The Sun.
London, England, 1855-06-11 00:00:00

LONDoN, MONDAY EVENING, JUNE 11, 1855.

SCOTTISH WIDOWS' FUND
AND LIFE ASSURANCE SOCIETY.
The FORTY-FIRST ANNUAL GENERAL COURT of MEM-
BERS of this SOCIETY was held within the Royal Hotel. Frillee'S-
street, Edinburgh, on Friday the 25th ultimo,—
The Very Reverend Dr. Macrant.aw, Principal of the University
of Gaseow, end one of the Extraordinary Directors of the So-
ciety, in•the chair.
The CHAIRMAN, after stating that he had teen unexpectedly
ca'led on t preside, in consequence of the Marquis of Tweeddwe,
one of the Vice-Presidents. and who had been requested tn talc's the
ch ir, having been summoned to England, and after having craved
the indulgence of the meeting, commenced the business ty calling
on the Secretary to read the Minutes of the last Special General
Court, held on Ist December last
These Minutes having been read and approved of by the Court, the
MANAGER read the Report of the .Directors as to the Society's opera-
tions during the past year, and, from which there a,;•pear,'lnter, alia,
the following results:—
That durieg the year 1954 there had been 638 Policies passed and
taken up by the proposers, representing Assurances to the ex-
tent of 455,3771. 14s. 3d.
That the Society's realised and A ccumulated Fend had increased
to the extent of 115,5541. 15s. 10d, and amounted at 31st De-
cember last to 2,902,1401. Is. Id.
That the Annual Revenue had increased to the extent of
22,1691. Os. 11d, and amounted at 31st December last to

373,9011. 13s. Bd.
That there had been 142 deaths during the year 1854, the claims
consequent on which (including Bonus Additions) amounted
to 204,588/. 17e. 4d. •
The Cm:tissue then rsse and addressed the Meeting as Prows :
Gentlemen,—l think I may very safely eengratulate this Society, and
each one elite members, on the satisfactory Report which has now
been pvesented by the Ordinary Directors, an.l on the very hi;th state
of prosperity in which the affairs of the Company are shown to-be at
tonwas firstp ;Fororty years have now elapsed since this Insti-
tion founded f I understand that the first Policy was
issued at the end of the year 1814. It has certainly gone on very
steadily, and has attained a magnitude far beyond what was antici-
tasted by its orizinal founders.' When we find that 15,000 Policies
have been issued during that period —that between 9,000 and 10,000
of these are still held by-a' out 8,000 persons --and that hundreds of fa-
milies have already enjoyed the benefit of the previsionatriade through
the Society's agency, T think we may be satisfied that the Institution
has well fulfilled the purpose for which it was founded and called
into operation. (Applause.) But when we contemplate the magni-
tads which it has now reached, I think we can only look on it with
feelings of wonder and astonishment, combined with satisfaction.
(Bear, hear.) From the report which you have just heard, it ap-
pears that the; Capital of the Society has received an increase during
the last year of 115,5051, and that now it amounts to upwards of
2.800.000/.,—in short pressing very closely on a realised sane of Three
Millions sterling. (Loud applause) The Revenue has increased in
Proportion; the increase during the last year has bn 22,000/ , and
its total amount is now 374,C100 e (Renewed applau been 22,0001, and
its total amount Is now 374,(t0'. (Renewed applause.) Ail this has
been effected and accomplished under circumstances certainly by no
means propitious. It his been effected during a period of war, and
under the pressure of a war taxation, bearing heavily on the means,
and substance, and income of all classes of the community ;—and it
'has also been effected in the face of an increasing and unexampled
competition on the part of various other assurance Offices, whether
of older or more recent institution. Notwithstanding these disad-
vantages, you have heard, and I hope with satisfaction, the progress
which has been made during the course of the year 1854. (Applause.)
There is, as you might rotice. a statement in the report of the
number of deaths,—the lives which have lapsed,—and by which
additional burdens have been brought on the Society during the
course of the last year. In 1853 the number of deaths was 31 ; in
854 the number was 142. Now this is an increase which might na-
turally be expected in the progress of events ; for the more numerous
the members are there must of course be additional mortality ;
and we must further bear in mind that many of our members have
been connected wtth the Society for a long period, and that as they
are becoming advanced in life there must necessarily be a greater
amount of mortality amongst them as a body. Each one now
present is a year older than he was twelve months ago, and conse-
quently the chances of his surviving have been diminished, and the
probability of death increased ; hut what we have to look to is the
general result, stated in the Report, that the total number of deaths
during the past year is grea'ly within the calculation upon which
all our regulations are based, and upon which the institution was Aret
put into operation. The increased number of deaths is thus easily
accounted for, without causing any unnecessary alarm, and is, I may
say, comparatively small; and, when viewed in connection with
the original calculations, hears ample testimony to the great care
and prudence which havebsen shown in the selection of lives, and,
at the same time. to the soundjudcment and safe principles upon
hich the Institution was o'iginally established and founded. (A p-
rlause.) will only say further, in behalf of some gentlemen, who,
like myself, have been for many years contributors to this Fund,
that I hope we are not weak enoneh to grudge the additional pay-
ment which each year has brou ht upon us. We have not only to
thank Film by whom our lives have been graciously spared, that
oar ability to pay our premium has been continued to us, but also
that we have been receivine, through the excellent management of
this Fund, a very considerable compensation for our extended con-
tributions, in the shape !of bonuses regularly assigned to us (hear,
hear)—and surely not less in the prospective return which has
been realised for us through the exertions of the Officers of the
Institution. in the benefits which will be conferred on our families
and relatives, and those who may have claims upon us. I would
even say that the seenr• ty. the constant tranquillity of thought
which is produced by the knowledge that we fir • thee secured, to a
certain extent, against that ordinary contingency to which we are
every day liable, may have contributed not a little to raise the
value of the lives of the members of this society above the average
of what had been before expected. (Hear, hear.) I do not in-
tend to detain the meeting by enteringinto a general eulogiam upon
°he advantages of Life Insurance. They are now extensively known.
They have been in this room repeatedly illustrated, with great elo-
quence and great power, by these gentlemen who have occupied this
chair; but I would merely recal your thoughts to the fact of the
actual deaths in reference to what was exnected from the calcula-
tions end say, that while much is due to the careful selection of
those lives uron which insurances have been effected, much, I am
quite contldent, is also due to that serenity of mind reacting on the
bodily health which such a position as that occupied by a member
of an institution like this is calculated to inspire. ( epplause ) After
the exeerience of 35 years, I feel perfectly confident that there are
hundreds, I would say thousands, that are members of this Society,
who, like myself, have laid down their heads c intentedly and tran-
quilly on their pillow by night, and could never have done se but
for the knowledge that, if called away, the obligations which lay
upon them from the ties of parental affection, or those which they
might have contracted in the course of business, would be fully,
completely, and honourably met, and that they would descend to
the dust, tearing characters unimpeached, and endeared bathe recol-
'ection of those who were related to them, or to whom they had in-
curred obligations, by the thought that towards all they had dis-
charged the duties that devolved on them. (Loud applause) Now,
all this is accomplished by a small deduction annually from their
ordinery income—a deduction .vhith it was the duty of every one to
make whether his life was nsitred or not ; but which was more cora-
tete, more ertain. and less liable to fluctuation. in consequence of
havir,g sn-h en institution as this to be.the enarantee of his •uldlling
repent pa P'abti iryt cOnng r tsu Pi
a' lac: ni t)o Ithr membersn're of this c SocietyThsing.iniottht:pr\
vieeitni;ti
erhth:e
djnutoidewgmthoeetn,ont.
with
read. and
Diotrife,slcfdet
ret
son
remark
character ht ther
napteettrei
freccot of the
fidelity,
warmesttr
ye
.;) whichoagerrtcaut
dy,
3.
and judgment
they have conducted your affairs; and I will sit down after moving
that thereport now read be spnroyed of by the meeting. (Applause.)
The approval of the report having been carried by acclamation,
the Honourable Lord NEAVES proposed a vote of tha,,ks to the
Directors and Office-Bearers of the Society for the it services during
.the past year, and the motion having been seconded by JOHN HUNTER,
Esq , Auditor of the Court of Session, was unanimously agreed to.
On the motion of the Rev. Dr. Coos, St. Andrews, seconded by
JAMES NVRTGIIT, Fsq., Secretary of the Royal Bank of Scotland, the
Courts of Directem were appointed for the next year.
A vote of thanks having, on the motion of HENRY CREYNE, Esq.,
Writer to the Signet, been given to the very reverend Chairman, the
meeting adjourned.—Edinburgh, 2d June, .855.

COURT OF DIRECTION-1855-36.
Those marked thus * are new appointments.
PRESIDENT.

The Right Honourable the
E-PRESI Earl of
Nos berg, K.T.
VICDTS.
MS Grace the Duke of Buccleuch, K.G.
The Most Honourable the Marquis of Tweeddale, K.T., and C.B.
The Right Honourable the Earl of Ellesmere.
*Robert Dundas, Esq., of Arnist^n
EXTRIORDINAI
The Very Rev. Principal Mader- I

It DIRECTORS.
Alexander Blair, Esq., banker,
Edinburgh
William B. Watkins, Esq., Alder-
man, Manchester
William E. A ytoun, Esq., Profes-
sor of Rhetoric in the Univer-
sity of Edinburgh
Tohn Ravenhill, Esq., banker,
Warminster
William Wilson,Esq., C.S., Edinr.
J. Y. Simpson, Esq., Professor of
Midwifery in the University of
Edinburgh
*Sir James Russell of Ashiestell
*George Tod, Esq., Cheltenham
*Flcnry Cheyne,Esq.,
*Frederick Thynne, Esq., land
agent, George•st., Westminster
DIRECTORS.

lan, Giaagow
John North, Esq., Dock Solicitor.

Liverpo
The Right Hon. Lord John Frede•
. .

rick Go •ciln Hallyburton
The Right Hen. the, Earl of Stair
Henry Bury, Esq., banker, Dian•
che+ter
Sir John S. Richardson of Pitfonr.
Bart.
The 'light Rev. the Lord Bishop

of Lincoln
John AmeTy, Esq., banker, Stour-

bridge
The Hon. Lord Benholme
Joseph James Welch, Esq.,Cb cap-
side, London

• ORDINARY'
Thomas G. Mackay, Esq., W.S.
John Cadell, Esq., of Tranent
Alexander Dunsmure, Esq., mer-
chant, Leith
Thnmas Beveridge, Esq., D.C.S.
William James Duncan, banker,

George Dundas, Esq., Sheriff Of
SOlkirkBhire
Christopher Wood, jun., Esq.,
merchant, Leith
Archibald Davidson, Esq., Sheriff
of Aberdeenshire
Charles Yorbe., Esq., of Canaan
Park, Edinburgh
Isaac Bayley, Esq.. of Manuel
*dos. Mylne, Esq., W.S., Edinr.
*John loop Esq., W.S. Edinr.
*Jas.Tytier,Esq:,ofWoodhouselee
rcEs.
Edward Loyd, Esq., banker, Man-
chaster
The Hon. Bouverie F. Primrose
Alexr. Pringle, Esq., ofWhytbank
Fames Begbie, M.D:
MANAGER —John Mackenzie.
Illiam Lindsay.
LONDON HONORARY BOARD.
George Young, Esq,, Mark-lane
Charles Edward Pollock, Esq., Barrister, Temple
David Hin. Esq., East India House
John Murray, Esq., publisher, Albemarle-street
Samuel Laing, Esq., Chairman of Brighton Railway
Sir John Thomas Briggs, Admiralty
Leonard Horner, Esq., Home-office
John Taylor, jun., Esq., C.E., Queen-street-place

Edinburgh
Lewis A. Wallace, Esq., archi-

tect
Anthony Murray, Esq., of Del-

lerie, W.S.
The Hen. Bouverie F. Primrose

TRW.
William Mitchell Inner, Esq., of

Parsonsgreen
James Balfour, Esq., of Mfg,
W.S.

MEDICAL OFFICER•
AUDITOR—DonaId Lindsay;

SEC RETA RY

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

(Prom, the Times of this day.)
It is now pretty plainly admitted that the celebrated
Four Points were the result of a compromise, and, if
than a delusion. We are new speaking. of the faults which
adoptedal imen,
in'yclßU,ulisnsgiatt would have turned out little better
he very Ministers who are responsible
for the framing of these Pointsi, . find in them. of the
difficulty of carrying them out, and the fresh difficulties
that are sure to arise as soon as the, former difficulties

aro surmounted. We would•direot attention at this mo.

went not to those things for which provision has, how-
ever imperfectly, been made, but to a matter of the last
importance, which has been omitted altogether. The
occasion of the war was the trrgressidn of Russia upon
Turkey—the cause of the war is, undoubtedly, the ag-
gressive attitude of Russia , towards the civilised
world. She is surrounded by a number of States indi-
vidually ton weak to cope with her; and bound together
by bonds of union too slight to produce a really for-
midable and effective confederacy. Sweden and Den-
mark, Austria and Prussia, Turkey and Persia, are all
at discord with each other, and read* to sacrifice their
common safety, in order to gratify their individual ani- '
mosity. Firm resistance is only to be expected frOm
those States not immediately in contact with Russia ;
and it is a remarkable fact that, except Turkey, which
has actually been invaded, there is no Tower having a
common frontier with Russia which has ventured in the
present war to unsheathe the sword against her. Such
being a abort statement of the case, it is simply absurd
and ridiculous to treat the question between Russia and
the Western Powers as a purely local one, or to suppose
that we gain anything by blocking up one outlet of Sla-
vonian barbarism while we leave every other untouched.
We have been labouring to destroy Sebastopol, as yet
without effect, but we have taken and utterly razed to
theground the Sebastopol of the North. How comes

it'that in the Four Points no mention whatever was
made of the fortress of Bomarsund, and that it was left
open to Russia to rebuild that demolished fortress when
and how she pleased Those best qualified to judge on
the subject are of opinion that in Bomarsund Russia was
laying the foundation of a power Which in a few years
would have converted the Baltic Sea into a Russian lake.
The situation was admirably chosen ; it lay at the
moaths of the Gulfs of Finland and Bothnia, and com-
manded the southern part of the Baltic. The Aland
Isles lie over against Stockholm, at even less distance
and separated by fewer obstacles than are interposed be-
tween Sebastopol and Constantinople. The plan of the
fortress was vast and comprehensive. It was con•
structed in direct violation to treaties, having in it every-
thing to facilitate attack and aggression. Money was
lavished on the foundations on such a scale as befitted
nothing less than the nucleus of a future empire. Had
the present war been deferred only a few years—
had the cockatrice's egg, instead of b-ing rudely crushed
'at once, been allowed to batch—the North would have
stood appalled at the monster by which itsfreedom—nay.
ifs very existence, was overshadowed. There would
have been no need of large expeditions by land: Sweden,
Norway, and Denmark would have soon felt that every
remnant of independence had passed from them, and
tamely bowed their heads in submission to the yoke
which the construction of such a fortress would have
placed around their necks.
But it may be said, after all, we might have besieged
and destroyed this mighty citadel just as we are be-
sieging, and we hope on the point of destroying the
corresponding fortress of Sebastopol. But the cases are
widely different. Sebastopol lies in a temperate cli-
mate, in which, with moderate care and precaution,
the heat of summer and the cold of winter may be
supported without difficulty ; hut the Aland
Isles are protected during more than half the year
by a climate the rigour of which makes military opera-
tions impossible, and which during the rest of the year
is in the highest degree foggy, rainy, and uncertain.
These islands are singularly difficult of approach, and the
narrow channels which lead among them admit of being
fortified in a manner to render the access of a fleet dan-
gerous, if not impossible. The climate is proved to be
most injurious to health, and thus nature would lend
her most powerful assistance to art in rendering the pro-
jected citadel impregnable. A blockade, except for the
few summer months, would be impossible, so that the for-
tress could be repaired, re provisioned, and the ccarrison
reinforced every winter. The erection of such fortifica-
tions within a few days' sail of our peaceful shores would
be to us a great source of misfortune and weakness, and
to the nations that dwell around the Baltic Sea certain
and immediate destruction.

And yet this very fortress, so menacing in its posi-
tion and its destination—so nearly completed, so for-
tunately destroyed—was not considered worth a thought
when the articles were to be fixed on which peace should
be concludes ! Had it not been for the fortunate perver-
sity of Russia in repudiating the third point of the neE,m-
L tiation by transparent subterfuges and counterfeits,which
to the impartial reader appear of the grossest and Glum-
' siest description, we should have been hound to make
peace without any provision whatever with regard to
' the future erection of Bomarsund. We must have sat by
and seen Russia raising anew from its ruins that mighty
fortress, traverse, ravelin, bastion, and parapet, without
having a right to make a remark or utter a single word
of remonstrance. We should have known perfectly well
that it was the first against its weaker neighbours, and
then against ourselves, that this fortress was constructed,
and we should have had as little power to prevent its
erection as the criminal who watches from the window
of his cell the construction of the scaffold on which he is
about to be executed. We have just escaped a peace
which would have withdrawn our army from the Crimea,
leaving the fortress which we besieged stai.ding, and per-
mitted the immediate reconstruction of the one we took,
and the very ruins of which we have been at so much
pains to destroy. In the recent debate no persons have
been so severe on the policy of the four points as some
of the very ministers who advised and were responsible
for them. But, even in their utmost zeal against the
work of their own hands, they have omitted the most
serious imputation—that these four points would,
after all, have left the aggressive career of Russia
unfettered in a sea in which Great Britain and
France ought at least to feel as much interest as
in the waters of the • distant Euxine. No doubt it
is most desirable that Russia should not absorb
Turkey ; but, in our anxiety to save Turkey, to
hand over Sweden, Norway, and Denmark to her
mercy would be to imitate a philanthropy of the good
Bishop Las Casas, who, in his horror at the atrocities
perpetrated by the Spaniards on the natives of the West
Indies, suggested the importation of African negroes to
suffer the torments of slavery instead. It is a grave
question whether it be wise to lay down in time of war
the conditions on which the belligerents are willing to
make peace. Reason would seem to pronounce against
it, though much allowance must; no doubt, be made for
the facility such a course affords for the formation of
alliances. At any rate, we have a right to require that
obligations of so binding a nature should not be entered
into with less care and solicitude than a treaty of peace
itself, and that, if we be compelled, as we hope we shall
not be, ever again to resort to them, we shall find them
more carefully prepared than those conditions which
were, we trust, finally scattered to the winds by the dis-
solution of the Conference of Vienna.