The Express.
London, England, 1867-02-05 00:00:00

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The winds were stmugaVdaiitbilly on our southern coasts
yesterday : thin morning they art chiefly south-westerly, male-
rate to strong on our southern and eastern coasts, and westerly
and moderate on our northern coast& lu the south-west of
Ireland they are north-westerly and strung. Barometric pre.sure
has again decreased and is unsteady. In the north of Scotland
bar.inieters have fallen below 29 inches. Temperature generally
has declined. Ulu bas been very general on our coasts.

THE PACKING-CASE MAKERS.—In accordance
with the resolution adopted at the general meeting of the
operatives in the above trade, the whole of the workmen
in the shops of employers belonging to the Masters' Associa-
tion struck work yesterday, morning. About 500 men
thus struck, and the whole of the shops were strictly
picketed throughout the day. In the evening an aggregate
meeting of the trade was held at the Harp-alley school-
room, Farringdon-street, which was crowded to excess.
The following resolutions were unanimously adopted amid
great cheering :—" That the men in the employ of those
masters willing to sign • paper not to alter the trade
arrangements mutually agreed on last year remain at
work ; but that they be not allowed to execute any work
for those employers whose men are on strike or locked out,
and, in the event of their being called upon to do so, they
at once leave the employ." " That the men now locked
out and on strike hereby pledge themselves not to resume
work in any shop until the employers belonging to the
Masters' Association have withdrawn the notice for 7 to 7
o'clock, and expressed their intention to abide by the 6 to
5.30 time of working." The meeting then proceeded to
consider the subject of the Trade Co-operative Manufac-
turing Company, and a report was given in by the managers.
Arrangements were then entered into by which it was
zikecbusiness would be commenced in • few days.
at:twait AND OTHER BILLS IN PARLIAMENT.
Yesterday Messrs. Frere and Palgrave, the examiners
upon standing orders proofs, resumed their duties at
Vs eatminater, and transacted the appended business, after
winch they adjourned until the 11th inst. Before Mr.
Frere :—The standing orders were complied with in the
unopposed cases of the Lainpeter, Llandyuil, Tregaron,
and Aberaron Gas; Broxbourne Railway, Limerick Harbour.
Caledonian Railway (deviation, branihes, /te..), Bristol and
Exeter Railway (further powers), Bristol and Exeter Rail-
way (Rae Valley Railways), and Devon and Somerset and
ItrW.ol and Exeter Railway Companies bills. The unop-
posed Worcester and Birmingham Canal, Snailbeach Mine
Company, and Dublin Harbour Board bills were ad-
journed. The opposed Mitcham and Wimbledon Gas 11111
Mestanding orders. Before Mr. Palgrave :—The fol-
d g
unopposed bills passsd standing orders :—Newry
and Armagh Railway, Orley Local Board, Leeds Corpora-
tion Water, Liverpool Improvement, Ebbw Vale Com-
pany, Atlantic Telegraph Company, and Tees Conservancy.
he unopposed East London Water Supply Bill was ad-
Wourned. The opposed Huyton and Roby Gas and the
Voolton Gas bills passed standing orders.
DUTCH RHENISH RAILWAY. —The receipt* for
the fortnight ending January 15, 1867, amounted to
uo,rau. Ile. 14d., and for the corresponding period of last
year to 10,740/. 7s. Hid., showing a decrease of 1451.165. Ild.
against the present year. The receipts since the com-
mencement of the present book year, on the lot May, in-
cluding the above, amounted to 105,350/. 14s. 341., showing
a decrease as compared with the corresponding period
of last year of 28,608/. 13e. 2d. The working ex-
penses for the fortnight amounted to 4,81491. 3s. 11d., or
46.24 per cent, of the receipts, and for the corresponding
period of last year to 5,097/. 3s. or 47.81 per cent.,
showing • decrease of expenses amounting to urn.
tga w. in favour of the present year. The working ex-
7from the Ist May, 1866, to the 15th January,
/7amounted to 79,267/. its. 2d., or 40.85 per cent. of
the receipts, and for the corresponding period of last year
to 37.21 per cent.
THE LATE ALEXANDER SMITH.—Those who have
in their minds a certain ideal of the look and physical ap-
pearance to be expected in poets, who fancy them as per-
sons all weirdly, ecstatic, and wind-blown, would have had
their ideal somewhat discomposed by their first eight of
Alexander Smith. Even people who had no such ideal for
all cases, but who had formed a preconception from Mr.
Smith's early poems, found in him, when they came to
know him, a very different sort of being from what they
had pictured. He had a full sense of the fun of this him-
self. A tight-built, modest youth of middle stature, or
nearer the short than the tall, with lightish-brown hair
wont close, a round but nowise singular head, a placid and
shrewd expresaion of face, and a distinct but not disagree-
able cast in one of his eyes—ouch was the Alexander
Smith one saw just after he had become famous. Latterly he
had become stouter about the shoulders, and more manly-
looking, with a tendency to baldness over the forehead,
which gave a better impression of mental power. But the
most remarkable thing about him was his wonderful
quietness of demeanour. There was never a quieter man,
one who could sit longer with (others and obtrude himself
leas. People meeting him casually complained of this,
and wanted more converution, more of the poet. They
might try him on this tack and that, but he foiled them,
listening pleasantly to what was said, but keeping his own
contributions to a minimum. When he war really known,
one came to like this quietness as but the social form of a
mind of the most perfect good aense,incapanle of flummery
or pretence, and sagacious in tiling the measure of per-
sons and things around it, but kinully-humorous and ac.
quiescent rather than explosive or aggressive. There was
something even formidable in this power of at least never,
in the midst of other people's rubbish, saying anything
that was silly or untrue. With his familiar friends, how-
ever, in • walk or in a snug room, he was, though still far
from loquacious, chatty enough. _lie talked racily and
simply, but generally with a flavour of shrewdness and
humour. " So-and-so," he would say, "lathe finest fellow
in the vrarld, and I never come away from him without
feeling rebuked by the contemplation of so lofty a stand-
ard • but then, you know, he's a great ass." Or, again,
speaking of the reaction that had taken place against biz
own poetry, and of the ferocious onslaught upon him as a
plagiary which bad so much to do with this reaction,
" One does feel these things," he said, " and it is queer to
come out in the sunlight and walk along the street after
you have read such a review of your book ; but I find that
all such chagrins pass off in exactly twenty-four hours."
His fancy apparently was that every rotation of the earth
brings things round again to the status quo. Nor was this
mere talk. As the first sudden burst of applause* had never
turned his head, so the contrary blast had no more than a
twenty-four hours' effect upon his equanimity. He would
have gone on to the end quietly, modestly, and like a man
of the soundest sense.—Macuillaa's Magazine for
February.