SECULAR NEWS | AdventAI

Pacific Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Oakland, California · Mar 15, 1877

SECULAR NEWS.

—Dr. Dio Lewis is making San Francisco his headquarters, answering to calls to deliver lectures.

—The Prince of Wales will be the ornamental head of the British Department at the Paris Exhibition.

—The Atlantic and Pacific Telegraph Company has contracted with Roebling Sons for 22,000 miles of new wire for additional lines.

—There are 13 teachers in the State Normal School, San Jose, with 395 scholars in the school proper, and 100 in the training department.

—Congress has passed a bill appropriating $250,000 for the purpose of furnishing a building for a national museum, of which the Philadelphia exhibits are to form a nucleus.

—A News special from Pesth reports that according to the official statement of the Servian War Minister the Servians lost 8,000 killed and 20,000 wounded during the late war.

—The Aldermen of New York have adopted a resolution asking the Legislature to pass a bill appropriating $1,000,000 for the repairing of the lower streets of the city, to provide employment for destitute laborers.

—A wealthy man, who lately died in the Province of Quebec, gave by his will a little over two hundred thousand dollars to the State of Vermont, to be applied to the improvement of its system of common schools.

—Colorado, the youngest of the States, contains more than double the number of square miles of New York, and Texas is more than twice as large as Colorado. The figures are: New York, 47,000 square miles; Colorado, 105,000; Texas, 247,000.

—A Chinese banquet was given in Pittsburgh, Monday, Feb. 12, the first day of the Chinese year, at which not less than one hundred American guests were present. It is described in the Pittsburgh Gazette as having been a very interesting occasion. The hundredth psalm was sung by two young Chinamen, also the twenty-third which was sung both in Chinese and English.

The 23rd of March is the day fixed by the Second District Court of Utah for the execution of John D. Lee, the famous leader of the Mormons who murdered a party of emigrants at Mountain Meadows on the 16th of September, 1857, nearly twenty years ago. It is thought that when the contents of Lee's statement are made public the world will only begin to know the numerous murders which have been committed in Utah by the Mormons.

“The public-spirited Philadelphians did a very proper and handsome thing,” says the Christian at Work, “in presenting Mr. John Walsh with $50,000, as a token of their appreciation of his services in organizing and conducting the Centennial. But it was a much finer thing on his part to use the money to found a Professorship in the venerable University of Pennsylvania. That is the most enduring and most serviceable monument which a rich man can rear to his memory. A marble shaft is a cold and mocking memorial in comparison with a bread-fruit tree which drops its life-sustaining bounty for the benefit of those who need it.”

—Real cannibals have been discovered by missionaries on the islands of New Britain and New Ireland, off the north-east coast of New Guinea. These natives are nude savages of the Oriental negro type, who live more like beasts than human beings. The Rev. George Brown, a Wesleyan missionary, reports that he saw women roasting the leg and thigh of a man who had been killed in a fight. In another hut smoke-dried human flesh was hanging. In another he counted thirty-five jaw bones of men and women. Cannibalism seemed to be common throughout the islands, not as a religious rite, but as an ordinary means of subsistence.—Religious Intelligencer.

—Private advices from Mexico are to the effect that the country willingly recognizes Diaz as President. He is now firmly enthroned, and can only be removed by another revolution. The people have had enough of revolution and bloodshed in the past twelve months, so that the present President is certain to remain where he is for some time. The dethroned President Lerdo has retired to private life, making New York city his home for the present. He says that he has no desire to renew the conflict, and that he will never accept the Presidency without the full and free consent of the Mexican people. Yglesias, however, will do all he can to advance his claims to the executive chair.

—News is brought from Hawaii, one of the Sandwich Islands, of the eruption of Mauna Loa, and a submarine outbreak in Kealakeakua bay. The eruption commenced between nine and ten o'clock Wednesday evening, March 14, when the flames suddenly burst from the mountain and formed a magnificent column of fire to the height of 16,000 feet above the summit. About a mile from the shore jets of red, green, and yellow fire leaped from the water which is boiling and whistling like an immense cauldron. Thousands of fish literally cooked are seen floating upon the water, also large quantities of lava thrown up from beneath. So far as known, no damage has yet been done. The present remarkable eruption is the eleventh recorded disturbance on the islands since 1789.