The Sun.
London, England, 1862-12-09 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON, TUESDAY DECEIVIBER 9, 1861

THE SMI2HFIELD CLUB CATTLE SHOW.

The fine weather of yesterday gave the Smith-
field Show at its new home at Islington a start
which must have rejoiced the hearts of the direc-
tors. Islington-green and the Liverpool-road, where
are the two entrances to the Exhibition, were a scene
of animation from an early hour, and numbers who did
not dream of paying ss. for admission promenaded
the streets to view the opening of what to them was
probably for the most part an entirely novel spec-
tacle. The notion that Islington was too remote a
locality for any vast numbers to continue to take an
interest in the annual display, was completely dis-
sipated. Universal admiration was expressed at the
appearance of the new building. Amongst the sales
which took place in the course of the day were the
following :—ln the Herefords, an animal bred by
the late Prince Consort, and exhibited by Colonel
Hood, was purchased by Mr. Thomas Pawsey, of
Bath ; Mr. R. Farthing's Devon, winner of the prize
of £25 in its class, was secured by Mr, Jas. Hook,
of Frederick-street, Hamstead-road ; and another
Devon, bred by the late Prince Consort, which ob-
tained a prize of £lO, has become the property of
Mr. Longman, King-street, Islington. Of the pure
Sussex breeds, which attracted great attention
among the practical portion of the compb.ny, Mr.
Napper's animal which gained £lO was sold to Mr.
Parker, of the Hove, Brighton. Mr. Edmund Beare's
prize Norfolk polled animal is now the property of
Mr. Copeland, of Windsor. The remarkably fine
animal, of the Aberdeen and Angus breed, winner
of a prize of £25, passed from the hands of the exhi-
bitor, Mr. W. M'Combie, of Elgin, to those of Mr.
T. Norris, Lamb Tavern,Cattle-market, and another
animal of the same class which obtained £l5 for
Mr. J. Stewart, of Aberdeen, will soon be offered by
Mr. S. Mann in another form to the inhabitants of
Croydon. An animal of the Galloway breed, which
was exhibited by Mr. Heath, of Norwich, and,
though not a prize animal, was much admired, will
soon be suspended on the tenter. hooks by Mr. T.
English, of Chelsea. The sales of sheep and pigs
were somewhat limited in number.
Some idea may be formed of the number who li
visited even at the high price of 65., when our
readers are informed that in one hoar during the
morning upwards of 1,000 catalogues were sold.
Amongst the visitors recognised during the day
were Prince Edward of SaxeWeimar, the Duke and
Dowager Duchess of Sutherland, the Duke of Rut-
land; the Dowager Duchess of Beaufort, with her
Grace's daughters, the Lady Hen. Morant, and the
Lady Rose Lovell; Lord Llanover, and the Hon.
Mr. and Mrs. Herbert of Lanarth, Lord Fevers-
ham, Lord Berners, Sir M. Peto, M.P., SirJ. Pax-
ton, M.P., Mr. Bramston, M.P., and Mrs. Bretz:-
oton, the Earl of Hardwicke, Lord St. Maur, Lord
Walsingham, the Hon. Gen. Hood, the Hon. James
Byng and the Hon. F. Byng, Sir E. Colbrooke, Col.
Challoner, &a. As might naturally be expected,
the great sources of attraction were the splendid
cups and tazzas to be presented this year as prizes
for the best specimens in the respective classes in
lieu of medals, and which were exhibited by Mr.
Thomas, of New Bond street, the manufacturer, in
an enclosure in the central avenue.

COURT OF COMMON COUNCIL.

THE CITY SOLICITORSHIP.

A special court of Common Council was held yes-
terday at Guildhall, for the purpose of taking into
consideration a report presented at the last court by
Mr. S. H. R. Waterlow, the chairman of the Lib-
rary and Law Clerks Committee, having reference
to the vacant office of City Solicitor.
Tho Right Hon. the Lord Mayor presided, His
lordship, on entering the court, was loudly cheered.
It will be remembered that, in their report, the
committee recommended that the salary of the City
Solicitor should in future be fixed at £1,250 a-year
—that the whole of his time be devoted to the duties
of his office—and that £5OO per annum be allowed
for clerks and the expenses of his office, Another
question submitted for the consideration of the com-
mittee was, whether it would be advisable to amal-
gamate the office of City Solicitor with any other
office appertaining to the Corporation, and they
reported that they did not consider it advisable to
recommend any such amalgamation at present.
Mr. S. H. R. WATERLOW briefly moved that the
report should be agreed to, and he said that after
the most careful consideration the committee had
come to the conclusion that £1,250 per annum was
a reasonable and proper salary for the office of city
solicitor, and he trusted that the court would now
agree to the report.
Mr. NORRIS, M.P., expressed his opinion that
there were several serious objections to the report,
one of which was that the salary recommended was
not sufficient to procure the services of an eminent
men such as ought to fill the high position of soli-
citor to the Corporation of London. He also believed
that one portion of the report which was to the
effect that the surplus fees received by the solicitor
should be returned to the Corporation could not be
legally carried out. For these and other reasons,
he should move that the report be referred back for
further consideration.

Mr. KELDAY, the chairman of the City Lands
Committee, supported the amendment, and said
that the late solicitor's salary was £2,000 a year,
and he had not heard any reason given why it
should be reduced, and he expressed nimself satis-
fied that no man who was of eminence in his pro-
fession would accept the appointment at the pro-
posed salary. (Hear, hear.)
Mr. BONE said, as one of the members of the
committee, he thought it right to state that the
d by sending it back for rgenpnodrtenhualdd bbeeeannmswoestrecarefully considered, and no
fur-
ther consideration.
Mr. DE JERSEY also supported the motion, and
said, with regard to the salary, he thought when
the subject came before the committee that £1,250
per annum was sufficient, and he thought so still;
and it appeared to him that there was no ground
for sending the report back. (Hear, hear.) The
whole subject had been thoroughly, fully, and pro-
perly considered, and there was no reason why the
report should not be carried out. The Government
were acceding to the feeling of the public with re-
gard to the restriction in the salaries for the civil
service, and only recently a large reduction had
been made in the salary of the solicitor to the Post-
office, and yet a most efficient man was obtained for
the office. (Hear, hear.)
Mr. ANDERTON and Mr. LAWLEY supported the
amendment, and the latter said he should be glad if
the Common Sergeant would inform the court
whether
betrtehemCaode suggestedrporation couldby
thele rgalelpyerrt.eeeive the
fees
Au caTtu he
bo
jf
eParliament,CutmdependingMCOMMON
E SERGEANT said he should not like
to give a positive opinion at a moment's notice upon
that the recommendationbu
carried out without in
ut
apanotnopfrtethsheeencct
oobninesmtwriutatcset
eiaofmnoi
pgoihfntianbnne
y way infringing the law.
(Hear, Hear.)

After some warm discussion between several
members of the court,
Mr. H. L. TAYLOR said he was rather surprised
at the excitement that had been exhibited by some
members in reference to this question, and he
hoped it was not to be explained by the fact that
many of the gentlemen who appeared to feel so
warmly on the present question found themselves
in the minority upon a former occasion when the
question of suspending the standing orders of the
court in relation to this appointment was dis-
cussed. He could not help regarding the pre-
sent proceeding as an endeavour to give the go-by
to the decision that was then arrived at, and
he hoped the court would not lend itself to such a
proceeding. (Hear.) The eyes of the public were
upon them—they would be entitled to see whether
they carried out the professions they had made with
regard to ts appointment, and he trusted that they

I
would not disappoint them. (Hear.) One hon.
member had stated that the report was full of ano-
malies, bat he could not help expressing his opinion
that it was the very best report that had ever been
made by any committee. (Cries of oh, oh, and hear.)
If the real object for referring the matter back was
to create delay and give an opportunity for other
gentlemen to come forward as candidates, it ap-
peared to him that they ought to say so, but he
really could see no other object for the postpone-
ment. (Hear.)
Mr. ELLIS supported the amendment, and said
he was certain that no solicitor of eminence in his
profession—and none other ought to be selected to
this great:Corporation—would accept the appoint-
ment at the salary of £1,250 per annum.
After some further discussion the question was
put, and the amendment was declared to be lost.
A division was demanded, when there appeared—
For the amendment 36
Against it ......
Majority against the amendment —59
Mr. ROWE then proposed that the amount of the
salary should be £1,500 per annum instead of
£1,250; but the standing orders of the court pre-
cluding him from doing so without notice, he gave
one to the effect stated for the next court.

Deputy HARRISON then abked his lordship to
appoint a day for the election.

Mr. H. L. TAYLOR suggested Thursday, the 18th
inst., which he said he would be the week before
St. Thomas's Day. (A laugh.)
The LORD MAYOR said that he had no objection
to fix the day named, and the court then adjourned.

ME7ROPOLITAN SUBTERRANEAN

RAIL WAY.

The spring, when this line was to have been
finished, and the summer, too, have come and gone,
but the City is still in point of time just as far dis-
tant from the West as ever it was. All the little
delays and all the great annoyances of overcrowded
traffic which it was to mitigate, if not to do away
with, are still as rampant and glaring as ever, and
the public and the shareholders also seem to be get-
ting impatient in their desire to know the reason of
the long delay. The varying rumours and constant
speculations to which the postponement of the open-
ing has given rise have been numerous enough, one
would have thought, to enable some to come near
the truth as the real causes of the delay. The lat-
ter, however, have been so very simple that no one
has guessed them. The breaking in of Fleet Ditch,
though it in no way affected the line itself, caused
serious loss of time in completing the main City
terminus at Farringdon-street. From the time
when that obstacle was removed, now more than a
month past, the line could have been worked easily
at its minimum rate of traffic, which is to be no less
than 90 trains a day each way. The only reason
against such working in October last was the wise
determination of the directors—in
which they have
been heartily supported by their able engineer, Mr.
Fowler—not to run a single passenger, train until
every minute detail in relation to their stations and
signals was finished, and arranged in the most per-
fect working order. The directors seem to be well
aware that in a line on such a novel plan, and
having so many peculiar features in its construc-
tion, it would be dangerous to open it to the public
while still imperfect, or till they had organised
all their various departments as to give confidence
by the customary appearances which on these
works denote a well-matured and deliberate sys-
tem. Thus, even in such trifling matters as
painting stations or papering and furnishing wait-
ing-rooms, nothing has been left incomplete, and
from Farringdon-street to Paddington the whole
line is now absolutely perfected and ready in
every branch, even down to the liveries of the
guards and porters. The usual ten days' notice
was given last Friday to the Board of Trade to in-
spect the mechanism of the signals,and when, these
have been examined the line will open, and, as we
have said, with as much completeness of detail as
if it had been 12 months in working order.
The importance of this new route, both for the
relief it must afford our overcrowded streets and in
diminishing in point of time the space between the
various districts of this unwieldy city, makes it one
of the most remarkable of all our many railway
triumphs. It is, for a London line, the cheapest
that has ever been constructed, though the engineer-
ing difficulties it presented at every hundred yards
were the moat formidable of their kind that have
ever been encountered. Sewers and gas and water
mains had to be respected, drains for the tunnel
itself to be made, heavy buildings in near proximity
to the excavations to be kept secure, and even the
thoroughfares under which the shaft was driven
like an entrance to a mine, left undisturbed, with all
the heavy traffic rolling incessantly overhead. How
great were the difficulties these almost irreconcil-
able conditions imposed—and above all when it be-
came necessary to make underground junctions, as
at King's-cross, where a labyrinth of complicated
brickwork for the tunnel had in fact to be invented
for the purpose—only engineers can understand.
The present powers of the company only allow
them to carry their line from Paddington to Fins-
bury-circus, a distance of about five miles, of
which the first great length, from Paddington to
Farringdon-street,
is complete, with working junc-
tions to the Great Western and Great Northern
railways. The tunnel commences at the Paddington
terminus, and continues in an almost direct line
towards the New-road, passing beneath the Edgware
road at right angles, and intersecting in the same
manner Lisson-grove-road and Upper Baker-street,
skirting along, beneath, and just outside the south-
ern extremity of Regent's Park. Thence it passes
under the houses at the eastern extremity of Park-
crescent, beneath Tottenham-court-road, into the
New-road, and passing close by Euston-square, turns
at King's-cross to effect a junction with the up and
down lines of the Great Northern Railway. From
King's-cross a great part of the line is an open cut-
ting, except for a length of about 600 yards beneath
Bagnigge-wells-road and Coppice-row, where again
a short tunnel intervenes. From this to the Farring-
don-street station it is nearly ell a fair open cutting,
and up to this point the line is perfectly ready.
From Farringdon-street station, on the waste ground
beyond Holborn which is still dignified with the
name of a street, the line is soon to have two
branches, one intersecting Holborn-hill, or rather
Skinner-street, and continuing its course due south
under the site of the old Fleet Prison, to effect a
junction with the Chatham and Dover line, which
is to cross the Thames at Blackfriars ; the other and
more important branch—in fact, the main line—is
to be continued under the ground north of Smith-
field and south of Charterhouse-square, and will
pass beneath Barbican into Finsbury-circus. At
this terminus it is intended, for the present at least,
to stop; though, as the advantages which this mode
of communication will afford become more generally
gnown and appreciated, the shareholders, we be-
lieve, will find their account in extending their
branches to the chief suburban districts of the
metropolis.

From West to East the average slope downward
of the whole line is one in 100 feet till it enters the
City, when it rises slightly again, but there is no
steeper gradient than this throughout. The rails
vary from a depth of 26 feet to 51 feet below the
surface of the ground ; the sharpest curve is one of
200 yards' radius, and there is not more than 1,200
yards of perfectly straight line throughout, Such
London, required certain adaptation;
of the tunnel, according to the nature
a line, passing through all the kinds of subsoil to
irffiininculties it had to surmount. Thus, in
goibnfoeottfdhhoeeualinfdodd easy ground its general form is illiptical,
the span of the arch of the tunnel being 281
feet, and its height 17 feet. The lengths of this
description are built with no less than bix rings of
brickwork, though the Board of Trade do not re-
quire more than five rings in railway arches of

seven feet greater span. In other portions where the
line goes deeper, and there is great 'pressure to re-
sist, the form of the arch is altered to give it greater
strength, and the crown is taken to a height of 19
feet. At no part are the foundations taken less than
five feet into the solid ground beneath the rails, and
wherever extra strength has been necessary the
whole has been driven like a shaft, and a solid ring
of the most massive brickwork above and below.
From end to end the whole work is set in a square
bed of solid concrete, covered in on the top with
asphalte to keep all watertight. Never, probably,
has any tunnel been planned so greatly in excess of
the strain it is required to bear. The easier por-
tions were constructed in 12-feet lengths, at the
rate of 72 feet a week—quicker than any work cf
the kind has ever been accomplished ; but when
passing near churehes or other heavy buildings a
regular shaft had, as we have said, to be driven by
skilled miners in four-feet lengths, and from the
great care requisite at these parts the works ad-
vanced but slowly.
Along the whole line all the stations are open to
the air, except two—that at Gower-street, and that
at Baker-street, which are underground. One of
these, however, by a serious of most ingeniously
contrived openings in the sides of the tunnel,
communicating with the forecourts or front gar-
dens of the houses above, is almost as well lighted
by daylight as those open to the air. The Portland
road station is lighted by domes above the tunnel
itself. The King's-crose station is as large, lofty,
and as well lighted as any of the best metropolitan
termini ; so also is that at Farringdon-street. The
Paddington station is, as a piece of construction,
marvellous for the skill with which a small but
most convenient terminus is made out of an odd
corner of the Great Western Company's ground
near the Bishop's-road bridge.

At present it is arranged to commence running
with no less than 90 trains a day each way, from
6 a.m. to 10 30 or 11 p.m., the trains starting at 10-
minute intervals during the busy hours. These
facilities will soon be further increased to trains at
five-minute intervals, with express trains going
through without stopping from terminus to termi-
nus, and the hours of traffic will probably be ex-
tended to midnight. The fares even by first-class
will be lower than the present omnibus rates, and
twice in the morning and evening each way working
men's trains will run, taking passengers the whole
distance for ld. per head.
As soon as possible after the opening it is intended
to proceed with the construction of the main line to
Finsbury. The cost of the whole undertaking is
estimated at less than £1,300,000. Had it been taken
on a viaduct it would have cost nearly four times
this amount, and absolutely spoilt some of the finest
streets in the metropolis. Whether or not it will
be remunerative as a speculation has yet to be seen ;
but, paying or not paying, it must be a great con-
venience to the public.

7HE .RE-ASSESSMENT IN S 7. GEORGE

211 E MAR7YR, SOUTHWARK.

A considerable amount of excitement and dissatis-
faction have for some weeks past existed amongst
the ratepayers of St. George the Martyr, South-
wark, consequent upon a re-assessment of the pro-
perty of the parish and a large increase in the poor
rates. It is alleged by the ratepayers that the new
assessment has been made in an unfair and partial
manner, and that while the private houses and pre-
mises occupied by the humbler ratepayers and
smaller tradesmen have been re-assessed at a much
higher rate than heretofore, the public institutions
in the parish, such as the Surrey Theatre and the
public houses have been allowed to remain on the
old assessment. This partial mode of re-assessment
has, it is contended, vitiated the poor rate made
under it, and in consequence payment of t te last rate
made has in general been refused, while no less than
250 appeals have been made against it, on tho
ground of the parochial authorities not having com-
plied with the Act of Parliament. Those appeals
came on for hearing last week before the magis-
trates at the Surrey Petty Sessions, who considered
that the appellants had good grounds for the
steps they had taken, but they postponed any
decision upou the subject until Wednesday the 17th
instant, in order to give the parish authorities an
opportunity of reconsidering the matter. Last night
a public meeting, convened by the portion of the
vestry who take part with the appellants, was held
in the school-room, Suffolk-street, and was presided
over by Mr. Sarell, one of the vestrymen.
A long discussion took place, and in the end a
resolution was adopted, by a large majority, to the
effect that, in the event of the magistrates deciding
against the appellants, the question be taken to the
quarter sessions, and that in the meantime the rate-
payers be advised to withhold payment of the rate.