The Sun.
London, England, 1864-02-29 00:00:00

1863.

1881

42.890 45.588 58,828
15891 t°1446" t 0 408 9d to
Od d —8 Od
1,465 1,255 2,062
98,417 65,051 50,222

720 998
81,W 72,330 80,203
48s Gd 46a Cd 43s Oil

• RAILWAY INTEL LIGENCE,

TRAFFIC RECEIPTS FOR THE WEEK.
Miles Opened. Receipts.

Railways.

1564.

1863.

1864. 1863.
£
136 1,739 1.729
49 637 607
28 1,490 1,505
121} 5,220 5,237
.a 5 16,771 15.412
8} 259 257
20 200 276
6} 119 161
32! 422 313
53t 1,399 1,201
17 198 225
63 1,226 1,284
63 1,475 1,550
23 181 131
48} 2,t.55 1,838
169} 7,077 6,890
5 3,20 2,802
198 8,443 8,199
617 20,894 25,705
351 30,291 25,561
58 1,441 1,710

Belfast and N. Counties lO
Belfast and County Down 45
Blyth and Tyne 23
Bristol and Exeter l2l*
Caledonian
Cockermouth& Workington
Cork and Bandon :',o
Cork, Blackrock, & Passage 6}
Cork and Youghal ..... 321
Cornwall 651
Deeside l7
Dublin & Belfast Junction 63
Dublin and Drogheda 75
Dublin and Meath
Dub. & Wicklow and Wextd 9l}
Edinburgh and Glasgow len
Furness, &c lO
Glasgow & South-Western
Gt. Eastern,Nrfk.,&E.Union
Great Northern 353
Great North of Scotland 5B
lit. Northn. & Wes tn. (Irel.) 7ll
rit.Southn. & Westn.(lrlud.) 373/
Great Western 10561
Inverness & Aberdeen Juno B6l
Inverness & Perth Junction 119}
Irish North-Western 145
Lancashire & Yorkshire 492
Limerick and Ennis 241
Limerick and Foynes .......
Llanelly 461
London & North-Western
London and Blackwall
London & South-Western
Lond. Brighton, &S. Coast 2611
London, Chatham, & Dover 72}
Do. Metropolitan Extension 104
Lond., Tilbury, & Southend
Han.,Shellield,& Lincolnsh
Manch. S.J un.& Altrincham 9}
Maryport and Carlisle 2B
Metropolitan
Midland (incl. N.-Western) 641
Midland Gt.Westn. of Irind 2591
Monkland 7ll
Monmouthsh. Rail. & Canal 4l
North British, Edin., Perth
and Dundee
N-Eastern and Stock. & DarL 1095
North London 9
North Staffordshire 254
Oswestry and Newton... 5O
Rhyrnney l9l
St. Helen's Canal & Railway 52
Scottish Central
Scottish North-Eastern l3B
Somerset and Dorset 66
South Devon ...... 751
South-Eastern 306
Taff Vale 57
Ulster
Vale of Clwyd.
Vale of Neath 32}
Waterford and Kilkenny 3l
Waterford and Limerick 77
West Cornwall 271
IV.Liallkepool Harbr.&Rail 52
IV'haven,Cleator,& Egrmnt 7
Whitehaven Junction l3
Whitehaven & Furness Jun 35
FOREIGN AND COLONIAL.
Antwerp and Rotterdam 52 52
Austrian B2B 828
Belgian Eastern Junction., 26/ 211
Bombay, Baroda, & Cen. India 185} 167}
Buffalo and Lake Huron l6l} 1614
Detroit and Milwaukie lB9 189
Dutch Rhenish
Eastern Bengal
Eastern of France
East Indian
Grand Trunk of Canada lO9O 1090 18,186 19,553
Great Indian Peninsula 5,3 495 10,324 7,717
Great Luxembourg 134 134 3,799 4,2,3
Great Southern of India
Great Western of Canada 345 315 13,399 11,959
Madras
Madrid, Saragossa &Alicant 659 490 16,103 16,121
Northern of Canada ... .....
Northern of France 697 697 46,549 48, 27
Norwegian Trunk
Ottoman
Paris, Lyons, & Mediterrn 1855 17 13 117,688 120,467
Paris and Orleans 1614 1414 60,679 56,288
Pernambuco 771
Royal Danish 69 69 --
Sambre and Meuse 6B fig 1,288 1,250
South Austrian .. 1527 1468 44,000 44,008
Southern of France ...... .... 770 680 22,843 23,577
Victorian HG 195 9,8%9 9,329

ilt -449 438
329 7,054 7,234
10324 53,46; 50,243
862 826 954

963
145 1,573 1,635
895% 34,020 31,:-AOO
24t 159 139

103 106
461 576 443
1179,E 88,829 80,665
61 1,617 1,510
4411 16,953 17.092
261 i 13,897 14,. 40
nt 3,625 2 661

,
5} r.OO 270
42} 984 1,022
239 t 16,255 H 240
9} 1,242 3,013
28 1,305 1.405
31 2,011 2,253
6'lo 41,140 37.785
259} 3,9:2 4.6.5
714 1,023 1,636
44 2,566 2,055

4104
1079:f
9
254

138
39i
751
303

11,447 10.863
50,914 47,851
3,149 2,976
8,461 7,918
1,109 869
983 924
2,070 2,065
4,468 4,267
4,930 4.746
841 336
2.975 2,198
15,40) 17,751
5,738 5,443
2,321 2,016

-141 151
2,381 1.826
3 8 315

930 1,005

800 -793
4,079 3,435

676 5'5
1,053 933
1,034 1301

1,168 1.697
30,0/1 27,761
31f 247
3,066 1,772
2,433 2,3.4

4,730 3,809

Welland
West Flanders 75 75 1,022 897
W. and N.W. of Frame

CONSUMPTION OF SPIRITS, &C.—The quantity of
home-made spirits retained for consumption in the United
Kingdom as beverages only, in the year 1863, amounted to
19,118,092 gallons; in 1862 the quantity was 18,836,187
gallons. The quantity of brandy imported and entered for
home consumption in 1863 was 1,916,434 proof gallons; in
1862, 1,700,156. Of rum the quantity was 3,419,756 proof
gallons; in 1862. 3,420,356. Of foreign and colonial wine
10,478,401 gallons in 1863, 9,863,028 in 1863. Of malt
44,638,893 bushels were charged with Excise duty as re-
tained for borne consumption in the year 1863, 39,823,172
bushels in 1862. Every item was larger in 1863 than in
the previous year.

THE MALT-TAX.—The agitation against the
malt tax is being actively continued in the Eastern counties.
On Saturday Mr. W. Fisher Hobbs was the moving spirit
in a meeting at Colchester, and on Friday the members of
the Hinckford Conservative and Agricultural Club made a
demonstration at Castle Hedingham, a locality which is
now during the Parliamentary Session at a comparative
discount, although in the autumn it periodically attains a
certain notoriety as a focus of Essex politics. Farther meet-
ings are also announced for next week at Braintree, Chelms -
ford, and Saffron Walden. At Ipswich last week an im-
portant meeting was held, at which Sir F. Kelly, M.P.,
the originator of the present agitation, delivered a stirring
address. In Norfolk arrangements have been made for a
demonstration at King's Lynn? to which various notabili-
ties have been invited.

PHOSPHORUS AND CIVILISATION.--Consider for
a moment ; every adult human being requires at
least four pounds of phosphates to build up his bony frame-
work, quite apart from the quantities used up in his softer
parts. This amount is sequestrated from the earth, and
never returns to it. Yet the earth without phosphates re-
fuses to grow plants. Think of the millions upon millions
of pounds which are drawn away from the primitive stock,
and you will understand why vast stretches of Asia Minor
are barren, why parts of Sicily, Palestine, Arabia
Felix (once so fertile), and the plains of Babylon, are
deserts. These lands have been robbed of their phosphates.
If Egypt still preserves her ancient fertility, it is because
the annual inundation of the Nile renews the precious phos-
phates. Philosophy considers this, as requested, and straight-
way begins to theorise upon it. She bids us remark the law
of history (she is fond of such gg laws"), that nations after
emerging from barbarism into civilisation, after growing in
wealth, skill, luxury, and populousness, are always submerged
by some fresh wave of barbarism. The puny citizen, ener-
vated by luxury, cannot withstand the stalwart barbarian.
So it has been—so it will ever be. All the skill and all the
appliances which make men forraidible to beasts, fail to
make men formidable to barbarians. With knowledge and
wealth has come the corruption of luxury. It is that which
has destroyed the rude and manly virtues of an elder
time; it is that which makes man dissolute,
selfish, timid, without fervour, without patriotism.
Are you quite sure of this, 0 philosopher ? Is Luxury
so universal in civilised communities that nations no
less than individuals are enfeebled by it ? Have the millions
been accustomed to Capuan indulgences ? Let us abandon
rhetoric for a msment, and see whether the enfeeblement of
nations may not be traced less to the excess of civilization
than to the deficiency of phosphorus. It is a paradox I
set before you, no doubt ; but it is not less likely to be a
truth because it contradicts your opinions—which is the
meaning of a paradox. Did the barbarians always conquer
because they were ignorant? No ; because they were strong.
They were truly the "sons of the soil," and of a soil not
robbed of its phosphates, like the soil of old and crowded
nations. The civilised Roman trembled at the presence
of the gigantic Gaul; but the descendant of that
Gaul is so little of a giant that he now boasts of his
stature when he is four feet six 1 It was remarked by Pliny
that the Romans were rapidly degenerating in stature, and
that sons were rarely so tall as their fathers; but he attri-
buted this degeneration to the exhaustion of the vital sap,
not knowing that a Liebig would come to proclaim the ex-
haustion of precious phosphorus._ cornia Magazine for
March,

MURDER AT FELSHAL—An adjourned inquest
was held at Feisham, near Bury St. Edmund's, on

Saturday, respecting the death of Frederick Browne, aged
three years, the illegitimate son of Julia Browne, a single
woman about 20 years of age. It appears that Browne
lived at service in Brettenham, a village two miles from
Fslsham, and that she went on the previous Wednesday
week to the latter village to see her child, who resided there
with its grandmother. On the Thursday morning, before
leaving, she went into the child's room to bid him good-
bye. Soon atter, the boy was found to be very sick, and a
doctor was sent for, but the child got rapidly worse, and
died the same afternoon. Mr. W. E. Image gave evidence
to the effect that death was caused by the administration
of sulphuric acid. The dress which the woman wore on
the day the child died was produced, and the front of it

showed that oil of vitriol had been spilled down it. The
jury returned a verdict of "Wild murder" against Julia
Browne, and she stands committed for trial.
A NEW BRIDGE is to be built over the Thames at
Hampton Court.