Rensselaer Standard, Volume 1, Number 20, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 1 November 1879 — GENERAL. [ARTICLE]

GENERAL.

Upon himself and his 800 wives the Sultan of Turkey spends $10,0000,000. The rinderpest is raging in Russian Poland with greater virulence than ever. Eight coach horses, costing S3OO each, were sent recently from Lexington, Ky., to Alfred Withers in London. The pay-roll of the New York City Fire Department, for the month of September, Anounted to $86,385.64. The Indians in New Mexico are "on the rampage,” having recently committed horrible massacres and depredations.

The Swiss colony, numbering some 700 souls, that settled in Tennessee, is devoting its energies entirely to cheese making. General Grant is said to have become a strict tetotaler, during his foreign tour, and now abstains from everything intoxicating. The value of exports of live cattle from the United States to Europe has increased from $3,896,818 during 1878 to $8,379,200 in 1879. Oranges, lemons, olives, and almonds are to be Cultivated in Florida soon by a large number of Italian colonists, now on their way to the State. Prof. Wise has not been heard from since his ascension at St. Louis weeks since. All hope of his being alive has been abandoned by his friends. There has been imported into New York by sea from California since the beginning of this year 1,156,712 gallons

of wine, and 114,717 gallons of brandy. The Spiritualists of St. Petersburg, ‘.hough much laughed at, are rapidly .ncreasing in numbers, and they are about to establish a Spiritualist weekly. The amount of gold coin received at New York by European steamers during last week was $3,660,000, making $41,750,000 since the Ist of August. , ; The navigation of the Ohio river is to be improved by the construction of a semi-circular dyke, 3,000 feet long, at the Portland bar, opposite New Albany. at a cost of $30,000. The net weight of $5,000 fllfcw American coin is 18 lbs. 7j ozs. The weight of silver of equal coin value is, without going into fine fractions, sixteen times the weight of gold. The citizeu of Chicago have decided to extend iweception to General Grant upon his visit to that city. The promi'nent citizens, with out regard to party, are taking the matter in hand. One of the most enlightened monarchs of the present day is the Queen of Madagascar, who labors earnestly to impress upon her subjects the importance of sobriety and education. > Notwithstanding the great advance in American breadstuff's during

the last few weeks, the smuggling of flour from the United States into Canada is said to be steadily increasing. Philadelphia is enjoying a spiritual revival, under the ministrations of ayoung man called the "boy preacher," a smooth-faced youth with a wonderful eloquence. The converts under his ministrations number 11,000 souls. It is estimated that the postal service for the present year will cost $39,920,000. Of this amount the postal revenues will pay $32,210,000, leaving a deficit, to be supplied by Congressional appropriation, of $7,710,000. In January next a postage Rtamp of a new design is to be issued in Great Britain. It will bears portrait of the Queen as she appears in mature age, and not, as now, a likeness of her Majesty when she had just entered womanhood.

The highest inhabited house in the world is believed to be the one erected for the miners employed on Mount Lincoln, in the main range of the Rocky Mountains, Park county, Col. It is 14,157 feet above sea level. A million and three-quarters ol dollars have been subscribed for charitable purposes through the agency of the New York Chamber of Commerce during the past twenty years. The Chicago and Northwestern fires in 1871 called out gifts to the amount of $1,044,000; the French sufferers by the

• war in 1870 received $143,000; the yellow fever fund raised last year amounted to $172,000. Great excitement prevails out West on account of Jho recent rich discoveries of gold bearing quarts in the Big Horn mountains, about seventy-five miles northwest of Fort McKinney, Wyoming, at the head of the Tongue river. Large numbers of miners are ea route to the mines. The ore has been assayed with the following results: lowest $4, highest S7O per ton. A young lady of Pniladelphla had her pocket picked of a wallet'containing $5. On ascertaining her loss she found that a diamond ring, pronounced to be worth S3OO. had slipped from the thief s finger during the operation and remained in her pocket. "Not more than fifteen aeronauts have loet their lives during the last hundred years.” One man in Kentucky who fell seven hundred feet glanced on a tree, and still lives. He is a little rheumatic at times. Russia is exercised over tne safety of its Central Asian expedition. The ».flfa.tr at Geok Tepe proves to have been terribly disastrous. The troops are suffering the fatsl scourges of diphtheria and scorbutic diseases, while the medical arrangements are very indifferent.

Eastern Siberia is menaced by famine, the prices of grain are higher than were ever known before, and the poorer classes are suffering severely. The harvest is extremely poor and the cattle plAgue has increased the evil, there being ii} many villages not one beast left alive. The anti-rent agitation in Ireland increases. Agents report to absentee landlords that they will be unable to collect their rents, while tenants are threatened with assassination if they pay their dues. The English Government is likely to have home as well as 'foreign problems to settle. Blondin, in his Vienna exhibitions, uses a rope stretched at a height of 150 feet, and walks blindfolded, without a balance pole. No net is spread to break a fall, and death would be inevitable if he tumbled. In this respect his feats are more dangerous than at Niagara where a drop into the water might not have killed him.

The daughter of Mr. Meeker, the agent assasinated by tbe Ute Indians, is very severe on the Colorado and general governments for their tardiness in coming to her father’s succor when he appealed for soldiers. Congress is to be asked to vote $5,000 to mark the grave of Daniel Morgan, the hero of the Cowpens. The grave is in Mt. Hebron Cemetery, at Winchester, Va., the slab that once covered it now nearly destroyed by relic-hunters. Great opposition is being manifested in the Austrian dominions to the introduction of American meat of all kinds. The Government has hot prohibited the importation, but tbe local producers proclaim that the American article is rotten with worms. _ A waxwork Franklin, on exhibition in France, is labeled "Franklin, Inventor of electricity. This savant, after having made seven voyages around the world, died on the Sandwich Islands, and was devoured by savages, of whom not a singlefragment was ever recovered.” The death of Henry C. Carey, the distinguished author, at Philadelphia last week, removes another of a charming circle in that city, which was broken by the death of Morton McMichael. Mr. Carey was born in 1793, aud fes the son of Matthew Carey, the Irish agitator. The Marquis of Headfort and his agent have received letters threatening them with death unless a reduction of rent be granted. A number of the tenants are supposed to be privy to this attempt at intimidation. The Marquis is the owner of extensive estates in the west of Ireland.