MISCELLANEOUS.

Inangahua Times, Volume VII, Issue 1068, 31 March 1882, Page 2

MISCELLANEOUS.

The charitable-institutions of Victoria appear to be most extravagantly conducted The cost per patient in hospitals ranges form £63 15s per head at Ballarat to £33 at Kyneton ; medical comforts form 10s per head at Castlemaine to £6 2s at Wangarrata. At Ballarat they pay £ 1 1 6s a gallon for ■whisky.

Died of starvation and cold on Christmas morning. It is painful to think that this possible in London; but such was the fate of a man, name unknown, who was found by the police crouched up in a doorway off Holborn and who expired in a few hours after being taken to the Royal Free Hospital, without being able to tell his name.

Dancing men have become so scarce in England that the Saturday Review discourses at length on the best means of utilising the small stock which is still available.

Henry Irving's limbs are thus concisely criticised by females esthetic. Mr Irving's legs are limpid and utter. Both are delicately intellectual, but his left leg is a poem.

A singular fatality seems to have attached to a Victorian family named Welpdale. Three years ago two sons were drowned. A short time since the mother was killed by the upsetting of a dray ; a few days ago the third and only surviving son met his death by a fall from a horse.

According to a census lately taken in Victoria, that colony appears to be rich in sects. Without counting the headings of "no denomination " and "object to state," under which a great number of persons have returned themselvts, there are set out in the census returns 150 sects. Cf these divisions, Episcopalians furnish two, there are eleven different Presbyterian churches, and nine specified Methodist bodies. Among the others are " Sandemains, Morrisonians, New Lights, Mormons, Spiritualists, Sankeyites, Mahometans, Josephites, Millerites, Memnonites,Sep&ratists, Walkerites, Parsees, Fatalists, Positivists, Atheists, £c" One person describes himself as a " man of God," some few as "uncertain," and another states he is " neutral."

Visitors to the Milan 1 xhibition may see there the petrified body of a young girl 18 years of age petrified by a new process, the secret of Dr. Comi. When he took the body from a Florence hospital it was already in a state of putrefaction, but the doctor, withont touching the intestines, set to work, and gradaully reduced the body to marble ; that is, the body has become white and hard as marble, but the hair has remained as soft as during life and even the down on the arms remains as in Ufa I r Comi first brought the body to Rome, naturally thinking that it would have been eagerly seized for a medical or other museum, but no one would take it, So now it is being exhibited in * ilan, where no doubt it will prove a great attraction to doctors of all nations.

The inhabitants of Sandhurst (Victoria) have been visited by a disease which has caused a great deal of mortality. Suspicion pointed to the pork consumed by the good people as a probable cause, and a commission of learned and illustrious gentlemen proceeded on a tour of visitation of the varior piggeries of the locality. What they saw and smelt horrified and convinced them. Pigs were discovered feeding on the half putrid carcase of a horse, and in the majority of cases pigs were found to be fed upon the most disgusting offal, whilst at a dam to which the animals was driven for water, blood and tilth and washings were flowing in from the slaughterhouse. In each instance the stench arising was sickening and overpowing. The visit disclosed a frightful state of affairs.

As indicating the liability of local governing bodies for accidents caused in a remote degree through their action, we mention the following cases tried, in the Supreme Court of Victoria re cently :— •' A man was drowned in the. Emerald Hill Municipality by tlm flooding of the river Yan-a, and UU

widow got £1300 damages against the Corporation, on the ground that the accident would not have occurred but for the alterations made in the levels of one of the streets. A boy in Melbourne lost an eye through a spark from the engine of a steam roller used on the streets, and the corporation had to pay £350 damagea There was no evidence of direct negligence by the corporation in question, and hence it is very obvious that local bodies and their officers should be extremely careful in guarding against the occurrence of accidents, whether directly or indirectly through their instrumentality, for juries never miss an opportunity of mulcting a corporation. Friday, which has long been superstitiously regarded as a day of ill-omen, has been an eventful one in American history. On Friday, Christopher Columbus sailed on his great voyage of discovery. On Friday, he, though unknown to himself, discovered the continent of America. On Friday, Henry 111. of England gave to John Cabot his commission, which led to the discovery of North America. On Friday, the Mayflower, with the pilgrims, made the harbor of Princetown, and on the same day they signed that august compact, the forerunner of the present Constitution. On Friday, George Washington was born. On Friday the surrender of Cornwallis at Yorktown occurred — the ' crowning glory of American arms. On Friday, Congress declared the colonies free and independent. Americans surely need not be afraid of Friday. . The San Francisco mail news contained in a recent number of the Otago "Witness the following items occur : — A Kansas national bank failed, and the president and officers started for parts unknown. They made fraudulent conveyances, and did not leave a cent for the depositors. The indignant de- - positorg captured them, when the . cashier settled like a man. The president put on airs, had nothing, would find nothing, and attempted to bribe fys guards. In vain he was given 24 hours to settle or hang. * The sheriff could' not interfere, as the entire populace had the bank-thief in hand ; and when the bluff game did not do he promised to settle. The people restrain him in custody until the money is forthcoming. This •example is very likely to be adopted hereafter. There are half-a-dozen men in San Francisco who should be similarly dealt with.