The Sun.
London, England, 1864-02-11 00:00:00

HEALTH OF THE METROPOLIS.

(From the Registrar-General's Weekly Return.)
Sixteen hundred and fifty-five deaths were regis-
tered in the metropolitan districts in the week that
ended last Saturday. In the ten corresponding
weeks of the years 1854-63, the average number was
1,346, which, if raised in proportion to the increase
of population during these years, gives a mortality
of 1,481 for the present time. The deaths last week
therefore exceeded by 174 the estimated number.
Diseases of the respiratory organs were the cause
of 43S deaths,of which 299 were attributed to bron-
c‘iitis, 90 to pneumonia, and 18 to asthma. The
deaths referred to phthisis (or consumption) were 186.
The deaths by zymotic diseases were 340 ; 10
deaths were ascribed to smallpox, 23 to measles, 58
to scarlatina, 24 to diphtheria, 68 to typhus, and 81
to whoopingcough.
Tho deaths of 11 nonagenarians are recorded, the
oldest of whom was a man who had attained the age
of 98 years. Four children of a coachman, aged 3,
4,6, and 7 years respectively, and residing at 55,
Park-crescent-mews West, Marylebone, died of
scarlatina, accompanied by diphtheria. The twin
daughters of a tailor residing at Gerard-street, Soho,
were found suffocated in bed. The wife of a

lighterman, residing at Windmill-street, Lambeth,
died of bronchitis,hastened by want of sufficient bed
clothing. The infant son of a cabinet maker died at
94, Green-street, Bethnal-green, from the absence
of sufficient breast milk through poverty. The in-
fant daughter of a French polisher died at 44 Bri-
tannia-street, Gray's-inn-lane, from inflammation
of the lungs, accelerated by want.
Last week the births of 1,055 boys and 1,023
girls, in all 2,078 children, were registered in Lon-
don. In the ten corresponding weeks of the years
185463 the average number (corrected) was 2,069.
METROPOLITAN WATERS IN JANUARY, 1864.

According to the analyses of Dr. Robert Dundas
Thomson, F.R.S., the London waters contain from
one to two grains of greater amount of total impu-
rity than in the preceding month. The organic im-
purity is also'greater in all the Thames waters. The
Southwark water exhibits little or no deposit,
which it did in great excess in the three preceding
months. The Kent possesses no surface impurity,
and it is to be hoped may not again be contaminated
with impure surface water. Covent garden well had
much impurity from soakage, as there was present
no less than -408 grains of ammonia per gallon.
The smallest quantity of organic and total impurity
was obtained from New River water.
Total impurity Organicim
per gallon. purity.
gre. ordeg. gre. or deg.
0•0 0.0

Distilled Water -....
Loch Latrine water, new supply
to Glasgow 2'35 •605
Manchester water supply
Well, Covent-garden. lOl,lO 21'52

THAMES COMPANIES.
Grand Junction 22.01 3'oo
West Middlesex 22'60 2'32
Southwark
Chelsea
Lambeth

OTHER COMPANIES.
Kent
New River
East London
The table is read thus—Loch Katrine water contains in the
gallon 2'35 degrees or grains of foreign matter in solution,
of which .605 degrees or grains are of vegetable or animal
origin.
At the Royal Observatory, Greenwich, the mean
height of the barometer in the week was 30.025 in.
The barometrical reading decreased from 30'29 in.
at the beginning of the week to 29.86 in. on Wed-
nesday. The mean temperature of the air in the
week was 37.8 deg., which is 0.2 deg. above the
average of the same week in 43 years (as deter-
mined by Mr. Glaisher). The highest day tempera-
ture was 50.0 deg. on Wednesday. The lowest night
temperature was 27 9 deg. on Friday. The entire
range of temperature in the week was, therefore,
22.1 deg. The mean temperature of the water of
the Thames was 40.8 deg. The difference between
the mean dew-point temperature and air tempera-
ture was 4.6 deg. The mean degree of humidity of
the air was 83, complete saturation being repre-
sented by 100. There was hoar frost on Sunday
and Monday. A little rain fell on Tuesday and
Wednesday, and snow fell on Thursday, Friday,
and Saturday.

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The Frederick William, 84, screw at eamship, of
3,240 tons and 500 horse power, has been brought
down Portsmouth harbour and placed alongside the
dockyard to complete her outfit from the first-class
reserve for immediate commission. It is rumoured
that the Princess Royal, screw line_of• battlo ship,
the ship which has been named as the flagship of
the future Commander-in-Chief on the East India
and Cape Station, Rear-Admiral St. Vincent Bing•,
C. 8., has been found to he so defective that it was
necessary to substitute some other ship for the pun.
pose, and hence the present orders for the Frederick
William.

The Urgent, screw troopship, refitting in the did
ship bssin, of Portsmouth dockyard far cocarni.mfon
by Capt. Henderson, late in command of tile iron
screvtroroci;ar
hiip is undergoiag wry ex-
tensives on ner hull, externally end hnter-
naliy. In addition to what is required to the iron
hull below the upper deck the woodwork of:the
latter is being almost entirely renewed with. new
work. The fastenings of her plating under water
were found very defective, owing to the went of
some protective composition covering the rivet-
heads on the ship's inner skin.

The Sharpshooter, 6, iron gunvessel, screw, in
No. 6 dock at Portsmouth, is under repair by tha
shipwright department, and is expected to he com-
missioned when completed in her refit, for horn°
and experimental service. This vessel is fitted with
Captain Warren's patent bow -- for steering
the ship when go:ng astern, and is coated internally
with Spence's patent cement.
The Sparrowhawk, 4 screw gun vessel, has a
large number of hands employed upon her, repair-
ing defects in dock at Portsmouth. She is in a very
dilapidated state, and the greater part of her bow
and stern will have to be entirely reconstructed.

The Calcutta, sailing line-of-battle ship, is fittinQ
by the shipwrights in No. 2 dock at Portsmouth,
to take the place of the Illustrious, as tender to the
Excellent, gunnery ship at Portsmouth, the former
ship having been condemned. The Calcutta's ports
are undergoing alterations to suit the different de-
scriptions of ordnance which she will carry for ex-
perimental purposes, as well as for ordinary prac.,
tice and drill. She is also having a portent on each
side 7ft. by 6ft., through which to take in heavy
ordnance and carriages, in lieu of hoisting in over
all, as has hitherto been the case. nis ship was
built in Bombay in the year 1831, of teak, and the
extraordinary soundness of her timbers at present
furnishes a strange commentary on the flimsy build
and rottenness of such vessels as the Sparrowhawk
and scores of others which have been constructed of
late years.

The undocking of the 21 gun corvette Wol-
verene at Woolwich, for the reception of the iron-
cased sloop Enterptise, is ordered to be deferred
until Saturday, by reason of the entrance and off-
ing abreast of the dock being encumbered with mud
and gravel, which it is difficult to remove earlier.
A couple of dredging-machines, employed in
cleaning out the inner basin, are engaged in the
work, and the refuse is removed in bargce
to aid in extending the wharf, which is
in progress at the extremity of the arsenal. The
Wolverene will be afterwards brought into the
ianer basin, to be fitted for commission, and is
ordered to be ready by the &ose of next month.
The paddlewheel sloop Gorgon, Commander Ttril.
son, will be put out of commission this morning,
and the crew paid off at 10 o'clock at Woolwich,
Mr. Brain, appointed assistant-master shipwright
at Woolwich, has taken up his duties in succession
to Mr. Thornton, promoted to Chatham yard. Mr.
Brain has obtained experience in various positions
in most of her Majssty's dockyards. He hes been
employed at Portsmouth during a consecutive
period of 16 years, and has there been engaged in
the building of theVietoria,Roval Sovereign, Prince
Commissi
oners n owf the
hAi
ad
smeirTileteys !Ina vac
of Wales, Marlborough, Duncan, and other ships.
eTailper elis:erdds their
letter of commendation and thanks.

Spreading of the News of Thacheray's Death.

(AS PICTURESQUELY DESCRIBED BY HENRY RINGSLEY IN
THE FEBRUARY NUMBER OF "MACMILLAN.")
And those who loved him are left lamenting because he is
gone, and because they missed the few last priceless words
which he might have spoken, We honour their grief, but let
them remember that it is shared by others—that William
Makepeace Thackeray has seventy millions of mourners.
Just now the mails are going out. A hundred splendid
steamships are speeding swiftly over every sea, east, west,
and north, from the omphalos called London, to carry the
fortnight's instalment of British history and British thought
into every land where the English language is spoken. But
the saddest news they carry—sadder news than they have
carried for many a month—is the announcement of the death
of William Thackeray.
It will come first to New York, where they loved him as
we did. And the flaneurs of the Broadway, and even the
busy men in Wall-street will stay their politics and remem••
bar him. They will say " Poor Thackeray is dead."
Though they may refuse to hear the truth—though they
choose to insult us beyond endurance, at stated times-12t
us keep one thing in mind : the flags at New York were
hung half-mast high when Havelock died. Let us remem-
ber that.

And so the news will travel southward. Some lean,
lithe, deer-eyed quadroon lad will sneak, run swiftly, pause
to listen, and then hold steadily forward across the desolate
war-wasted space between the Federal lines and the smoul-
dering watchfires of the Confederates, carrying the news
brought by the last mail from Europe, and will come up to a
knot of calm, clear-eyed, lean-faced Confederate officers—
(Oh I that such men should be wasted in such a quarrel, for
the sin was not theirs after all) ; and one of these men will
run his eye over the telegrams, and will say to the others,
" Poor Thackeray is dead." And the news will go from
picket to picket, along the limestone ridges, which hang
above the once happy valleys of Virginia, and will pass
south, until Jefferson Davis—the man so like Stratford de
Redcliffe—the man of the penetrating eyes and of the ILin
close-set lips—the man with the weight of an empire on his
shoulders—will look up from his papers and say, with
heartfelt sorrow, " The author of ' The Virginians' ie

dead."
n a
group o
Highfu
Ep onno.tl
ihs eh h
Scotch
I -csoitdcoh t a Snidm
Iristhh e rgee
nwtillelms teann, dl
os
ooko
ever the great plain below, and remarking to one another
how much the prospect had changed lately, and how the
grey .brown jungle has been slowly supplanted by the bril-
liant emerald green of the cotton plant, and by a thousand
threads of silver water from the irrigation trenches. They
will be hoping that Lawrence will succeed poor Lord Elgin,
and that he will not be sacrificed in that accursed Calcutta;
they will be wondering how it fares with Crawley. Then
a dawk will toil up the hill-side wiLh the mail ; and in a
few minutes they will be saying, "Lawrence is appointed ;
Crawley is acquitted; but poor Thackeray is dead."
The pilot, when he comes out in his leaping whaleboat,
and boards the mail steamer, as she lies-to off the heads
which form the entrence gates to our new Southern Empire,
will ask the news of the captain ; and he will be told, " Lord
Elgin and Mr. Thackeray are dead." That evening they
will know it in Melbourne, and it will be announced at all the
theatres; the people, dawdling in the hot streets half the
night through. waiting for the breaking up of the weath'_r,
will tell it to one another, and talk of him. The sentence
which we have repeated so often that it has half lost its
meaning, will have meaning to them. " William Thackercy
is dead."

So the news willfly through the seventy million souls who
speak the English language. And he will lie cold and deaf
in his grave, unconscious, after all his work, of his greatest
triumph; unconscious that the great, so-called Anglo—
Saxon race little knew how well they loved him till they
lost him. Vanitas vanitatum I " Let us sliut up the box
and the puppets, for the play is played out."

OMINOUS ACCOUNTS are received of the doings of
the Italians, who are preparing for war by collect-
ing an immense amount of material at Ancona. Garibaldi
has redoubled his earnestness of appeal to his countrymen
for the million of arms, and men to back them. It is gain
-
this furore has ben awakened by Austria's proceedings in
connexion with Prussia, and the belief that there is a com-
pact for the latter to have Kieland the former to be defended
in her possession of Venice; so the sooner a check is given
to the design by Italy the better. Such is the language of
Italian journals copied into German PaPerg•—
Court
Journal.
Persons in debt may obtain instant protection against
Imprisonment or seizure of their goods, and an entire release
to Messrs. Marshall, solicitors of the. Court of Bankruptcy.
easy instalments. Offices—
from all debts and liaLilities without publicity, by application
Charges under £5 payable by
(established 1830),1?, Hatton-garden. City branch-0, Moor-
gate-street, Bank.—ADVT.