The Daily Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1860-04-17 00:00:00

THE DAY'S NEWS.

The Horse Railway is to have a fair trial.
All honour to Birkenhead for having the spirit
and enlightenment to introduce this great im-
provement. We shall not be long without it on
this side of the Mersey. It only requires to be
seen in operation to convince the most sceptical
of its practical value. The Birkenhead Commis-
sioners, to-day, will all but unanimously agree to
accept Mr. Train's liberal offer to make the great
but by no means doubtful experiment.
By the sudden death of Capt. Leicester Vernon,
M.P., a vacancy is created in the representation
of Berks. The late member was a Conservative.
He contested ,the seat unsuccessfully in 1857, and
was first elected for it in May last.
It is a great fact that the Post-office could
afford to do all the work it now does for two-
thirds of the present charge for postage; or, to
put the same fact in another light, to do one-third
more work for the money ! It is clear, there-
fore, that the public are entitled to greater
accommodation from this department of the
State, and that there ought to be no complaints of
insufficient pay to those who have to do the work.
This is brought out in the last issued report of
the Postmaster General. There is now to be a
a special investigation of the whole system, and
hereafter we may expect a report on the defects
of this most important branch of the public
service.

How is it that unendowed Dissenters and
Roman Catholics make such head against the
Church of England, in spite of all her, material
advantages ? All are professedly engaged in one
work,—the invasion of one common foe,—and the
same weapons for the warfare are patent to both ;
but the Church is outstripped by the sects. How
is this ? We think a solution of the question is
afforded by a careful consideration of the pastoral
letter just addressed by the Bishop of London to
the laity of his diocese. It announces as plainly as
possible the failure of a society with a high-sound-
ing name, and under the highest auspices, whose
object is to promote the sub-division of parishes
into districts, and the erection of more churches,
with their full appointments, endowments, &c.
The London Diocesan Church Building Society has
collected for that purpose, from among two mil-
lions and a half inhabitants, in one year, the very
inconsiderable sum of £4,871! What could be
more significant ? The means are not adapted to
the end. We must have "churches" 'just as we
must have three-deckers—but if our lanes and
alleys are to be invaded, and the masses to be
successfully gained over, we must also have a
flotilla of gnnboats to push up into these narrow
creeks where the " church and steeple" is alto-
gether unavailing. The home missionary enter-
prise, which has been so successfully plied by
sectaries, is the proper- work of the Church.
She, of all others, is best able to organise and
carry it out effectually; and until this great
strategic truth is acknowledged and-acted upon,
the Church will only continue to loose ground as
the Church of the people.
A new and ingenious mode of estimating the
amount of Parliamentary representation which
each county and borough ought to possess, has
just been propounded by Mr. David Chadwick.
He would take two elements—the amount of the
population, and the annual value of the property
assessed to the Poor-rate ; and adding these
together, people and pounds, by an arithmetical
process, he elicits what he calls a mean or com-
posite number, which he calls a fair index of the
right of each county and borough to representa-
tion. It were idle to occupy space in exposing
the superfluous attempt at an amount of precision
which, if it could be attained, could never be
maintained—to say nothing of the erroneous prin-
ciples upon which it is based.
Last night the Commons returned to their legis-
lative labours, refreshed, it is to be hoped, by the
brief repose afforded them by the Easter recess.
The Liberal member for Salford again reminded
the House of the existence of "the little Reform
Bill," by intimating his intention to move its
reference to a select committee. That redoubt-
able champion of naval reform, Sir Chas. Napier,
again had an opportunity of ventilating his
favourite subject, in which he was kept in
countenance by another brave " salt," Sir J. D. H.
Elphinstone. Mr. Lindsay opposed Sir Charles'
views, and complimented Louis Napoleon, whom
he believed to be too enlightened to wish
to go to war with this country,—an argu-
ment which we fear will not carry with
it much weight. Sir M. Seymour adverted to
the difficulties of manning the navy. The
management of our dockyards is admittedly bad;
and the claims of the reserve captains for increased
pay seems to be well founded. Several members
took part in the discussion of the naval estimates,
which occupied the rest of the sitting.

A difference or dispute of a monetary kind
exists between the discount houses and the Bank
of England. The former foolishly complain
because the Bank will not supply them with
means whenever they have gone beyond their own
resources. The Bank prefers discounting for the
public instead of for the bill brokers—and, imme-
diately the screw is tightened by raising the rate,
the bill brokers cry out that they ought to be
served first. A simultaneous, if not a combined
efibrt, has been discovered among these
.'private
discounters to produce such a. state of .embarrass-
ment in the Bank circulation-. .as would
enable them to realise, for' a tiine- at least,
a high rate of interest. This has been attempted
by these parties procuring, in one way or
another, about two or three millions sterling in
bank notes, and locking them up! The moment
seized for commencing this = Unreasonable and
most censurable struggle with the Bank was that
at which the public were most likely to feel the
inconvenience of such an artificial pressure, but
for the present its failure may be considered com-
plete.

The question of the annexation of Savoy con-
tinues greatly to agitate the people of Switzerland.
They not unnaturally look to England to aid
them in the preservation of their independerice
and neutrality. All parties seem to have sunk
their differences in order to unite their strength
in effecting this object.
__The_ presence of Sir
Robert Peel in Geneva has- been seized upon as,
an opportunity for giving expression to their
sense of the importance of interesting' England
on their behalf. He has just been waited upon
there by a deputation representing all parties,
who, after presenting Sir Robert with a cup
and rifle, exchanged with him the most cordial
expressions.

In Nice, the popular voting is said to be all
but unanimous in favour of annexation to France.
The result would be known last night.
The revolution in Sicily is increasing, and the
country is swarming with armed men. In