p. 206 | News of the Week

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Mar 28, 1882

News of the Week

SUNDAY, MARCH 19.—A furious snowstorm is raging along the line of the Union Pacific Railroad. Trains have been stopped, and the storm threatens future damage in the shape of floods.

—In South Africa, troubles of a serious character are brewing on the Transvaal border.

—A line of Bremen steamers has been chartered to bring 10,000 emigrants from that port to Baltimore at the rate of 1,000 a week.

—Reports received at the War Department estimate the number of destitute sufferers in the flooded regions between Cairo, Ill., and the Gulf of Mexico at 80,000, and it is believed that Congress will be required to appropriate $1,000,000 to their relief before they can again become self-supporting.

MONDAY, MARCH 20.—At Lawrence, Mass., the strikers, and others idle on their account, number 3,000. They have refused to work at the Pacific Mill on reduced wages.

—It is said that Prince Bismarck apologized to the German Parliament for not attending to national affairs by stating that his time was fully occupied in preserving the peace of Europe.

—In County Sligo, Ireland, a police sub-inspector was fatally shot.

TUESDAY, MARCH 21.—Three strong shocks of earthquake have been felt at Chios, Greece, to-day.

—The sympathy for Sergeant Mason has assumed a tangible form, and is resulting in raising a fund for his wife and baby.

—The storm to-day has raised the Ohio River at some points from 25 to 40 feet. Great damage has been done by the wind and rain in Southern Indiana, Ohio, Kentucky, and West Virginia.

—A terrible railroad accident occurred at Bismarck, D. T., to-day. A construction train broke through a bridge, precipitating several cars into the river. By this accident 8 persons met a terrible death.

WEDNESDAY, MARCH 22.—The 86th anniversary of Emperor William’s birthday was celebrated throughout Germany to-day.

—A Mormon elder has succeeded in making about 175 converts in the Southern States.

—A disastrous conflagration at Ripon, Wis., destroyed property to the value of $175,000.

—800 Jews have been expelled from Moscow, Russia, for not having passports.

THURSDAY, MARCH 23.—The bill prohibiting Chinese emigration to this country for 20 years, passed the House of Representatives without amendments.

—A tug-boat exploded in Philadelphia harbor this morning, killing five men.

—The Czar has refused to confirm the recommendation of the commission on the Jewish question in favor of compelling the Jews to quit the rural districts of Russia, on the grounds that such expulsion would almost ruin agriculture, and that the recommendations are generally conceived in a vindictive spirit.

FRIDAY, MARCH 24.—Henry W. Longfellow, one of the best known and best loved of American poets, died at his home in Cambridge, Mass., this afternoon, after a severe illness of nearly a week’s duration. On the 27th of February, the 75th anniversary of his birthday was widely celebrated in this country.

—The Russian government has again resorted to severity, and many arrests have been made. The discovery of a depot of arms and military uniforms led to this course on the part of the government. The uniforms were evidently intended as passports to the presence of the Emperor.

MISCELLANEOUS.

—The national debt was decreased $9,783,511 during the month of February.

—Last year Philadelphia paid $23,220,000 for liquor, $1,000,000 more than for rent.

—In Australia the Roman Catholic Church is waging uncompromising war on the system of public education.

—86 town elections were held in Massachusetts this spring, only 23 giving a majority in favor of liquor license.

—Thirty Russian Jews, possessing an aggregate capital of about $27,000, have gone to Palestine, where they intend to form a farming colony.

—The construction of railroads in this country during 1881 was larger than during any previous year, aggregating 8,242 miles of track.

—From recent statistics of suicides it appears that there are about six times as many suicides among the divorced as among the widowed.

—There is a bill before the Mississippi Legislature forbidding the sale of tobacco to minors, without the consent of their parents or guardians.

—General Booth, the leader of the Salvation Army, proposes to build a Salvation Temple in London. It is to cost $500,000 and will seat 10,000 people.

—New Zealand is spoken of as a country having a prosperous future in store. It has an area of 105,000 square miles, and is capable of supporting a large population.

—A huge meteorite recently fell with a great shock at a point 50 miles southeast of Fort Assinaboine, causing consternation at Fort Benton, nearly 100 miles southward.

—A Boston hook and ladder company have just made successful experiments with an instrument by which they can, in case of fire, send a rope to the highest building.

—The Catholic bishop of Hong Kong, China, states that the Catholic mission there took 400,000 Chinese children last year, and is bringing them up in the faith of the church.

—During the past ten years the cost to the United States of protecting the frontier from Indians, employing an average 73 per cent of the regular army, has footed up over $223,000,000.

—The indefatigable lobbying of Captain Eads has brought forth from the Senate commerce committee a favorable report on his bill to guarantee $50,000,000 of his ship-railroad bonds.

—Despite all efforts to break up the slave trade in Africa, it is estimated that not less than 50,000 are annually captured and exported, to say nothing of the hundreds of thousands who perish in the process.

—An inmate of the lunatic asylum in Utica, N. Y., believing himself to be Guiteau, and an ambassador from Heaven, shot and seriously wounded Dr. Gray, one of the physicians of the institution.

—Nice, Italy, has a society whose object is the protection of vegetation. The members are to destroy injurious larvæ and guard harmless birds. During 1881, they destroyed over 2,000,000 grubs, larvæ, eggs, and insects.

—A member of the British Parliament has recently summed up the outrages committed on Russian Jews, as follows: 56 persons killed, 201 women assaulted, 20,000 families rendered homeless, and $80,000,000 worth of property destroyed.

—Count Campello, the Canon of St. Peter’s, Rome, who recently left the Catholic Church and entered the American Methodist Episcopal Church in Rome, has applied to the Archbishop of Canterbury to be received into the Anglican communion.

—Mrs. Mackay, the wife of the California money-king, has recently bought for $20,000 the dress ordered by the municipal authorities of Paris as a present to the Empress Eugenie. It cost to make it fourteen years of assiduous work of the best lace-makers of Normandy.

—The United States Senate has passed a bill prohibiting Chinese laborers from coming to this country for a period of 20 years. It is said that should the bill become a law, the Celestials propose to dissolve diplomatic relations between their country and this, and to discriminate against Americans trading in China.

—Fancy horticulture among the Chinese consists in raising miniature trees. By trimming the roots and cultivating in a shallow pot or pan, they contrive to grow miniature pines and cedars which, on a small scale, exactly resemble the natural plants; and by appliances of strings, wires, and pegs, they fashion these dwarfs into all sorts of grotesque shapes.

—The Census Bureau has just completed its report on the population of Utah. The inhabitants are classified as Mormons, Gentiles, Apostles, Josephites, and Doubtful. Of the Mormons there are 120,283, about 49,000 of whom are over twenty-one years of age, while 40,000 are less than nine years old. The number of Gentiles is given at 14,156, of whom a little more than one-half are over twenty-one. There are 6,988 Apostle Mormons, 820 Josephites, and 1,716 persons classified as doubtful. Of the whole number of Mormons, 37,000 are of foreign birth.

—Work on the tunnel under the channel between France and England has commenced. The company having the enterprise in charge have command of a large capital, and are said to be in earnest. If ever completed, it will be the wonder of the world. But as 24 years were required for the construction of the tunnel under the Alps, and nearly as many for the work on the Hoosac tunnel, which is next largest, many years must elapse before the traveler can expect to pass from England to the continent by land,—more, probably, than will dawn on this world in its present state.