The Sun.
London, England, 1838-01-22 00:00:00

AMUSEMENTS FOR THE WEEK.

At Drury-lane, in consequence of the success of Mr.
Charles Kean in Hamlet, that tragedy will be repeated to-
night, on Wednesday, and on Friday next. To-morrow, for
the accommodation of juvenile visitors, the pantomime will
take precedence of the other performances, consisting of the
new farce of Our Mary Anne, the ballet of the Daughter of
the Danube, and other entertainments. Every other evening
the new pantomime of Jack-a-Lantern will conclude them.
Covent-garden to-night presents Shakspeare's tragedy of
Macbeth ; to-morrow Amilie ; or the Love Test; Wednesday,
Joan of Arc, with the Brigand—every evening with the new
attractive pantomime of Harlequin Peeping Tom of Coventry ;
and on Friday will be represented Shakspeare's tragedy of
King Lear, in which the catastrophe of its immortal author
will replace" the commonly acted one by Tate ; the part of the
Fcol will be also restored, and other emendations of the text,
more in accordance with the original play, will be made. The
following will be its powerful cast : Lear, Mr. Alacready ;
Kent, Mr. Bartley ; Glo'ster, Mr. G. Bennett ; Edgar, Mr.
Elton ; Edmund, Mr. Anderson ; the Fool, Miss P. Horton ;
and Cordelia, Miss Helen Faucit. _ _

Opera Buffa (Lyceum), to-morrow, Donizetti's opera of
Belly, with the first act of Ricci's opera of Scaramuccia ; and
on Thursday will be repeated Mozart's opera Le Nozze di
Figaro.
The Adelphi to-night and during the week, the new bur-
letta of All for Love ; or, the LostPleiad, with, first time, a
new burletta, called the Black Domino, followed by the
Dancing Barber, and (compressed) the pantomime of Harle-
quin Silver Sixpence.
The Olympic to-night and during the week, the Black
Domino, with Shocking Events, the Ringdoves, and Puss
in Boots.

The St. James's tries a novel experiment to-night, com-
mencing and concluding its entertainments with theatrical
performances, and giving intermediately, for the first time in
Englar.d, a grand instrumental concert, with promenade a la
Musard at Paris, for which purpose a band of eighty of the
first performers in Europe have been engaged, and the pit will
be covered over, forming with the stage, a very handsome and
spacious saloon. Is she his Wife will precede, and the Young
Widow follow the concert.

The Surrey to-night and during the week, All Hallow's
Eve; or, the Spirit of the Lahe, followed by other enter-

tainments.
The Victoria to-night, tc-morrow, and Wednesday, Romeo
and Juliet, with the Village Lawyer. On Thursday, Friday,
and Saturday, the Jew of Lubeck, wish I and my Double ; to
conclude every evening with the Cottager's Daughter.

THE BANSHEE.—John French, Esq., of French
Park, who represented the county of Roscommon, from 1743,
until the time of his death in 1775, was drowned in the latter
vfar, together with his brother Robert, on his passage from
Dublin to Parkgate. A plcm, entitled " The White Lady,"
o considerable merit; written we believe by a lady of the
French family, and printed for private circulation, gives the
following singular tradition connected with this melancholy
event:—" John French, Member for Roscommon, and Robert
French, were drowned in the year 1775, in returning from
Parkgate. Their wives were at French Park, awaiting their
return. On the night of the day when they were expected,
it blew a perrect hurricane, in the midst of which, the coach
and six was distinctly heard to drive up to the door. As it
stopped, a piereinr, shriek, louder than the storm. rung on the
ears of the atfiigiTted household. 'I he wife of John French,
called The Ban Tierna,' exclaimed, "Ti 3 the cry of the
Banshee—my husband is drowned!' The door was opened—
no carriage was seen—nor bad any entered the gates. A few
days after, the news arrived that the packet in which they were
returning had been lost."—Burke's Commoners, Part X V.
The present severe winter has brought to thi, country
several species of birds but little k❑own here. On Friday
seven pine cross-bill parrots were shot near Leamington; and
a black-throa'ed or speckled diver, which rarely comes south
of Scotland, was on the same day killed near High Wycombe.

AN UNCOMMON GOOD SHOT.—Two passengers
coming down the Mississippi in a steam-boat, were shooting
birds on shore from the deck. Some sportsman converse en-
sued. One rernarkcd, that he would turn his back to no
man in killing r.-coons, that he had repeatedly thot Efty a day.
• What o' that ?" said a Kentuckian ; " I make nothing of
killing a hundred 'coon a day, cenary luck."—" Do you know
Captain Scott of our state?" asked +a
Tennessean bystander;
" he, now, is something like a shot. A hundred 'coon; why
he never p'ints at one without hitting him. He never misses,
and the 'coons knows it. T'other day he levelled at an old
'un in a high tree. The varmint looked at him for a minute
and then bawled nut, Cap'n Scott is that you?'—
' Yes,' was the reply...—. Well, don't shoot says he; ' it's
no us-2, ; hold on ; I'll come down—l give in 1' which he did 1"
It is unnecessary to add, that this was the last hunting story.
—Knickerbocker.

The Leicester Chronicle records the death of an in-
dividual in that town, caused by excessive s,noking. The
deceased was, it is said, of sound constitution, and, with the
exception of cigars, temperate in everything. He was stized
with a sudden prostration of strength, which proved fatal in a
few days. On a post raortent examivatkn the body exhibited
"no traces of disease." The medical men attribute his death
solely to the too great indulgence in smoking.

On Wednesday morning the extensive premises of
Mr. Louis Merideth, situated at Wyle Cop, Shrewsbury,
which consisted of several floors of warehouses filled with
hops, tallow, seeds, wax, and groceries, to the value of
12,000 i. were completely destroyed by fire.
STRIKING DEATH.—In the morning of December
15th, Matthew Johnstone, mai iner, Monkwtarmouth, a native
of Roxburghshirc, dropped down suddenly, and expired.
Mrs. Johnstone, in assisting to remove his clothes, &c., from
the ship which he was to leave for the winter, was nearly
drowned in the river Wear. He saw from the vessel the boat
in which she was capsized, and hurried to her assistance.
After reaching the top of the bridge stairs, he procured a
st mulus to prevent the effects of the immersion, and urged
her to hurry home ; he went for a bag of apples to the bridge,
with which he was to follow her, but had not taken many
steps till he fell down to rise no more. His wife, not knowing
what had happened, was waiting with the utmost anxiety to
express to him her gratitude for such an astonishing delive-
rance, when she was informed of his sudden death l The
deceased bore an excellent character, though connected with
sea-faring temptations for about fifty years.
A DISHONEST WIFE.—One evening last week,
a man pursued his wife into Inverness, a distance of about 30
miles from their home, the woman having run off—not with
some gay Lothario—but with a sum of 101. belonging to her
husband. The offending party was detected, and most of the
money found on her person, after which the poor man, with a
rare and exemplary meekness of spirit, took back the repentant
wife, and they went home together.—lnverness Courier.

FROST AND SNOW.—The mild weather on which
we lately congratulated ourselves, assometbino- almost unpre-
cedented, has at length given place to severe frost and snow.
Both north and south the mails are detained behind their time.
There is no snow between Inverness and Perth, but south and
west of Edinburgh it lies deep. In Caithness there has alto
been a considerable fall of snow, and travellin• on the coast,
•r Aberdeen road, is impeded from the same cause.--Inver-
ness Courier.

LONDON AND BLACKWALL
extraordinary meeting of the proprietors of the London and
Blackwell Commercial Railway was held on Friday, at the City
of London Tavern, to consider a Report proposed to them by
Messrs. Stephenson and Bidder, relative to an improved mode
suggested by those gentlemen for constructince and making' the
railway. Mr. Esdaile was the Chairman, and the meeting was
numerously attended. The Report, which contains some Tory
useful suggestions, having been read, the proposal was made that
it be agreed to ; upon which a proprietor suggested that some
account of the state of the funds of the Company should be laid
before the meeting ; but, as no one seconded the suggestion, it
was withdrawn, and the Report was unanimously agreed to. A
resolution was also unanimously agreed to expressive of the
opinion of the proprietors that the undertaking was a very ad-
vantageous one, and that it would be advisable to commence it
as soon as possible, and carry it on with vigour. Several pro-
prietors expressed their conviction that the railway would be
advantageous to the public, and lucrative to the shareholders;
and one of them (Mr. Stock, of Poplar) dwelt on the conve-
nience which the railway would present if it existed at the
present moment, when vessels cannot come higher up the
river than Blackvvall ; and spoke of the immense number of
passengers who now came from Blackwell to London by land.
Another proprietor expressed a hope that in time an Act of
Parliament would prevent steam-vessels from coming further
than Blackwell ; for that they would then be compelled to
" vomit their contents" at that place.---( A laugh.) Thanks
having been voted to the Chairman, the meeting adjourned.
The village of Colnbrook has been in a good deal
of excitement within the last few days, on account of the fol-
lowing circumstance. As some labourers were going to
their work on Tuesday morning, in passing through a lane a
short distance from Colnbrook, they discovered the body of
a man lying upon the ground. His throat was cut from
ear to ear, and a short distance from him lay the razor,
covered with blood, with which instrument the wound ap-
peared to have been inflicted. The body was quite stiff and
cold, and had no doubt been all night in the situation where
it was found. An alarm was immediately given, and assist-
ance being procured, tic remains were removed to the Black
Boy Inn at Colnbrook, where the deceased'a clothes were
examined, but no papers or documents of any kind were
found upon him to afford any information respecting him,
neither had he any money. There were no other marks of
violence upon his person. An inquiry was instituted, but all
that could be ascertained respecting the unfortunate deceased
%Nes, that he had been seen at Hounslow a day or two previously,
where it was believed he had come from London, and his de-
jected and melancholy appearaLce had been remarked by every
one who saw him. He sveut by one of the Windsor coaches
to Colnbrook on the evening before he was found dead as de-
scribed, and after he had paid the coachman, he went into a
public-house, and called for half a pint of beer, and ho re-
marked while he was paying for it, that it was his last penny.
He then left the house, and nothing more was heard of him un-
til he was found in the lane. A coroner's inquest was subse-
quently held upon the deceased, when the jury after a minute
investigation returned a verdict that the deceased destroyed
himself while in a state of temporary derangement.