The Sun.
London, England, 1864-01-15 00:00:00

FEDERAL AGENTS IN IRELAND.

Mr. Sergeant Howley, in opening the quarter session s
for Cashel recently, said—" I deeply regret to learn th; at
throughout the country, and even in the neighbourhood of
the present place, attempts have been made, and to a certo in
extent successfully, to entrap the young, the impulsive, a nd
the unwary, and to involve them in the meshes of illegal
associations. The origin of these associations is folly, or,
worse, it has been imported from a country which at this
moment presents the most lamentable instances of the
horrors ever attendant on civil war. Devastation, blood-
shed, and massacre are its concomitant characteristics.
In the American strife we have held up to us a picture of
its sad and awful results, and it should be a warning to the
people against rushing upon a similar misfortune. There
are people abroad who are engaged in administering un-
lawful oaths to the people, and the project that they con-
template is the severance of this empire. No amalgama-
tion of this kind can succeed, there is too much loyalty in
the land to permit of it or to warrant the prevalence of
fear that any dangerous consequences should result from
it. Thera are too many allied to property and a love of
order to think that a reckless band of conspirators can.
destroy with impunity the lives of men or the security
of property. I am glad to say that the Roman Catholic
clergy are alive to the danger that is abroad and have
raised their voices against those evil associations."
The remarks of Sergeant Howley are re-echoed in a
Clonmel paper. Agents are at work throughout the county
of Tipperary, it declares, swearing in and enrolling men as
members of a secret society, which it designates as an
"American born" organisation. " Not many weeks ago,"
continues this journal, "a delegate from the parent associa-
tion arrived in Clonmel from the States; but through the
activity of those in authority, and the refusal of several in-
habitants of the town whom he solicited to join the Fenians,
to have anything to do with him or his designs, lee had to
depart for more congenial quarters." Several Catholic
journals, evidently placing reliance in the common rumour
that Federal agents are enticing the peasantry away, are be.
ginning to write strongly on the subject. The Cork Examiner
is one of these—" The Northern Irishman, the Irish-burn
American," it observes, " does a lawful and legitimate as well
as a natural act in enlisting in the Northern army ; but the
Irishman who quits Ireland for the purpose of enlisting in the
same ranks plays the part of a mercenary, who hires himself
at so many dollars to kill and destroy so many innocent and
unoffending people, or to conquer, subjugate, and doves.
tate a country whose citizens are fighting tor their indepen-
dence, and defending their homes and altars. Put this
proposition in any light we may, what we state is the fact,
arid many will call the act of the Irishman who volunteiza
in such a cause by a harsher and a juster term than we
have any desire to employ. But there is a reason for this
sympathy—this unnatural sympathy—this discreditable
volunteering—as well as this desire to identify Ireland with
the Northern States. The Northern States having destroyed
liberty in the South, are to give freedom to Ireland ! For
the sake of restoring national independence to Ireland,
Federal America, which has been wasting its blood and
treasure in striving to crush those who are battling for their
independence, is to declare war against England I Was
there ever such a wanton and wilful delusion ? How any
man with brains in his head could hit upon such an idea
or could seriously entertain—we cannot imagine."

SPORTING INTELLIGENCE

RACING FIXTU.
FEBI

RES FOR 1864.

:VARY.

Birmingham
Harrow
Chelmsford

Lincoln Spring
Hungerfurd

Nottingham Spring 1
Derby Spring
Liverpool
Shrewsbury
Doncaster Spring

Warwick .. 16
Durham
Northampton 29
Catterick 3O

Croxton- park
Edinburgh Spring .. 2
Abergavenny 5
Thirsk 5

Epsom Spring
Newmarket Craven
Newmarket First Spring 25

Manchester
Harpenden
Epsom

METROPOLITAN RAILWAYS FOR 1864,

In cur previous notice on this subject we stated
that the great railway struggle of this session would
be between the rival plans of Mr. Hawkshaw and
Mr. Fowler, the latter gentleman having adopted
the lonia' suggestions of last year and now bring-
ing forward two gigantic, but most comprehensive,

EC:henies for carrying them out. The chief sugges-
tions made by the Lords' Committee were, that

what is called the metropolitan railway district
should be considerably extended, that no main lines

should be allowed to come further into the metro-

polis, and that an inner and an outer circle of rail-
way should be formEd by an independent company
which should intercept all the great main lines above
their present metropolitan termini, and so divert
their traffic round rather then through London,,The
outer circle it was recommended should be used for

this interception of goods and passenger traffic ; the
inner for the purely local traffic of the metropolis

itself. It was further recommended that at one
po.rt of their circumference the inner and outer

circles should join at a level, so as to virtually make
t he two lincs one for the purposes of communication.
'This report, from which Mr. Hawkshaw dissented,
Mr. Fowler has accepted, and, with a large staff of
surveyors, has passed the recess in carefully set-
ting out a plan in which all the recommendations
of their lordships are carried out ; and the two
projects are really most comprehensive. The cost,
however, is likely to be a formidable drawback on
the commercial success of the plans, and most
especially when we consider what it is estimated
at, compared with whit the outlay is almost certain
to be. The inner circle is merely an extension
of the Metropolitan, or underground, Railway,
which now commences at Paddington and
ends at Blackfriars, but which is being ex-
tended to Finsbury-circus. This line it is now
proposed to extend from Paddington through and
beneath Bayswater, under Notting-hill, and round
and at some distance outside the western extremity
of Kensington-gardens. Thence it sweeps round
Brompton, passing behind the houses facing the
Exhibition in Cromwell-road, and continues along
the south side of Chester-square to the Victoria

station, and across Westminster to Westminster-
bridge. From Westminster it is hoped to take it
along the Thames Embankment to Blackftiars, and
thence wader the proposed new street into Cannon-
street, where it has a defiant station full in front of
Mr. Hawkshaw's. From Cannon-street it winds
under King William-street to the Fenchurch sta-
tion, and thence round by Haydou-square, across
Liverpool-street, beneath Finsbury-square, where it
attest joins the end of the lletropolitan underground
line which is now being made. This constitutes the
inner circle, though, as its course has been as far as

possible selected to avoid valuable property, it as
vary far indeed from being a circle, but is an irre-
gular oblong about five miles long by two broad.
Its total length is 121 miles, of which four miles are
already built in the Underground Railway, leaving
8!--; to ba constructed, and the estimate for this 84
mite& is £3,000,000, or in round numbers about
£300,000 per mile. This estimate appears little
short of astounding when we consider the nature of
the property the line passes through, as compared
with the property taken by the Underground Rail-
way, which has cost more than 1300,000 per mile.
At what price is it expected the contracts will
be let for taking the tunnel up Cannon-street
and under King William-street to Fenchurch
station, when the contractor is liable for all
damage done to the surrounding buildings by
cracks and settlements ? We know how in the
very widest thoroughfare in London—that down
the New-road—the houses on either side were
afficted while the tunnel was being made for the
subterraneln line. Is it expected that a similar tun-
aiel can be made through such a as that under
Cannon-street, which is less than a quarter the
width of the New-road, without cracking the lofty
piles of warehouses on either side far and near ?
How much per foot will a contractor expect for
driving a tunnel under King 'William-street to Fen-
church when he has to pay for the damage done all
around him ? The idea of such an inner circle is, no
doubt, an excellent one if it were practicable with
reasonab:e outlay, and if it did not include within
its schemes the total disfigurement of the Thames
Embankment ; bat to say that it can be effected for
13,000,000 is to set the engineering world staring
with amazement. The stations on this line are pro-
posed to he all open to the air, and these will be the
only outward signs of the existence of the line,
which will be entirely subterranean. There are to
be stations in Liverpool -street, Fenchurch, Cannon-
street, Eare-street,Viraterloo-bridg,e, at Westminster
(where there are two, one for the public, and one to
he used only by members of the Lords or Commons)
one at Victoria, one in Pimlico, one at Bro mpton,
one at Kensington, one at Notting-hill, and one at
.Bayswater, and the cost of all these, including those
in the city, is supposed to be covered by the esti-
reat- of 13,000,000.
ll'he outer circle is as comprehensive in idea and as
expensive in fact as the inner, but though likely,
perhaps, to be more useful to the public than the
inner line, it is unfortunately certain to be more
vehemently opposed, from the mass of vested inte-
rests in the shape of established lines on the profits
of which it apparently trenches. This outer circle
is, in railway parlance, intended to "tap" the great
lines leading to London at short distances outside
their metropolitan termini, and draught off their
paseengers to the various districts round London
to which they may be destined, in the suburbs,
oar, by the junction of the inner and outer circles,
to the heart of the city itself. Whether the great
main lines are likely to approve this scheme or not
'aye cannot sF.y, though on the face of it, as inter-
cepting their passengers may mean intercepting
part of their profits, it isjust possible that they may
not, be willing to join in it. These considerations,
however, are, in a manner, beside the question with
the public, who will only look on the plan in the
light in which it is offered to them—as an accom-
medation for themselves. It is under this aspect
that we have to regard it—to see how far what it
Troffers is capable of execution. The enter circle,
then, commences at the South-Western near Clap•
ham, crosses the river at Battersea, passes through
Erompton, and makes its junction near the Exhi-
bition with the inner circle, along which it runs
side by side to Notting-hill, From this point it
diverges across to the Great Western, which it' taps"
at about a mile from Paddington, thence on to the
London and North-Western Railway, which it joins,
or "taps" rather, at Kilburn, and so on to the
llampetead. and City Junction, where it has a per-
:ea fen of branches. It continues round by South-
end to Kentish-town (crossing the Hampstead and
City Junction again), and s 3 on to Holloway, where
at the Seven Sisters Station it " taps" the Great
Northern, and goes to Stamford-hill, making its
junction with the Great Eastern at Upper Clapton.
From this point it turns south through Lower Clap-
ton, Homerton, Hackney, Old Ford, Bo w,Bromley,
Limehouse, crossing the Thames between the West
India and Commercial Docks on a high level bridge,
and thence on to Deptford, where, near New-cross,
it again; spreads out like a fan to form four junc-
tions with a mass of southern lines. From these
junctions the remainder of the circle is completed
by the London and Brighton line, which passes
through Peckham and Camberwell, and joins with
the Le idea, Chatham,-and Dover, which continues
on through Clapham to the South-Western. This is
the outer circle. Its diameter is 7 miles, its length
24 mites, and its junctions and branches 8 miles more
—32 mile*s iu all. Its estimated cost is £5,000,000,
and it is carried either on arches or embanktnents
almost entirely at a high level above the streets. Of
what kind this line will be may be at once seen
from the fact that in its 21 miles' length it has no
lees tear. 8 miles of branches and junctions. It has,
in fact, upwards of 3') junctions with great main
lines. Every railway traffic manager knows how
easy it is to despatch trains quickly; how difficult
it is even to approximate to time when the arrange-
ments depends on the trains that have to arrive. If
this outer circle with its mass of junctions can be
managed with less than six lines of rail it will do
what no other company has ever yet achieved; and
we do not hesitate to say that with the time lost in
catching arrival and departure trains a traveller
could reach Brighton in the same, if not in less
time, than would be oceep;ed in journeyieg over