General News.

Gisborne Standard and Cook County Gazette, Volume III, Issue 438, 8 April 1890, Page 4

General News.

Bush Miller, or Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania, led pretty Annie Miller to the altar. But John W. Snyder was not prepared to see Miller carry off the lady he had unsuccessfully wooed. As the bridal party left the church he shot the unfortunate bridegroom dead. The sale of the Norton Manor Estate for only £38,000 has caused quite a panic among land owners in the West of England. Here is a property in excellent order, within 3 miles of Taunton, with a very fine modern house, the reduced rental being close upon £2OOO a year, and, after being in the market for a considerable period, there is a forced sale by the mortgagees, with the result that it was knocked down to a local land agent for the miserable sum of £38,000, whereas £75,000 was actually refused for the estate about 15 years ago, and the new house cost nearly £20,000. Much sympathy is expressed in West Somerset for the Welmans, the late owners of the estates, an old Roman Catholic family, who have possessed it for many generations. A distinguished literary man of Oakland stood up in a police court to answer to the usual charge of vagrancy. “ I object, your honor,” he said, with dignity, •• to this prosecution of gentlemen who follow the profession of letters, and ”•* I understand,” interrupted the judge, “ that you were found sleeping under a doorstep; that you have no visible means of support, and that you have been seen under the-influence of liquor.” “ What of it ?” cried the prisoner. “ Though I am as poor as Richard Savage, when he made bis bed in the ashes of a glass factory; as drunken as Dick Steele, who was full nine-tenths of his time ; as immoral as Byron, as dirty as Sam Johnson, as— ” “ There, there !” cried his Honor, impatiently: “ I've no doubt your associates are a disreputable lot, and I shall deal with you in such a manner as to cause them to give Oakland a wide bertb. Sixty days with hard labor. Mr Clerk, furnish the constable with the names of the vagabonds mentioned by the prisoner.” In England there is a controversy as to whether their anonymity should still be preserved by the writers of leading articles in newspapers. Mr L. F. Austin, one of the editors of the National Press Agency, says : When the Pall Mall Gazette was launched—in ‘ Pendennis,’ not Nortbnmberland Street—the eloquent appeal to the gentlemen of England to rally round this new standard of their order was written by Captain Shandon in a debtors’ prison. Had the gallant Captain signed his article, would the gentlemen of England have been deeply impressed by the noble sentiments of the gentleman in gaol ? Every signature would be a focus of the animosities, rivalries, and unreasonable prepossessions which expose a man to illegitimate pressure. It is easy to say that no writer ought to be ashamed of his opinions, but will any experienced journalist tell me that he could be perfectly frank in all circumstances if his name were shouted from the housetop ? What would become of the freedom of literary censorship if every reviewer were likely to be cudgelled, or blackballed, or summoned for libel, or beslavered with the social flatteries which are the most dangerous foes of independence ? So far from strengthening the sense of responsibility, the signed article would fatally weaken it. The press would lose its courage; the temptations to corruption would be enormously increased. The change would lessen the weight of real opinion, multiply the most insidious forms of private ’interest, and sharpen the edge of personality.”