The Sun.
London, England, 1847-01-18 00:00:00

station in Glasgow. The lemr,th was one mile and a
half, and the estimated cost 350,000/.
The formal proofs were found to he defective, inas-
much as one of the notices had not been served within
the time specified by the standing orders.
Mr. GRAHAME opposed the petition, on behalf of the
Caledonian Railway Company, and succeeded in sus-
taining one or two allegations as to inaccuracies in the
plans and sections.
GLASGOW, PAISLEY, KILMARNOCK, AND

SPORTING INThLLIGEN(;E.
BATH STEEPLE CHASES.—FRIDAY.
Sweepstakes of 10 sovs. each, and 50 added. Four miles.
Mr J. Barrow's Carlow
NIT.. 11.Iorgan's Compton ...
Mr. Bennett's Mr. Simmonds 3
11r. Price nd Tavistock
Several others ran. Won easy by three lengths.
The second race was won by Mr. Oakey's Emperor.
The Burton Constable Steeple Chase, on Friday, for
was won by Mr. G. Wray's grey horse, aged (Mr. John
Lamplugh), beating three others easily.
MANCHESTER.—FRIDAY.

LITERAT UH

THE EDINBURGH REVIEIV. CLXXI.
One of those admirable biographical articles for which
the blue-and-buff Review has been remarkable since its
commencement, is prefixed to the seven other articles in
the present quarter. The subject has been suggested
by the recent publication, edited by Mr. John Hill
Burton, viz., a copious biography of David Hume.
As a composition the paper is singularly difficient: it
has none of the graces of style, and none of the orato-
rical enthusiasm, which would have characterised a
contribution upon the same theme from the pen of
Lord Jeffrey : it is altogether devoid of that epigra-
matic tartness and brilliant illustration, which would
have been found in one written by the late witty
Canon of St. Paul's Cathedral, Sydney Smith : it
has neither the graceful style of Walter Scott,
nor the splendid enamel of Macaulay. Never-
theless, the article is valuable, readable, and
judicious. Since the decease of the great his-
torian of England, but little, comparatively, has
been known by the multitude respecting his
domestic career, and his familiar character.
Whatever circumstances or peculiarities in his per-
sonal history had reached the ear of the public, had
only come to us incidentally. As his contemporaries
—the more illustrious of them—followed him to that
ferry-boat of old Charon, which he himself in a de-
plorable fit of levity, joked about on his death-bed,
stray anecdotes and casual incidents relating to David
crept out piecemeal in their memoirs and autobio-
graphies. Otherwise nothing was printed which
could elucidate his disposition and his habits, until
the letters and manuscripts left by Hume to
the care of his nephew, Baron Hume, with a tes •
tamentary injunction as to their publication,
(an injunction rejected .by Adam Smith,) were
consigned to the Royal Society of Edinburgh on the
decease of the Baron, were ultimately resigned into
the editorial hands of Mr. Burton, and were finally in
1846 given to the world in two goodly and interesting
volumes. Before then, the generality of the English
public had only picked up a few intermitently recog-
nised traits in regard to the historian of the country.
Everyone knew that Hume was (ethically) rather
more than slightly deistical. Everyone knew that he
had dabbled in metaphysics, and had tried to establish
a system of philosophy, and had failed. Everyone
knew that Hume had a natural ' affection for
frugality, and an occasional passion for vo-
luptuousness. Everyone knew that Hume was
a fat man—a decidedly fat man ; more than
corpulent in his middle age, and towards the
close of his life rapidly approximating to obesity.
Everyone knew that he absolutely abhorred Eng-
land, that he contemned " the barbarians living on
the banks of the Thames," that he had contracted an
incongruous friendship, and afterwards picked an
anomalous quarrel, with Jean Jacques Rousseau ;
that he rejoiced in the luxurious society of Paris;
that he could at last thoroughly enjoy the fabrications
of the cuisine; that his physiognomy was lumpish
and unmeaning; and (be it said with tenderness and
reverence) that he had wept passionately on hearing
of the death of his mother. We had grouped together
the hieroglyphs, but we wanted the key to them.
We were aware of the principal actions and events of
his bodily life, but we wanted the narrative
of his mental alternations ; we wanted admittance into
the secret chambers of his heart ; we a anted to plomb
the depths of his infidelity, and to form some ade-
quate conception of his extraordinary intellect.
These desiderata could be best obtained through the
medium of his private correspondence, and the multi-
tude of hitherto unrevealed facts treasured up among
his private manuscripts. Through the intelligent
agency of Mr. Burton, under the sanction of the
Royal Society of Edinburgh, most of these mysteries
are now explained, many of the most intricate por-
tions of the labyrinth are threaded. "The Life and
Correspondence of David Hume " reposes in
authentic " leather" on a thousand bookshelves in
the kingdom, and that Life and that Correspondence
are condensed into the compass of some seventy pages
in the January quarter of the _Edinburgh Review.
From the period of his birth, at Edinburgh, in 1711,
to his demise in the same capital, on the 25th of
August, 1776, the career of David Hume is tracked
with sagacity and discrimination. After his matri-
eulating, in 1723, at the University of Edinburgh,
we are introduced to him when the victim of the
most morbid and hypocondriacal phantasies.. For the
law he is destined—reads the rudimentary chapters of
Voet and Vinnius—and imbibes a thorough and iner-
radicable detestation of the profession. In his twenty-
first year, namely, in 1731, we find him selling
gloves and bombazeen from behind the counter of an
extensive tradesman in Bristol. A fierce disgust
seizes him at his occupation, and before the expiration
of the twelvemonth, he is off ti France, and domesti-
cated at La Fleche. By 1737 he has returned to
London with his " Treatise on Human Nature" com-
pleted, and in 1739 the same treatise is issued through
the press—an abortion. Thereupon David Hume is
dejected, and seeks consolation in the family circle at
Ninewells. Before 1741 has expired there appears
in Edinburgh a little volume from him, entitled
"Moral and Political Essays," a volume which
ultimately accumulates in bulk and worth
into the shape of his renowned " Essays, Moral,
Literary, and Political." ~,Subsequently he produced his
" Dialogues on Natural -Religion," and in the courie
of 1745, he is degenerated into "tbe company-keeper
of a literary lunatic," Lord Annandale, living near St.
Albans. Then comes the ridiculous expedition in
Britanny, carrying off the Scotch scribe in the retinue
of General Sinclair, in the capacity of secretary and
Judge Advocate. Saving that this adventure en-
abled him to obtain some more extended experience of
the world than he could have gleaned by dozing in
his elbow-chair, it was the waste of the invaluable
time of Hume. After an absence of two or three
years he returns homewards, one thousand pounds in
pocket, and settles down, in something like domes-
ticity He is there
and comfort, at Edinburgh.
soon afterwards elected Librarian of the Faculty
of Advocates, which places an enviable assort-
ment of books at his command. In 1752 he
commences his History of England, beginning with
the Stuarts, and so going back towards the Conquest,
till its completion in 1762. During the intervals of
its composition he comes to London, namely
in 17
1758,
and resides there somewhere about a ysle-
street, Leicester-fields. By the publication of his im-
mortal work, David Hume had now won for himself
laurels upon which he could repose (and not inglo-
riously) during the remainder of his days. He visits
Paris in the full blaze of his celebrity ;_ returns to
England, and lives in London two years, dating from
the middle of 1766 to the middle of 1768, and settles
finally in the autumn of the latter year at Edioundnburgh
with a respectable income of twelve hundred ps pheer
annum. An amusing description is given by t
of
reviewer of the literary despotism exercised in
,s
Lon-
don by Doctor Johnson, at the periodlme
arrival in the metropolis. " Considering,.l- Johnson's
occasional brutality," says he, „ it wouldnot have
been safe for him and Hume to have met
in
the great
And as a superb illustration of the sway, ofb
privat.
taking
lexicographer. he observes, "it was I
advantage of Johnson's being awaY,
thSamith into the
friends contrived to smuggle Adam
Hume ontTlalfy-a-dozen
to Eng-
club." The laughable antipathy of 11
land and the English people, is
111 uestionably the
•el his character.
weakest of the many weak points in it
It tainted his whole nature like gangre.ne ;
'a. During his
flawed his intellect like mono
sojourn in the French capital,
inhabitants he was
mshaenihistorian was not
merely " a passion," with its
downte writer is not ado-
a God, before whom they bowedration ; and we conceive the
far from the truth, where he suspects that the incense
erous acts of extrava-
offered to him for a time intoxicated his masculine and
robust nature. Among the nuwas
that of the presen-
gant homage paid to Hume,
princes (sons of the Dauphin),
tation of the three little.
eight, and six. These poor
aged rispectivelysetnir,
p to deliver prepared harangues
children were
on' his Philosophy and History."
to David Hume,
and spectators of that buries-
those infantine panegyrists
Little did the enactors
que scene anticipate
were the germs of three
of the English historian,were
to be rendered memorable by
that
sovereigns, who
misfortunes—Louis XVI L • XV
Louis 111 and
their
imagine to
Charles X. We can ima ourselves the
of
grotesque figure
alt n Mio ns ieur Hume, enaged
n a pant •
a om• imic tableag
ux at
S
in the role of a the Scotch author making
Paris : we can itnagi.ne
fictitious love to his imaginary captives, seated upon
a sofa, between two of the prettiest women in France,
thumping his legs. an,cl s,tobti.iac;, and spluttering out
over and over again
b bl.en., ?nes demoiselles. Eh
Lien! vous voila done; e zen. vous voila, ,ioilS. ?Vila
iCi 1" until he is tumbled out of the reom "disgrace-
fully" as incorrigible. We can readily imagine that
preposterous exhibition, now that it
has been so vividly
revived to our recollection by the reviewer. There is
a very noble image introduced into this article by way
of illustration to the meanness of Hume's haughty
infidelity in matters ethical. It is comprised
in three brief sentences, and is this :—" He would
have been happier, we think, if the severity of
his code of morn's had been a little raised—and
o a her
if he had lifted himself up by looking t
nature ! There was of old legendary figure
Christ, which was said to have a power gure
growth in
it, so as to be always taller than the tallest man.
The companion to this figure, and also converse to it,
would be the man, who, erect in himself cnoble
yet, from looking upwards, becomes noblerant,,,
We have commented so largely opennth.s .
biographi-
cal paper, that we have left ourselves little space
for the enumeration of the subsequent articles.
A contribution larded with anecdotes, and brimming
over with antiquarian gossip about
Paris, follows. Talking about the the streets of
Place Royale, the
writer has availed himself of the opportunity to sketch
the character of Cardinal Richelieu
touches—so brilliant and so truthful withal, that we
transcribe the passage entire :
" Cardinal Richelieu, take him for i
all
n all, was per-
haps the ablest, if not the greatest of Frenchmen (for

AYR (No. 4.)
This was a similar petition to the last. It was opposed
by the Caledonian Company, and a few unimportant
allegations were sustained.
The inquiry was adjourned till Monday (this day).

Not a bet made to-day.
HUNTING APPOINTMENTS.
Her Majesty's staghds meet the first day after the frost,
at the Golden Ball, Bracknell—at 11.
Sir C. Constable's hds. meet Wed., at West Newton-111;.
Baron Rothschild's staghds., Thurs., Littlecote--11.
Surey staghds, Tues., Trentham Bottom ; Sat., Warling-
ham.
Bedale lids., Wed., Wood End; Fri., Kiplin-10112.
Cambridgeshire hds.; Fri., Barrington-101.
Cleveland hds., Thurs., Sunny Cross-101.
Durham County hds., Wed., Stoney Gate; Fri., Esh-101.
Mr. Drake's hds., Tues., Bourton Village; Thins., Men-
marsh Guide Post; Sat., Marston St. Lawrence-101.
F. B. lids., Wed., Bonython-101.
Haydon lids., Wed., Haydon Plantation ; Sat., Kennel
Mr S. Lowndes's lids., Sat., Nash Common-11.
Oakley hds., Thurs., Cranfield ; Sat., Hail Weston Wood
to 11.
Rabe hds., Wed., Tudhoe Villa; Fri, Walkerfield-10%.
Sinnington hds., Tues., Catter Bridge; Fri., Helmesley.
Sir Henry Seale's lids., Wed., Kennel; Sat., Holne Cot:
Tindale lids.. Thurs., Nafferton-101/0.
Mr. Watson's lids., Fri., Netherwitton-10%.
York and Ainsty hds., Tues., Strensall ; Thurs., Ferensty ;
eat., Brandsby Bar.
Mr. Fane's hrrs., Thurs., Warpsgrove Lane; Sat., Eme-
line.
Al brighton lids., Thurs., Chillington ; Sat., Warf Gate-10.
Herefordshire hds., Thurs., Rackhall Wood ; Sat., Cornet's
Bridge— 10 %.
Craven hrrs., Tues , Eshton Farm ; Fri., Marton East-11.
Mr. Hildvard's hrrs., Tues., Acklam Blue Bell ; Fri.,
Trenholnie Bar-101/.z.
Cottesmore lids., Tues., Loddington Hall ; Wed., Bull,
Witham Common; Fri., Norington Village; Sat., Thistlet;.n
—ll
Lord Southampton's lids., Wed., Stoke Plain; Fri., Astwell
Mill; Sat., Biddlesden Park—ll.

York
•Egham
Derby
*Hereford ....

NOVE'

THE SUN. LONDON, MON DAY MORkING, JANUARY lB, 1847.

Napoleon, it must be recollected, was not a Frenchman
by birth) ; and he was the most essentially French.
Capable of the, greatest schemes of statesmaike ambi-
tion, the smallest personal interest or personal pique lay
ever more closely at his heart. Even while planning his
vast combinations of foreign and domestic policy, the
bulk of his time and thoughts seem to have been cccu-
pied with cares of the most trifling description : with
amorous and literary enterprises, having nothing but the
gratification of vanity for their object : with elaborate
devices of mystification and buffoonery, childish rivalries,
womanish intrigues, and the tricks of a malicious monkey.
He had none of the sympathies, few of the prejudices,
of his age. Neither sacred things, nor consecrated im •
postures, had any empire over him. King, Pope, and
Parliament were to him mere names, representing pieces
in the game of politics. Yet the same man was the slave
of the paltriest impulses, when his conceitlor egotism was
piqued. If we read of him one day as guiding the sword
of Gustavus, of stemming the Romish re-action, founding
the short-lived absolute monarchy of France ; the next
day he figures on a level with poor Dr. Goldsmith, when
he wanted to exhibit his agility in jumping over a stick
against a showmen's puppet. This is no idle compari-
son. Brienne has recorded how Mary of Medicis, making
sport of her clerical lover, then Bishop of Lucon, per
suaded him, by adroit reflections on his skill, to execute
:1 new saraband in her royal boudoir, with castanets in
his: bands, and in the costume of an Andalusian majo—
amidst the suppressed convulsion of laug, ter of certain
spectators posted behind the arras—laughter which
Richelieu, when he discovered the trick, never orgot cr
forgave to his dying day. On the one hand, Father Jo-
seph, the masked politician, the secret councillor of all
the deepest plans of Richelieu's ambition ; on the other,
Bois Robert, the unfrocked athiest and buffoon—these
are the contrasted figures with which that of Richelieu
seems inseparably connected. On the whole, great as he
was, there is something fundamentally odious in his
character, which makes him one of the most uninterest-
ing great men of history. Like Voltaire, whom he so
strikingly resembled in many points of character, he was
spiteful. hard-hearted, and cruel. He hated the Queen,
who had rejected his impudent suit. He hated all whom
she favoured. His political victims were not many, but
they were hunted out with peculiarly cold and careful
cruelty. He could be generous towards those who had
committed offences against him; there is a striking story
told by Tenement des Riaux, who may be believed when
he speaks well of any one, of his conduct to a thievish
secretary; but he could not forgive an insult, a jeer, or
the slightest mortification to his vanity, or oppositisn to
hi. projects. His death was felt by France like the re-
lief from a nightmare—from the king to the lowest
rhymester of the rude', 01 joined in the burden of the
couplets which proclaimed it--
II
est parti, it a plio bagage,
Ce Cardinal 1'
But it is remarkable that a man so hateful, so destitute
of all faith and all loftiness of purpose, should have left
such durable impressions on the world. Scarcely does
Paris itself, which is full of his relics— the Palais Royal,
the library, the street which bears his name—speak more
plainly of Richelieu than that fabric of modern European
policy, of which he has, scarely with exaggeration,
been termed the founder."

That (brio was erected in the ruins of aristocratic
feudalism ; and, in return, upon the ruins of that
fabric was erected the yet more modern system of
European policy. A. clever argument in favour of
the transference of the moneys collected by the local
taxation of the kingdom (amounting annually to some-
where about 11,000,000/. sterling) into the hands of
Government, is contained in the next contribution.
The writer conceives that by this transference
of the administrative power from a number
of scattered and conflicting municipalities to the
one united power by which the whole destinies
of the empire are protected, a very considerable
economy would be the consequence. In this there is
something beyond mere plausibility, but the matter
is one involving so many interests, and is one, more-
over, in which the body of the citizens of this empire
are so deeply interested, that it requires the most
elaborate scrutiny before a single step be taken one
way or the other. There is much reason in the ad-
vocacy both of the Government distribution of those
11,000,0001.. and of the local distribution of them.
As Lord Lincoln observed in his recent ad-
dress to the constituency of Manchester, there
is ample scope for both Government exertion
and individual exertion, though the Noble Lord
qualified the observation by exclaiming, " Do not sup-
pose that I should wish to see everything conducted,
as in other countries, by the effort of the Govern-
ment." The calculation of the amount of rates, tolls,
dues, and fees collected annually in England is of so
much importance to the consideration of the question
at issue, that we transfer it to our columns :
" Relief of poor (1845) ... ... £5,039,703
Miscellaneous purposes defrayed out of

poor's rate ... ... ...
County and borough rate (1845) ...
Highway rate ... ... ...
Church rate ... ... ... ...

... 537,737
... 1,279,962
... 1,312,812
... 506,812
... 82,097
... unknown
... unknown

Sewers' rate (metropolis) ...
Rest of country
Lighting and watching rate

Total of rates in England, £8,759,123
... £1,348,084
... 378,011
... 257,776
. 554.645
68,725
unknown

Turnpike tolls
Borough tolls ...
Light dues ... ...
Port dues ...
Justiciary fees
Other miscellaneous fees

Total of tolls, &0., in England, X 2.607,941
Adding these two classes of local taxes together, we
obtain the following result :
Rates .
Tolls, dues, and fees

... £8,759,123
... 2,607,241

Total local taxes in England, £11,366,364

Upon " Bancroft's History of the United States,"
and "Bunsen on the Basilicas of Rome," there are
two admirable articles to which we could willingly de-
vote more than a cursory allusion. "Thornton on Over-
population" is a sensible review upon a matter of the
highest interest, both in regard to nationality and hu-
manity. The essay devoted to the consideration of the
"Genius and Writings of Pascal," is a splendid panegyric
upon a man with a sublime nobility of heart and a
supreme loftiness of intellect. Blaise Pascal is one
of those " bright particular stars " which appear not
once in a generation, but one in a century of gene-
rations. The article is eloquent and learned. With
a disquisition upon that very comprehensive system
called " Centralization,"—a subject suggested by the
recent works of M. de Carmenin (Timon), M. Vivien,
Charles Dunoyer, and Samuel Laing—the Edin-
and completed excellently.
ltrgh Review for the first quarter of 1847 is com-
pleted,

FAMINE IN IRELAND—DEPARTURE OF A STEAMER
LADEN WITH FOOD.—On Saturday morning, at au early
hour, the powerful Government steamer Dragon, en-
gaged by the " British Association for the Relief of the
Digressed Poor in Ireland," sailed from Deptford for
the Irish coast, having on board a cargo of several hun-
dred tons weight of articles of food, clothing, flannelt
blankets, &c., for distribution in the most distressed dis-
tricts. This is the first vessel dispatched by the asso-
ciation, but others will follow in succession as speedily
as practicable.
GAME PRESERVING.—On some occasions of late
there have been more than 50 night watchers employed to
protect the game on the preserves of the Duke of Buching-
ham at and around Wotton.
Ibrahim Pacha was so highly gratified at the re-
ception given to him by the late Lord Mayor, Alderman
Johnson, that he transmitted a cheque for 5001. to his
Lordship, with the request that the distribution of that
sum might be made amongst the poor citizens when any
emergency should take place. The time has arrived
when effect can be given to the kindly disposition of the
Pacha, greatly to the relief of the numerous ind'unt
families in the city of London; which, with all its means
of administering relief, participates severely in the gene-
ral distress ; and we trust and believe that Alderman
Johnson will exercise his usual judgment iu superin•
tending the distribution.

At the meeting of the Royal Humane Society, on
Tuesday, a silver medal was unanimously voted to Com-
mander J. W. Finch (then Lieutenant of the Victory), for
saving the life of a seaman by jumping overboard through a
port-hole after him, from the Naiad, in July last, during
very rough weather. This is the second occasion of Com-
mander Finch receiving a testimonial from the same society
—the former was for saving lives during a storm. from a
wreck.

THE CHAIRMANSHIP OF THE EASTERN COUNTIES
RAILWAY COMPANY.—There is no truth in therumour which
has prevailed in the City during the last few days, to the
effect that Mr. Hudson,had ceased to be the Chair-
man of the Eastern Counties M.P.,ailway Company.
THE HYDROPATHIC SYSTEM.—Friday, at twelve
o'clock, an inquiry, which was crucmhencoefd I,nanWednesday
before Mr. Higgs, coroner for the
resumed at the Crown and Three Horse? ;hoes, Enfielitie(l.:lwasase,
on view of the body of Martha Hobbs, aged 20, whose death
was alleged to have been the effect of the hydropathic treat-
ment. Dr. Lovell, who had attended deceased as herme-
dical adviser, and who is a practitioner of the hydropathic
system, was present, with a solicitor to watch the proceed-
ings, and the inquest-room was crowded. Eliza Ronsell, ser-
vant to Mr. Swanwick, boarding-house-keeper. Chase Side,
Enfield, said that the.deceased was in the same service up
to Monday week. She had not been in good health since
September. She was able to go about her work till last
Thursday fortnight; when she complained that she had a
cold. On Monday she was in a state of delirium. On the
following day she was worse. The next day she was re-
moved to her aunt's, Mrs. Betts, Chase Side. Erysipelas
made its appearance in her face and the side of her head.
Deceased had an aversion to medicine, and stated that she
would not have medical treatment any more. This witness,
and some others who were examined, then described the
succession of baths which the deceased had been treated
with, and stated that she had shown symptoms of erysipelas
in her head. Mr. T. Ashberry, surgeon, Enfield, and medi-
cal officer of the union, stated that by direction of the
coroner be made a post mortem examination of the body of
the deceased, which be did in conjunction with Mr. Taylor
and Mr. Tate. The immediate cause of death was the recent
inflammation of the pericardium, the erachnoid membrane,
and the pia mater, together with congestion of the brain,
brought on by the transfer of a chronic constitutional disease
of the skin to the internal membranes and organs, ending in
acute disease and death. The transfer was facilitated by the
continual application of cold. By a jiiror—l saw no appear-
ance of the existence of erysipelas. Dr. Lovell defended his
'mode of treatment, observing that it existed from the time of
the creation, and had been carried into practice by many
eminent men. The Coroner said it depended on the consti-
tution of the patient as to the propriety of the treatment.
The jury, after above two hours' consultation, returned a
verdict of " Manslaughter against Dr. Luvell, as principal,
and Aune Betts, as accessory." The inquiry lasted seven
hours.

COTTON IN