MISCELLANEOUS.

Inangahua Times, Volume IX, Issue 1385, 9 April 1884, Page 3

MISCELLANEOUS.

In Germany each town must now keep a record of all the hard drinkers, and the city medical men are hound to report those who habitually imbibe to excess, so "that the authorities may subject them to a strict course of treatment. The Buffalo Evening Republic says that thirty -four years ago a poor young j jnan named " Pat " Milmo left Ireland i to seek his fourtune. To-day this same individul, who now rejoices m 'the name of Dbn Patricio Milmo, is one of the nabobs of Mexico, and OtfmpateS'his wealth at 15,000,000d0L : ,:r ; v: . At the Gisborne Borough. Council the other night, when ■merhb^rs^were ' asked if they had any extraordinary ' business to bring under notice, Mr Tutchen said, " Yes. One of the cdun- ! cillors brings a dog here every night, j which is full of fleas. I move— ( That j councillors come here dogless. 1 This brute gets under the table among our : legs all the time. My legs are full of fleas." There was cause for the com-, plaint, but no formal action was taken, j Mr Joyce remarked, amid laughter, that the dog being a ratepayer, as shown by its collar, had a right to be there. Mr Tutchen said that might be, but the fleas were not ratepayers. It was to their presence he obj< cted. — (Hear, hear"). ■ ; The Liverpool Post states that a discovery has recently been made in electric lighting which, it is hoped by , the patentees, will solve the question ' how to bring the electric light into j operation for domestic use. It has • been found possible, to produce the j light without the aid of either engines or dynamos. All that are required are merely the ordinary metals and j carbons and a peculiar kind of acid. These are put into an ordinary cell, and immediately the acid is poured in and the continuity established the electric force begins to develop. % Experiments have recently been made by Mr E. H. Thomson, the well-known electrical engineer, by which a 20--candle light has been kept continuously going by the electric current being generated in this way, and the experiments have been pronounced a decided success by all who have witnessed them." By this process no accumulators are required, and the batteries r can be 60 made as to supply one or a hundred or .more lights, according to the numJber required. The new light, which is called the Acme, it is ajserted, will be admirably adapted for country resi dences, yachts, &c, and can, it is estimated, be 1 produced at a price about the same as that of gas, with very superior illuminating power, while the original expense of providing 20 lamps of 20-candle power each is calculated at about £50. . At an insolvency examination at Melbourne of Francis Horace Stubloy Borne cxtiaoidmavy revelations wore

made. He stated that he had been a member of the Queensland Legislative Assembly, and that after failing as a shipbroker he went to the mines, making at the rate of £1,500 to £2,000 per week. He calculated his dividends in eight years at £200,000. Subsequently lie went into squatting, but his opt-ratioias were unsuccessful, as also were his dealing as a wheat and wool shipper. He had-purchased some thousand pounds' worth of jewellery for his wife, including seven or eight diamond rings, a diamond set that cost £200, a sapphire set worth £150, and a ruby set worth £200. At his primary examination he gnve his evidence in such an unsatisfactory manner that he was committed for a few days for contempt. Something like a Crushing.-— The' Extended at Gympie has got o,ooooz retorted gold, besides l,uoooz of amalgam, from one crushing. The gold product of California last year was somewhat less than in 1881, owing partly to the suspension of work in some of tlie mines, consequent upon unsettled litigation. The total yieldwas about £3,200,1)00. The Comstock lode has paid in dividends since its discovery no less than £23,0:>0,000 It seems now, however, to be nearly exhausted. Dr Strain, Eoman Catholic Archbishop of Edinburgh and St. Andrews, died intestate. The inventory of his personal estate has now been returned, amounting to £211, from which are deducted bebts and funeral expenses, amounting to £113, leaving £9b as the sum chargeable with duty. The late Archbishop was very generous to the poor of his church. In Denmark the -Well known Bishop Martensen recently examined and ordained two young Eskimos, who will engaged in missionary work in Greenland under the auspices of the State Church of Denmark. They sailed from Copenhagen a short time ago for their field of labour. Chile is making rapid political and educational progress. Her citizens 1 are beginning to believe in a future of national power. Religious freedom is granted, -and liberal legislators, even now, foresee the separation of Church and State. A gentleman in a street car, while reading a newspaper, discovered a paragraph thatystruck him as being particularly fujfny. "Here is something good," said he to his neighbor, and he read the item to him, A tired look swept over the gentlemen's face, but he never smiled. Presently the reader came across another paragraph that tickled his fancy. "I will try him with this one," he did so and a tear actually welled out of his neighbor's eye and coursed slowly down his cheek. " Heaven, man !*' was the exclamation, "what's the matter with you? Have you no sense of humor? What do you do to pass away your time, anyway 1 " Looking mournfully out or-feima^gßSajßajPSr plied : " I am a proof-reader on a comic weekly." — ' Philadelphia Call.' Mr Call, stipendiary Magistrate at Melbourne, had the other day to deal with a woman whose heartle,ssness was unexampled. Martha Letitia Wright had abandoned her child some time ago near the Carl ton Refuge and was subsequently arrested and committed for trial for child desertion. She was, i however, acquitted at the general scsi sions, but refused to take charge of the child which was brought up repeatedly as neglected, but it was only with great difficulty the unnatural mother was •induced to attend the Court. In answer to Mr Call, she said that she did not know what to do with the child, but ' she would pay half-a-crown per week. Mr Call said that he wouldn't take her word for anything, and told her that I twelve months in goal would do her j good. He sent the child , to the i Industrial School for s«ven years, and told the woman that '• a more un- : mothtrely creature in petticoats was perhaps, never seen before. He was . going to say that she had no more I feeling than a dog had for its puppies, but a dog had feeling for its young. She evidently had hone, neither caring to kiss her child nor even to look at it.' The woman then lefti the Court, h.r demeanortb^roilghout have been defiant and repellant. ; The China papers comment on the circumstance that " owing to the deplorable condition of the money market," consequent upon the uii--1 settled state of political affairs and the ! probability of war, several Chinese ; bankers have committed suicide by ! talking large doses of opium. Their j despair is stated to have been due in ' part to the severity of the laws towards defaulting debtors in a country were bankruptcy acts are unknown. In ah article on the Picton coal mine, the Marl borough Express says: -'All that, the shareholders can lealise from the last report about the Picton Coal Company with any degree of accuracy, is that up to the 31st of Dec. last, £578 had been paid for salaries to a •secretary and engineer, £1287 for wages, and £1029 10s for contracts, with only £6 worth of coal to repi cseut the output of the mine from its commencement." The inhabitants of the Rue Denoyez,, Belleville, France, were recently horrified to see a young woman rush out of a house into the street with all her clothing on fire. They threw blankets over her, and succeeded in extinguishing the flames. She was carried to a chemist's shop, dreadfully burnt, and her life being in danger, was thence taken to the hospital. It transpired that she was the wife of a charcoal dealer named Jumiilac, and that, in consequence of a violent quarrel the inhuman monster had thrown the contents of a bottle of mineral essence over her, and deliberately set light to it with a lucifor match.