News and Notes | AdventAI

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Feb 18, 1889

FromThe Signs of the Times, Vol. 15, No. 7

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News and Notes.

SECULAR.

—The German Reichstag adjourned without day on the 8th inst.

—The question of the jurisdiction of Behring Sea is to be referred.

—The United States steamer Mohican has been ordered to Samoa.

—Scarlet fever has made its appearance among the students at Cornell.

—The Emperor of Japan has promulgated a constitution for the empire.

—There were $1,200,000,000 deposits in the savings banks of the United States in 1887.

—Count William Bismark has been appointed President of the province of Hanover.

—It will cost Pennsylvania $250,000 to submit the prohibition amendment to the people.

—The Panama Canal Company has been dissolved and its affairs placed in the hands of a receiver.

—A large part of the business portion of Steelville, Mo., was burned on the morning of the 7th inst.

—A Paris dispatch states that the microbe of diphtheria has been discovered by two disciples of Pasteur.

—The Denmark Temperance Society is reported to have 408 local societies affiliated, with a total membership of 17,500.

—Heidelberg, the noted German university city, has, according to late statistics, one saloon for every eighty-seven inhabitants.

—The longest street railway in the world is near Buenos Ayres, connecting a number of towns, and has a total length of 200 miles.

—In Mexico, says Bishop Hurst, of the Methodist Church, “the Sunday newspaper is as thoroughly domesticated as the bull fight.”

—The Spanish mail steamer Remus foundered recently off the Philippines, and all the passengers are supposed to have been drowned.

—The total number of failures in the United States for the calendar year 1888 is 10,587, against 9,740 in 1887, an increase of 9.7 per cent.

—February 5, the Massachusetts House of Representatives adopted the proposed constitutional prohibitory amendment by a vote of 161 to 69.

—There is in the United States a dog for every three inhabitants. The cost of keeping twenty million dogs is at least $200,000,000 per annum.

—Heavy gales were reported on the coasts of Ireland, Scotland, and England, on the 8th inst. Vessels were wrecked, boats capsized, and lives lost.

—The Government is about to send 3,000 tons of anthracite coal to the United States coaling station in Samoa. It will be shipped from Philadelphia.

—A few Baltimore hunters have purchased 50,000 bushels of corn from a damaged cargo to be used in baiting wild ducks in the marshes of the Chesapeake Bay.

—There are said to be thirty rum shops to every school throughout Western Siberia, and thirty-five rum shops to every school throughout Eastern Siberia.

—The late street-car strike in New York, though of short duration, cost the companies $200,000 and the men $60,000, besides some 2,000 men are out of employment.

—Recent advices from Hanoi, Tonquin, say that the French troops attacked the villages of Dinbeintong and Chochu and routed the rebels. Three Europeans were wounded.

—According to the papers of that country, Great Britain has 1,000,000 less cattle than one year ago. One hundred thousand calves less were raised last year than the year before.

—Typhus fever has broken out in Doboka, Hungary, and is rapidly spreading. In addition to the fever, the inhabitants are suffering greatly through the failure of the potato crop.

—It is stated that the severity of the winter is increasing the distress caused by the famine in Shan and Manchuria, China. It is estimated that 250,000 persons are starving in Chin Kiang.

—A Paris firm of glass-makers has produced some porous glass, to be used for window-panes. The makers claim that the pores are too fine to permit of draught, but cause a pleasant and healthy ventilation in a room.

—“It is certain,” says the Berlin correspondent of the Daily Telegraph, “that the German Consul at Samoa will be removed. Prince Bismarck is extremely annoyed by the Consul exceeding his instructions.”

—Thirty-two United States Senators are millionaires. Gen. W. D. Washburn, recently elected to succeed Sabin from Minnesota, is a railroad president, is worth $5,000,000, and lives in a $1,000,000 house at Minneapolis.

—Seventeen men were drowned on the 5th inst., by the breaking of the ice on Pine Lake, New York. The victims were driving teams engaged in hauling logs across the ice, when the ice broke and the men and horses were all lost.

—February 4th the steamer Nereid collided with the ship Killochan, off Dungeness, England, and both went to the bottom. Twenty-four persons were drowned. Nine members of the crews were rescued, one of whom afterward died.

—The Constitution of Costa Rica prescribes hospitality to strangers as a sacred duty, and declares citizenship to be forfeited by ingratitude to parents, abandonment of wife or children, and neglect of the obligations due to the family.

—Maine farmers are making loud complaints against having the juice of the apple included in the law against the manufacture and sale of liquor, and a vigorous effort will be made to have the cider clause repealed by the Legislature.

—February 4th the Glen Line steamer, Glencoe, a three-masted screw steamer of 1901 tons, carrying a crew of fifty-two persons but no passengers, came in collision with the bark Largo Bay, off Beachy Head, England, and sunk with all on board.

—The Samoan war cloud has cleared away. Germany has proposed a conference of the three Governments interested, namely, the United States, England, and Germany, and the matters of difference will no doubt be amicably adjusted without resort to arms.

—The largest Catholic school in the West, the one at Terre Haute, Ind., was burned on the 7th inst. The loss is over $100,000. The same day a large blanket mill was burned at Cleveland, Ohio, loss, $100,000; the nail works at Tiffin were also destroyed, loss, $50,000.

—The Authorities at Rome are alarmed on account of the activity of the socialists, who are busily engaged in spreading their doctrines among the working classes, and especially among those out of employment. It is feared the agitation will result in riotous demonstrations.

—February 7 a severe snow-storm swept over Canada and the Middle States, Maryland and Virginia. Two men were found frozen to death in western New York and other losses of life by the excessively cold weather are reported. Trains were snow bound on several different railroads.

—The joint resolution proposing an amendment to the Constitution, declaring that the right to vote shall not be abridged by the United States or any State on account of sex, was favorably reported on the 7th inst. by Senator Blair from the select Senate Committee on Woman suffrage.

—In the Colorado Desert, near Idaho, there is a large bed of rock salt, and the Southern Pacific Railroad, in laying the track to the salt bed, has been obliged to grade the road for 1,200 feet with blocks of these crystals. This is the only instance where a road-bed is laid and ballasted on salt.

—A Washington dispatch says that if the Oklahoma bill is not passed by this Congress, no less than 50,000 people will enter the Territory within thirty days, and to dislodge them would require a force of soldiers, and cause an amount of bloodshed for which no Administration would dare assume the responsibility.

—A Cleveland firm which was boycotted by the Bricklayers’ Union of that city, sued the officers and members of the organizations, and has just been awarded $2,700 damages. There have been a number of criminal actions growing out of boycotts, but this is the first instance where a civil suit of this nature has been carried to a successful issue.

—The December report of the Department of Agriculture, which publishes in detail estimates of some of the more important crops, makes the product of corn 1,987,790,000 bushels, grown on 75,672,763 acres, valued on the farm at $677,561,580, or 34.1 cents per bushel, against 44.4 for the crop of 1887, a decrease of 23 per cent.; the product of 1887 being 27 per cent. less in volume than that of 1888. The wheat aggregate is 414,868,000 bushels, grown on 37,366,158 acres, valued at $384,248,030. The aggregate for oats is 701,737,000 bushels, grown on 26,998,282 acres, and valued at $195,420,249. A comparison of aggregate value shows that the present corn crop is worth only $31,000,000 more than the previous one, wheat $74,000,000 more, oats $5,000,000 less.

—A Chicago paper states that at Senator Hearst’s Washington dinner all the wine was imported, and advises Kate Field that if she can’t induce California senators to use California wine, she should go out of the liquor business and enter the tobacco trade. It will be remembered that Miss Field is the paid advocate of California wine-growers and dealers.

—It is stated that all the money which the world possesses to-day would only purchase one-third of its railways, since the railroads in the world are worth nearly $30,000,000,000, or about one-tenth of the total monetary wealth of the civilized nations, and over one-quarter of their invested capital. In comparison with this sum the amount of money invested in banking throughout the entire world is but a trifle.

—On the 7th inst., Senator Chandler introduced the proposed amendment to the Naval Appropriation bill, authorizing the construction by contract of two harbor rams of steel, to cost, without armament, not exceeding $1,500,000 each, and of fifteen gunboats or cruisers, each not to exceed 1,700 tons displacement or $500,000 in cost. It appropriates $5,000,000 to begin the construction of the vessels, and $3,000,000 for the armament.

—A heavy gale did considerable damage in various parts of Nebraska on the 4th inst. At Omaha a wall was blown down and six persons were killed; at Hastings, the Central School was wrecked, three persons being so severely injured that their recovery is impossible. One of the scholars in the Hastings School building was killed outright, one other injured so that he will probably die, and the teacher, Miss Aldrich, was fatally injured. The storm was widespread.

—A Chicago Times New Orleans dispatch of the 9th inst. says that from 600 to 1,000 white men at Lafayette, La., have organized themselves into a body of vigilantes for the purpose of regulating local affairs in places where they reside. A number of bands have been commissioned to visit the homes of all colored people and enquire into their employment. Those who have not been able to obtain work for the ensuing year will be requested to leave the parish, under penalty of castigation.

—The railroad business in this country is one which is increasing at an almost incredible rate of speed. In 1875 the world’s railways aggregated 185,000 miles, while in 1885 there were over 300,000 miles of railroad; thus showing an increase of 115,000 miles in ten years, or on an average upwards of 11,000 miles a year. When it is considered that this would mean the laying, each year, of railway enough to reach nearly half around the earth, the magnitude of the increase can be in a measure appreciated.

—The Austrian Handels-Museum gives the following interesting figures respecting the position of British cotton manufactures as compared with that of the rest of the world. The figures relate to 1887. The number of spindles in England is 42,740,000; in the rest of Europe 23,180,000; in America, 13,500,000; in India, 2,420,000; total, 81,840,000. The quantity of cotton consumed is: in England, 1,314,521,000 pounds weight; in the rest of Europe, 1,459,119,000 pounds; in America, 944,758,000 pounds; in India, 300,000,000 pounds.

—The fears entertained by the authorities of Rome that an outbreak would occur among the thousands of unemployed men in that city, were realized on the 8th inst. A great crowd of unemployed workingmen assembled and marched through the Via Condotti and other streets of the city, blackening the shop fronts as they went, and, in some cases, entering stores and carrying off whatever plunder they could secure. Street lamps and windows were smashed by the mob, and on the Via Frattina a number of buildings were partly wrecked. Thirty persons, mostly policemen, were dangerously wounded during the riot.