The Express.
London, England, 1854-01-05 00:00:00

MANCHESTER.
(By sLscraic

WEDNISDIT EVININO.

It shored in the neighbourhood of Manchester all
Tuesday night and during this day. The depth is not great,
but a strong north-east wind causes it to drift very much,
and all the railways ace blocked up, and many of the turn-
pikes even a few miles outside the town. No train from
Landon since last night's mail. This morning's mail is said
to be fast with morning papers and letters above
Stafford. Two hundred men have been employed
all day endeavouring to open a cutting near
Whitmore, but the wild blows snow into the cutting so
fast that little progress is made. Eleven passenger trains
due. Last sent out here toward London at 1.30, got in a
snowdrift at Cheadle, nine mites distant, which was four
feet deep. One drift is said to be sixteen feet deep. So
many points of the line stopped that it is possible the com-
munication with London may be cut off for days. Mac-
clesfield line, North Staffordshire, Sheffield, Lancashire
and Yorkshire, East Lancashire. and other lines snowed
up, end many trains due. Many persons residing only a
dosen miles from Manchester cannot get home. Some of
the 'busses running only a few miles bare had six bosses
attached, but scarcely a vehicle of say kind is running
now.

BIRMINGHAM, lAN. 4.

The snow bas fallen thickly here during the whole of
today, and the trains have all been greatly delayed; this
morning the train with the morning papers was more than
two hours later than usual ; up to 5 this afternoon not a
single train has arrived from Liverpool since last night ; the
Bristol and Birmingham line is still open, but on the Derby
line an more trains are to be started " until further orders."
The Stour Valley line is open, but the trains have all been
greatly impeded ; on the Chester line the snow had drifted
near Llangollen, so that it was late before any trains
reached Shrewsbury. M six to-eight the snow was still
falling heavily, and as it lies deep • few miles off, there
are doubts whether the empress will be able to make its way.
On Monday night here the cold was so intense, that we
have been informed that at ens period of the night the then
mounter stood within four of Zero.

r, J.4:4. 4.

Yesterday morning, when the first meriting mails were I
despatched from the General Post-office, no mails bet those
from the South Western and Great Western Railway had
arrived. All mail communication has been cut off between
Dorchester and Exeter and Weymouth. Unfortunately
some carriages got off the line near Nine Elms early yes-
terday morning, and interrupted the down traffic all the
forenoon. The 7 o'clock train from Vauxhall did not leave
Kingston before 11 o'clock, nor Southampton before half-
put I—three hours and a half after time. If it bad not
been for the accident at Nine Elms, the traffic on the line
would not have been much impeded. The India, China.
and Australien mail did not reach Southampton before
nearly 4 o'clock. The Dorchester night mail of Tuesday
did not reach London before late yesterday.
The West India mails reached the Weymouth poet-office at
5 p.m. onTuesday, and it was found, on inquiry, that the road
between Weymouth and Dorchester was impassible. It
was resolved, therefore, to detain the mails at Weymouth
until yesterday morning. A van and carriage and a large
number of men were hired in the morning to start the
mails off. At one part of the road the snow was higher
than the van, and the mails were detained until a clearance
was made. At length five horses were harnessed to the
van, and about 20 men pushing behind, the van and car-
riage were got over the worst part of the road, end the
mails arrived at Dorchester just after the early train bed
started for Southampton. The mails reached the latter
town at half-past 2in the afternoon, and were despatched
to London by the 3 p.m. train.
The Indian, China, and Australian mail, consisting of
400 boxes and bags, was despatched froui the General Post.
office yesterday at 11 o'clock in the forenoon. None of the
northern sight mails had arrived when the foreign nail
sent off.

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If La•

SHIELDS, JAN. 3.

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The weather in this district has been intensely cold
during the pest five or siz days, a hard black frost binding
the earth in an iron grasp. The thermometer was 21 degrees
below the freezing point this morning, and the bill districts
west and north of the coast are well covered with snow.
The Wear at Durham is frozen over, and hundreds of
persons were skating on the ice yesterday, and great blocks
of ice are in that river below Victoria Bridge. The Tyne lease
frozen over above Tyne Bridge, and if this weather keeps we
may expect the passage to be blocked up below Newcastle.
Au immense number of sea and freshwater fowl are upon
the Northumberland coast, and the presence of these birds
was the cause of a most affecting accident at the month a
the Tyne yesterday. A young man of the name of George
Ferguson, belonging to Elation, in the interior of North
umberland, was working at Messrs. Laing's dock in North
Shields, as a sawyer, and invited three brothers, Jame.
Wilkinson, George Wilkinson, and William Wilkinson,
belonging to the same village, but working at Newcastle,
to come down and spend the day with him. When
they came down they determined to have a
half day's shooting, and procured a boat at the
low end of the town to go down to the month
of the river for the purpose. George and James
Wilkinson, and Ferguson, got into the boat, but
William having wet his feet returned back to Ferguson"
lodgings. The poor fellows had pulled down to the
" Narrows," milled shot a gull, but utterly unacquainted
with the danger they were in, had allowed the boat to drive
amongst the broken water, the sea breaking heavily at the
time. While in the midst of the surging waves, some persons
from the shore observed the poor fellows with their hats upon
the ends of their guns, and crying for aid. A steamboat run
down to their assistance, but before it could reach them
their boat had upset with them, and they were drowned.
The bodies of the poor fellows have not been found. The
weather is a little more modems to•night, and several
reads have gone to sea. The wind, however, is not very
favourable. It is south-east.

.the
I.—
down

while
arrived

Two POLICEMEN Faozen.—Two constables at-
tached to the metropolitan police force were found frozen
to death on Tuesday morning in the neighbourhood of
Hounslow.
METROPOLITAN POULTRY Saow.—The arrange.
ments of this great show, which is to take place at the
Baker-street Bazaar, are now completed. Upwards of I
1,100 pens of poultry, exclusive of extra stock, have been
entered. Amongst the exhibitors are the names of hie
Royal Highness Prince Albert, Lord Robert Grosvenor,
Lord Berwick, Lord North, Lieut.• Col. Goulbourn, Lady
Gilbert East. The number of pens, including pigeons and
lut rabbits, amounts to 1,800.