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Stationery and Fancy Trades'
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State of Trade Generally ......... 17

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General Summary of Events

Periodicals

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Political Summary...

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Notices to Correspondents

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Paper Items

Book and Serial Notices

Exhibitions

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Board of Trade Returns.....
Fancy Trades' Price Current ... 23

GENERAL SUMMARY OF EVENTS.

THE depressing effects of months of darkness being one of the most trying features of Arctic exploration, the Admiralty authorised Captain Nares to obtain for the Alert and Discovery a variety of games and "parlour pastimes" to the amount of 50. Printing presses were also supplied to each ship in order that the publication of an Arctic journal may be carried on for the amusement of those who will be so far removed from intercourse with the outer world.The Swedish expedition to Nova Zembla which also starts this month from Tromsö, will be occupied first with botanical, geological, and ethnological inquiries in the southern part of Nova Zembla, and then advance along the west coast to the northern point which it expects to reach towards the middle of August. From thence it will go to the north-east, to explore this still quite unknown part of the Polar Sea, and then southwards to the mouths of the Ob and the Jenisei, where the country is geologically very interesting.- -A scheme is on foot for making Lyons a port by means of a maritime canal, uniting the port of La Joliette at Saint Louis and the Rhone, so that a steamer might go from the Mediterranean to Lyons without stoppage. A report read at a meeting of the Municipal Council of Marseilles shows an extraordinary increase in the traffic of the port, especially in Indian and Japanese merchandise.- -The latest attempt to bridge the Channel has failed, but not ingloriously. The Bessemer steamer has not fulfilled the expectation of her designers as a safe and pleasant Channel steamer. But she has proved herself a most formidable ram. A steamer which in times of profound peace

[YEARLY 6s.

can carry away sixty yards of Calais Pier, without so much as a graze, and merely at the expense of the foremast, ought evidently not to be lost sight of by the Admiralty.- -At the meeting of the Society of Arts Mr. Clements Markham, C.B., read a paper on the agricultural statistics of India, in which he maintained that better knowledge of facts is necessary for the improvement of that country.At the last meeting of the Scottish Society of Arts it was determined to bring the subject of teaching the telegraphic alphabet in primary schools before the Education Board. The Morse code is the one suggested by Professors Sir W. Thomson and Fleeming Jenkin.Colonel Sandford, of the Royal Artillery, and Mr. Cunliffe Owen have sailed for Philadelphia in the Illinois, in order to commence their duties as British Commissioners in connection with the forthcoming International Exhibition in that city.A cookery club has been established in Boston by a number of fashionable young ladies. They meet twice a week at the house of each member in turn, who treats her sisters to a breakfast, dinner, or tea, prepared exclusively by herself. -There are estimated to be in the United States about 1,500 thoroughly organized base ball clubs, having an aggregate membership of over 25,000.-The increase in the exportation of fire arms and also in gunpowder this year is remarkable. In the last four months the value of arms was £178,220, and of gunpowder 140,740. Last year the sums were respectively 108,464 and 134,131.Under the head of emigration, further departures for Queensland from the agricultural districts may be noted, and an increasing flow of labour from Ireland is reported. Advices from Canada do not indicate any special demand for labour, except of the agricultural class, and in the United States no great inducements to emigrants can be held out at present.— -The King

of Italy has presented the Crown Princess of Germany with a set of jewels. The diadem is in the purest Greek style, after the pattern of the celebrated Stephana, in the collection of the Marchese Campana, and the earrings according to the same original. -At Bradford, Mr. W. E. Foster unveiled a statue of Mr. S. C. Lister, whose inventions in the silk and worsted manufacture have been of great importance to the interests of the borough, whilst his public spirit has also been conspicuously shown.---A native Japan journal intimates that a number of Japanese maunfacturers have made arrangements for a display of specimens of their products at the forthcoming Centenary Exposition at Philadelphia. Up to the present only some ten persons have expressed an intention to exhibit. The exhibits will consist chiefly of porcelain, bronzes, lacquer-work, ivory, and objets d'art.

NEWS OF THE DAY.

SKATING ON WHEELS.

The London Patent Wheel Skates, which was referred to in our April issue, did not appear an hour too soon, as skating on wheels bids fair to be a more extensively popular pastime than bicycling or croquet. Ladies as well as gentlemen can disport themselves on these summer skates. Thus, the example set by the fashionable world of London at Prince's and at Brighton, has been followed by Manchester, Edinburgh, Bath, and a host of other provincial cities. In London and the suburbs skating on wheels may also be enjoyed at the Belgrave Skating rink, at the Alexandra Park rink, at Lillie Bridge, at Ealing Skating rink, Sloane Square, and at Rosherville Gardens.

PROVINCIAL NEWSPAPER SOCIETY.

The annual meeting of the Provincial Newspaper Society was lately held at the Alexandra Palace, I. Latimer, Esq., of the Western Daily Mercury, in the chair. There were over sixty members present. Mr. J. Paradise, of the Stamford Mercury, was unanimously elected president for the ensuing year; Mr. W. W. Hargrove, of the York Herald, was re-elected a member of the committee, and Mr. P. S. Macliver, of the Western Daily Press, was chosen as a member of the committee, in the room of Mr. J. W. Lowndes, of the Oxford Journal, who retired by rotation. Mr. G. Harper, of the Huddersfield Chronicle, and Mr. C. Naylor, of the Cambridge Chronicle, were elected trustees, vice Messrs. Walker and Baxter, deceased. The members afterwards dined together.

CITY SCHOOL OF ART.

A lecture has just been delivered by Mr. George Smith on Assyrian art before the members of the above named school, but which contains matter likely to interest the readers of Perry's Gazette. The lecturer said that Assyrian history commenced 2,000 years before Great Britain was known. Assyria possessed a very ancient style of art, which was the natural growth of the country. The wedge-like form of the Assyrian writing had caused the characters to be called cuneiform, or wedge-shaped. The Assyrians not only stamped writing on their bricks, but naturally they used it for more important purposes. They wrote in minute characters upon oblong tablets of clay, which were afterwards baked as usual, and then placed in sets in a regular library. He had before him a cast of half of one of these tablets, the now celebrated "Deluge" text. The writing on the tablet covered both the front and back, and was arranged in six columns, each of these columns containing over fifty lines of cuneiform characters. The Assyrian inscriptions describing the Deluge were not the originals-they were copies made by the order of an Assyrian monarch from earlier Babylonian texts; and they were discovered among the fragments of Assurbanipal, King of Assyria. Upon examining another kind of tablet, which he would call a case tablet, it would be seen that on it were inscribed cuneiform characters enclosed in a second tablet, which consisted of a shell or skin of clay, inscribed like the inner tablet. Upon inspection, the two tablets showed that the subject described on each was the same, and it referred to a law case. With respect to the buildings, Assyrian architecture had its origin really in Babylonia; and there being very little stone there, while excellent clay was abundant, it was natural that the buildings should be constructed of brick, and not of stone. There was no beauty either in the material or shape of these buildings; and to give them ornament they painted them either in plain colours or with figures, or gilded parts, and, where possible, faced the walls with slabs of stone on which figures and inscriptions were carved. The Assyrians excelled in painting and sculpture. Few of their paintings of course remained, and these consisted of wall decorations; but the British Museum possessed many fine examples of Assyrian

sculpture. With regard to metal-work, the Assyrian people cast and worked gold, silver, iron, copper, bronze, and lead; they beat out gold into leaves to gild their buildings and furniture; they cast it into statues; they carved inscriptions upon it. Iron was manufactured into weapons and ornaments; and bronze served for utensils, furniture, gates, inscribed tablets, and numerous other works. In conclusion, Mr. Smith said that his aim in giving a short sketch of Assyrian art had been to give some general interesting information about the specimens, that it might lead to further inquiry on the subject. LIVING ON THE PUBLIC.

The London correspondent of the Leeds Mercury writes: Some curious stories are going about at present as to the occupations devised by needy gentlemen and distressed gentlewomen to earn a living, or eke out a scant income. Everyone knows the gentlemen, who, in clubs and at private dinner parties, get more commissions for wine merchants than any paid canvasser could do, and of ladies who make a good thing out of getting two or three daughters of rich merchants into their houses, undertaking to introduce these neophytes into high society. Not the least curious of these fashionable avocations is that of the lady who pretends to be smitten with a love of all sorts of curiosities-who cannot help purchasing them when she sees them, and who is glad if any of her friends will come and relieve her of her precious bargains, apparently at the price she paid for them. Japanese Curiosities, Italian mirrors, blue and white China-she has always a stock of these on hand, and then there is the wonderful Cashmere shawl that Lady Jocelyn parted with when she went into perpetual mourning, and the curious decanters which were bought at such and such a sale, and the fancy dress the Countess of Connemara wore at Marlborough House. What is she to do with her houseful of such things? The dear, good-natured soul is convetous to buy but not to retain. She will part with the treasures to her friends for the mere sum that she gave for them. Accordingly her house becomes a delightful lounge. Ladies introduce their friends to her, they go up thither, and in wandering about they discover that they have urgent need of this or that article, of the existence and uses of which they had been absolutely ignorant before. The woman is not born who can resist what she believes to be a bargain, and at the present moment, when everybody is trying to cram his or her home with the most bizzare objects to be got in any part of the world, this collector has around her a complete circle of believers and admirers. They buy from her Moorish tapestry, Wedgwood ware, old-fashioned crystal candlesticks, made of eagles' legs, fans made of peacocks' feathers, and green beetles, Indian screens, Irish lace, Spanish jewellery, and what not. Of course their husbands dare not denounce as an imposter an amiable old lady who, as her victims declare, is the most invaluable and good-natured creature in the world.

PARLIAMENT AND THE PRESS.

The Saturday Review says :-The profession of reporting or writing for newspapers, conventionally described as the Press, stands in need of neither championship nor vindication. The representatives of journals have but a slight interest in the present controversy; and whatever may have been the case with their predecessors one or two centuries ago, they have been subjected to no recent affront. The rule which either wholly or occasionally excludes strangers, was adopted before the modern system of reporting was known. When Mr. Biggar lately distinguished himself by disregard of ordinary conventions, the second personage in the realm shared the exclusion to which the reporters were, together with other spectators, subjected. While shorthand writers are entitled in common with other sections of the intelligent and respectable community to all consideration, it is an affectation and absurdity to claim special privileges on their behalf. Among many inconclusive arguments and most irrevelant was the mention of persons afterwards celebrated, who had at some time occu