Northern Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1859-10-17 00:00:00

A CONGRESS ON THE AFFAIRS OF
ITALY.

The news of the day, writes the correspondent of the
limes in Paris, is the agreement of all the Great Powers
to meet in congress. Difficulties and delays are still,
however, to be apprehended, and we may anticipate
considerable trouble and lapse of time before the bases
of the proposed congress are agreed upon. Eleven
Powers are to meet the five great ones, and Sardinia,
Sweden, Spain, Portugal, Naples, and Rome. The
report in Paris is, that the treaty of peace is likely to
be signed in a day or two. The paragraph in the
C9nstitutionnel is as follows :

"Several journals give credit to very inexact reports,
touching the delay experienced by the deliberations at
Zurich. As we have more than once had occasion to
declare, there is every reason to expect the approaching
signature of the definite treaty of peace. The contract-
ing Powers have come to an agreement on all , the
.stipulations which will form the object of this treaty.
There is divergence only about the Lombard debt. But
everything makes it to be hoped that this last difficulty
will be promptly levelled. As to the new questions,
which will not be regulated by the treaty, they will be
submitted to a congress, concerning whose meeting all
the great Powers are to-day equally agreed."
On the strength of the good news, the funds have gone
up to-day. about as much as they fell. Some people seem
to think that the restoration of the dukes will be given
up, but that the Legations will be restored to the Pope ;
however, that would be no settlement of the Italian
question, unless with such reforms as nothing will ever
wring from Rome. The Comtitutionnel, of Friday, has
an article upon the subject, in which it deplores the
angry controversy to which the Roman question has
given rise, recommends its patient study, with calmness
and moderation, and asks why such emotion and anxiety
are shown, why such alarms are propagated, and whe-
ther the temporal power of the Papacy is menaced to
such a point that its maintenance is despaired of, and
that its defenders have no resource left but to curse
their adversaries ? The writer continues :

"It would be a fatal imprudence to refuse to recognise
the precarious state in which it (the temporal power of
the Church) to-day finds itself. For the last half cen-
tury it has been seeking in vain to recover its basis.
How, if this be so, should we not understand that it is
the interest and the duty of all Europe to concern itself
about an abnormal position which henceforward cannot
be prolonged without peril ?
" But, we are told, it is repugnant to certain Catholics
to see the Holy See submitted, though only in its tem-
poral power, to the control of a European tribunal. Let
us be permitted, on that point, not to experience this
singular repugnance. We must, whatever may be said,
distinguish between the Pope, supreme chief of the
Catholic Church, and the Pope the temporal Sovereign
of a part of Central Italy. The Pontiff is superior to
all human jurisdictions, and recognises only that of God ;
the Sovereign, on the contrary, is amenable to European
law, for the sole reason that he benefits by it.
" That which in fact causes alarm is the composition
of this European congress. It is denied that Protestant
Prussia and England, that orthodox Greek Russia, can
decide with impartiality when the question concerns the
States of the Holy See. It should not be forgotten,
however, that, in 1815, the Holy See itself complained
of Catholic Austria to those same powers, and had not
to complain of their decision.
" Prussia, England, like Russia, must desire that the
supreme chief of a Church which reckons 200,000,000 of
believers should integrally preserve his independence,
and should take to no Catholic Power in particular the
formidable support of his influence and prestige."

Garranlea Mills, situate near Cashel, were, accidentally
destroyed by fire on Monday last. The loss is estimated
at £2,500.
ELECTRIFYING MAD WOMEN.—M. Teilleux, says the
Medical Times, has been investigating the effects of
electricity on mad women, and avers that the remedy is
often of service. He also occasionally uses it as a means
of coercion, instead of the strait-waistcoat and douche;
but does not say how it is applied in this sense.
Wilds AND BEQUESTS.—The will and codicil of the
Right Hon. Charles Murray, Earl Cathcart, K.C.8.,
were proved in the London Court of Probate on the
10th of October, by Captain H. W. Gordon, one of the
executors, a power being reserved to K. •3PKerrel,
Esq. His lordship has left all his personal and move-
able estate to his countess and his daughter, Lady Hen-
rietta Louisa Frances Cathcart ; and bequeaths the
family pictures, plate, &c., subject to their life-rent use
therein, to his eldest son and successor to his title and
estates. He had given to his eldest son, the present earl,
heretofore Lord Greenock, certain estates; his youngest
son, Lieutenant Colonel Augustus Murray Cathcart,
being already provided for, as well as his two married
daughters, Lady Elizabeth Douglas, and Lady Adelaide
De Trafford. All property which the countess had
acquired, and that which had come to her by the death
of her mother, were considered and treated by his lord-
ship as her ladyship's- exclusive right. His lordship's
personalty in the United Kingdom-liable to prohatc duty
was sworn under £5,000. The will was dated in
1854, and the codicil in 1857. —The will of the
Hon. John George Charles Fox Strangeways, late of
Brickworth-house, Wilts, was proved in London on
the 6th of October, by the relict and sole executrix ;
the personalty sworn under twenty thousand pounds.
He has bequeathed the whole of his estates, real and per-
sonal, to his wife ; and, by virtue of a power under the
will of his late brother, the Right Hon. Henry Stephen,
of tHon.nol 1
an Danielda s Jacobprove
proved
an
Eucci n
Earl of Ilchester, dated the 10th of November, 1857,
has charged the estate in Wiltshire belonging to the late
earl with an annuity of £6OO for the absolute use of
his wife. The testator's will is dated the 2nd of March,
1858.—The
Esq.,The
London by his eldest son, Johan Hendrik Floris van
lateii of the
Utr e Rightehi
in
Euyck, Esq., and Andreas Cornelis van Hensde, Esq.,
his son-in-law, the joint executors. He has left to his
eldest son the manor of Ostbrock and -de Bilt, cum an-
nexis, and it is his wish that he should hold the same to
distinguish the family branches; also leaves him all the
family portraits, pictures, and curiosities, with all wri-
tings, private and professional. He bequeaths to his
cousin, who, since the death of his wife, has superin-
tended the education of his children and the management
of his house, six certificates of I,ooof. each in the
National Debt Two-and-a-Half per Cents. ; and to the
Dutch Bible Society 1,000 guilders, and to each servant
as many times 25 guilders as they have been years in his
service ; and to Ayte de Boer, a servant who has been
twenty years with him, 300 guilders • and leaves the
residue of his property to his six Children, equally
amongst them.—The will of the late Mr. I. K. Brunel,
C.E., has been administered- to by the executors ; the
personal estate being sworn under £9o,ooo.—lllustratcd
London News,