The Sun.
London, England, 1854-01-06 00:00:00

LONDON, BRIGHTON, AND SOUTH COAST.

The mail and other trains on this line came in yester-
day rather late, but no considerable inconvenience was
experienced. The line is now perfectly cleared.

LONDON AND SOUTH-WESTERN.

Yesterday morning the Southampton mail was delayed
a short time at Farnborough, where the snow had
slightly drifted ; but it arrived in London soon after its
usual time. The first ordinary train from Southampton
was also rather late, but the other trains arrived and
were despatched as usual.

On Wednesday morning the North Stafford train,
which should leave Derby for Crewe and Liverpool at
ten o'clock, did not start until after eleven. As soon
as it had started and entered the Normanton cutting,
it became embedded in the snow, And could not
proceed on its journey. Assistance was sent for,
and a powerful engine belonging to the Midland
Company was despatched for the purpose of pushing it
through if possible. This engine, however, also stuck fast.
A second engine, a powerful one, used for conveying
large luggage trains, was went to draw them back into
the station yard, which it succeeded in doing, and the
train has remained in the station yard ever since. Three
times afterwards on Wednesday an attempt was made
to force a passage through this cutting, but it was of no
avail, and the Birmingham and Derby, North and South
Stafford lines, &e., were declared " blocked."

On Wednesday afternoon the 4 o'clock train from
Lincoln got embedded in the snow about 2 miles on this
side the city, and has not yet been removed.

The afternoon train from Leeds, due at Derby at 8 5
p.m. on Wednesday night, was stopped at Chesterfield,
and the passengers had to take beds in that town.

The north mail due at Derby at 11 on Wednesday
evening did not arrive until 7 o'clock yesterday morn-
ing ; and the train which follows it, due at 5 20 yester-
day morning at Derby, did not arrive until 8 o'clock.
The Ambergate branch has been blocked since Tues-
day night.

Yesterday (Thursday) morning an attempt was again
made to " force the pass " of the Normanton cutting
by five enaines, but they had to return to Derby ; and
the station-master said there would be no further at-
tempts made that day.

LIVERPOOL—DEC. 5.
So severe a winter has not been known in this dis-
trict since 1842.

Snow fell the greater part of yesterday, and during
the whole of the night. There has been a cessation this
morning, but the atmosphere threatens a further down-
fall.

We have had no arrivals of trains from London since
an early train yesterday morning ; in the afternoon a
telegraphic despatch was received at the Lime-street
station of the London and North 'Western Railway from
Crewe, stating that the line was blocked up with snow,
and that the 7.30 and 9.40 trains from Liverpoorfor
London were standing there unable to proceed, while
the London down trains were detained from the same
cause at Stafford. Mr. Norris, the chief engineer, had
gone with 100 men to clear the line at Standon ; of
course, all the trains which afterwards arrived at the
two *points, Crewe and Stafford, were unable to proceed
further. A second telegraph message, received last
night by Mr. Ilberry, the station-master at Lime-
street, station, reports that nothing had passed Crewe
since the down mail train on Tuesday evening. " The
line," it is stated, is " blocked up between Whitmore
and Stafford. Mr. Norris, the engineer is there, and we
are sending by daylight 300 men to his assistance."
These men would get to work the first thing this morn-
ing, and hopes are entertained by the railway officials
that they will be able to clear so much of the line as will
enable the 9 p.m. train from Liverpool to London to get
through without stoppage. The mail train which left
Liverpool at the usual time last night was unable to
proceed further than Warrington. A telegraph from
Warrington states that the line is snowed up between
that place and Crewe, and that they would be unable to
clear it until this evening.

The non-arrival of the London trains at Liverpool
caused the greatest inconvenience in all circles, but per-
haps to no one is it a greater cause of anxiety than to
the provincial editor ; he is at his wits end to know how
to dish up a presentable bill of fare, and fervently prays
for a speedy thaw.

A lady residing in Liverpool was yesterday morning
to have been married to a gentleman from town, who
was expected to join the guests assembled at the mar-
riage feast in the morning. Instead of his bodily pre-
sence, however, the bride received a telegraphic mes-
sage conveying the intelligence that her intended was
" snowed up" at Stafford.
_ .

Nineteen or twenty trains from all directions have
come to a standstill at Bolton.

An accident happened on the line near Holyhead
yesterday, the train getting off the rails, and running
ft a snowdrift. The driver and stoker were suffocated.
In the absence the London journals, the merchants
on 'Change had recourse to a snowballing match, which
ended in a riot on a small scale. They were ranged in
two sides—cotton-brokers versus share-brokers, the
latter section being marshalled by a leader of prodigious
proportions. The melee raged thickly and furiously,
and a dense crowd assembled to witness the encounter.
Ultimately, the head constable, Capt. Greig, entered on
the scene of action, accompanied by a section of police,
and attempted to put the belligerents to flight. They
were, however, upon their private property, and asserted
their right to do as they liked with their own. They
renewed the match in the captain's presence. He or-
dered arrests to be made. Au indescribable scene fol-
lowed. Several merchants were taken into custody, and
marched off to Bridewell, amid the yells and groans
of the infuriated "merchant princes," who wreaked their
vengeance upon Captain Greig and the "Blue coats "
by hurling at them showers of well-aimed snowballs.
The head constable's hat was repeatedly displaced ; he
was several times times thrown down, while he was
picturesquely bespattered with snow. The snowballing
was renewed, and the head constable returned with a
Larger force, who attempted to take possession and clear
the flags. They were vigorously hustled, however, and
speedily broken up into units. The captain then walked
into the news-room, with the intention probably of ad-
dressing the merchants, but he was surrounded by a
crowd of menacing faces, and literally hustled from the
room. He was ultimately compelled to withdraw
his men, who lafS the ground followed by a smart
shower of snowballs. The ringleaders who had been
taken into custody were liberated—their names had been
booked. The matter at one time had a somewhat seri'
ous aspect, several windows in the police-office being
broken, and the crowd assuming a threatening attitude.

DEATH OF LORD PLUNKET.

The elpetrie telegraph brings intelligence of the death
of Lord Plunk2t, yesterday, at his residence near Dub-

lin, at the great age of 89 years. His death revives re-
collections of a time so far distant that many will wonder
when they read that a man so famous when their grand-
fathers were young survived until within this present
week.

Throughout the first quarter of the present century,
the ,bar of Ireland was rarely adorned by talent and
learning. Far above the most eminent of his order stood
William Conyngham Plunket. He had not perhaps the
legal lore of Saurin or Burton, the fine genius of Curran,
or the graceful elocution of Bushe, but he was the most
efficient advocate that Ireland ever produced. He ad-
dressed a jury or a judge, an English or an Irish audi-
ence, a select committee or a popular assembly, with
equal power and success. A supporter of Roman Catho-

lie claims, he still contrived to win and to retain the
suffrages of Dublin University--a lawyer indurated by
tie practice of his profession, he was yet a legislator and
a politician—a flaming patriot with Grattan, Flood, and
Charlemont—a supporter of Addington and afterwards
of Pitt ; on the death of the latter, an aristocratic
Whig swearing by Charles Fox ; a Grenville in Perce-
val's time, a Tory with Lord Liverpool, a partisan of
Canning upon,favourable terms, and a staunch Liberal
with Melbourne and Grey. He began the world with
scarcely the position or the resources of a gentleman,
but long before old age could quell his keen ambition
ho had won a coronet for 'himself and a mitre for his
son, places for several of his family, together with ease
and opulence and honours, and every other appliance
that could soothe the decline of his own protracted
existence. Fully 40 years practising at the bar, nearly
20 years in the House of Commons, twice .Attorney-
General, once Chief Justice of the Common Pleas, twice
Lord Chancellor of Ireland, he retired from public affairs
in IS4I, and survived, as we have said, till yesterday.
Some fourscore years ago the Rev. Thos. Plunket was

the pastor of a Presbyterian congregation in the town of
Enniskillen. He had two sons, the eldest son of whom
was Patrick ; the second, considerably junior to his bro-
ther, was the celebrated man whose death we have just
recorded. Lord Plunket was . born in the month of
July, 1764. In a pecuniary sense his prospect of in-
heritance was small, but nature compensated him by the
most precious of her gifts—a sound mind in a vigorous
frame. A few of the north of ,Ireland Presbyterians
doubt the doctrine of the Trinity, as it is generally re-
ceived in Christian churches, and of that number was
Mr. Thomas Plunket. While yet a comparatively young
man he removed with his family to Dublin, and became
the minister of Strand-street Chapel, in that city. This
change greatly facilitated an object very dear to his
heart, that of giving a liberal education and learned pro-
fessions to both his sons. Patrick, the eldest, became a
physician, died childless, and, we believe, unmarried,
more than forty years ago, bequeathing to his brother,
William (Lord) Plunket, a large library and a very
considerable fortune. William was, however, yet a
boy when death removed his father from a world in
which his struggles were at once severe and unsuc-
cessful. He died in embarrassed circumstances, and
left to his congregation the care of his family. This
appeal was handsomely responded to, and, though
the Unitarians in Dublin were neither numerous nor
wealthy, still a sufficient sum was subscribed to pay
Mr. Plunket's debts, as well as to defray the expense
of keeping the younger son at school, and completing
the education of the elder, who soon found himself in a
condition to return their assistance as well as to contri-
bute to the expenses of William Plunket, who had re-
solved to engage in the profession of the law, upon which
he entered in Hilary Term, 1787, having previously ob-
tained a scholarship and graduated with considerable
credit at Trinity College, Dublin. The legislative inde-
pendence of Ireland had not been established many
years when Mr. Plunket was called to the bar, the one
event having occurred in 1782, and the other in 1787.
The late Lord Charlemont was then one of the leaders
of the Irish Liberal party, and Mr. Plunket, while at
college, had acquired no small fame for oratory in a de-
bating club called the Historical Society, which in those
days held its meetings within the walls of the Dublin
University. He was just the man "to badger a
Government," and Lord Charlemont, with his usual
shrewdness, secured his services. His Lordship
immediately brought him into the Irish House
of Commons for his own borough of Charlemont,
and Mr. Plunket then commenced a career which
ended with the Chancellorship and a peerage.
He was bold, sarcastic, unsparing ; at once witty
and logical, popular and prudent, he displayed an
energy which misfortunes could not conquer, and a
spirit of political antipathy as strong as if the Ministers
of that day had once been his friends. Stimulated by
narrow circumstances and boundless ambition, he gave
all his days, and almost all his nights, to toils which
politicians " court, and think them joy;" but, though
capable of speaking at the shortest notice, he was yet a
holiday orator. He could indeed speak with ease and
effect about anything or nothing ; but he never relished
small skirmishing, and almost always reserved himself

for great occasions. Not that he was ever in the habit
of writing pamphlets and committing them to memory,
but it seemed as if the fervour necessary to his nobler
efforts could only be excited by profound emotions long
indulged, supported by reasonings so cherished and nur-
tured as to have become a part of his being. With the
every-day business of legislation his name is therefore
little associated, while the fame which he acquired in
the Irish Hbuse of Commons is due principally to the
power which he displayed in resisting the Legislative
Union. He scarcely could be said to have brought to
its discussion the views of a philosopher or the experi-
ence of a statesman ; but from night to night, during
the debates on the Union, he directed against the
Treasury bench a perfect hurricane of wrath. Al-
though these efforts conferred no benefit on his country,
they tended greatly to advance his own reputation ;
although the Viceregal Castle would not capitulate,
he took the Four Courts by storm. The palace of the
Lord-Lieutenant closed its gates, but in the Temple of
Justice he was received as her most favoured son ;
professional income which had been reckoned by hun-
dreds soon rose to be computed by thousands, and the
legal circles of Dublin, not less than those of the North-
West Circuit, still cherish the traditions of his forensic
victories. Every faculty of his vigorous mind, as well
as every feature of his extraordinary character, were
disciplined and developed by the -Union debates ; and
most especially did he acquire fame from the boldness—
we had almost said the audacity—with which he con-
fronted his political adversaries.

The extinction of the Irish Parliament seemed for a
time to extinguish Mr. Plunket's hopes of building up
the character of a statesman ; but he " improved the
occasion" by creating the greatest forensic reputation
that any Irishman ever attained. A short time after his
"call" he obtained business sufficient to justify his being
allied in marriage to a lady of good fortune, and de-
scended from an ancient family. The wife of Mr.
Plunket was Catherine, only daughter of Mr. John
M`Causland, who had represented the county of Done-
gal in four Parliaments. The union of Mr. Plunket
with Miss M'Causland took place in 1791, and a nu-
merouslamily were the issue of that marriage. Anxious
as he must necessarily have been at this period of his
life to provide for the necessities of his position, yet he
cordially united with his brother, Dr. Plunket, in re-
turning to those members of his father's congregation
who subscribed to pay that gentleman's debts and main-
tain his family the amount of all their contributions,
with full interest, so that the Unitarians of Strand-
street lost no money and gained much honour by their
connection with the Plunkets.
When the rebellion of 1798 burst forth Mr. Plunket
excellent. reasons,
was a Member of Parliament, a rising man at the
bar, and the father of a
even if higher motives were wanting, to
him from abetting that sanguinary
Ymov
aid movement
t;othscnolignhe
he subsequently gave his
professional
few men among its leaders and victims. Many years
before that fatal period, at the time when Persian =vans
were indoctrinating all Europe,'
it is said that Mr. Plun-
ket did not quite escape their influence, aid that among
the Irish Liberals of 17 89 —more especially at the houses
of Dr. Emmett and his son Thomas—Mr. Plunket was
accustomed to proclaim that " all the sovereigns of
Europe were malefactors, and all the nations of Europe
enslaved." But such a charge against such a man is
more easily preferred than established, and we have yet
Ito learn that there ever existed for it even the semblance
o f any foundation. People have thought, however, that
it was urged with sufficient pertinacity to render Mr.
Plunket very desirous of some signal and public oppor-
tunity to give that calumny a practical refutation. An
occasion favourable for that purpose presented itself in
the month of August, 1803, upon the trial of Robert
Emmett, whose followers murdered the Irish Chief
Justice, Lord Kilwarden. Mr. Plunket—who in three
months afterwards became Solicitor-General—appeared,
in addition to the learned gentlemen who were then law
officers of the Crown, as counsel for the prosecution ; and
there are those who thought, and said, that he discharged
his duty during that painful trial in a manner more re-
markable for zeal in his cause than for humane conside-
ration towards the culprit. The immediate conviction
and ultimate fate of the prisoner were regarded as
matters of certainty. The earnest address of Mr.
Plunket to the jury was therefore calculated to promote

no other object than the very superfluous purpose of
•.
dissociating himself from the frantic and criminal author
of the eineute in which Lord Kilwarden fell. That Mr.
Emmett should in return have assailed him with the
measureless sarcasm of which Mr. Plunket f had
set many examples will surprise no one who recollects
the position and character of that young man. He \f/74...z:4,:4.,
accused Mr. Plunket of having inculcated popular re- it"
Cl'f'7
sistance and physical force in his speeches both at the
241"
bar and in Parliament, while the adversaries of esta-
-A
blished order, immediately after the trial, charged him
with ingratitude and treachery in volunteering to assail
the son and brother of men with whom he had lived on
terms of intimacy, and with whom he once had shared
those sentiments which, on the trial of Robert Emmett
in 1803, he indignantly reprobated. That this aocusation
was utterly false Mr. Plunket proved long afterwards
upon the trial of an action which he brought against
William Cobbett for propagating that unfounded charge.
On the 22d of October, 1803, he was advanced to the
office of Solicitor-General for Ireland, and on the 15th
of October, 1805, to that of Attorney-General. The
death of Mr. Fox, and the pressure on the king respect-
ing Roman Catholic claims broke up the Government,
and Mr. Plunket resigned, after holding the office of
Attorney-General from October, till May, 1807. He
had now ceased to go to circuit ; in a great measure he
withdrew from the common law courts, and gave him-
self up to the pursuit of Chancery practice. In every
Chancery suit he appeared as leading counsel, and con-
tinued in the undisputed enjoyment of that position
from 1807 till 1827, in the course of which period his
fees, exclusive of professional gains during the preceding
20 years, could not have amounted to less than 120,0001.,
or an average income of 6,0001. per annum.

At the general election of 1812, for he was known to
be favourable to Roman Catholic claims, it was for
the first time Mr. Plunkett took his seat in the British
House of Commons as representative of the learning and
orthodoxy of Ireland. He had previously sat for Mid-
hurst from January 1807 to April in the same year. A
single speech, however, sufficed to set him right
with the House. When be first rose no one knew
what sort of oration to expect—a dry lawyerlike
disquisition, or a burst of Celtic declamation. No
one was prepared for, and, therefore, everybody
listened with surprise and attention, to a man whose
quiet, self-possessed, grave, and studious mien bore
no trace of Hibernian origin ; a startling array of
facts, reasoning, ingenious, severe, and eminently
forcible, a masterly grasp of the whole subject,
felicity of illustration, variety, condensation, freshness,
the choicest diction rendered doubly expressive by a de-
livery earnest, impressive, and unaffected, procured for
his debdt an amount of favour so great that the wonder
is he should have succeeded in preserving it unimpaired
throughout the 15 years that he• sat in our House of
Commons. His exterior certainly presented nothing pre-
possessing ; his stature was short, his limbs clumsy, his
countenance a small and unfavourable specimen of the'
Scottish physiognomy, aggravated by a true " vinegar
aspeot ;" yet his Parliamentary success was not merely
remarkable —it was brilliant. The great men o
that day vied with each other in compliment-
ing their new companion ; and Mr. Canning
was bold enough to affirm that the advent of
such a man brought back the days of Burke and
Pitt, of Fox and Sheridan. As Macaulay says of Hamp.
den, " his eloquence was of the kind most esteemed in
Parliament—ready, weighty, perspicuous, condensed."
In the world of politics he rarely conceded any advan-
tage, and never spared an adversary, but in private life
he was placable, rather generous, and even kind-hearted.
Amid his domestic circle he is said to have been most
amiable.

The " Manchester Massacre," combined with a
prodigious amount of discontent throughout the
country, rendered Lord Liverpool's Government very
sensible of the value of such an auxiliary as Mr.
Plunket. Upon that occasion he defended their
policy, or at least extenuated their errors ; and,
when the proper opportunity arrived, they seemed
by no means unwilling to manifest their grattitude.
The death, in 1822, of the second Marquis of Lon-
donderry, better known as Lord Castlereagh, led to
a variety of Ministerial changes ; and, though Lord
Liverpool continued to be Prime Minister and Lord
Eldon still held the Great Seal, yet the intense Toryism
of the Government was mitigated. Mr. Canning took
the management of the House of Commons, Mr. Hus-
kisson became President of the Board of Trade, and
several members of the Grenville party joined the Ad-
ministration, Mr. Plunket receiving the office of Atior-
ney-General for Ireland.

In the House of Commons he continued to hold a
position among the highest order of public men. Mr.
Canning more than once said, that no individual what-
ever contributed so much as Mr. Plunket had done to
the success of Roman Catholic claims. The names of
Grattan, O'Coinell, and Sidney Smith were mentioned ;
but Mr. Canning repeated his deliberate opinion
that Mr. Plunket was the most efficient labourer that
ever toiled in that cause ; for this reason—that he
gained over adversaries by persuading them that a
repeal of ' the penal laws would strengthen the estab-
lished church in Ireland. But he ceased to have a seat
in the Lower House before that great change in our
Constitution was consummated. In 1827 the state of
Lord Liverpool's health rendered his retirement indis-
pensable, and Ed. Plunket being then in the 63d year of
his age, and having been five years' in the office of At -
torney-General, thought he had a fair claim to a seat on
the bench. Mr. Canning, at that time Prime Minister,
did not like to lose his services, in the House of Com-
mons, and proposed to appoint him Master of the Rolls
in England. This plan, however, was, after a little
'consultation, abandoned, and Mr. Plunket was, in
the month of June, 1827, raised to the peerage of
the United Kingdom by the title of Baron Plunket,
being at the same appointed Chief Justice of the
Common Pleas in Ireland ; and in that important
office he continued till the close of the Wellington Ad-
miuistration, a period of somewhat more than three
years. While Lord Plunket presidedin the Common Pleas
namely, from June, 1827, till November, 1830, his
judicial career, though attended with much success, was
not marked by any very extraordinary events. Not so,
however, his position as a member of the Upper House.
No one can forget that the great feature of the Welling-
ton Ministry was the Roman Catholic Relief Bill. While
that measure was under discussion in the House of
Lords, the Duke invited Lord Plunket to sit with him
on the Treasury Bench, to advise him step by step—as
the phrase is, "to take charge of the bill," and see it
fairly through the house. The measure called "Emanci-
pation" having been carried, the labours of Lord Plunket
as a legislator reached their close. Occasionally he made a
few remarks in Parliament, but he scarcely ever again de-
livered a speech or earnestly engaged in any discussion.
With the exception of five months, between November,
1834, and April, 1835, the Whigs remained in possession
of the Cabinet, and Lord Plunket was their Irish Chan-
cellor, till a short time before their withdrawal from
office, when he reluctantly resigned, and was succeeded
by Lord Campbell.
Durinegamtheeovlasert
toW tiogndMoiist
nn;ry Lord
but
hewasPlfuunllk6et 6 occa-
sionallyyears
of age before he took his seat on the bench of the Court
of Chancery in Ireland, and it may fairly be considered
that at that advanced period of his life he was entitled
to withdraw from Parliamentary labours. His public
life may be considered as terminating in 1841 ; still, for
some years after its close, he continued to visit his friends
and to diffuse the charms of his conversation. At length
he became oppressed with the weight of human infirmity,
yet even in that night of life were oocasionally seen
many bright gleams of his once clear and powerful in•
tellect.

VIENNA.--Letters from Vienna, received by a Lon-
don firm, announce that a reduction in the Austrian
duties, both on pig and railway iron, was to take effect
from the Ist inst. The reduction in pig iron is to the
extent of 10s. per ton—that is to say, from the existing
rate of about 255. to 15s. ; while on rails it is to be 2/.
per ton, or from about 71. to 51. These alterations are
likely to be sufficient to lead to a steady importation of
pig iron, and probably also of rails.
CONTINENTAL ADVICES.—The general continental
advices continue uninteresting. At Paris, especially,
great dulness prevails. The letters from Namburg are
to the 30th ult., when money was abundant at 4i per
cent., and the rate of exchange tending favourably for
this country. From St. Petersburgh the exchange is
slightly less favourable, the quotation being 390.
AllSTRALlA.—Australian advices have been received
yesterday via Panama, nearly a fortnight later than
those by the last arrival, and thus furnishing another
demonstration as to the true route for speed. They are
dated Sydney, the Ist of October, and give a favourable
description of the general tone of the market for imported
goods. The receipts from the various mines during the
preceding week had been large, and the number of per-
sons engaged at them was increasing. A new act for
the regulation of the goldfields was to come into opersp
tion on the day of the vessel sailing. It reduces the
license fee to 10s. per month, and the royalty upon veins
on Crown lands to 3 per cent., while it also abolishes
all extra charge in the case of foreigners. Among the
bills just passed in the Legislative Council was one for
incorporating the Hunter River Railway
C Company, and
another for the Australian Coal Mining ompany. The
and the Helen Baird,
price of gold was 775. 6d. to 785.,
which had sailed for
London which th 30th of September,
had taken 13,879 ouncea (of 10,267 are for the
Walter
days, was also to
Union Bank of Australia), while the clipper ship
Ainmaonfgewthe questions under
hood,ar
ry a we
ohni es
ihd
era
bulcel
sduemp r t
discussion, consequent upon the warlike appearance of
affairs in England, the necessity for fortifying Sydney
place.
occupied a

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