SECULAR | AdventAI

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Mar 6, 1893

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 19, No. 18.

SECULAR.

—Typhus fever is said to be increasing at Buenos Ayres.

—An explosion in the Skalis mine, in St. Yria, Austria, on the 21st inst., caused fifteen deaths and injuries to twenty miners.

—Many of the ships now leaving San Francisco are being manned with non-union sailors. Deep-sea sailors are demanding $25 per month.

—The San Francisco police court clerk, who recently decamped with about $3,000 of public funds, has been arrested in Astoria, Oregon.

—The tribunal of arbitration to settle the Bering Sea controversy between Great Britain and the United States, assembled at Paris on the 23d inst.

—At Palermo, Italy, last week, 104 criminals, members of the notorious Mala Vita, were sentenced to terms of imprisonment from one to six years.

—Quite pronounced shocks of earthquake were experienced at Winters and at San Rafael, this State, on the 22d inst., but no serious damage resulted.

—A vein of coal, said to be of excellent quality, has been struck in a Southern Pacific Railroad tunnel being constructed near San Luis Obispo, Cal.

—The recent disappearance of the cashier of the Gate City National Bank at Atlanta, Ga., led to an investigation and the discovery of a defalcation of $65,000.

—Several Vatican officials have been arrested at Rome for selling tickets of admission to St. Peter's on the occasion of the celebration of the mass by the pope on the day of his jubilee.

—Advices from Cape Palmas, Liberia, state that the feuds of the natives at Rockton culminated January 26 in a battle, in which forty-six were killed and 200 wounded. As the mails left hostilities were renewed.

—The machinists employed by the Atchison, Topeka, and Sante Fe Railroad, at Raton, New Mexico, went out on strike, on the 22d inst. They wanted a 25 per cent. raise of wages and were refused, hence the strike.

—The Legislature has passed an act creating an additional police court in San Francisco. It seems that the more "Christian" (legally) this nation becomes, the more criminal it becomes. But it has been just so in all ages.

—The deputy postmaster at Spokane, Wash., has become a defaulter in the sum of $7,100, and, to save further trouble for himself, committed suicide. His mother, being on his bond as security for his official acts, has to make good the amount.

—A Rome dispatch of the 22d inst. states that twenty Anarchists were arrested on suspicion of having been implicated in causing the dynamite explosions in that city last year. A bomb ready for use was found in the room of one of them.

—General Beauregard, a noted Confederate Army officer, and one of the principals of the Louisiana Lottery Corporation, died on the 21st inst. His funeral is said to have been one of the most demonstrative ever held in New Orleans, the city authorities taking charge.

—At Alcoy, Spain, last week, Anarchists attempted to create disturbance by posting placards inciting workingmen to rise and proclaim a social revolution. The government promptly sent a strong force of the Civil Guard to Alcoy to prevent any further demonstration.

—In the fore part of last week disastrous storms were reported in New England. Snow was two feet deep in Boston, several vessels were wrecked on the Atlantic Coast, and railroad trains were greatly delayed. There were also reports of terrible suffering in various localities.

—Benjamin Bazelle, a St. Louis man, has invented a process of steel manufacturing which, it is claimed, eclipses the discovery of Bessemer, and will so reduce the cost of steel rails that they can, by its use, be sold at a good profit for one-half the present expense of making them.

—It is reported that a vehement manifesto has gone out from Belfast, Ireland, against Gladstone's home rule bill. The manifesto demands either union with Great Britain or complete separation from the proposed Irish Government. It names March 21 as the date of the great unionist demonstration in Ulster Hall.

—On the 23d inst. five men were arrested at Des Moines, Iowa, in the act of robbing a grave. It is not surprising that a doctor should be one of such a party, but that the signal observer of the U. S. Weather Bureau should be engaged in such work is a decided surprise. The other three were a laborer, a liveryman, and a hackman.

—Jackson, Mich., is said to be "in a fever of excitement" over the ravages made by the cocaine habit. A local physician, himself a confirmed user of the drug, has brought many of his patients under its influence. Many of the best citizens have, it is said, become addicted to the use of the drug. Ravenous whisky drinking follows the ravages of the cocaine.

—The Hawaiian annexation treaty, sent to the Senate last week by President Harrison, failed to receive ratification. It was generally believed to have been drawn up and signed too hastily. The new administration will have to consider the question. There is no doubt, however, that if the United States does not annex the islands at an early date, England will.

—President-elect Cleveland has chosen his cabinet of advisers as follows: Secretary of State, Walter Q. Gresham, of Illinois; Secretary of the Treasury, John G. Carlisle, of Kentucky; Secretary of War, Daniel S. Lamont, of New York; Secretary of the Navy, Hilary A. Herbert, of Alabama; Secretary of the Interior, Hoke Smith, of Georgia; Postmaster General, Wilson S. Bissell, of New York; Attorney General, Richard Olney, of Massachusetts; Secretary of Agriculture, J. Sterling Morton, of Nebraska.

—The switchmen and switch tenders on the Western Indiana Railroad went out on a strike on the 22d inst. They had made a demand for an increase of wages, and had arranged for a meeting with the officials of the road to consider the matter; but before the appointed time arrived the strike was on. Being a trunk line, the stopping of the Western Indiana also interferes with several other roads.

—A recent St. Petersburg dispatch says that in consequence of the destruction of the crops by frost last summer, famine and disease are now prevalent throughout Finland. More than 200,000 persons are dependent upon charity, and the towns and villages are thronged with beggars. At least 500,000 peasants are barely able to find means of subsistence. They have eaten most of their draft animals and domestic pets. Typhus fever is carrying off hundreds daily.

—Three young American students recently ran away from a Canada college, and started for the Sandwich Islands. They got as far as Chicago, when one of the party stole all the money of the party, and left his companions at their hotel. He was afterward apprehended, but the proposed escapade was blocked. These young men were all the sons of wealthy parents, and were probably ruined by too much money. The thief, who was only 19 years old, pleaded intoxication as an excuse for the deed.

—A railroad collision at Philadelphia, on the 22d inst., caused the death of four persons, and the serious injury of ten others. On the same day a Pittsburg and Fort Wayne express was derailed at the crossing of Little River, Indiana. One man was killed, and twenty injured. Another accident occurred at Reading, Pa., with the result that three were killed and two injured. One cause was a misunderstanding of orders. Still another collision is reported near Lincoln, Nebraska, in which twelve men were badly injured, and a large number of cattle killed.

—A pugilist known as "Billy Miller the Swede" died in San Francisco on the 25th inst., from the effects of a prize fight at one of the athletic clubs the night previous. This is the fourth death from the same cause that has occurred in that city within five or six years. The news of Miller's death reached Sacramento while the Senate was considering a bill for the prohibition of prize fighting in the State. The bill had already passed the Assembly, and without further consideration was passed by the Senate, with only four dissenting votes. It makes prize fighting a felony, and includes principals, aids, seconds, or backers. The penalty is $1,000 to $5,000 fine and one to three years' imprisonment.

—Californians can hardly realize what it means when, on a warm, sunny day, as was the 21st inst., inviting people out to the fields and hills, they read a dispatch from New York City like this: "The North and East Rivers are filled with ice, and the upper bay resembles an Arctic sea in its unbroken field of crystal. The mass extends from shore to shore. During the night the ice came down the North River in giant floes, and was swept down the bay till it reached from side to side and raised an almost impassable barrier. The result of it all was the lowest ebb tide in the bay in twenty-five years. It is said that many ferryboats ran aground at their piers. The heavy ice also made navigation extremely dangerous even for the largest ships."