Cardinal Gibbons Honored.—January 15, at a mass and banquet given in Washington, D. C., in Cardinal Gibbons's honor, there were one hundred special guests, among whom were Baron Hengelmueller, the Austrian ambassador, dean of the diplomatic corps, occupying the place of second honor; ministers from the Netherlands, China, and Spain. The Western Watchman says: "Other guests at the mass and luncheon were Attorney-General Wickersham; Secretary of the Interior Ballinger; Secretary Nagel, of the Department of Commerce and Labor; Chief Justice White and Associate Justice McKenna, of the United States Supreme Court; Senators Beveridge, Scott, Bacon, Aldrich, Carter, Purcell, and Taylor; Speaker Cannon; Representatives Champ Clark, J. E. Ransdell, Olcott, C. V. Fornes, J. A. Goulden, T. E. Ansberry, J. F. O'Connell, J. J. Fitzgerald, J. M. Graham, J. H. Keliher, M. E. Driscoll, H. J. Dupre, and F. J. Mondell. There were also Surgeon-General O'Reilley and Gen. John M. Wilson, Rear-Admirals Rand and Sands, of the navy; Major Sylvester, chief of police; Dr. Hannis Taylor, former minister to Spain; Commissioner of Labor Neill, District Commissioner Rudolph, former District Commissioner West, Major W. A. McCathran, Judge De Lacy, Judge Mulloway, Justice Stafford, Gen. George H. Harries. . . . Attorney-General Wickersham spoke of the cardinal as a 'citizen of world-wide importance.'" Surely it was a representative and highly significant company. That accidents to submarines will not necessarily be fatal hereafter, is believed by experts. An accident to the German submarine U-3 which resulted in its sinking with its crew of thirty men, gave opportunity to demonstrate the worth of the submarine telephone and the new salvage vessel Vulcan. The submarine at the bottom became securely lodged in the mud, and in three hours, with the use of the under-sea phone, it was brought to the surface, none the worse for the accident, and with its crew alive. "Our Rome Letter" in "The Western Watchman" of January 19, after alluding to the fact that the Canalejas measures against the religious orders had passed the Chamber of Deputies in Spain by a vote of 108 to 20, says: It may be then expected that developments of interest will take place shortly from which "the ambitious young man," Señor Canalejas, will learn more of the power of Rome. It is reported that a plot has been revealed in which a clique of adventurers in Chicago was preparing a revolution to take place in Brazil in the hope of seizing the rubber industry there. The plans of the promoters were revealed by one who was asked but who refused to join them in their expedition. A steamship is said to have been chartered to carry the conspirators and ammunition to Brazil. The American Red Cross Society has recently sent out a special car donated by the Pullman Company, for use as a traveling first-aid school. The car is fitted with all sorts of first-aid appliances, and stops at various manufacturing and mining centers long enough to institute classes in first-aid, and to interest local physicians who will conduct the classes after the car has gone. The Chinese are vigorously protesting against the burning of the dead bodies of plague victims, for fear the ancestors of those stricken may not recognize them in the future life. Despite the precautions taken, several deaths from the plague are reported in Pekin. The Japanese are erecting plague camps capable of containing 4,000 persons. A St. Louis Catholic paper tells of a dance given in a high school in that city in which the clothing worn by the girl of sixteen "was as flimsy as nothing," and all but 200 of the 2,000 spectators left the hall in disgust, those staying being school boys and girls. Such a dance is indecent anywhere. It ought not even to have been possible. The Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals in New York City, acting on the information that "acts of cruelty under the name of 'animal experimentation' are being performed" in the State, have passed a resolution asking Governor Dix to include in his message to the legislature some suggestions for the supervision of vivisection. Medical tests made in Washington, D. C., show that one pupil in each twenty has eye or ear troubles, and one in every six has seriously defective teeth. Leaflets on children's health have been prepared by a volunteer committee of twenty educators, and distributed gratuitously, for the purpose of awakening parental interest. Sir Alfred Pearce Gould, senior surgeon of the Middlesex Hospital in England, says that prolonged exposure to the X-rays is likely to produce cancer. He also states that alcohol increases the liability to cancer. "The disease," he says, "is twice as frequent in England among brewers and publicans as it is among clergymen, and the liability to cancer in any trade varies with the attendant habits as regards alcohol." "The disease is not limited to man, but occurs in all vertebrate animals." Vegetarians therefore would be less susceptible to the disease than flesh-eaters, total abstainers from alcoholic beverages less affected than those who indulge in alcoholics. President VanHise of the University of Wisconsin says that one half of the people of the earth are always inadequately fed. In commenting, another remarks, "The universities had better leave a lot of their instruction in the dead languages and begin to teach living people the way of civilization." Sixty-five thousand voters in California have placed their signatures to a petition protesting against the passage of any Sunday law at the next session of the State legislature, on the ground that Sunday laws are unconstitutional, and direct legislation in matters of conscience and religious liberty. Commanding officers throughout the United States Army are officially directed to induce soldiers and civilians connected with the army to submit to vaccination against typhoid fever. The order, however, is not compulsory except under such conditions as may justify it. With nearly 5,000 accredited delegates and thousands of visitors, the Thirteenth Triennial Convention of the International Sunday School Association at San Francisco in June, promises to be the most notable religious gathering in America during the present year. An increase has been made in the salary of President Fallieres of France. He now receives $50,000 a month, which is as much as President Taft receives a year. The question is asked, "Are we Frenchmen fools, or can it be that you Americans are stingy?" A bomb factory has been discovered on the outskirts of Lisbon. A number of arrests have been made by police who have raided the place, and who say they have evidence that connects the conspirators with a plot to overthrow the republican government. The gross receipts from this year's Passion Play at Oberammergau are officially reported as $426,150. After defraying all expenses the balance of $108,750 has been placed in the village treasury for civic improvements and the maintenance of a hospital. Altho other great engineering works have had their influence, it is thought that the great quantities of explosives required for the Panama Canal is partly responsible for the increase of more than fifty per cent in the price of glycerin. A cotton-picking machine has been perfected by its inventor, Angus Campbell, after ten years of untiring labor. The average field hand can pick about 200 to 260 pounds a day, while the machine picks 250 pounds in twenty-five minutes. Aviator Philip Parmalee, at the international aviation meet on the Selfridge Field, San Bruno, California, raised the American endurance record for flying. In a Wright biplane he remained in the air nearly three hours and forty minutes. The International Congress for the Suppression of the Opium Traffic will be held May 30, 1911, at The Hague. It is stated that the United States will support England in the proposal to include morphia and cocain. Twenty-six persons were either killed or drowned when the reservoir dam near the city of Huelva, Spain, gave way and the water swept down over the adjacent country in a raging flood. Strained relations are existing at this writing (January 25) between Italy and Turkey to the extent that Italy is planning a naval demonstration to frighten the latter. Four persons were killed and nearly a score injured in a rear-end collision on the New York Central at Batavia, New York. Every year in the United States about 13,000,000 cattle are slaughtered.