cooperators. The wealth of the country is £10,000,000,000. Looking back to the starting of the co-operative movement at Boohdale in 1810, the total wealth of the country was given by Porter as being £6,000,030,000. So that whilst co-operation had been saving £12.000,000 the Capitalist clssses had saved £1.000,000,000. Gathering up every mortal thing that could be credited to the total savings of the working classes, they could not be put at more than £200,000,000. But, according to Giffen, this was exactly the amount saved every year by the upper classes. At a sale of curias in London lately one of the features was the disposal of a fine Egyptian mummy, in its decorated casket, dating from the later period of between 600 and 100 B.c. The sale of such relics of late years has been rare, and the fashion of purchasing such gruesome memorials of the past (which not a great many years ago was prevalent) has practically dropped. This particular mummy comprised the mortal remains of a lady with the euphonious name of “ Ta-ta-amea-neb-nest-tarm,” who was the daughter of “ Pe ta-amen-apt.” This interesting specimen of ancient burial was eagerly sought for, and eventually sold for £33. Tho demand for disestablishment in Wales is not only kept alive but strengthened by such a burial question as that created by the Eev, T. Hughes, vioar of Bistre, in Flintshire. The daughter of James Crofts, a poor working man living in a small cottage, had died, and the neighbouring Baptist minister appealed to the vicar to bury the body on Sunday on the ground that (1) it was unhealthy to keep it longer in so small a house (" they are forced to do everything in the room where the body is laid out ”) ; (2) the father had been away from work a week and did not want to lose another day’s wages ; (3) relatives could attend better on Sunday than on Monday. To this appeal the lordly vicar replies, declining “ entering into any correspondence with you on the subject,” and refusing a Sunday burial without certified necessity from the doctor, though ho bad formerly allowed burials under the old Act on Sundays without a certificate. The Belgian Chamber has passed a law forbidding all public demonstrations of hypnotism. This is due to the abuses which have been practised ia connection with the exercise of hypnotic power. But the most subtle and ineiiious forms of hypnotic influence are not thorn performed in public, but are more often due to private influence gained by one mind ever another, and which in tho future are likely to give not a little trouble to jurists. If A can in a subtle manner influence B to injure C, against whom A has a grudge, it is conceivable that it might be wail-nigh impossible to trace the influence thus exerted eo as to place it beyond a doubt and to secure the adequate punishment of Iho guilty person The remarkable case of Qabrielle Compare!, in which experts io hypnotism puzzled a French tribunal, shows what curious iutoliectul forma of crime may be possible ia the future. Against these it is not easy to see how legislation can cof e.