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Inangahua Times, Volume 16, 22 October 1880, Page 2

The Times and Standard have warmly complimented the Australian cricketers. The Tinifc.B says that constant exchanges of visits does more to knit Australia and Britain together than years of beneficial legislation. Referring to tbe question of payment, the Times says there is no just cause of j complaint if cricketers, who are not professionals, receive substantial compensation for tbese international trips, and it thinks many will consider that a more generous felling might have bee» displayed towards the team in the earlier part of their visit, although at the conclusion of their trip through good will is being shown to them. At a time when the religious Orders in France are receiving such arbitrary treatment from the present Government, the following, respecting Convents will be rend with interest: — "Before the Great UevoluMon (says the writer of ' Continental Gossip' in S.M. Herald), there were about 38,000 people of both sexes living in convents and apart from the duties and interests "of common life. The devolution, regarding these centres as dangerous, abolished tbe re'igious order, sold off their convents, and dispersed their members. It seems incredible but it is none the less true, that there are in Franco at the present d:>y no fewer than JG0,009 monks and nuns, inciud* ing the Jesuits. In Paris, and iv mos : oftteFrench to^ns, there is a quarter almost exclusively comnosedof religious bouses ; mostly vast edifices, sbut iv by high walls and entered by strong massive doors ; enclosures jealously separated from tbe eyes and the knowledge of the outside world. The streets of these quarters abound in people wearing the costumes of such of the orders cs per' mifc their votaries to 'cave the walls of 1 their convents ; half the shops are de« voted to the sal-i of the various things known as objects of piety, eruoifiwp, reliii't'iis pictures and beoks, rosaries, medals, votive off. rings, bnly water recipients, figures of saints an;»els the Madonna, J-/ v->, the nnrtyrp, &c ; pwts. garlands, and houq^ieis (if art fiirial fl .wers, candles, onudel abra, &",, tor decking ahars; pri.sf.s' garnieuis rich in gold, ?' k, v^lvpl, lace, and e.nbroid rv , ami the rhousaiH other gliiteriug obj eta employed in vie Human rituil In ceriain towns tiit 1 be-»t. yires atv row red with conyi j iiiß. an ( ! ihe iw-Iks pos*es<ed by i| )P wealihier unl.-i\-< i<rv vt-ry (Mfi-i lm;;1>I<-. -As all these frocked ati.'t ('oistrieJ luiclie.s : re ami-'O, ul) ican to a lu.ul, lo a woaiau, and aa they exercise a very powc^ul iullu.'Dce on tbe miuds of a

considerable portioa of the Dation — an iufluence all the more potent that they have the greater portion of the Freueh youth of both sexes in their schools — the preseut Government naturally regarded these establish* mants as inimical to its stability, and has determined to execute tbe old laws in deßince of win. b H )e religious orders, banished in 1793, had not only contrived to re-establish them>. Ives in France, but to increase and multiply to vastly greater proportions than they had reached a hundred ve^rs ago.