The Express.
London, England, 1851-12-16 00:00:00

iliTliE.—A very corrupt election
Mon the part the
loring candidate, Baron M. de Bothachill. Petition b.
drawn.

HORSIIAII.—The sitting member, Mr. J. Jervis, ion of
vour own late Attorney-General, unseated; his opponent
elected in his stead, and also unseated for wholesale bribery
at this election.

LONDON.—Flagrant bribery alleged against the agents
of your lordship, and the Baron L. de Rothschild. A peti-
tion presented against the latter, which was compromised.
Lira ILEUlS.—Petition tried, and very flagrant facts eli-
cited, especially as they regarded the losing candidate. I
shall have on another occasion to refer to the report of the
Committee on this entr.

LANCASTelt.—Sitting member unseated for corruption.
LUCE-STEIL—Both the sitting members unseated.
Ltxtui,r. Sitting member unseated for personal
bribery I believe on strange evidence, and that he was
"sold."

MALDON.—A moat infamous election. The losing candi-
date, Mr. Q. Dick, by several degrees the worst. Petition
withdrawn.

NARLOW.—AIto a cry infamous election. Petition
withdrawn.

MONTOONIERY.—A double return. One of the members
resigned, and the petition was not proceeded with.
MoNswurlisitine.—Warmly contested by twu relatives
Petition withdrawn

NOTTINGIIAIL—retition presented, but not proceeded
with.

NEWCASTLE.I7NDER-LYWlL—Petition not proceeded with,
the losing candidate, Lord Draekley, having obtained his
election for the county.
STAFFORD.—Rather better than usual, but Ptill a corrupt
election on the part of the Pitting members. I'etition with-
drawn.

STOCCPORT.—Petition presented alleging bribery and
treating. Withdrawn.
W•taALL—Petition presented and withdrawn, the losing
candidate not bein-.; at that time in a position, thiancially,
to proceed with it.
WESTBURT.—A very corrupt election; one candidate as
bad as the other. The sitting member one of your lord-
ship's government. Petition withdrawn.
W Mint: TH.—Eight thousand pounds spent on each side.
One of the sitting members, Mr. Christie, obliged to resign
before presentation of the petition, and let in his adversary, in
order to avoid exposure and says his party. Received
compensation from your lordship's government in the shape
of a colonial appointment.
YAIMOUTH.—Buth the sitting members unseated for
bribery. An extremely bad case.

Here are 32 eases of petitions presented, alleging
corrupt practices. There were eight other eases in
which this corruption was notorious—the cases,
namely of &vertex, 1) ever, llastings, Pontefract,
Shrewsbury, St. Albans, Totneas, and Wallingford.
In all these cases, however, the losing candidates
had been equallyguilty or several degrees worse than
the sitting members. There were also at this eke.
tion eight Irish, and one Scotch petition, but these I
have left out of the calculation. Adding all these to-
gether, I should produce a total of nearly fifty in-
stances of corruption. But I take merely those cases
in which petitions were presented. They show, my
lord, that the progress of corruption has been suffici-
ently

In 183.3
In 1837
In 1841
In 1847

With these figures before you, I leave your lord-
ship to determine how far the second declared object
of the Reform Bill has been effected—namely, the
diminution of the expenses of elections, and the pre-
vention of corruption among our constituencies.
I am, my lord, your obedient servant,
RUNNY MEDE.

•tje Court.

OSBORNE, MONDAY.

Her Majesty, Prince Albert, the Prince of Wales,
and the Princess Royal, attended by the Wks and gentle-
men of the household, were present at divine service at
Whiniiingliarn Church, yesterday morning. The Env. T.
Protherue otlici4ted.

A deputation from the trustees of Essex Turnpike Trusts,
consisting of Sir John Wood, Messrs. Tower, Cox, Dixon,
Fisher, Hobbs, Brewster, Tobor, and Codd (clerk to the
trustees), bud an interview with Sir George Grey, yester-
day, at the llome•cittice.
Sir Gaspard Le Murchant had an interview with Earl
Grey, at the Colonial-oftice, yesterday. Mr. Currie, M.P.,
had also nn interview with the noble earl.
The Oxford University Commission had a meeting yes-
terday at the official residence of the First Lord of the
Treasury, in Downing-street. Present : the Bishop of Nor-
wich, the Dean of Carlisle, the Muster of Pembroke, the
Rev. 13. J. Liddell, J L. Dampier, Esq., the Pro-
fessor Powell, the Rev. G. if. S. Johnson, and the Rev. A.
P. Stanley (secretary).
Lord Monteaglo transacted business, yesterday, at the
Railway Department of the Board of Trade.
Despatches were sent off, yesterday, from the Colonial-
office, to the Governors of the Cape of Good Hope and
Sierra Leone.

THE WI

PLAY.

Last night the great event of the year in West-
minster School came off by the performance of the
" Eunuchus "of Terence. To it the students look forward
with the greatest interest and anxiety, and no inconsiderable
amount of training has to be gone through in order that
"the actors" may acquit themselves creditably of the parts
assigned to them. Tuere are not wanting many persons—
rationalists in education—who object that too much of the
students' time is lust in the endeavour to master a single ,
author ; but, on the other hand, there have been most suc-
cessful teachers, who maintain that the very best means of
acquiring a precise and ready knowledge of a language is
to become perfectly familiar with some one of its best
authors. A more serious objection is, perhaps, the selection
of Terence for such a purpose, who though acknowledged
on all hands to be a writer of the purest Latin, abounds in
situations and passages of which modern taste does not
approve. However, if in obedience to a time honoured
custom the Westminster alumni must wear the sock
and buskin fur a few nights previous to the
Christmas holidays, the limited range of the Greco-Roman
drama leaves the authorities very little choice in the matter.
The language of Plautus is too antiquated and impure, and
his raillery is too coarse, to be made the object of modern
representation, although his roughorude, Itoman style is
unquestionably more true to the character of the people
before whom his plays were to be acted than that of his
successor. Terence, on the other hand, lived on terms of
easy familiarity with some of the first patrician families of
Rome, and his pieces are adapted from the period of the
New Comedy, in which the domestic life of the Athenians
was represented with less exaggeration and less personality
than in that of the Middle Comedy, which Plautus for tho
most part imitated. It should always be remembered, in
witnessing a play of Terence, that, although we hear the
Roman tongue, we ale never brought face to face with
Roman ideas, Roman mariners, or ROM= character.
Everything—the inner spirit and the outward form,
even to costume and locality —is Grecian, and
for the most part Athenian ; and it is unde-
niable that not a single new character was added by the
Roman playwrights to those they found already existing.
The " Eunuchus," for instance, is a mere copy of Monan
der's play of the same name, the two principal characters,
Guatho and Tiaras°, being dovetailed in from tho Kolas
of the same author. The characters were distributed last
night as follows : Phredria Mr. G. de L. Lacy; l'arnuno,
Mr. G. B. Macilwain ; Thais, Mr. F. H. Hodgson; Guatho,
Mr. 8. Joyce; Chorea, Mr. W. G. Armitstead (captain of
the school) ; Pythias, Mr. Q. W. F. Twigs; Chretnes,Mr.
V. T. Green; Dorian, Mr. H. Lipscomb; Duras, Mr. C.
W. Fendall; Sonya, Mr. A. F. A. Slade; Sophrona, Mr.
F. H. It. Hewitt; lathes, Mr. B. Somerville. Mutm Per-
sona: l'anspAila, Mr. E. Wodehouse ; &walk), Mr. J. G.
Edwards; Loma, Mr. H. Salwcy ; Syriscus, Mr. A. L.
°allow ; AnciUa "Ethinps, Mr. R. f. Waters; Ancilla, Mr.
H. W. Harrison. We have only to add that the acting was in
the usual style of excellence manifested by the " Westminster
Boys," although the play does not afford as many salient
points u the " Andria," which was the play of the pre-
ceding year. The Guatho of Mr. Joyce was a rich and
unctuous personation, and the CAserea of Mr. Armitstead
had all the order and vehemence required in the delinea-
tion of that character. The l'yelsias of Mr. Twins nested
much laughter, and the whole performance amply merited
the plaudite with which the play concludes.

ST. CROSS HOSPITAL—In consequence of the de-
fect in Lord Guilford's title to the legal Mastership of
St. Cross Hospital, to which we recently called public atten-
tion, a memorial has been presented to Sir A. Cockburn, the
Attorney-General, praying him to take immediate steps for
compelling Lord Guilford to refund the lay profits and
immense Sties he has for the last 42 years so unjatly appro-
priated to himself, and also for the appointment of a re-
ceiver under the Court of Chancery for the purpose of stop-
ping the existing maladministration and abuses of the
. .

hospital until the new scheme is prepared and confirmed by
the court.

REPRESENTATION OP NORTH DURUAM.—Mr. R.
D. Studio, one of the members fur the northers division of
the county of Durham, having intimated his intention of
retiring from parliament, whenever a dissolution takes
Elam, • requisition has been presented to G. H. Russell,
Esq., that he will allow himself to be put nomination.
Mr. Russell is son of the Hon. Hainaut Russell, of
Brancepeth, near Durham, and is a liberal in politics.
•

REPRESENTATION OF GREENWICH.—Last evening
Mr. Montagu Chambers, Q.C. addressed a numerous body
of the liberal electors at the Lecture Hall, Greenwich, upon
the principles on which he proposes to ask their suffrages at
the expected election consequent upon the acceptance by
Admiral Dundss of the command of the Mediterranean

beet. 11;...--as---fo;aboiiti;n of property qualifications of
members, the equalisation of eleetorel districts, household
suffrage, the ballot, and short parliaments. The meeting
resolved that Mr. Chambers was a proper person for elec•
tion to parliament.