NOTES OF NEWS | AdventAI

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Nov 7, 1878

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 52, No. 19.

Read the full edition

NOTES OF NEWS.

—The latest reports from India are favorable for good crops this year.

—$20,000 has been raised to start a Protestant newspaper in France; the capital proposed is $40,000.

—110 torpedo boats have been distributed among 61 Russian war ships.

—Negotiations concerning the Afghanistan difficulty are still going on.

—Eighty distinct languages are spoken in the city of New York.

—During the season 10,000 Mormon converts have been sent to Utah.

—In Geneva, twenty-one cantons have accepted the scheme for the completion of the St. Gothard railway.

A Delaware church recently purchased 187 spittoons.

—At Atzala, Mexico, a mob, incited by priests, killed twenty Protestants, and wounded a number of others.

—A world's conference of Y. M. C. Associations was recently held in Switzerland. Twelve nations were represented.

—The Republicans of France are confident of gaining twenty-eight seats in the approaching senatorial elections.

—In the severe storm of Oct. 28, 500 buildings were more or less injured in Philadelphia, involving a loss of about $2,000,000.

—An American missionary to China says it is estimated that 10,000,000 deaths have occurred in consequence of the famine and diseases induced by it.

—The hereditary protector of Juggernaut is in prison. The worship of this great idol seems to be decaying.

—Dr. Gillooly, former Bishop of Elphin, Ireland, has been appointed by the pope as apostolic delegate from the holy see to Canada and the United States.

—Edison is still hard at work in his laboratory perfecting his old patents, and arranging for new ones. His present income from his patents is said to be $60,000 a year.

—England has an ally. The Begum of Bhopal has offered to place her army at the disposal of England. Bhopal is a province in Central India a little larger than Connecticut.

—The obsequies of Paul Cullen, Ireland's first cardinal, were celebrated at Dublin, Oct. 29. The ceremonies were solemn and imposing, fully equaling, in this respect, those of Rome itself on similar occasions.

—It is stated that the Marquis of Lorne, the new Governor-General of Canada, and his wife, the Princess Louise, will prepare, with pen and pencil, a book on the United States, to be issued sometime next year.

—The appointment of a successor to Cardinal Cullen is a subject of much speculation not only in Ireland, but in Great Britain, and it will be judged from a political as well as from a religious standpoint.

—A Vienna dispatch of Oct. 31 says it appears that the powers are becoming aware of the danger of the Bulgarian insurrectionary movement, and have opened a confidential exchange of ideas upon the subject.

—A Constantinople dispatch of Oct. 30 states that Gen. Todleben has arrived at Lule Bourgas, and has ordered the construction of barracks for winter quarters.

—The Manhattan Savings Institution of New York was recently robbed of nearly $3,000,000 in securities and money by masked burglars. They carried off $11,000 in cash. It was one of the boldest robberies on record.

—A London dispatch of Oct. 30, from Simla, states that England's ultimatum will summon the Ameer to give guarantees for future good understanding. The preparation of the army in the meanwhile will be unrelaxed.

—The Bible Society of Geneva, Switzerland, has undertaken to send a copy of the New Testament to every school-teacher in France. It will require 80,000 copies; 27,000 have already been sent out. Among the letters of thanks received is one from a Roman Catholic nun.

—The Porte, at the instance of France and Italy, expresses its willingness to make a slight rectification of the frontier in favor of Greece; but it is thought Greece will refuse any boundary other than that indicated in the conference at Berlin. Meanwhile, Turkey and Greece continue their hostile preparations.

—American readers may cherish a pardonable pride over the confession of the London Spectator that it was “surprised and ashamed to find at the Paris Exhibition that a New York firm, Tiffany & Co., had beaten the old country and the old world in domestic silver plate.”

—In the district of Tekuch, Roumania, a species of mole, yellowish in color and of a snake-like appearance, has destroyed 126 acres of wheat. Part of the ground has been cleared so effectually that it is impossible to tell what kind of grain had been sown. Their appearance was sudden, and the oldest inhabitant had never seen anything of the kind before.

—A recent number of an English religious journal says that “peace with honor, as events interpret it, means wars and rumors of wars, tribulation, bitter animosity, and universal distrust and dread. It is long since there were so many dark omens in the sky. We are entering, instead of emerging from, a period of contention and confusion.”

—According to the latest figures, the entire population of the whole American continent is but a trifle over eighty-five and a half millions, while the Russian empire alone contains eighty-six and a half millions. The population of Africa is nearly two hundred millions; of Europe, over three hundred and nine millions; while Asia, the cradle of the human race, has the enormous number of 824,548,500 inhabitants. The entire population of the globe is 1,423,816,800.

—A full font of Japanese type comprises sixty thousand characters, and when a compositor gets twenty-five or thirty wrong letters in a word, and the proof-reader overlooks them, they are scarcely ever noticed by the reader. The printer's case is distributed all around a big room, and when he is at work running from one box to another, he looks like an American base-ball player making a run.—Norristown Herald.

The success attending the circulation of the Protestant Bible in Spain has led the pope to issue decrees of excommunication against any person who may afford food or shelter to any Protestant missionary in Spain, or who may have in his possession any Protestant religious publication, whether for sale or otherwise. These decrees are to be read from every parish church in Spain. The pope sent with them an autograph letter to King Alfonso, urging him to use all his efforts to bring the civil power to bear against the missionaries, for their expulsion, and the confiscation of their establishments throughout the country.

—The number of failures for the third quarter of 1878 is 2,853, as compared with 1,815 for the same quarter last year. The liabilities for the last quarter were $66,000,000, as compared with $42,000,000 for the same quarter last year. The number of failures for the first quarter of 1878 was 3,855; liabilities, $82,078,826. It is believed that the trade of the country has survived what threatened to be a serious shock to confidence and credit growing out of the circumstances of the repeal of the bankrupt law; and, excepting the unfortunate epidemic at the South, the general conditions of trade are more healthy than at any previous time since 1873.

—PROGRESS OF CATHOLICISM.—Recently published statistics, as compiled by Monsignor de Haerne of the English College of Bruges, show the progress of the Catholic faith in Great Britain and the United States. These statistics, as given in the Independent, show that in England in the last twenty years the number of Catholic places of worship has increased from 894 to 1,815; of priests, from 1,115 to 2,088; of religious homes for men, 21 to 73; of convents for women, from 97 to 289. In 1855 there were 44 Catholic sees in Great Britain and its colonies. Now there are 88 archbishops and bishops. In Canada since 1869 the number of Catholic churches has increased from 779 to 913, and of the clergy from 768 to 1,171. In the same period the number of religious homes has advanced from 78 to 196. There are 819 schools, one for every 600 of the population. In the United States there was only one female academy in 1800. Now there are over 400. Of 56 bishops 30 are of Irish birth.

—We have now about 90,000 miles of railroad; the annual consumption for ties alone is 40,000,000, or thirty years’ growth of 75,000 acres. To fence these roads would require at least 130,000 miles of fence, which it would cost $45,000,000 to build, and take at least $15,000,000 annually to keep in repair. We have 75,000 miles of wire, which requires in its putting up 800,000 trees, while the annual repairs must take 300,000 more. The little, insignificant lucifer match consumes annually in its manufacture 300,000 cubic feet of the finest pine. The bricks that are annually baked require 2,000,000 cords of wood, which would sweep the timber clean from 50,000 acres. Shoe pegs are quite as important an article as matches or bricks, and to make the required annual supply consumes 100,000 cords of fine timber, while the manufacture of lasts and boot trees takes 500,000 cords of maple, beech, and birch, and about the same amount is required for plane stocks and the handles of tools. The packing boxes made in the United States in 1874 amounted to $12,000,000, while the value of the timber manufactured into agricultural implements, wagons, etc., is more than $100,000,000. The farm and rural fences of the country consume an immense amount of lumber and timber annually, but as we grow older as a nation this consumption may, and probably will, be reduced by the more general use of live fences, or hedges. Our consumption of timber is not only daily on the increase, but our exportation of timber is also rapidly increasing. Our staves go by the million to France annually, walnut, oak, maple, and pine to England, and spars and docking timber to China and Japan.—Lumberman's Gazette.

—WANTED—A DEFENDER OF THE FAITH.—Speaking of the Pope’s action on the subject of the massacre of Roman Catholics in the Balkans, the Pall Mall Gazette calls attention to the fact that Catholics are “the least protected, in a temporal sense, of any denomination. Protestants in trouble can be sure that one, if not three, first-rate powers will be ready to take up their quarrel—England, America, and Germany having each and all stood forth in our own time as champions of Protestantism. Members of the Greek Church again, as Europe has too much reason to know, never lack the most zealous of defenders. At all events, they know that their wrongs, real or imaginary, will always be welcome pretexts for giving employment to Russian generals. There is no Israelitish empire, but the Jew may be said to be under the protection of every Stock Exchange in Europe—no bad protection either. Moslems may, with more or less confidence, look up to the Empress of India; while Buddhists, again, might in perilous times derive some confidence from the fact that Britain is, in one sense, the greatest of Buddhist powers. But Catholics as such, have at the present moment no prince or commonwealth particularly eager in their cause. The Eldest Son of the Church is no more; the Catholic King is not powerful; the most faithful King less so; the Austrian Caesar exercises but a feeble sway over a house divided against itself; and since the last Belgian elections there remains not a single ministry in Europe which even its enemies could style ‘clerical.’” Which is rather a depressing outlook for the Vatican.

—According to recent estimates made by the Catholic World, the leading periodical of the church published in this country, the Catholic population of America is 9,000,000. This we believe a pretty good guess, in the absence of exact census returns. In 1840 the Catholics were 960,000, in a total population of 17,070,000, or one-eighteenth of the whole; in 1850 they were 2,150,000 in a total of 23,191,000, or one-eleventh of the whole; in 1860 they were 4,400,000, in a total of 31,000,000, or one-seventh of the whole; in 1870 they were 8,500,000, in a total of 40,000,000, or over a fifth of the whole. We have not at hand the requisite data to give the growth in wealth of the Catholic Church in America since 1840, but have been able to collect some statistical information respecting it since 1850. First may be considered the growth in wealth of the Roman Catholic Church in the United States, as compared with that of the whole country, and of the leading Protestant denominations. In 1850, the total property valuation of the United States, according to the census report of that year, was $7,135,780,228; in 1860 it was $16,159,616,068; in 1870 it was $30,063,518,507. That is to say, the aggregate wealth of the country increased about 125 per cent from 1850 to 1860, and about 86 per cent from 1860 to 1870. The total property valuation of the Roman Catholic Church in the United States in 1850 was $9,256,758; in 1860 it was $26,774,119; in 1870 it was $60,985,565. That is to say, the aggregate wealth of the Catholic Church increased about 189 per cent from 1850 to 1860, and about 128 per cent from 1860 to 1870. In 1850, when Catholics had $9,256,758 of church property, the Baptists had $11,620,855; the Episcopalians, $11,375,010; the Methodists, $14,822,870; the Presbyterians, $14,548,789. In 1870, when the Catholics had $60,985,565, the Baptists had $39,229,221; the Episcopalians, $36,514,547; the Methodists, $69,854,121; the Presbyterians, $47,728,782. It will be seen from these figures that the Catholics had in 1870 distanced all their Protestant competitors with the single exception of the Methodists. But it must be borne in mind that while in the twenty years from 1850 to 1870 the Methodists, whose astonishing growth is the standing boast of the Evangelical Protestants of this country, made a gain of 371 per cent in the value of their church property, the Catholics made in the same twenty years a corresponding gain of 558 per cent.—Inter-Ocean.