General News.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume IX, Issue 424, 27 May 1881, Page 15

General News.

A Land League for England seems to be much needed. A Protestant clergyman of the midland Counties complains that 30,000 acres of land in Leicestershire are without a tenant ; and a baronet has received from all his tenants, except one, notice of their intention to leave, as the landlord refuses to recognise the existence of the much-complained of depression. From Scotland comes a similar complaint. An Aberdeen farmer declares that half the farmers in his country would be glad to be allowed to leave their holdings, as their leases are proving their ruin, and it is impossible to keep up their rents, which he points out, are now from 30 to 40 per cent, too high. This is serious. When the shoe begins to pinch the English and Scotch farmers — which has been for generations seriously pinching email farmers and tenants in Ireland — it is likely that some genuine redress of the long-existing grievances is not far off. — Universe. Vast efforts were made by the Eussian Government last summer to destroy the grasshoppers. The work was carried on for about four months, and occupied in one district, Gori, no fewer than 20,000 people per day. These colossal efforts resulted in cutting down the ratio of crops destroyed to two per cent. While many million roubles worth of hay and corn were saved, the enterprise cost the Government 200,000 roubles. Many thousand acres of fields and gardens were neglected by their owners because the extra work offered in the grasshopper district was more remunerative. Strange things are going on in Russia. Our readers remember that some years ago a Polish priest was transported to Siberia, and had to walk on foot all the way, some 4,000 miles, and when be reached his destination it was found that he was the wrong man, and so he had to tramp all the way back again. In Odessa, ninety-three persons were singled out last year for transportation to the same healthy climes — all of them accused of Nihilist practices. Among these was one man with his wife and a baby 18 months old ; all the three, including the baby, were charged with high treason. Ostrowski is rather a usual name in Southern Russia ; and consequently it was found when a man of that name had reached Irtusk, that he was the wrong one, and had to be taken back again, 2,000 miles ; the real Nihilist Ostrowski had disappeared by this time. Similar mistakes occurred in a good many other instance^, and in one case a Catholic priest wae to be transported because he happened to have the same name as a railway porter who was suspected of Nihilism ! That's what the Russians call rough and ready justice. It is rough and ready enough, but as to justice, that's quite another thing. — Universe. Cavallotti's attack upon the Government for allowing the provincial Communes to be heavily mulcted for the expenses of the late Humbert tour opens up the whole interesting question as to the worth of loyalty that is hired at so much the man, or of shouting that is heavily paid for beforehand. We always thought that the ecstatic devotion of the Italian crowds was too fervent to be genuine, and this rebuke administered by Cavallotti to those who have been making the local authorities pay " too dearly for their whistle " is a proof that the adoration of Piedmont was a thing got up, an affair of so much per cent. — Universe. The old slander, popularised by Sydney Smith, that it required a surgical opeiation to get a joke into a Scotchman's head, has just received fre3h support by the action of a Free Church minister on the Isle of Skye, who frightened his congregation half out of their wits on a recent Sunday by announcing from the pulpit that the Russians had invaded England and that Mr. Gladstone had been 6ent to the Tower. The consternation of the islanders was increased when the minister bade them prepare at once to defend their firesides. Every word of this dire announcement was accepted as gospel truth, and such the minister believed it to be until some one who knew better brought about an explanation, from which it appeared that a stray copy of an English comic paper, containing a jest about a Russian invasion and the imprisonment of the Premier, had fallen into the clergyman's hands and been received by him in all faith. " Boycotting " promises to become a weapon of universal adaptation. It has just been introduced into France, at Saumur. There is a famous cavalry school there, a very aristocratic establishment, which always contains a number of the gilded youth. The Commiseaire de Police in Saumur, who seems to be a disgreeable type of an official, excited the animosity of some of these young gentlemen. They applied to the Mayor for his dismissal, which being refused, they boycotted the town. The school consists of 650 members, and for a fortnight not one of them entered a store or made a purchase. Local trade became paralyzed, and the Mayor had to give in. The Commission of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland discussed on Wednesday, March 2nd, the report of their special commissioner, Dr. Rankin, sent out to Africa to investigate the charges of cruelty brought against the missionaries at Blantyre Mission, East Africa, by Mr. Chermside. The commissioner found corroboration of the allegations of flogging, thef I, and immorality. One of the natives died in consequence of the punishment administered. Dr. Rankin also found that a man had been executed on very slender evidence, and that; war had been unjustifiably made upon a chief named Mitiochi, who, however, had repelled the attack made upon him. The commissioner approved of a resolution to recall the Rev. Duff Macdonald, the head of the Blantyre Mission, and a number of the other agents there. Here and there a preacher of position and influence is beginning to wake up to the significance of the statistics showing the astonishing break down of the churches when considered as agencies for the conversion of sinners. Thus the Rev. Dr. Cuyler, of Brooklyn, in last week's Independent, says that the official statement that 5400 American Presbyterian congregations have got only 4200 communicants to show for last year's work — less than one apiece — is " absolutely appallin ,-." He avows the opinions that if the bottom facts could be got at, it would be found that the

Methodists, Baptists, Dutch and German Reformed, and Congregational churches were no more successful. If new churches are springing up in the West, old ones are dying out in the East. "He says : " The falling off in church attendance all over the land is undeniable. All attempts to conceal or to falsify such facts are both cowardly and criminal. The best thing for our churches to do is to face them." The London Divorce Court reveals a sad state of things in English society. During the past legal year 643 divorce cases have been decided, and between 500 and 600 marriages have been dissolved. One of the commonest of the causes of separation is said to be drunkenness. The vast majority of petitions for dissolution of marriage are from the " lower middle class," and the working classes. The experience of the Divorce Court tends to confirm the opinion that a great deal of the misery to which the working classes are subjected in their homes arises from the inability of women, when they have got married, to render their homes comfortable and attractive. In other words, a great many of the women who get married are unfit for married life. On the contrary, their habits and training — if they can be said to have had any training at all — have only too often been such as to render them incapable of properly discharging their important duties in the domestic sphere. Rendered miserable at home, men rush to the public-house, or find solace in other places, and the misfortunes which follow it is unnecessary to enumerate. Of course there are plenty of instances in which the men are to blame, and the men solely. It is to be feared, however, that but few married women properly appreciate the amount of moral responsibility devolving upon them in the position which they occupy, or the extent of the good influence they may exercise by the practice of those virtues which most adorn and exalt the character of a wife and mother. — Catholic Review. No man ever ascended the throne under greater difficulties than Alexander 111., the new Emperor of Russia. In his own proclamation to his people tie says that his principle aim will be the good of the nation ; and the circular prepared by M. de Giers, the substitute of Prince Gortschakoff at the Foreign Office, tells us that Russia only means to keep what she has, and means to live at peace with all her neighbours. A very excellent programme, and one which has Bet to rest a great many apprehensions which were entertained of the supposed Panslavic and warlike propensities of the new Czar. There will be no difficulty in keeping peace abroad ; Russia need only forbear from attacking others, for no one thinks of attacking her. But in what way the good of the nation can best be promoted is quite another question. On this point the political doctors differ greatly ; the only thing on which they are agreed is that the material and social condition of the Russian people is about as bad as bad can be, and calls for ready and efficient remedies. We shall judge the new Emperor by his acts and not by his words. — Universe.