CURRENT TOPICS.

Star (Christchurch), 30 September 1893, Page 6

CURRENT TOPICS.

The geyaer which was reported to bav6 been discovered on the elopes of Mount • Egmont, and "rising about the size of a man's body, about two feet above the level of the ground," according to the Wainata Witness appears to be merely a little " bubbling spring, warm, bot with vegeta. tion growing all around it, with an. over* flow which runs into a beautif ul lagoon,'* The Eev John E. Fray, of tha Duiyea Presbyterian Churoh, Brooklyn, N.T., haa inaugurated the new departure of having the prettiest girla of his flock officiate a* usher.. This innovation is said to have; the effect -of drawing young men to ohuroh* New York opinion is divided on -thS merits of the innovation— one party hold. ing that the lady ÜBhers are an attrao* tive feature of the service., while another declares that using pretty girls as decora is degrading to the influence unconscious]* exercised ?u the church by temi nine piety* One sneering cynic observes that tha employment of girls as ushers in church i* like having pretty barmaids and pretty waiting girls to stimulate the custom p£ saloons and restaurants... More than sixty yeara ago, when the death of the two infant daughters of William IV. had made the Princess Victoria heiress-presumptive of the Throne, a . curious suggestion waa made in the House of Commons. Sir Robert Ingliß pointed' out that tbe name Victoria was .outlandish and strange. It carried with it no historic associations. It would be better, he . thought, to change it; and he ' suggested' that the young Princesß Bhould take the name of Elizabeth. Lord Althorp, in: rebuking this folly, declared, with his usual rustic frankness, that he did not think it mattered what the future Queen, of England was called, and expressed the-'' hope that in time to come the name of Victoria would be as illustrious as that o£' any English sovereign. The sixty yearswhich have passed Bince this curious dis-. cußaion have made the hope of Lord Althorp a reality. The outlandish' name;: says the World, has become a household word. Victoria is aa familiar as Elizabeth, not leas illustrious, aud cherished with" au even more affectionate reverence. .Professor Blaokie, who has just entered oh his 'eighty-fifth year,' is . decidedly ' eccentric in many respects, in. proof " of' •which^ the Ball Mall Gazette.- tells the - following story :—■?* On one occasion, abouttwelve years ago or so, after he had visited Egypt, he gave a lecture on the subjeot: before the Edinburgh Philosophical" Society. Coming do ira from the platform into the body of the hall, in order that he might use his pointer on the diagrams more freely, he proceeded with hiß remarks. Boars of laughter were heard from all parts' of the building. The Professor noticed them, but did not know what was' the matter, and probably does not know to this day. , It seems that while he was speaking he had put out his disengaged hand for something to rest it on, and had secured the top of the head of a bald-headed gentleman in the front row. As he warmed to hia subject the Professor gently stroked the head, and pres&ntly bagan to pat it. \ After thiß the recipient of his attentions hurriedly moved to another seat, atd tha leoture went on withont further inter- : ruption. A curious but eomewhat pathetic scena' waa witnessed recently in the Albert road* : Battersea, London. A respectably dressed old man waa wandering about the road' apparently in great distress. In reply ta some enquiries, he said he did not know hia name and address, and wanted to ' know where he was. At first a hoax waa ' suspected, and P. C. Howlett took the man to the Battersea Police Station. There the same enquiries were put to him t and to them all he turned a deaf ear, gazing ahout him and talking in a childish manner. A last Dr Felix Kempster, the divisional snrgeon, was called, and. he certified that the man had completely lost his memory. He added, however, that recollection would return probably in a short time. The man was, therefore, de* tamed at the station, and, after an hour's -- interval his memory did return. One of the most extraordinary incident* in modern journalism is recorded in connection with tha lobs of the Victoria, •' Several hours before any rumour of the > disaster had reached a London newspaper office, the essential facts had been given - to its readers by a journal in one of this most distant cities of Sonth America. The * news that the Victoria had been lost, and that Admiral Tryon with nearly 500 of his men had perished, came to the know . , ledge of the London correspondent of La Nation of Buenos Ayres, from a private . source, at two o'clook in the morning. He . instantly cabled it to hiß paper, the differ- * ence in time leaving ample opportunity for its transmission in season for publica. - tion in the morning edition. It was not until ahout ten o'clook on the fame day that the direful news first became current in London. By the steamer Changsha, China news to August 26 was brought. As was feared, the bank of tbe Grand Canal in the Tien- ,< Tsin province broke, and the country tor miles ab once became flooded, with fearful loss cf life and property. Tien-Tsin is now completely surrounded by one vast sea, and a similar condition of suffering and death to that during the flood of three years ago is said to exist. A riot has occurred at '. Min-Kiang against the foreigners, aud a Boman Catholic mission there was de- • stroyed, by the rioters. The anti-foreign ' feeling in all parts of China ie spreading to an alarming extent. In Northern Ho-Nan, where the Canadian Presbyterian mieeion has been established several yearß, this feeling is very strong, and in Central, China" placards are to be seen everywhere _< threatening to kill every foreigner in $xeP country unless they take lessons from th.,, riots that have taken place and blear out. ____*_•■" .'-■■■•'._..■ A London contemporary says : — Two botanical experts, Dr Christ and D* Bftmer, have lately paid a visit to Hildasheitn to examine and report upon the famous rose-bush in the crypt of the Cathedral. The Hildesheim " Eosens took " is said to be over a thousand years old and Dr Komer says that it is probably tha oldest rose-bush in the world, though not ■' quite bo venerable as the looal legend asserts. It is 6aid, in a manuscript of tha Jesuit Elbers, written iv 1673, that th# people had for the last twenty year* supposed that the rose was plauted by the ! Emperor Ludwig the Pious, the son and ! successor of Charles the Great, at the . foundation of the Cathedral. The same tradition is stated in a Latin poem on "The Eose of Hildesheim," published in 1690. The two botanists agree that the age of the present bush is about 800 years. The original stem must have died centuries ago, bnt at the present time there ard.. living Buokers, sprung from the old mother root, close to each other, whioh cover tiie whole wall of the apse on one si de." -The - rose does not belong to any of the dis*" tinguished modern species, bnt is a> simple; old-fashioned dog-rose, auoh aa grows in our country lanes. Therp is another patriarchal rose-bush; Of unknown an tiquity, at Over-Haverbeok, on the Liinet ' berger Heath, whose branches extend to ai circumference of forty paces.