The Express.
London, England, 1866-03-26 00:00:00

Tall OXFORD AND CAMBIUDGI BOAT BACK.

The Times regards it as likely that the want of unity
and university spirit at Cambridge, chiefly due to the
ascendancy of Trinity and St. John's, may contribute to
neutralise the advantage is the selection °tithe Cambridge
eight which she might otherwise derive from her greater
numbers. At all event., this alone of the many oonjeottusl
explanations that have been offerel seems at all plausible.
The inferiority of the Cam is the lamest of excuses, for a
mere canal, if broad enough for the sweep of oars on both
aides of a boat, would afford as good a training course for a
race on dead water as the noblest of rivers.

The Post regrets that the betting on the present race
has been greater than that on any former occasion.
One would no more attribute, the Star says, the vice of
gambling to the encouragement of the Oxford and Cam-
bridge boats than he would blame the clergyman of a
church for preaching to a congregation amid which sits a
man who is at the moment picking his neighbour's pocket.
A betting man would bet though all the races in Eng-
' land, whether of boats or hones, were abolished to-morrow
morning. The yearly training of the crews seems to the
Star one of the beet institutions in the two universities,

and it thinks it would be well if these who are not
amongst the eight would geoerilly adopt the more useful
and applicable portions et the system which ban qualified
the crews.

VICTOR HUGO ON LIBRRTY.
-...--.

La Liberty of yesterday contains a letter from
Vidor Hugo, addressed telt. Dtivernois. In it the veteran
writer says :—" Liberty has become the deep thirst of men's
souls. Liberty is of all parties, being the vital mode of
thought. Liberty is to the mind what light is to the eye.
Therefore from the first day men have yearned for it. Like
you I wish for liberty, bet at this moment lam an exile. I
have written, the day when liberty shall return I will re-
turn.' lam waiting liberty with great personal patience and
great 'Rational impatience. France, without liberty, is still
only the goddess, not the soul. Every two or three
thousand years' progress require' a push. Human
guishment overtakes it, gni a quid direnum is required.
In the brief history of man the r erection of Europe on Asia,
se swig by Homer, was the first impulse, Christianity was
the second, end the Preach revolution the third. All re-
volutions have a two-fold character, by which they are
recognised—that lof a formation beneath an elimination.
Revolutions do not whimper. They are explosions of latent
oalorie—uothieg more. They externalise the eternal and
internal set whose manifestation has become a necesaity ;
they setfree this ant ; and people believe It to be new
because they see it, whereas before they only felt it. The
hidden right becomes public right ; it passes from the con-
fused to the definite; it was brooding, it borate forth ; it
was sentiment, it becomes evidence. This sublime simplicity
is peculiar to the acts of the sovereignty of progress. '
The twolast shocks of pr egress brought into light and seta.
blishedlthe two great acts of men, for Christianity disen-
gaged equality and the French revolution disengaged liberty.
Where these two acts are not, there no life is. To be all free
and all broth-re is to live ; they are the movements of the
lungs of civilisation. Equality and liberty are the inspi-
ration and respiration of the human race. This
being so, is it not gaud to hear people talk
of " memory libertiss" sad " necessary liberties ?"
Liberty ban this in common with God, that it excludes •
plural. It therefore exclaims, sum qui sum—l am that I
am. Raise high, thee, your flag ; your watch cry Liberty is
the very word of caviliest'oe. It is the sublime Fiat Luz of
men ; it is the preound a• d mysterious invocation which
seMbring out the oon.tell•tion. The star is behind the
horison—it listen,. Courage 1 Perim the recluse if, ex-
cited by your eloquent aid grave language, and your power-
ful rallying cry, he has for the moment broken silence. He
bailees to return to it, but before doing so grasps your
hand."

The Earl de Grey left town on Saturday evening
for Studley /loyal, his seat be Yorkshire, to join the
Countess and Lord Ooderiob, who had left town previously
to per the Easter recess.
The French Ambassador entertained the Prus-
sian Ambassador sad the Conotms Be•natorf and Countess
Therese Bernatorif, the Italian Minister, Baron and
Baroness Fardisaod de Rothsotuld, Barom de Baud*, &a,
at dinner yesterday arena`, at the French &Amply, at
Albertiate. _ _

The Austrian Ambassador and the Countess
Apponyi entertained at dinner, last evening, at Chandos
House, the Turkish Ambassador and Madame Musurus and
ffiadUes Musurus, the Bosnian Ambassador and Baroness
Brannon, the Netherlands Minister, the Bavarian
Minister, the Hansa Towns Minister, the Hanoverian
Charge d'Affaires and Baroness de Biome, Priem Oettengen,
Count de Oreourt, Viscount Asaph, Count Kalnoky, and
Baron Hubner.

Bath House, Piccadilly, bee just passed into the
hands of the present Lord Ashburton. The house end it.
splendid collection of works of art were bequeathed as a
fees gift to the title by W. Bingham, Lard Ashburton,
whose private property they were.

A oontemporary etatee that the Home Secretary
hie resolved to avail himself of the services of Sir Walter
Crofton is carrying out a more efficient inspection of oar
criminal prisons.

The Advertiser is glad to learn that the Oaths
Amendeneat Bill, whisk was carded In the °maroons by
the mull majority of fourteen in • large house, is to be
opposed is the Lords. The opposition, it is supposed, will
Meths Inns al Lord Derby proposing, u an amendmeet
N the sewed read*, the amendment proposed by Mr.
lAleseL is the Orauseons.