The Express.
London, England, 1861-12-18 00:00:00

SPAIN.

MADRID, Dic. 16.

The address of the Congress, in reply to the
Queen's speech, has been passed by 228 against
79 votes.

Senores Olosags and Hadoz protested against the
accusations which had been made against them,
and stated that they professed dynastic principles.

ARMING MAIL STEAMERS.
SOUTHAMPTON, TOZSDAT Moor.
The Union Steamship Company, under ontract
for the conveyance of her Majesty's mails to the
Cape of Good Rope, &c., have received instruc-
tions from the government to arm their steamers
forthwith.

It ie our painful duty to record the death of the
eminent physician and father of unitary reform, Dr.South-
wood Smith, who died at Florence on the 10th bat, after
six days' illness, from bronchitis. Southwood Smith was
born at Martock, in Somersetehire, on the 21st December,
1788, and was therefore at his douses within eleven days of
completing his 73rd year, though from the length of time
his name has been before the world, he was generally
thought much older. Originally educated for the Christian
ministry, the name of Southwood Smith was early brought
into repute as the author of " Illustrations of the Divine
Government," which passed through several editions. The
duties of the pastoral oleos having brought him much
in contact with the pour, his penetrating and benevolent
mind readily perceived how greatly physical suffering contri-
butes to moral degradation, end he entered upon the study
of medicine at Edinburgh, with a view to administer healing
to the body whilst cooveying spiritual consolation and admo-
nition to the soul. Accordingly, for some time after rarely-
ing his diploma, Dr. Southwood Smith united the offices of
pastor and physician at Yeovil. Employed in this manner,
the miserable condition of the dwellings of the poor became
firmly associated in his mind with the undue prevalence
of preventible disease, especially of fever.
Dr. lionthwaod Smith's next publication was a work on
"The Phileneykr of Health," which reached a tenth
edition.

It has fallen to the lot of few to accomplish such extensive
seribes for the public Mosfit u have been sabsequently
rendered by Dr. Southwood Smith. He was the chief
originator of the mince of Preventive Medicine as system.
atically applied in this country, and the clearness and force
of his writings made him very successful in popularising
the leading principles of national health.
Appointed physician to the London Fever Hospital and
the Erten Dispensary in 1024, Dr. Smith spent several
yeas h the wards of the one and visiting the patients of
the other in their squalid abodes ; at the same time em-
bodying the results of his observations in a work described
by the Medical Chiron/kat Review as "the best work on
fever that ever flowed from the pen of physician in any age
or country." He there proved that epidemic fever is the
great pauperiser of the land, and that it is preventible : and
it has been truly said, that " the man whose seal sad seem
brought these facts to light deserves to be reeked in the
number of his country's benefactors."
Called, during a violent typhus epidemic in 1837, to the
assistance of the Poor-law Commissioners, he presented two
valuable reports on the causes of sickness among the poor,
which are capable of prevention. In lit:l9 he was chiefly
instrumental in forming the " Health of Towns Aasocialdon,°
materially aided a committee of the HOW of Oommem on
the same subject in 1840, and mimed during the same year
on the Children's Employment COlllOllll.lOO.
In 1842 he took an active part in founding the "Metro-
politan Association for Improving the Dwellings of the
Industrious Classes." From the first, indeed, he had
laboured to impress on the public mind the now admitted
truth, that a certain amount of physical comfort is names.
wary to morality and religion ; "that," in his own worth,
" mond degrsdatioo is indissolubly united with physical
squalor—moral impurity with bodily impurity—and that it
is only when the house muss to be a sty, and is rendered
capable of becoming a home, that it can receive with any
hope of benefit the schoolmaster and the ministerof religion."
Is 1844 he gave most impressive evidence before a cominia-
aim for *Wing auto the health of towns, and is 1847 was
sprinted on the Metropolitan Sanitary Commission. la 1848
the "Public Health" and " Nuisances " Acts were passed,
when Dr. Smith was sprinted medial member of the
General Board of Health ; but for nearly 12 months his
services were rendered gratuitously. In 1850, however, he
was appointed permanently to the board, and altogether re-
linquished professional practice.
Of his labours as a member of the Board of Health, his
repeats oo cholera, his notifications relative to that
=l.:and especially his introduction of the system of
anouse visitation, bear witness. But he at the same
thee established additional and irresistible claims to
r.pbtrtiogratitude by the authonhip of the " two admirable
n Quarantine, which have obtained a world-side
a
Mebr• Aoki. Dean Peacock) Dr. Southwood Smith had no
other claims on the lasting gratitude of the nation, I would
refer to his Reports on Quarantine as quite sufficint fto
eatable& them. They have contributed more than any
other publications no this subject to dissipate the gross and
mischievous delusions upon which these regulations are
founded, and which are known to be so injurious to the free
commercial intercourse and prosperity of mama."
For some considerable time prior to his decease Dr.
Southwood Smith had been actively engaged in preparing
an entirely new and complete edition of " The Philosophy
of Health." Another edition of "The Divine Government"
was also in preparation, and in all probability both these
works will shortly be republished.