SECULAR by Editor

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Jun 19, 1884

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 10, No. 24.

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SECULAR.

By Editor

—The lower House of Congress has passed a resolution to adjourn June 30, for the term.

—The first car-load of apricots and peaches left Vacaville, Cal., for the East on the 11th inst.

—The mayor and four ex-councilmen of Tucson, Arizona, have been indicted for malfeasance in office.

—Railroad roundhouse and repair shops at Des Moines, Iowa, were burned on the 8th inst., causing a loss of $125,000.

—The paying teller of the Cleveland National Bank of Commerce has been arrested on a charge of embezzling $100,000.

—A fishing schooner was wrecked in Trinity Bay, N. F., on the 7th inst., and the whole crew of fourteen men were drowned.

—The late Cardinal Sparetti was the thirty-third of that rank deceased during the present pontificate, and the fourth during 1884.

—A negro boy who shot a white lad while strawberrying near Castlewood, Va., recently was taken from the jail and hanged by citizens.

—James Watson Webb, one of the veteran New York editors, and who has been noted for many years in political circles, died on the 8th inst.

—Bishop Simpson has been seriously ill for some time, and his recovery is considered doubtful.

—In a conflict between Orangemen and Nationalists at Newry, Ireland, on the 7th inst., many persons were injured, and others were arrested.

—A St. Petersburg dispatch of the 9th inst., says that 100 persons have been arrested at Keil on charges of nihilism, including forty army officers.

—A report comes by way of London that a waterspout occurred at Akulsig, Turkestan, on the 2d inst., destroying seventy houses and drowning forty persons.

—The International Convention of Socialists met in London on the 11th inst. The speakers expressed great satisfaction at the spread of Socialism in England.

—The trouble between China and France continues. The Chinese ambassador at Paris has been recalled, and extensive preparations for defense are being made.

—The village of Springfield, Vt., has been flooded the second time within eleven months. Houses and barns were swept down Black River. Losses will aggregate $50,000.

—The National Prohibition Camp-Meeting Association will hold the first of a series of meetings for 1884 on the fair grounds at Decatur, Ill., commencing July 1 and continuing seven days or more.

—At Lille, France, the other day, the car of a captive balloon, containing twenty persons, became detached and fell about 120 feet. Three persons were killed outright and the rest were seriously injured.

—The Utah Democratic Territorial Convention, held last week, literally read the Mormons out of the party, declaring that “Democracy and Mormonism are irreconcilable,” and that “no Mormon can be a Democrat.”

—London, June 12.—General Booth, head of the Salvation Army, is treating for the purchase of Patti’s castle and estate in Wales for a family residence. The General is said to be making large profits as leader of the Army.

—Another quite general rain-storm prevailed in California last week, and there is much complaint of damage to hay and grain. California farmers are hard to reconcile to summer rains—they are not used to them, as Eastern people are.

—A San Francisco scientist, it is claimed by a reporter of a daily paper, has discovered that old coins carry about the country the germs of disease. It is not probable, however, that many people will decline to receive the “filthy lucre” on that account.

—Three Indiana highwaymen, fearing that a boy whom they had robbed might reach a neighboring village to report the crime before they could get to a safe distance in the other direction, deliberately shot a bullet through each of his legs in order to lame him.

—Customs officers have been instructed to be careful to confine the issue of certificates to Chinese laborers who depart directly for foreign ports, and to refrain from issuing them to laborers who intend to proceed to China, or any other foreign port via some other port in the United States.

—The St. Paul, Minneapolis, and Manitoba Railroad Company has been notified by the collector of customs at Winnipeg that no hogs can be imported from the United States into Manitoba for breeding purposes, and that the shipment of hogs is forbidden except for immediate slaughter.

—There is a complaint of overbuilding at Brussels; and the more strange complaint that the country people are getting to spending more in the city than they can afford. City people do not generally make such complaint, but a shrewd business community sees that “waste makes want,” and reaction is dreaded.

—Crops in Los Angeles County, Cal., have suffered heavily by the late rains. At Pasadena, on the 13th, it is reported that hail fell to a depth of six inches. Sacramento County reports are to the effect that the wheat fields are very much damaged. Butte County farmers are also said to be heavy losers; much hay is spoiled, and wheat flattened to the ground.

—The invention of new engines of destruction still goes on. The latest in our own country is a new electrical torpedo-boat, run by electricity from the shore by means of copper wires. It is said that it never fails to fasten a torpedo to any vessel toward which it may be run; is submerged till nearly under water; is swift, noiseless, and “undoubtedly one of the most horrible engines of warfare ever invented.”