The Sun.
London, England, 1825-09-23 00:00:00

MISCELLANEOUS.

THE COMET.—This luminary is now passing
through the south-eastern part of the Constellation Taurus, and
forms an equilateral triangle with Aldebaran and the Pleiades,
the comet being situate in the south-eastern angle. The tail,
or rather brush, points towards the south-west, and when the
Light is favourable, appears from two to three degrees in
length. The nucleus emits a light about equal to a star of the
third magnitude, and has travelled through rather more than
cne degree or two of the moon's diameters, during the last
4fl hours.

THE GIGANTIC SHIP.—The great timber ship,
The Baron of Renfrew, Captain WALKER, sailed down the
River St. Lawrence on the 28th of August. She is larger than
the large ship of last year by 1,000 tons ; the following is her
immense cargo :=2,014 pieces pine,. 335 do. oak, 14 do. elm,
23 do. hickory, 4 do;• basswood, 3 do. butternut, 1 do. birch,
13 do. beach, 15 do. maple, 1 do. ash, 34,852 trenails, 5,148
staves, 8,175 deals, 4,6112 deal ends, 23,098 pieces of lathwood,
5;223 plank, 7:1,765 West India staves, 11 knees• by Gillespie and Co., 25,616 pieces deal by G. Hamilton, 92 pieces oak, 4 do. ash, 1 do. elm, 1,193 do. pine, 84 'masts and bowsprits,
337 spars, 4,788 ash oars, 19,511 staves and headings by H.
Atkinson.

THE WIDOW OF.TIIE• 1301-iT BtTßNS.—Extract
of a -private letter from Dumfries :.--." This is the town in -
which the Poet (1-11rRNs) spent the latt,r years of his life ;
and his arniathTh Widow? still occupies the small- but neat house
in which he breathed his last: She appears in comfortable
circumstances, and is treated with mitch attention and respect
by all classes of people in the place. Shc is very acces-,
sible, and few strangers visit numfries -.jthout paying their'
respect to • the relict of the bard 'of • Scotia. Mrs. -.Boma,
speaks of her great husband with the
:utmost affectionand re-
spect, but she does not assume any airs of vanity or conceit
on account of her connection with a man whom nations
conspired to honour; and I tun told,, that with her -old- AC_
quaintances,_ she carries herself as meekly and as familiarly
as when she and her husband and their children were tv ruggling
to maintain themselves upon -the paltry stipend 'of an Excise-
man. His remains lie in - the grave-yard of Saint-Michael's
Church, in Dumfries. There was a mausoleum erected over
them about ten years ago, which is said to hare cost n, ,::'.y
2,0001. It is shown to strangers for money; and as few
strangers go to Dumfries without visiting it, some One must be
deriving a pretty handsome income from the show. lifflrgot to
say that Mrs. Burns has now living with her' the motherless
daughter of' her youngest - son James, who• is resident' it, -the
East Indies. This child is about three years of -age, and has
lately left India. She is a peculiarly beautiful and interesting.
little creature. Her sister, who was to years
:older, died
upon the passage." -

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a
RIOT AT THE CALTON GAOL—A ecrtsttherable
alarm was excited yesterday, in consequence of the sudden
movement of a party of the 17th regiment,, to quell a dis-
turbance among the prisoners in the Calton 'gaol. Various
rumours having'gone abroad, we have been at considerable
pains to ascertain the true state of the case; and, althougiv
an examination is still going on, our readers and the public
may rest assured that the following is the actual eccUrrence :
Some of the convicts, by great ingenuity, contrived to break
into the cell of, and rob, a poor man, who has been long an in-
mate of the prison. A search was resisted on the part of the
convicts, and the debtors were called to assist the officers of justice.
This was considered a great breach ofdecorurn, and a violeht at
was commenced upon the debtors. A recent delivery
.of coals
giwe the assailants the command of a large supply of missiles,
which they hurled At the debtors and turnkeys, who were moon
discomfihed, with a few slight bruise's. The convictiq'n:lcta
infuriated, proceeded to demolish some of the gates, to
enable them to get together in greater force; and, as the
thing was so sudden, the military were,
with' great •piri:
priety called in, when the convicts immediately. submit-
ted, and were all strongly ironed, and shut up in their
Most of the stolen articles have been recovered ; but there was•
not the slightest intention to break prison, thoug such a report
was current all over the town. Captain Young, the Governer
of the gaol, returned yesterday morning, at five o'clock, from
Leadburn, on the Peebles road, where he had apprehended two
of the convicts who escaped some weeks agO.—(Edifiburgh
Of
server, Sept. 20.)

Flying descents from a great height, by means
of a rope, as lately performed at Dover by. Mr.
COURTENAY, are not unprecedented. Many years
since an adventurer slid 'down froM one of the
openings in the- steeple in St. Martin's Church
in that manner, supported by iron rings passed
round him and the rope, and descended in. the
King's Mews.