The Sun.
London, England, 1862-02-15 00:00:00

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T E SUN.

LONDON, SATURDAY, FEB, 15, 1862.

In the days of our boyhood we knew a country
parish, distant about fourteen miles from a consi-
derable agricultural seaport. One part of the road
to the port was over three or four miles of heath,
and was in fact no road at all, nothing but a set of
parallel ruts in the turf, or mud, or sand, such as
may possibly be found across a few heaths down to
this day. The gigs and light carts, if they got into
(me parallel of ruts, must keep it, under the penalty
of wrenching the wheels from the axes; the heavy
laden waggons, at times, could not get across at
all ; and when they could, a pair of additional
horses, and even then at certain spots, a waggoner
putting his shoulder to the wheel were necessary.
It followed that every farmer sending his corn to
the port wanted, perhaps, two shillings a quarter
more than if he sold it near home. In fact,
there was a small local port about ten miles off the
village referred to, but in which ten miles of not
particularly good road there was no heath to cross,
1 where the merchant could always purchase the corn
much cheaper than his brother merchants at the
larger port, though the journey to both places was
a day's work for the team-men.
In the days which we better remember, all this
had been changed. A turnpike transformed the
road across the heath, almost into a tramroad ; ex-
cept at busy times, the farmer was willing to send
his corn the fourteen miles over a road which did
not strain his animals and his waggons ; and the
local purchasers found their mon ppoly destroyed.
Even the merchant at the ten miles distant small
port, soon felt the difference, and the result was
that the road to his port had also to be much
improved to give him any share of his old advan-
tage. In fact good roads are paying things. They
equalise prices, and raise the value of all the pro-
perty through which they pass. Whether the
traffic in a district be large or small, the good road
pays, If once well made the somewhat heavy cost
is incurred for a very long time, and the repairsare
very small if there be not much traffic; and, if there
be much, the repairs ever after cast less, while on
all the traffic carried on, the. saving in time, in
wear and tear, in cheap deliver
a distance, and cheap briniybor local produce to
g ng l
of cattle food
and manure, is a very handsome
per centage on the
1 outlay to the ratepayers. It Ittudi„aa and tenants ,

were wise they would leave no part of their estates
and farms inacessible, or with difficulty accessible,
for want of the means of easy communication with
the rest of the country.

Since the multiplication of railways the necessity
for perfecting the local routes of communication has
been increased ten-fold. We are taken so easily to
every part of the country, that it is above all things
unendurable, when you have sped your way with-
out trouble one or two hundred miles, to find a few
miles off the railway, that you are fairly brought
up by the impossibility of getting the local con-
veyances across a few miles of country in much less
time than you have spent in your railway trip.
We are likely now to escape the misery of taking
more time to get to Paddington, or perhaps to the
Great Northern Station, from London Bridge than
it took us to ride from Brighton, and we must
have a parallel improvement in the mud, and sand,
and deep rut roads, if they deserve to be called
roads, which lie not far from railways
in many parts of the country. When, how-
ever, the distance to a railway station
is considerable, the necessity for improving the
local communication is, if anything, greater. People
might almost as well emigrate to New Zealand as
live twenty or thirty miles from a railway, with
bad roads to that grand link with the civilised
world.

Now we find it estimated that about one-third of
the highways of England are very much in the
position of the heath roads of our boyish recollec-
tions. They lie as an obstruction between the one-
third of highways in excellent repair and the one-
third in moderately good repair ; and the cause of
this is confessed to be two-fold. First, that each
parish is its own road-maker, next, as each parish
does not furnish a man skilled in road-making, or
caring much about road-making, the parish road
is, in too many instances, left to take its chance.
It did very well for our grandfathers and great-
grandfathers, why should it not do for us.

The principles of the bill then, if we understand
it, are first to preserve representation of the tax-
payers, that being an essentially English principle.
But, secondly, to combine the parishes into dis-
tricts, which shall chose their way-wardens to have
charge of the highways. It will thus become im-
possible for one lazy lag-behind parish to make
itself an obstruction to the intercourse of parishes
on either side by allowing its roads to remain in
such a state, that passengers, who can do it, go miles
out of their way to avoid them. The charge of
centralisation is very unjustly brought against such
Unions. The truth is that where facilities
of intercourse are what they ought to be,
the area of easy co-operative action is very
much enlarged. Inhabitants become neighbours
by means of railways, telegraphs, bridges,
good roads and penny postage, who had, many
years ago, scarcely any acquaintance with each
other. The old parish system will indeed be a long
time before it gives way to anything like parochial
districts. Its memories are too long for that, both
socially and legally. Still the parochial system
must be modified in many things by those condi-
tions which during the last five and twenty years
have so completely modified the social relations
of time and space.
The other principle of the bill, that it shall be the
business of some responsible and competent person
to see to the roads of the district, is the only one on
which reliance can be placed for having the work
well and cheaply done. It is but the universal
principle of all good management, whether national
or local, or commercial, and we should ex-
pect the best results from it. The present
parish surveyors are practically irresponsi-
ble. They may care about their duties, or
they may not. They generally allow the farmers
to suit their own convenience to an extent which
is ruinous to the highways. Under the propose d
arrangement probably a fair rate would be paid
by all, and such farmers as pleased would receive
back of it what they could earn by proper em-
ployment of their teams at the times advantageous
to the roads. It is certain in any case that the
landlords and farmers would be among the
first to reap the benefit of the improved
means of traffic in agricultural districts, and that
they will eventually be thankful that the public
convenience coerced them to promote their own
advantage.

We trust the bill is now safe. A majority of 141
to 30 in a house of Landlords ought to put that be-
yond doubt. Mr. HENLEY'S scruples, illustrated
so amusingly, seem to have been satisfied by Sir
GEORGE GREY. Indeed, they all related merely to
details easy to arrange in committee. If this is to
be a session of useful, but non-political measures,
we have no doubt that this Highway Bill, when the
details have been well considered, will, more than
most, deserve the former title. A combination of
parishes will be worth a paid surveyor's time, and
the extent of the area, and the slight difference
to the rate of keeping all the roads equally good,
will prevent the ratepayers from grumbling, ac-
cording to the reputed wont of JOHN BULL. In-
deed, the probability is that each parish of the
combination, when it pays to a joint rate, will be
rather disposed to grumble if its own share of the
roads be not kept in thoroughly good repair.

S hips, Commerce, and Colonies used to bQ in-
scribed upon our banners as words peculiarly sym-
bolical at once of our strength and of our greatness.
The Regius Professor of Modern History at the
University of Oxford, with a very select few who
may possibly think with him, would have us erase
one of these words, with all convenient despatch,
and let the inscription run henceforth simply,
Ships and Commerce. Yet, at the very period when
this extraordinary proposition is advanced, our 1
colonies never were more flourishing, never were
more intimately bound up with the old mother
country, in all their interests, by those interwoven
ties of patriotism and loyalty, that are in themselves
and in their significance all but identical. It
is a happy augury that it should be thus with
our colonies, in truth, at an era in the develop-
ment of modern civilisation when the ends of the
earth are being fast brought together by the won-
drous agency of the electric telegraph. Once let
the globe be girdled by a continuous chain of sub-
marine cables and overland telegraph wires, and
London and Sydney—Pekin and Washington—
Cape Town and Terra del Fuego could be brought
into instantaneous communication. The Imperial
Government of England might then—as the result
we are referring to is one, the advent of which is in
all human likelihood simply a mere question of
time, we may say rather— will then be able
to transmit its instructions and advices as
rapidly to Hindostan and New Zealand, to
Jamaica and Vancouver's Island, to Gibraltar
and St. Helena as to the War Office in Pall Mall,
or, as used to be done, until a year or trio since,
to the India House in Leadenhall-street. The
network of telegraph wires and submarine cables
we know, for certain, is already weaving. We are
not here writing, consequently, of mere idle day
dreams. IVe are simply discussing the wider and
wider development of what is already growing
with visible rapidity. The trail of the lightning
messenger from shore to shore is being carried day
by day, further and further along the primeval bed
of the Mediterranean and the Red Sea, and will, at

a period now readily calculable, carry the winged
words to and fro in momentary flashes between the
British Islands and the remotest parts of her Asiatic
possessions. Simultaneously with the spread of this
marvellous agency there comes to light only the
other day the power and the vitality of that
identification of the affections, and interests of the
Canadian population, with those of the inhabitants
of the United Kingdom, which has demonstrated
for once and for all to the recognition of all rational
lookers on in both hemispheres the absolute unity
of the British Empire—scattered though that
empire is throughout the remotest limits of the ha-
bitable globe. As a fitting sequel, therefore, to the
extraordinary prelection of Mr. GOLDWIN SMITH,
the Professor of Modern History in the Oxford
University, came the dinner given on Wednesday
evening at the Freemason's Tavern, in celebration
of the astonishing growth, particularly of late
years, of our vast Australasian colonies.
The dinner in question was, in very many re-
spects, one of the most interesting festivities
that has taken place for a long while past in
relation to any part of our numerous and widely-
distributed possessions. It was presided over, as
our readers on Thursday evening were made
aware, by the ex-President of the Legislative
Assembly of Victoria. Among those who ad-
dressed the assembled participators in this
banquet was the Colonial Minister himself, his
Grace the Duke of NEWCASTLE. There also spoke
among others, andoas ever with him, exceedingly
to the purpose, the noble and gallant Secretary
of the Admiralty, Lord CLARENCE PAGET, Nor
were the leading orators of the evening restricted,
by any means, to a selection from among the
members of the present Administration. The
Conservative Opposition furnished its contingent
to the number of principal guests, and to the num-
ber of conspicuous speakers. Two of the Tory
Secretaries for the Colonies—namely, the Right
Hon Sir JOHN PAKINGTON, and my Lcrd STANLEY,
the Liberal son of the Conservative Premier,
spoke, as much con amore, upcn the self same
theme as the one gladly descanted upon
earlier that same evening by Lord C. PAGET and
his Grace the Duke of NEWCASTLE. Recollect the
dinner was in its purport no less than in its very
designation an Australian dinner. And bearing in
mind that it was so, may we not recognise as a
signal indication that the banquet so designed and
so defined was wonderfully well-timed, all things
considered ? when among the various toasts proposed
to the assemblage, toasts as appropriate to the
occasion as " Prosperity to the Australian Colonies"
(given by the Duke of NEWCASTLE), and "The
Governors and Legislators of the Australian
Colonies " (given by Lord STANLEY)—there
was quaffed in solemn silence a memo-
rial draught to the " Memory of BURKE
and WILLS " to the memory, that is, of
the first of those adventurous explorers cf the
fifth continent at our antipodes, the very first
whose heroic enterprise (at the cost of their lives)
led to the crossing and re-crossing, from south to
north, and from north to south, of the hitherto
(at least by Europeans) unpenetrated depths of
Australasia. It was upon the morrow of the
completion of that first successful expedition to
penetrate Australia from seaboard to seaboard
that the Banquet of Wednesday was given, a
banquet in celebration of the seventy-fifth anni-
versary of the foundation of the Australian
colonies. The seventy-fifth anniversary, observe,
of their foundation. In other words, more
than two whole generations have passed away
since the standard of England was first planted
there. Yet wide though the distance of time already
traversed since Captain COOK'S discoveries first led
to the organisation of the largest of all our sixty
colonial possessions—within how comparatively
brief an interval is it not that the growth of
our institutions there may be said to have
really commenced in earnest ! As a representative
Government, for example, the very oldest of our
now flourishing Australian colonies dates back no
further than to a distance of a score of Tears from
the present time. The youngest of them dates the
dawn of the epoch, of its self-government no
further back than to a distance of just three
Sears. Yet already their revenue has expanded
to an aggregate of six millions and a-half sterling
—their population to one million and a quarter—
their tonnage in outward-bound trading vessels to
one million and a-half—and the annual value
of their imports to 125,000,000. With some
show of reason, therefore, might the anni-
versary of the foundation of our cluster
of colonies in Australia be celebrated as it
was celebrated on Wednesday. If anything
could tend to cap the climax of absurdity, moreover
glaring upon our imagination in an eccentric pro-
position like that of Mr. GOLDWIN SMITH'S, to the
end that the British Colonial Empire, as a whole,
should be voluntarily disrupted as soon as pos-
sible, it would be blazoning forth of statistics
like these in regard to Australia, immediately
after the magnificent manifestation of loyalty and
patriotism witnessed at the turn of the year
among our fellow citizens in Canada.

The Earl and Countess of Donoughmore have
left the Pavilion Hotel, Folkestone, for Paris.
Lord and Lady De Blaquiere have left town for
Paris, and will remain abroad for a few weeks.

"Mr. Mark Lemon About London," continues to
attract very numerous audiences, and the first and second
parts have been considerably increased in interest by being
now compressed into one lecture, and liberally interspersed
with lighter anecdotal matter. " About London" is now
delivered every Monday and Friday, and " About West-
minster" every 'Wednesday and Saturday, with all the beau-
tiful and original illustrations.
REPRESENTATION OF LEICESTER.—The writ for
a new election in the place of Mr. Biggs was received on
Wednesday by the mayor, who appointed Monday next
for the election. The Conservatives had a meeting on
Wednesday evening, and resolved not to bring forward a
candidate, expressing themselves content with one member,
and resolved hereafter to claim one. Mr. Taylor, will, it is
expected, be returned unopposed.

GREAT GRIMSBY ELECTION.—RIOTOUS PRO-
CEEDINGS.—The nomination of candidates for the repre-
sentation of Great Grimsby took place on Thursday. Mr.
Heneage and Mr. Chapman were proposed amidst conside-
ri.ble confusion. The poll took place yesterday, and we re-
ceive by electric telegram the following numbers as the close
of the poll--Chapman, 456 ; Heneage, 436 ; majority, 20.
The brief telegram speaks of terrible rioting, of Mr.
Heneage's hotel being completely gutted, and of the streets
being torn up.
The Hull police, who were sent for in the
morning, were, it is sail, half murdered. Many men received
serious injuries, some of which are reported as almost fatal.

TIIE HARTLEY COLLIERY RELIEF FUND.—For
the support of the families rendered destitute by the late
melancholy disaster at Hartley the most ample provision
has now been made. A meeting of the committee entrusted
with the management of the funds was held in Newcastle
on Thursday, and by the secret,,ry the agreeable announce-
ment was made that the subscriptions
.towards the benevo-
let object have reached the handsome sum of nearly
£30,000. It was at the same time stated that the number
of sufferers entitled to receive relief was about 450, and that
the estimated expenditure of the current year would be
£ 1,000. Several communications, containing suggestions as
to the appropriation of the surplus amount collected, were
read, and to meet the almost universally expressed wish of
ho subscribers, it was resolved to make a public intima-
tion, to the effect that the committee would be prepared to
hold any residue which might remain beyond the require•
meats of the present emerc.cncy, for the relief of similar
cases of calamity in the counties of Northumberland and
Durham, either as a basis of a permanent fund, or in any
other mode which may hereafter be decided upon. A sum
of £3OO was voted to the fund being raised for a testimonial
to Mr. Coulson and his heroic fellow-sinkers, and a motion
to send six of the orphan girls to Haverstock School, pro-
vided they could be admitted for £5O each,
Newcast4 chroniek.
was adopted.—

And, as compared with the month ending the 12th Jan.
1861, the above returns show a decrease of £371,590
in the circulation of notes in England, and a decrease of
£1,122,816 in the circulation of the United Kingdom :
On comparing the above with the fixed issues of the seve-
ral banks the following is the state of the circulation :
rhe English private banks aro below their fixed
issue
The English joint-stock banks are below their
fixed issue

Total below fixed issue in England.... £1,565,968
The Scotch banks are above their fixed issue .. £1,544,330
The Irish banks are above their fixed issue £1837217
The average stock of bullion held by the Bank of Eng-
land in both departments during the month ending the Bth
Jan. was £15,843,684, being an increase of £827,230 as
compared with the previous month, and an increase of
£3,104,280 when compared with the same period last year.
The following are the amounts of specie held by the Scotch
and Dish banks during the month ending the 11th Jan. :
Gold and silver held by the Scotch banks
Gold and silver held by the Irish banks..

£5,099,573
Being an increase of £5,565, as compared with the
previous return, and a decrease of £53,630 when compared
with the corresponding period of last year,

SALISBURY CATTIEDRAL.—The Wiltshire county
Mirror says :—" Mr. G Gilbert Scott, the able Gothic
architect, has visited the cathedral, and made a very careful
and minute examination of the four piers which support
the tower and spire, and other parts of the building. The
four massive pillars are perfectly sound, and, although they
appear to be bending beneath the immense weight which
presses upon them, they are as well able to sustain it as
ever they were. Since the columns were first plumed no
perceptible deviation from the perpendicular has taken
place."