12 DECEMBER 1874

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For the seventh time within twelve months a seat is

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vacant for Stroud. After a trial in which Mr. Brand's agents were accused of buying votes, and the petitioner was charged by counsel with buying evidence, Mr. Baron Pigott...

President Grant's annual Message to Congress was delivered on the

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7th init. According to a very imperfect summary for- warded by cable, the President is hostile to Spain, stating that the " offences " of that country in the matters of the 4...

The French Assembly is about, it is stated, to adjourn

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on the 19th inst. for twenty-one days. The reasons assigned for this unusual delay of business are that Parisian tradesmen want to get quietly through their traffic on New...

• *** The Editors cannot undertake to return Manuscr ip t in

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any case.

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NEWS OF THE WEEK T HE trial of Count Arnim has begun, but we have not as yet the means of judging in any degree of the nature of the defence. It is clear that if he has not...

On the 5th inst. Prince Bismarck defended the abolition of

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the post of Envoy to the Vatican, by alleging that the war of 1870 had been brought on by the Pope and the Jesuits, who overbore Napoleon III. when he was hesitating—as if...

It was supposed last week that Marshal Serrano was on

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his way- to the North with a large army, and that the Carlists were in straits, an idea confirmed by a letter from the Bishop of Urgel abandoning the Carlist cause, but the...

German affairs have indeed occupied the week. Besides the Arnim

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trial, there have been two debates of importance in the German Parliament. The first was raised by Dr. Jiirg, leader of the Bavarian Catholics, who complained that the Foreign...

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Mr. Gladstone seems to be earning a great popularity amongst

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the Dissenters by his pamphlet on the Vatican decrees. The Nonconformist ministers of Launceston and its neighbourhood. have congratulated him on "the unanswerable logic and...

The President of the Local Government Board, Mr. Mater- Booth,

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did not give much comfort to the deputation which visited him on Thursday to protest against turning the hospital at the foot of Hampstead Heath into a hospital for contagious...

The Wesleyan and Church Missionary Societies question the accuracy of

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the figures we quoted last week from the Edinburgh Daily Review, but the gentlemen who write on their behalf appear to miss our point. Dr. Boyce writes that the Wesleyans had...

The latest intelligence, from India announces that the Ameer of

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Afghanistan and his son Yakoob have come to a compromise. The history of their quarrel is confused, but it would appear that Yakoob, who is a man of unusual courage, after...

"Vert-Vert," an opera bouffe, was recently placed on the stage

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of the St. James's Theatre ; the theatrical critic of Vanity Fair considered the piece stupid, the orchestra and singing bad, the ballet-girls incompetent, too much undressed,...

A curious trial, as to the right of an incumbent

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to refuse to administer the Communion to a parishioner who, in his opinion, had " depraved " the Book of Common Prayer, or " hindered " the Word of God, is to come before the...

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It seems that the Bishop of Lincoln (Dr. Wordsworth) ad-

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-dressed the other day (3rd December), to the Archdeacon of the diocese of Lincoln and to the Heads of the three Colleges of which the Bishop of Lincoln is Visitor (namely,...

The "cold spell," as the Americans call it, of the

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week ending the 5th inst. killed off Londoners very fast. The weather was atrocious, cold, damp, and windy, and the very old and very young perished under it like flies. Though...

Dean Stanley preached a fine sermon last Sunday before the

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University of Oxford, on the duality of man's nature, and the unreasonableness of alarm at the scientific hypothesis of his evolution from a nature purely animal and earthly. He...

The hearing of a summons against some Norwich surgeons for

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assisting a French surgeon, M. Magnan, in some extremely need- less and cruel experiments on dogs, during the Norwich session of the British Association last August, took place...

Messrs. Debrett, Lodge, Burke, Dod, Hardwicke, and the rest of

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the Peerage publishers must be interested in watching the negotiation now going on between the wealthy breeders of short- horns and the owner of what ought to be called "the...

The success or failure of the observations of the Transit

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of Venus, which took place early on Wednesday morning, was known here on Thursday morning from the stations at Calcutta, Madras, Kurrachee, Shanghai, Cairo, Japan, and Siberia ;...

The Dorsetshire clergy and laity who met at Blandford onWednes-

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, day to discuss a letter of the Bishop of Salisbury on the Ornaments Rubric, came to a resolution to adhere to the surplice only (whether with or without the black stole, we...

Consols were on Friday 911-91f.

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TOPICS OF THE DAY.

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PRINCE BISMARCK AS DEBATER. IF the sole object of political oratory were to produce immediate effect, Prince Bismarck might be pronounced the most successful orator alive....

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A LIBERAL DISRAELI.

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S IR WILLIAM HARCOURT'S excellent speech, on Wednes- day, at the Shoreditch Town Hall, on the Epping Forest victory and on the policy of Enclosure generally, will bring his...

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DISSOLUTION BY THIRDS.

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W E have an impression, not based upon information, but on a calculation of probabilities, that the proposal of M. Ernest Picard about to be made in the Assembly to arrange a...

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THE PENALTY IN THE MACKONOCHIE CASE.

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observe that at least one contemporary considers that it is debarred by the appeal to the Privy Council in the Mackonochie case from making any remarks upon it. It seems to us...

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A PRELATE AND A JACOBIN.

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T HE debate in the National Assembly on freedom of academical education has been made memorable by the speeches of two peculiarly gifted men. One was the Bishop of Orleans, and...

THE STRO1JD PETITION.

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T HE electors of Stroud, or rather a section of them, are doing their very best to discredit the Law of 1868 for preventing Bribery at Elections. From the day when the borough,...

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MR. GALTON ON SCIENTIFIC MEN.

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W E are very doubtful whether Mr. Galton, with all his study and knowledge of statistics, knows the limits within which statistics are useful, and beyond which they are mere...

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DECENCY ON THE STAGE.

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T HE importance of the case " Fairlie v. Blenkinsop " seems to us to be mainly incidental. As a libel case it was of no importance at all, the appearance of the Lord Chamber-...

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LETTERS TO THE EDITOR.

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CHURCH REFORM OR CHURCH DLSESTABLISHMENT ? [TO THE EDITOR OF THE SPECTATOR:1 Sin,—You state the case very fairly, and I go a long way with your argument. The question resolves...

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[TO THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR."]

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SIR,—I would ask if the position of consciousness in the chain of cause and effect is not sufficiently settled by the test of concomi- tant variations (Mill's "Logic," bk. iii.,...

[TO TEE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR."] SIR,—I have read with

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much interest your recent articles upon Materialism and Automata. But while I am "in entire sympathy with your mode of understanding these matters," I cannot but think that in...

BOOKS.

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THE LIFE OF THE PRINCE CONSORT.* Mn. THEODORE MARTIN was entrusted by Her Majesty with the task of writing the Life of the Prince Consort, and the first portion of the work—the...

HUMAN AUTOMATISM.

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[To THE EDITOR OF THZ "SPECTATOR."] was almost as much surprised as you were to hear, on the authority of Professor Clifford, that "automatism," which, as you say, "was a wild...

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MISS THACKERAY'S FAIRY STORIES.*

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WE never admire Miss Thackeray more than when she gives her fancy the rein for the purpose of casting round modern life some of the undefinable glamour and wonder in which the...

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SIR SAMUEL BAKER'S EXPEDITION.*

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THE general result of Sir Samuel Baker's Expedition was so well known before his narrative was published, the inexplicable em- ployment of "the incarnation of the slave trade,"...

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CAVE-HUNTING.*

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SOBER science has nowhere more conspicuously displaced mystic fancy than in the popular ideas as to caverns. Their gloomy passages no longer lead the explorer bodily down to the...

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THE ENGLISH PEASANTRY.*

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Ma. Haarn's book, while it is very interesting and very im- portant, is also somewhat disappointing. Because, though he calls it the English Peasantry, and says, in his preface,...

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CURRENT LITERATURE.

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CHRISTMAS BOOKS. We may take this opportunity of briefly mentioning the appear- ance of a very handsome edition of ne Life and Epistles of St. Paul. By Thomas Lewin, M.A. (Bell...

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.Mokeanna, and other Tales. By F. C. Hartland. (London: Bradbury,

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Agnew, and Co.)—These parodies of novels by /ifiss Braddon, Charles Reade, and others, are, of coarse, full of amusing nonsense and clever extravaganza and burlesque, and keep...

By Still Waters. By Edward Garrett. (Henry S. King and

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Co.)— Stories with a purpose are apt to be tiresome ; Mr. Garrett's story is certainly an exception to the rule. He has chosen for his theme the simple record of a woman's life....