SECULAR | AdventAI

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Apr 16, 1885

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 11, No. 16.

SECULAR.

—Nebraska reports fruit of all kinds in fine condition. —Nine whales were recently killed on the coast of Maine. —Cherries were shipped from Vacaville, Cal., week before last. —The town of Marysville, Tenn., was nearly destroyed by fire, April 6. —Many arrests of anarchists have recently been made in some of the cantons of Switzerland. —The thermometrical register of New York shows the coldest February and March for fifteen years. —The Washington Monument was struck three times by lightning April 8. No damage reported. —The steamer Michigan, which was held forty-two days in the ice on Lake Michigan, sunk March 22. —In the public schools in Sweden, four hours a week are devoted to instruction in mechanical arts. —A new morning paper, devoted to the interests of a high protective tariff, and having a capital of $100,000, will soon be published in New York. —The endowment of Girard College is $10,138,000; of Columbia, $6,250,000; of Harvard, $4,500,000. —Additional troops left the Brooklyn Navy Yard last week to protect American interests at Aspinwall. —April 6, one of the gangways of the Cuyler Colliery, near Shenandoah, Penn., caved in, burying ten men. —The Australian Frozen Meat Company lost $30,000 in the last six months, from their English shipments. —Bartholdi's statue of "Liberty Enlightening the World" will leave Rouen for New York about the last of April. —The paint shop and spar shed of the Norfolk Navy Yard were burned April 5. The loss is said to be very heavy. —A number of Benedictine Sisters from Switzerland have located at Uniontown, W. T., where they intend to open schools. —Miss Caroline F. Whiting has been principal of the East Twenty-seventh Street Grammar School of New York for fifty years. —At last, ninety years after the death of the Scotch poet, Robert Burns, a marble bust of him has been placed in Westminster Abbey. —An official proclamation from Constantinople was issued April 8, denouncing El Mahdi as an imposter and robber chief of the vilest stamp. —The Canadian Pacific Railway promises to run its first train through from Quebec to Port Moody on August 22d, and will make the trip in 105 hours. —A post-office has been established at Massowah, the chief town of a sterile island in the Red Sea, and said by geographers to be the hottest place on earth. —Two Christian temperance women were recently fined ten dollars each by a Justice of the Peace in Cornwall, N. Y., for disturbing the liquor saloons of that town, by prayer! —Louisiana is said to be the "worst whisky scourged State in the South," having 5,380 retail liquor dealers, while Mississippi, with 200,000 more population, has but 931. —The Manitoba rebellion has become formidable. The Indians connected with it have up to date massacred fourteen whites who were considered enemies to their movement. —The Mormons are much dissatisfied with the late rulings of the Supreme Court, which declares constitutional the Edmunds Act, which was framed to abolish polygamy in Utah. —General Barrios, president of Guatemala, and would-be dictator of all Central America, has been killed. His successor has been chosen in the person of General Manuel Lizandro Barrillos. —It is rumored that an American syndicate has been formed to colonize American citizens in Nicaragua. Among those engaged in the scheme are prominent politicians of Michigan and New York. —A terrific storm and tidal wave occurred on the English coast April 7. The steamship Germanic, which had just left Queenstown with passengers for New York, encountered the storm and was forced to return to port. —The late war news from the Afghan frontier has caused a great excitement in the Produce Exchange, New York. On April 8, 10,000,000 bushels of wheat changed hands, and prices advanced seven cents per bushel. —The "Victorian Year Book," just published, gives the population of Victoria, Australia, for March 31, 1884, at 938,937. The population of Australia together with Tasmania and New Zealand is increasing at the rate of 110,000 a year. —A naval officer in Washington says that the Russian Minister to this country has endeavored to secure the services of an American naval officer to purchase vessels for Russia to be used in case of war between that country and England. —After a long fight over the matter, the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad has succeeded in obtaining the right of way for their road into the city of Philadelphia, where they will make connection with the Philadelphia and Reading Railroad. —Vermont has started to solve the question of ignorant and incompetent juries. A law passed by the last Legislature provides for the drawing of special juries in important cases. It is first being applied in the trial of the case of ex-Gov. John B. Page, of Rutland. The jury drawn consists of leading citizens of the county outside of Rutland.

—A decree was recently issued by the Viceroy of Yunnan, China, for the destruction of all Roman Catholics and foreigners. In obedience to the order it is said that several Roman Catholic villages were destroyed, and some hundreds of converts killed. —Russian troops attacked the Afghans entrenched at Penjdeh, on the Afghan frontier, March 30, and killed 200 of the garrison. The English regard the act, so it is said, as a formal declaration of war between themselves and Russia, and will at once send 12,000 re-enforcements to India. —The National Temperance Society is to have a "Temperance Centennial," commencing Sunday, Sept. 20, 1885, at which temperance sermons and lectures will be delivered by ministers of all denominations. A committee will select the place of meeting, and perfect arrangements. —England has ordered 5,000,000 pounds of canned meat from Chicago, and 200,000 swords of the Ames Manufacturing Company of Chicopee, Mass. So says the Christian at Work. It may be that England wishes to introduce the millennium, and is buying stock of which to make plowshares. —Judge Ewing, of Pittsburg, Penn., has decided that a store order given by any company to an employe is illegal. Miners in Western Pennsylvania who have been compelled to accept such orders now propose to enter suit against their employers to recover wages. It is said that claims amounting to several hundred thousands of dollars will be presented.