The Express.
London, England, 1846-10-28 00:00:00

7ENING, OCTOBER 26, 1846.

boot awed Margaret Walk file Taman who Mr. Seeker,
the maßi e, refused to ear* a lunatic, to be brought
before awl for the purpose of testing her unity by a series of
ouMtions: these she answered satisfactorily . I tins suggested
that no alleged lunatic should be removed to an asylum with-
out having been examined 'by the boiud,which was agreed to.
It seems that by the last act relating to lunatics (9 and 10
Via. cap. 84), which came into operation on the 26th of
August, 1846, the medical officer of a union can, with the
aid of another medical man, mutually sign • certifi-
cate of insanity, and thus send a lunatic to an asylum
without the interference of a magistrate ; but as this is
optional, the board very properly determined to get the sig-
nature of a magistrate on such occasions. It was also
directed that an answer be sent to the Commissioners in
Lunacy relative to the above ease, and also that a resolution
be entered on the minutes that the recent proceedings before
Mr. Seeker were wholly unknown to the board of guardians.
Nine paupers who had been examined by the Commissioners
in Lunacy, and who had directed their removal to a lunatic
asylum, were then brought before the board, one of whom
had been an inmate of the workhouse for the long period of
forty yeen, all of whom were declared to be harmless when
the baud broke up.
HOTEL AND TAVERN KEEPERS' PROVIDENT IN-
anTuTioN.—The eighth anniversary in aid of this charitable
institution, the object of which is to provide for the relief of
necessitous and aged members, was celebrated yesterday, at
the Freemasons' Tavern. The Right lion. the Lord Mayor
presided on the occasion. Covers were laid for about seventy.
After the usual loyal and constitutional toasts were drunk,
the chairman proposed the toast of the evening, " The
Prosperity and Perpetuity of the Hotel and Tavern Keepers'
Institution," and in doing so he said he appeared amongst
them on that occasion for the second time that year, because
they had not done their duty and had not accomplished the
objects for which they met on the former occasion. He hoped
that now they would be able to declare they were in a po-
sition to put their committee iri motion, and that their
monetary affairs were so far completed as to enable them to
commence distributing a portion of the funds. His lordship
then called on the secretary to read the list of contributions,
from which it appeared that the sum at the disposal of the
institution, including the funded property, amounts to near
6,0001., which will be sufficient to enable the committee to
commence operations. The toasts of "The Chairman;"
" The Chairman of the Licensed Victuallers' Fire and Lfe
Assurance Company;" "The lion. Contributors;" "The
Lady Mayoress;" The President, Vice-President, &c., of
the Institution;" were then severally drunk and re-
sponded to.

THE DISTRESSED NEEDLEWOf4EN'S SOCIETY.—The
third annual meeting of the Society for the Protection and
Employment of Distressed Net dlewomen was held yesterday
afternoon, in Willis's Rooms, Duke-street, St. James's,when
Mr. Alderman Farebrother, the pre.ident of the society,
took the chair. The charity was formed in the year 1844, to
afford employment to the needlewomen of the metropolis.
From the report read by the hon. secretary (Mr. Roper), we
learn that the circumstances which first led to the formation
of the society was the truly distressed state of the poor
needlewomen, who were toiling fourteen or fifteen hours
daily, in order to earn 4d. or Gd., a sum not sufficient to pay
the rent of their miserable dwellings. Since the establish-
ment of this society, in many instances, by its exertions the
guardians of the poor in unions and workhouses had been
induced to abandon the system which had been followed, to
the injury of the industrious but unprotected needlewomen,
of taking in needlework at the lowest amount of payment
for the labour, and in those cases in which the practice still
continued, the full prices were now charged. It was also
satisfactory to be told in the report, that, by the intervention
of this society, the practice of pawning goods entrusted to
needlewomen to make up, had almost wholly disappeared
from the records of the police courts. The report then went
on to state that the ladies' committee had, only in cases
of emergency, afforded pecuniary relief, but that the greatest
benefit had arisen from the donation to the poor of articles of
clothing furnished by the Society, and by the employment
of the peculiar class of labour which the Institution sought
to assist and to protect. The Society also kept up a system '
trf niistration of the names and addresses of young humble
' clueslntpeachable character, to supply the trade seeking to
avail themselves of the services of respectable workwomen.
The account of receipts and expenditure from the Bth June,
1845, to the same date of the present year, showed an income
of 5601.65. ld., and an expenditure of 5151. 6e. (id., leaving a
balance in the hands of the Society's bankers of 441. 194. Bd.
Theprincipal items in the statement of the disbarments
were those of a sum of 188/. 3s. Bd., in the purchase edam-
nels and calicoes, and of 2041. 17s. 6d., for wages for making
up the same into clothes for distribution to the destitute.
In opening the proceeding, the Chairman narrated an in-
olenne in which the bounty had proved beneficial to two
lies whom he (the Chairman) well remembered to have
am enter their father's carnage in the county of Kent.
'nue ladies had been found in the City of London reduced
to the occupation of a miserable garret, without fire, and
scrawly with clothing or food. Finn no fault of their own
they bad been reduced to this extremity. Both their
parenta were dead, and to their only brother they had
entrusted the remnant of their fortune. That brother be-
came the victim of duplicity, and his death was prematurely
brought about by the eonviction that his ruin and that
of his sisters, to whom he was devotedly attached, were
simultaneous. The ladies who had resented to needlework
as a merenefsubsistence, were now, by theaid of this society,
earning from Bs. to 9s. per week, and declared themselves to
be truly happy. This was, said the chairman, only one of
many instating which might be adduced ir. proof of the
utility of this • . On the motion of Lord Dudley Stuart,
sounded by Mr. craw, the report was ordered to be
printed and circulated. The meeting was subsequently ad-
dressed by )Cr. L. J. Hansard, Mr. Moore, Mr. Gladman,
and other gentlemen, and a series of resolutions, declaratory
of the service•underei to the community by the society, and
of the determeation of its supporters not to relax their exer-
tion* were unanimously adopted. Thanks were voted to the
chairman by neelamation, and the meeting separated.
TILE GREAT BRITAIN EXPECTED IN NEW YORK.
—The Tribune of the Bth inst. says, "The Great Britain is
now in her sixteetb day. Her non-arrival in season to send
replies to the correspondence brought by her, in the Great
Western,is provoking, and no doubt will be a serious annoy-
ance Sleet y mezehanta."
ACCIDENTS.— DEATH FROM A FALSE STEP.—On
Monday livening about sine o'clock, as a married female,
named Barnes, who resided at 6, Victoria Cottages, Ken-
sington-gravel-pits, was engaged in conversation with her
sister, en the footway, at Victoria-grove, Bayswater, she
happened suddenly to move from the position she was in,
when, from there being no railing as yet erected in front of
the newbuildingasaluded to, she fell backwards down an
area and, in consequence of the frightful injury which she
sustaiinad, she expired in a few minutes after she was
Rieke& up.--Two YEN BekIED Axi vs.—Yesterday
afternoon, as five men were employed in excavating a sewer,
twenty feet deep, in a new street an the north side of Boston
Church the earth gave way. A previous slip of the ground
gave tbnely warning to three of the men, but their compa-
nions were it isshocking to add, immolated. The name of
one was James Haynes, and the other W. Lockhart, was
known as "Will of Box," *ma his having assisted in ex-
cavating the great Box tunnel. On the alarm being given,
workmen from the neighbourhood hastened to the spot, sad
proceeded with alacrity and courage to dig for the buried
men, in spite of the impending danger. A strong body of
police also coma to the rescue. Soon after the labourers Ind
commence& their search part of the limbs of Haynes and
" Will" were discovered huddled up in the most frightful
manner, but it was hoped both would be rescued before
death terminated their sufferings. Unfortunately at this
'mordent, when hope was about to be realised, another body
of earth, fell in, once more burying the poor men, and
jeopardising the lives of all employed in the humane work
tf attempting to rescue their fellow-creatures. A further
attempt was made as soon as a temporary support to the
crown, of the cutting could be erected, and in about an
hour-and-a-half the body of Haynes was got out.
It was conveyed to the station-house in Robert-
street, where hoe baths had been prepared by In-
quelor Pasco, aided by the neighbours, who prepared water,
and rendered even necessary aseistance in so great a time of
aid The poor fellow was immediately plastid in a bath,
and attended by Mr. Coward and Mr. Packer, surgeons of
the immediate neighbourhood, but all attempts to restore
animation wore useless, although every measure which
humanity cold suggest was put into requisition for the
purpose. Finding all means fruitless, a shell was prepared
and the body removed to the unfortunate man's house, to
await the inquisition of a coroner's jury. The poor fellow,
it ie stated, has left a wife and four ehildren to lament his
untimely fate,besides which his wife is at the present time in
a state of pregnacy. Meantime measures were going on for
the nuovery of the ether sufferer. Again and again part of
the man appeared, but from the het of his being wedged
in so tightly by the fallen mass, and the impassibility of
shielding the excavators by any protecting timbers. Hence
it was not till nearly 10 o'clock that the body of Lockhart
was extricated. Though not much mutilated be was quite
dead, and the body was conveyed to a neighbouring station
to await the ooroner's inquest. Fortunately no other accident
occurred, for, while the body was being dug out the earth
was falling around in large MINIM —ACCIDENT ON TH6
MI DLAN D Lire E.—Last evening the guards of the York train
which arrived at Euston-square at half-past ten, reported
that a collision of a serious character had occurred just
below the Syeton station. Three engines had, it was stated,
been "broken up." The time kw collecting information
was so limited daring the transit of the train by which the
news was brought, that no partieulara could be learned. No
lives have it is believed been lost.

INQUESTS.—DISAPPOINTMENT IN MARRIAGE.—At
the Old Pares Head, Aldersgate-st., before Mr. Payne, on the
body of Anse Ayleff, aged 24.—Thomas Aylsff, shoemaker, of
No. 10, Maidenhead-court, said that the deceased, hia daugh-
ter, had for some time past complained of pain in her head,
and had frequently said she feared she should ;re out of her
mind. On Monday mommg, as she had passed a restless
night, witness left her he bed while he went down stairs
to get the breakfast ready, and on retu • in about an
hour, found her hanging to the top of the ead, and
quite dead. She had formed an acquaintance with, and
wished to marry, a young soldier, but witness objected to
the marriage, on account of his being in the army. He
came a few weeks ago in his regimentals, and hearing wit-
ness's objection that he was not able to support a wife, he
seemed to agrte to the reasons given against the marriage,
and said he hoped that his uncle would purchase his dis-
charge from the army. The deceased and the soldier then
took leave. About three months ago, before witness had
refused his assent to the marriage, the deceased went to live
in Oxford-street, in order that she might be near the bar-
racks, and while speaking of how fondly she loved the sol-
dier, said that if they were not married she 'should drown
herself. Witness had no doubt that her grief when the
match was broken off was the chief cause of her illness,—
Other witnesses said that the deceased had grieved much at
her mother's death six months ago, and since then had had a
great fancy for going to graveyards, particularly that where
her mother was buried. The jury returned a yerdiet of
" Temporary insanity."

COMBINATION AGAINST THE "DAILY
NEWS."
[Front the Daily News.]
The subject to which we briefly adverted yesterday
was, a combination of the morning papers against the
Daily News. It is one of great public as well as pri-
vate interest : for it must be obvious that if the parties
could succeed in their object, there would be no other
limit to the price of the London newspaper than the
conscience and supposed interests of the proprietors.
The Times tells us that it loves opposition--nay,
courts it :—but then, it must be an opposition con-
ducted on the old principles, and involving a hopeless
speculation. What the Times does not love, is an
earnest, active, honest opposition, which has in it
the seeds of vitality. For a rivalry that may be
safely left to the element of mortality mixed up with
its original constitution, the Times has the most
generous indulgence : but one which has a new and
vigorous principle of health and life is to be met, at
once, by a direct and systematic persecution directed
against the new and living priuciple itself. Of these
tactics the public had proof long ago. When, for
instance, the Morning Herald came into the hands of
its present proprietor, it was evident to the Times
that it was likely to be a successful rival. Forthwith,
came cavillings and questionings, and objections; and
the Herald, on some pretence or other, was not per-
witted to join with the other papers in expresses.
I If at all, it must ran them at its own undivided cost.
Months had, of necessity, to intervene between the
date of the exclusion and the period when the new and
remote agencies could be brought into play. In this
interval, the Times was unusually energetic.; and there
was no term of scorn or derision which that journal
did not lavish on its dangerous rival : all with a pur-
pose of which the public has now the key ;—the pur-
pose of prejudicing the public mind against the
Herald, and inducing a belief that the latter was
always late with its news, and a day after the Times.
In this anxious and vehement assertion of the con-
trary did the Ewa cover its real apprehensions ;
which were that the Herald, when its policy should be
matured, and come to bear fruit, would be generally in
advance of the Times. And this did, in fact, happen.
When the Daily News came into the field, it was
somewhat hastily assumed by the experienced in
Printing House-square that it was to be one of those
helpless, hopeless experiments which would die
without slaughtering; and therefore, it was allowed
to squander its thousands at its own free will, and
without a word of remonstrance. Of course the
Daily News united itself with the excommunicated
Herald ; on terms, however, of perfect equality, pay-
ing one half the expense of the foreign agencies and
expresses. Here, then, was the Herald restored to a
position of equal advantages, in spite of the Times;
and here was a fair and legitimate opposition—the
I Times, the Chronicle and the Post, against the Herald
and the Daily News.
Well, for a time "all went merry as a marriage
bell." The co-operation of the Daily News and the
Herald was cordial and complete; and we took occa-
sion to bear public testimony to the freedom from all
petty jealousies which distinguished the conduct of
our ally. In the first flush of our success, while our
mechanical resources were yet inadequate to the,
enormous demand made upon them, the effects of an I
accident, which would have disappointed thousands of
our subscribers of their day's publication, were re-
paired by the prompt and generous assistance of the
Herald. We arc not disposed to forget these ser-
vices even now, when we have no longer the benefit
of that co-operation and friendly aid ; when our
former ally has forgotten all the scorn and contumely
which he endured in the pest; when the scorner is
forgetful too, for the sake of vengeance on the pre-
•mption which has established the most forrnio

ble rivalry he has yet encountered—and Herald,
Times, Chronicle, and Post—
Little dogs and all—
Tray, Blanch, and Sweetheart—
are associated to run their expresses, so soon as cir-
cumstances permit, as a joint-stock company, to the
exclusion of; and, if possible, to crush, the Daily News.
We will not say one word against our late colleague
beyond what circumstances enforce for our own justi-
fication. The Herald has perhaps acted naturally,
though we think shortsightedly, for its own supposed
interests. Wanting the courage to anticipate, by a
bold and timely movement, the reduction to which it
must inevitably come—and is now likely to come too
late—the temptation which promised so large a light-
ening of its present load, and au opportunity so fa-
vourable of assisting to clear the ground of dangerous
opposition, was not to be resisted. We are scarcely
surprised, therefore, to see the Jupiter Tonans of the
press and the Mrs. Harris of former days, in amiable
soft conjunction ; the Thunderer descending into the
bosom of his Dangle in a visionary shower of gold.
Nor does it fright us to see other quarrels forgotten
with like facility. We are satisfied to be the outcast
from this family of love ;—love for high prices and
cheap expresses, which must seem all the lovelier for
our dear expresses and low prices.
Yet, however reluctant we may be to allude to per-
sonal matters and private arrangements, the history,
in outline, of the pest three months must be told.
The origin of the separation and combination in
question we have already hinted at ; and the reader
would have been at no loss for conclusions had we
remained silent. The announcement of a London
morning newspaper at twopence halfpenny, startled
others less generous and noble than our ally. It fore-
shadowed an opposition altogether different from that
which is the loved and courted. The offer of a cheap
London morning newspaper was a clear cams belli—
and the Daily Noses must be at once attacked, by fair
means and foul, in its character, credit, and relations.
Accordingly out came the Times, with solemn plausi-
bility, to prove, by the simplest rules of arithmetic,
that no paper could succeed under fivepence ; that the
Daily News was virtually beggared, bankrupt, gone,
and to be nomore heard of! To those who know the
Times, it seemed strange that, the Doily News being
dead according to Cocker, a fact so simple and
obvious, should require two leading articles in proof ;
that a problem which was solved by the merest ele-
ment& of arithmetic should be encumbered by columns
of elaborate special pleading. If the Times had any
faith in its own figures, the natural and conscientious
coarse was to abide the issue. If the Thunderer had
made no mistake, it was clear that " when the money
seas gone the journal would die—and there an end :
and a paper so inevitably doomed might surely have
been left to die in peace : the Ti sea afterwards, like a
generous foe, giving it friendly burial, and with
sententious propriety writing its epitaph; pointing
the moral and making it serviceable as a warning to
all future rash and daring competitors.
But the further tactics of the Times were not of a
character thus inept. A mancenvre far more success-
ful than tampering with Cocker was, the formation of
a holy alliance amongst the members of the morning
press, for the maintenance of absolutism and the im-
maculate fivepence. A negotiation was accordingly
opened with the once rejected Herald. The oily voice
of " a commissioner" was heard, insinuating that
" 'Twas pity, so 'twas," that the Herald should go to
such needless expenses in the way of rival expresses
—had it not better join the league? It would be
thinking too harshly of human nature, and, we are
convinced, both ungenerously and unjustly of our
ally, not to suppose that, at this moment, some still
small voice—some whisper of the conscience—asked,
however faintly—But what of the Daily News?
Here we understand the conference was broken eff.
But the suggestive voice had left its haunting echoes;
the poisonous distillation had been poured into the ear,
and was silently doing its work. From that hour
things never went pleasantly between the Herald and
the Daily News. Coming events began to cast their
shadows—end these to take a form daily more distinct.
The figure of the great truth grew at length apparent,
and was recognised by all agents, and influenced all sub-
ordinates ; old associations were about to be broken
up and new ones formed, To our courteous remon-