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-= The Earthquakes in Spain…

SHOCKS OF EARTHQUAKE IN ITALY.

AMERICAN INTERESTS IN SOUTH…

BHAW'S TEAM IN AUSTRALIA.

MR. CHAMBERLAIN'S SPEECH.…

[No title]

THE MAN THAT HUNG HIMSELF…

GERMAN ANNEXATION IN AFRICA.

lTHE WEST AFRICAN CONFERENCE..

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The French in China.I

THE EXPLOSION ON THE ! UNDERGROUND…

ITRADERS v. RAILWAY COMPANIES.

SERIOUS CHARGE AGAINST A Promoter…

ILLNESS OF THE REV. C. H.…

[No title]

TO-DAY'S POLICE.

ITHE CHARGE AGAINST A SOLDIER…

----GLAMORGANSHIRE QUARTER'…

iMONEY MARKET. I

I SPORTING ITEMS. I

DASTARDLY ASSAULTS ON TWO…

CARDIFF CORPORATION AND LOCAL…

[No title]

THE CLUB NUISANCE AT I SWANSEA.

-----ALLEGED WOUNDING AT BRIDGEND.

THE ATTEMPTED MURDER AT I…

A STREET SCENE AT NEW- 1 PORT.

THE REDISTRIBUTION BILL.

THE WELSH PRESS. || i

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THE WELSH PRESS. || i [BY CCNEGLAS.] I RINGING OUT THE OLD YEAR, I Hie majority oi the Welsh papers contain tne I usual review of the events of the year. Like their 1 English contemporaries, they note that the year 1 was, except politically, exceptionally uneventful. I The Franchise Bill will, of course, make an abiding impress not merely upon the British Constitution, but upon the whole bent and ten- dency of future legislation, and upon the national character. The weekly exponents of Welsh opinion naturally devote more attention to the educational revolution in Wales than to the political revolution in the United Kingdom. The first year's work at Cardiff, the placing of Aberystwith on a safe foundation, and the estab- lishment of Bangor College, are looked upon as events jjregnant with meaning and influence on the future of Wales. The Genedl maintains that e S. this educational movement will effect a complete revolution in the social and commercial circum- stances of our native country, and that its beneficial and exalting influence upon the na- tional character will transcend all expectations. The time has now for ever gone by which took for granted that Welshmen were necessarily doomed to be hewers of wood and drawers of water in all circles of work even in their own country. Ou, expectations were in two respects disappointed in Mr Mundella's failure to introduce the Welsh Intermediate Education Bill, and in Mr Dillwyn's failure to get the question of the Disestablishment of the Church in Wales thoroughly sifted upoa the floor of the House ot Commons. The Goleuad is the only paper which has given prominence to the Continental movement for colonisation, which is led by Prince Bismarck. It is attributed partly to the desire for an outlet to teeming populations, partly to a growing ambition for territorial aggrandisement, and partly to an effort to check the growth of the British Empire. The Goleuad believes that much good to civilisation and religion will accrue from this form of political life revealed by the past year. With German, French, Italian institutions, and the International Association in Africa, it hopes that the prospects of the subject populations of the Dark Continent have been rendered more brighter and promising than ever before by the events of 1834.. The Herald, in an article on 'The Two Extremes,' comments upon the peace which has prevailed in Europe, and the comparative absence of crime in Ireland, while at the same time we are being dragged deeper and deeper into the Egyptian quagmire, and ar? spending streams of money on the Kh.:rtou.a expedition and the augmentation of ou; naval power. This vast increase in our national ex- penditure is coincident with acute and general depression in trade. Another illustration the existence of extremes in the social life of hngiand is the alarming total of money spent up r.?:> pars, and the wrecklcss waste of resources t.-oa drink and luxurie.. Gwalia labours, Sisyphus- like, to prove that the Conservatives immensely aided the passing of the Franchise Bill, and that a large share or the glory attaching to its enactment is due to the Tory party. After attempting to prove this startling thesis, Gwalict proceeds to assert that the agitation against the House of Lords was a failure, and that the position of that House was strengthened by the events of the autumn. But Gwalia, like other Tory dreamers, will be rudely disillusionised when the Upper House will be swept oil at its first show of opposition to the County Board* Bill, or any of the coming measures of enfranchised democracy. The Tyst a'r Dydd prefers to lookto the future, so it devotes its leading article to the new year. It looks wistfully towards the corollaries of the Reform Bill, espe- cially to the disestablishment of the Welsh Church and the severe restriction cf the liquor x traffic. CHKISr:,IASTIDE IN WALES. All the papers are overflowing with reports of literary meetings and musical festivals held on Christmas Day t..roughout the distinctively literary meeting's and musical festivals held on Christmas Day t..roughout the distinctively Welsh portions of Wales. In the district through which the Dee runs its first dozen miles, there were twelve meetings held on the great historic holiday of Christmas. The chief feature mail was the choral competition, and it was this feature, with its rivalry and attendant excite- ment, which drew huge crowds from the villages and hamlets of the country-sides. This mode of holiday-making is peculiar to Wales, and repre- sents a more determined and earnest effort after popular culture than can be found anywhere outside the bounds of the principality. Most of the pieces selected for competition are from the great musical composers, but at Llangefni and Dolgelly. Dr Roland Rogers, in his adjudication, severely lectured eisteddfod committees for select- ing pieces from Welsh composers, or whom he spoke very slightingly. He said that Welsh choirs sometimes wantonly waste their time by rehearsing pieces by Welsh composers bet for competition which are not worth burning, Tbi. bit of iconcelasm has caused much amazement. In adjudicating at Bala, Mr J. Jenkins, Mus, Bac., made a very sensible suggestion. He maintained that Aosrystwith and Bangor ought, like Cardiff, to establish a chair of music, for it is found more needed in Wales than chairs of biology or geology. The criticism of musical adjudicators at eisteddfodau is practically evanes- cent in its influence, so that musical culture in Wales is restricted and retarded owing to an absence of efficient- training. Tnerefore the three colleges ought to establish musical centres in populous places, so that choirs and individual vocalists may be trained without leaving their daily occupations in the quarry or the colliery. Half the expense should be borne by the college, and half by the local centre. This would serve to bring the colleges into a living and quickening touch with the people. Among the Welshmen of London the Christmas festival was the occasion for displaying an unruly temper amounting almost to rowdyism. The London correspondent of the Genedl endeavours, with much show of sarcasm, to cast the blame upon the adjudicator, Mr J. Enilyn Evans, but the London correspon- dents of other papers attribute the fault to the audience. This is net the first time that com- plaints have come to Wales about the headstrong temper and self-assertive Philistinism of Welsh- men resident in London. RELLGIOS AND THE MASSES. The Goleuaa, 111 an article on the auty of Methodists towards the masses, asks what is the raison d'être of various forms of Nonconformity. It answers that, politically, Nonconformity is a protest again-t constraint oi conscience, and, re- ligiously, care for the poor and fallen,which seeks to raioe them from degradation and igno- rance, to set Lefoie them higher iueals of life, and tt) get them the means of grace, the hope of glory, ur, in the incomparable words of the Bible, to exalt them of low degree and till the hungry with good things. That is the ideal which has inspired the founders of religions and sects. But what is the danger which besets their followers? The danger arises partly from the accidental circumstances of reli- gious life because religion, by encouraging pa- tient labour, temperance, and thrift, brings those who practice it into comfortable worldly circum- stances, so that they are influenced by the ordi- nary ideal of raising their position in society. Religion becomes for them a mark of respectabi- lity. But the tirst result of this worldly ease is to lose touch with them of low degree, whicn ori- ginally was the inspiiation of the dtOn mination. C.deridge maintains that the Church is the only true democracy." But we must confess that his- tory shows that the Church of England has tended to become the religion of the upper classes, and that the various forms of Nonconformity tend to become the bulwarks of the bourgeois. Is not Welsh Methodism, like the Church and other religious connexions, in danger cf iosiug its hold of the working and poorer classes in towns and villages ? AN INFAMOUS VEBDICT ON AN AMATKTJK POACHER. The Herald has u, long article upon a poaching cise which came before the Carnarvon magis- trates. Four men were poaching oil the Vayuol estate. One of them was caught by the game- keeper, had his hands fast bound, and his head broken open to the bone. This was acknowledged to be his first poaching ofience, but the magis- trates ;;ente¡1Ce ..him • to twu )11011"b, imprison- ment with hard labour, without the option of a fine. It is a scandal and a mockery to sentence a man to hard labour with his skull fractured by a cowardly gamekeeper. The time has surely come to sweep off the game laws, which lure men to commit illegal and cruel net. and give occasion to magistrates to increase the number of evil-doers.

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