Analogous to the Normal Class Bible work of the Chautauqua University is a new movement in Russia. An organization called the Stundists bind themselves to devote an hour (stunde) every day to the study of the Bible. The society has grown to immense proportions, and is said to have reclaimed whole villages from drunkenness and crime.
Keshub Chunder Sen, the famous leader of the Brahmo Somaj, is about to visit Europe and America again, to preach a new development of faith, in which Hinduism and Christianity are to be combined. Little good, we fear, will result from the Baboo’s advocacy of an eclectic system; for his adherents will be content to stop in that dim twilight instead of advancing into the full glory of the divine day. The teaching of the leader himself seems latterly to have degenerated into ceremonialism, and he attributes marvelous influence to external things; while some of his followers are giving themselves up with the wildest enthusiasm to perfect a sacred dance of a complex kind, organized with rotating rings of participants dressed in garbs of varied hue. All this mummery is a sad disappointment for those who hoped that Chunder Sen might destroy heathenism besides purifying it.
The Louisville Courier of August 9, referring to the great Exposition, speaks thus of one of the exhibitions: “Last night the electric railway was in operation, and the locomotive with two cars attached made the tour of the park. To-day it will be running constantly, and visitors will see what is the latest achievement of science. It is an event of extraordinary interest. It is the practical demonstration of the power of electricity applied as a motor. Without fire or smoke, with no visible agent to propel it, moved by an unseen and even as yet an almost unknown influence, it follows the path marked out with all the celerity and certainty demanded by the most cautious and practical.”
The directors of the Western Union Telegraph Company have made a concession to their employes by issuing the following order: “Commencing to-day (September 1), seven and a half hours actual service in this office during week nights will constitute a day’s work, or, in other words, the hours of the night force will be from 5:30 p. m. till 1:30 a. m., allowing thirty minutes for lunch. Sunday service will be paid for the same as other over-time services, at the rate of one-seventh of a day’s pay for each hour. All payments for over-time, including Sunday service, or for a fractional part of a month, will be based upon the number of week days in the month.”
Professor Bell is reported as saying in a recent conversation that there are more than 500,000 telephones in use in the United States, and the manufacturers are unable to supply the demand so as to keep abreast of orders. He said that the progress of the telephone would have been greater but for the opposition of the telegraph companies, who regarded it as, in part, a competitor instead of an ally. In other countries the telegraph companies had very generally adopted the telephone as an auxiliary, especially at city branch offices and at small offices in the country.