The Northern Daily Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1857-01-17 00:00:00

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LEFT, in a Car which took a fare from Castle-
street to the north end of the town, between five and
six o'clock. on Thursday Evening, a BOOK, wrapped up in brown
p per. Whoever will bring the same to the Northern Times office
wilt receive the above reward.

ROBERT MULLINER,
(Successor to GORST & 0;.);
(Late with Horne, London),
CARRIAGE -AND HARNESS MANUFACTURER,
&land 61. GREAT CHARLOTTE-STREET, LIVERPOOL,
MANUFACTURER. 'CIF EVERT DESCRIPTION OF
F RFFAS ItiONABLE CARRIAGES.
'N'ote Agent fer the Patent Dioraples, for which a Prize Medal wa
awarded at the Great Exhibition.

;A Great Variety of New and Fashionable CARRIAGES always on
vieW, whieh are ready for immediate use. Estimates given for
`.repairs.

- 'CARRIAGES TAKEN IN EXCHANGE.
r -od Standing on moderate terms. Carriages sold by Corn-
AfIASIOII.
Merchants suppliel with Carriages for exportation on liberal
terms.

FREEMASONRY

WEST LANCASHIRE INSTiTUTION FOR THE EDUCATION
AND ADVANCEMENT IN LIFE OF CHILDREN OF
DISTRESSED FREEMASONS.

ASPECIAL COURT of the GOVERNORS
of the above INSTITIITIOIST will he held at the
.ADELOHI HOTEL, on Tizesday next, the 2)th instant, at six
o'clock In the Evening.
HENRY WARD COLLINS, Sees.
HORATIO GAMBELL, Hon.
, •
Liverpo)l, 15th January, 18;4. •

TiortEßni t(inies

SATURDAY, JANUARY 17, 1857.

THE DAYS NEWS.

The local and domestic intelligence of the day
is meagre and somewhat uninteresting. The cases
of the gold dust robbers having been disposed of
in the Court of Queen's Bench on Thursday, and
the respective delinquents having received their
sentences, the Central Criminal Court was yester-
day the arena. of Redpath's trial for forgery. The
trial was not a protracted one, and the jury only
took teri minutes to bring in a verdict of guilty,
sentence was deferred. Immediately after this
Redpath and Kent were arraigned on another
'eharge, and the trial occupied the remainder of the
day, ending in Redpath's conviction, after which
he was sentenced to be transported for life. Kent
was acquitted.
With respect to the bullion railway robbers,
Whose conviction and sentence we noted in yester-
day's paper, we may observe, that Pierce was so
associated in the transaction that the law could not,
assign him a higher punishment than two years'
imprisonment with solitary confinement ; his act-
ing accomplices have received what may be
'equiValent to imprisonment for 14 years. A trial
More remarkable for its revelations of well planned
`and persistent guilt never took place in this coun
try, and it proves that we have greater felons in our
day than those of the Rob Roy class—felons who
distinguish themselves fOr intellectual superiority
rather than bodily strength and brave encounters.
'rester, not forgetting their friend Mr. Agar who
I.` peached" against them, ought to be employed,
in our opinion, as Generals of Brigade in the ope
htions against Persia and China. They would
rise to eminence in that line with such rapidity
and skill as to merit a public funeral when
dead, and Cathedral monuments over their
embalmed ashes, for it cannot be denied that all
their talents were employed against the organised
forces of the South Eastern railway in a way which
would make a military campaign in the enemy's
country entirely successful, and with the least
possible sacrifice of life.
We are sorry to see by our London cotemporaries
that at the present moment there is a vast amount
of suffering in the metropolis. The police magis-
trates are besieged with the supplications of the
poor and unemployed ; and, from the statements
of the police officers, we learn that numbers of
miserable women are left to perish in the streets,
while the workhouse officials pertinaciously refuse
to give them shelter. This cannot be. If so, the
parochial authorities are greatly to blame.
The affair s of the Royal British Bank have been
so often before the public that people are wearied
with reading the details of this sad commercial
calamity. Another story respecting the conduct of
its directors and their extravagance. It appears
that on a close examination of the Bank's accounts
that there is an item for a considerable sum
described as " luncheon to directors." It now
appears that, from the commencement of the
Bank in 1849, the directors and principal
officers, with one or two exceptions, were in the
habit of eating and drinking daily at the bank
at the expense of the establishment. The sys-
tem was commenced on an extravagant scale.
Rare wines and brandies, Scotch whiskies, Edin-
burgh ale, and Prestonpans beer were ordered for
the regaling of those gentlemen after they got
hrough their usual official duties. And as it was
thought that it might conduce to the interests of
the establishment, each director was allowed to
introduce a friend. Although described as "lun-
cheons," those repasts were in reality substantial
and sumptuous dinners, the fumes of which from
the lower departments of the bank filled the nos-
trils of customers and of famished clerks during at
least two hours every day. The expense of these
entertainments ultimately became so large_ as to
excite alarm in the mind of a nervousdirector,
who remonstrsted against so much extravagance,
and insisted on some regard to economy. The
" luncheons" subsequently were not marked by
the same reckless profusion, and the privilege
of inviting friends was abolished, Tt was very
common, however, with some of the directors, on
days when their attendance was not required at
the bank, "to drop in" about the " luncheon"
hour and partake of their share of the " good
things." At the end of every half year the late
general manager uniformly gave a grand party, at
which he personally appeared in a romantic
costume, and in the most exuberant spirits, de-
scribed the unparalleled prosperity of the institu-
tion, of which he was the practical chief. No
wonder, indeed, that an institution so managed
should so soon come to ruin.

Last evening, the annual meeting of the Liver-
pool Ragged School Union was held in the Colle-
giate. Institution. It was well attended, and from
the report read, it appears that the society is doing
much in the way of preventing crime, and diffusing
the blessings of moral and intellectual culture on
many a poor outcast in Liverpool.
There is not much Continental news of moment
this morning. From France, we hear of the
departure of the French diplomatic representative
in China for his post, as well as that of a French
Rear Admiral to the China station. The plot, of
which China is to be the victim, developes itself
bravely.
As the Swiss Federal Assembly has almost
unanimously adopted the proposition to release
the prisoners, the chief obstacle to a solution of

the difficulty is removed. The nature of the- con=
ditions on which the King of Prussia will insist,
about the transfer cf the sovereignty, we have
correctly described ; and althouglt the Federal
Assembly seems satisfied with them, the Swiss
press seems not.
• ConstautinOnlb ad vices of oth instant states that
the Shah of Persia insists on the continuation of
the war with England. General Chesney has
received a concession for the construction of the
Euphrates Valley Reilroad. The Ossereatore
Triestino confirms the news of the Triest Zeitung
relative to the occupation of the islands on the
eastern coast of the Caspian Sea. Some years
since Russia "borrowed" the island of Dagada
'from Persia, as a station against the Turcoman
pirates. The pirates were long ago annihilated,
but the island in question, which is at the mouth of
the Oxus. is still in the hands of Russia.
The Bombay mail has arrived, the dates are
already announced. In, the papers now to hand,
there is a dearth of news. There is not any
additional tidings respecting the Persian War.
There was a talk of troops mustering at Pesawur
with a view to an advance on Candahar. There
hi& been some disturbances in the Madras Presi-
dency; but, on the whole, tranquhity prevails
throughout the British dominions in India.
From China the chief item of intelligence is the
occurrence of some circumstances which will
involve the Americans in a quarrel with the
Chinese.
We have later news from the West Indies and
the West Coast of South America, an outline of
which will be found in another column. The
present mail brings intelligence from Melbourne to
the 20th October. Continued wet weather had
interfered with business, but improved wages and
lowered prices of such necessary articles of food as
flour and potatoes were leading to increased con-
sumption, and the tendency was to higher rates
than for the last two months. Ballarat gold is
quoted 77s 3d.

The returns of the losses at sea for 1857 will far
exceed those of former years. The loss of life has
been really lamentable, and the underwriters will
feel the mischances of the season most severely.
To those who have charge of the life boat service
of the country the public look with increased
solicitude, for some improvement in life boats
themselves, and the means by which they are
brought into use, for the rescue of life and
property. In the principal branches of
science connected with navigation much is
also expected. The compasses and compass
bearingS given to our mariners for their guidance
deserve the most prompt attention, Risks at sea
increase, and the rates of insurance go on advancing
in the most serious ratios, notwithstanding all the
improvements which have been made in the con.
struction of ships, marine propulsion, and nautical
instruments. The practical evils of the age having
therefore assumed a very formidable character, it
is not unlikely that attention will be directed
to them, and some means of relief brought
to light: In the life boat department
little difficulty in the way of attaining perfection
need be apprehended. There are many valuable
inventions before the Government and the public,
which may be brought into use to save life, after
ships have been stranded and wrecked. But in
those quarters where science has still more to
effect, then) appears to be no hope of speedy
amelioration.

It is a tolerably well known fact, that there is a
strong disinclination in high Government offices
to interfere with the compass bearings laid
down in the Admiralty charts of our coast. Having
failed to give true bearings, it is now found that the
ti uth would lead to incalculable mischief. Wh ether
this result would he confined to the authors of,
error, or would tend to multiply the disasters at
sea, time only can prove. Navigators of the high-
est standing are, however, anxiously engaged in
endeavouring to get at what may be called " The
" Forbidden Fruit." They love true Azimuths,
and spare neither time nor expense to get at them
with the utmost accuracy. Those who succeed in
this very onerous duty, amidst volumes of compass
errors, and incorrect compass bearings, suddenly
rice to distinction in their profession. And herein
lies the sole hope the underwriter and shipowner
really have to rely on for increased security for
their property. Official philosophers do not pre-
tend to deny the importance of reducing all the
operations of navigation to mechanical precision.
Once this is •done, it is admitted that navigation
will no longer depend on abtruse computations,
which are always subject to error, even where the
greatest care is used ; but where it cannot be
denied by the highest authorities in the
world that true bearings can be obtained by
mechanical instruments; it becomes the duty of
the shipowner, underwriter, and sea-going public.
to enforce their use whenever it may be prae_
ticab?e.

Readiness in determining the course which leads
to or from danger, is the only safeguard which can
be given to the wayfarer at sea. At present he is
left to grope his way by compass bearings laid
down by instruments which are wrong ever and
anon. His only guide on a dark night and
foggy day has no truth in it, and many
noble vessels, equal to combat the worst
weather on the waves, runs, like the steam packet
Violet, headlong to destruction. The unfortunate
vessel to which we allude was manned, as all the
packets on that line, are by men who have served
not less than twenty years on that particular part of
our coast. She was heavily luggar rigged, and
had command of abundant steam power. She was
considered, also, one of the most buoyant and best
steering vessels which sailed out of her port ; and
with all this in her favour, there can be no doubt
whatever that it was her compass which caused
her destruction. No system of computation
could have saved her in the weather with which
she had to contend ; and when she had
nothing but compass bearings, she speedily be-
came a wreck and drowned all hands on board.
It is useless to think of any mechanical method
of navigation which commences and ends with an
instrument which multiplies the errors of the com-
pass bearings, as laid down on the charts in ordinary
use, and as the modern system of exhibiting true
Azimuths on compass cards is objected to, owing
to the difficulty which has attended all attempts
to induce mariners to adopt improved instru-
ments and principles of navigation, we think
the time .has come when the underwriters
should devise some means of compelling
navigators to reduce all they seek to accom-
plish to mechanical precision. How this is
to be done remains for further investigation, and
that this is called for is clearly shown, in the
recent returns of Wrecks, attended with a vast
sacrifice of life and property. An improved life-
boat will do much to rescue sufferers from ship•
wreck ; and reducing the whole circle of nautical
science, as practically employed on board
of ships, to the accuracy which can be
obtained by mechanical instruments, which have
been too much neglected hitherto, will, we feel
assured, do all the shipowner and underwriter can -

reasonably desire. At present the theory of safety
cannot be carried out in practice, and if true
Azimuths are to be derided. because they expose
whole books of long sustained errors, the sooner
we give the navigator the truth, and nothing but
the truth, under all circumstances, by some other
means, the sooner the losses now falling so heavily
on capital and enterprise, will be materially
reduced.

ON Wednesday last we sent a special messenger I
to Prescot to procure, with a view, as we stated on
Thursday, direct from the Ecclestone reservoir, a
genuine sample of the Pike water, at the spot
where it might have been reasonably supposed
that it was uncontaminated mitt). any
,admixture
of the sandstone water. But, lo I when our mes-
senger reached the locality where the Water
Committee had led the Council to believe a large
quantity of water was stored, he found it wholly
empty ! On receiving this startling intelligence, we
were induced to ask the Water Committee, " whp
" if their works are so far completed as to enable
" them to introduce the Pike water fcr the general
" use of the inhabitants,of Liverpool, how it happens
" that not a drop of the Pike liquid was to be found
"in that reservoir yesterday." We have waited for
four-and-twenty hours for a reply to this- very
important enquiry ; and since the Pikeists have
not deigned to answer it, we feel constrained to
ask where they obtained the sample of liquid,
tabled "Ecclestone Water," which they forwarded
to DR. TAYLOR, and on which their chemist has
reported. DR. TAYLOR found all the water alike,
or very nearly so, and as there has been deception
practised with regard to the Prescot sample, it is
just possible that their Chemical Professor has
never seen a drop of Rivington water at all. It
is quite clear, however, that there is not a large
supply of water in the Eccleston. reservoir.

The question of supply, as well as the possibility
of bringing the water into town, has not therefore
been decided. The goits and pipes have not been
fully tested. Where the embankments have been
exposed to a heavy pressure, they have given way,
and are at this moment undergoing very: costly
repairs ; and, in an engineering point of view,
the whole undertaking is one huge mass of
blunders and failures, and 'the chemical and
various other objections, which were " originally"
urged against the outrageous job, are just begin-
ning to develope themselves, as the opponents to
the scheme have predicted, from the first dawn' of
the agitation down to the present moment. The
water itself is nothing more than the foul
drainage from the surface of a populous district. It
has been nothing else from the beginning of the
job, and the insufferable filth it contains now will
become worse as the population and factories of
the districts from which it is gathered increase.
All the sources from which it is obtained are
impure, and the analyses on both sides show that
these impurities have found their way into the
town, to the manifest danger of the public health.
This fact alone is enough to justify all that has been
said on the subject. A community of unenlightened
and besotted savages mightbe expected to sanction,
in their benighted ignorance, the introduction of
such a pest into their homesteads; but it is rather
too much to expect that the inhabitants of large
towns. in England will tolerate such attempts
without inquiry and determined opposition.
Let the Water Committee prove beyond all
question that the Rivington' water is fit to
e'nter our cisterns and be taken into our stomachs,
and the agitation which has so much fluttered the
Pikeist's Mercury must cease. The hireling will
then have won a victory, which will be adorned by
truth and superior intelligence. He may then draw
his claymore, and cut his way to glory through
those leeks, roses, and shamrocks which now seem
to cause him so much disquietude ; but until the
Council prove beyond dispute that the Pike water is
not poisonous as it flows into the reservoirs, and will
not become more deleterious in our pipes and cis-
terns,the public should not suffer their well grounded
alarms to be smothered by empty and insolent
assertions, which are all the Mercury can oppose.
to ascertained facts. We have not been bought by
the Pikeist, and as the public do not corrupt
newspapers by bribery, we can have no pecuniary
interest in the matter to govern us in the course
we pursue. When the Liverpool Mercury charges
the anti-Pikeists with having indulged iu miscon-
ceptions and ignorance, its contributors surely
forget their own short-comings in everything apper-
taining to intellectual refinement and cultivation,
scientific and practical knowledge, sound political,
principles, and unswerving honesty of purpose.
Smarting under the lash of a fearless competition,
and cruel uncertainty as to what would be the
best way to turn, our cotemporary does not hesi-
tate to risk the public health sooner than hazard a
fee, and forego future rewards.

The public, it is hoped, will see through the
craftily worded Pikeist defence, which the water
jobbers " tap-tub" is forced to ventilate at any cost.
It must take whatever is penned for its
columns in the Water Committee's name, or
by the persons pecuniarily interested in the
monster job. Assurances coming from such a
source will never be swallowed by the Ratepayers,
whose lives are at stake on the question of pure
or poisonous water. There are, it appears,
several Pikeists in our local Chemical Society; but
men who venture to speak only, and do not give us
some written data by which we can test the value
of their opinions, are not worth contending with.
We want the results of carefully conducted
experiments recorded in black and white, and not
unmeaning asservations based on what may be
mere hearsay. There was some tact shewn
in trying to make it appear that all Mr.
MERCER has said is perfect nonsense; but
the public will see through the well executed
design. Yet should the Chemical Society
demolish Mr. MERCER, they will still have Dr
MUSPRATT'S analysis to rely upon.
Dr. TAYLOR'S investigation will also answer the
purpose of the opponents to this base scheme.
When the samples were sent to London, we were
given to understand that they wernpure specimens
of the Rivington water. Now, we find that the
sample labelled " Kensington" only contained four-
sevenths of Rivington water ! And in this mixed
sample he 'found both mineral and vegetable
matter enough to render it unsafe for domestic
use ; and further investigation has brought to
light far greater grounds for alarm. Mr. EVANS,
a well known Liverpool chemist, informs us, in a
letter addressed to the Chemical Association, that
the Pike water contains " the sporules of a fungus
"in great abundance. The result of drink-
" ing water thus contaminated must be very
" prejudicial to health, giving rise to all, kinds
"of disorders of the digestive system., and
" sowing the seeds of cholera and other