The Sun.
London, England, 1841-10-09 00:00:00

MISCELLANEOUS.

Yesterday in 1817, died the Hon. Henry Erskine, ono
of the greatest ornaments of the Scottish bar. His
brother at the same time led the English bar, and was
Lord Chancellor of Great Britain, when he was Lord
Advocate of Scotland,

The Thames Tunnel is rapidly advancing to comple-
tion, the sub-marine cutting having been finished some
months.

Since the opening of the Brighton railway, several fu-
nerals, per railway, have taken place, the bodies being
placed in hearses on the line, and the mourners accom-
panying it in the railway carriages.
Knives were first made in England in the year 1563.
In a late speech at the Dublin Repeal Association,
Mr. O'Connell said, " I have not unfrequently been in
France; and there is a certain excellent practice there
among families, of having, on particular days, what they,
call la grande lavesse—that is to say, a great wash-
ing."—The Tories are sadly in want of a washing of
this sort, for some of their hands are anything but clean.
It would be as useless, however, to attempt to purify
Sir James Graham by any process of ablution, as it would
be to wash a blackamoor white. The taint of apostacy
is not to be washed out, any more than the red spot on
Lady Macbeth's hand.
It is evident from the short period that the present
House of Commons has sat, that Ministers think it will
do the country no harm to put it on short commons.
A Worcester paper says that " a man has been
missing for some weeks at Newent."—There are many
Tory consciences in the same predicament.
Mr. Swizz, the celebrated tailor, has contributed a
handsome sum for the yearly support of thirty-three
decayed tailors.—This is not so generous a bequest as
may be supposed ; for if you divide thirty-three by
nine—the number of tailors which it takes to make a
man—then Mr. Stultz will only have provided for three
men and a fraction ! _ _ _

It is calculated that the whole of the line on the
Eastern Counties Railway will be opened to Colchester
about a year hence. The works are proceeding contem-
poraneously from Brentwood, the present terminus, to
Chelmsford, and the cuttings from thence to Colchester
are in forward progress.
The Brighton Railway was again obstructed for some
time on Thursday, in consequence of a fall of earth at the
south entrance of the Patcham Tunnel, about four miles

from Brighton. It was fortunately observed in time, and
no accident occurred. Professor Barlow has beer. sent
down by the Government to inquire into the cause of the
late fatal'accident.

PROROGATION OE PARLIAMENT.—A numerous meet-
ing was held last night at the King's Arms, Philip-lane,
Wood-street, to take into consideration the Queen's
Speech on the prorogation of Parliament, when, after a
long and very able discussion, it was decided by an over-
whelming majority, that "in consequence of the Par-
liament proroiring before the Speech which the Queen
addressed to them on the opening had been taken into
consideration, the present Speech was deserving of the
public censure.
Tonvism AND CIVIL WAR.—The fresh rising in
Spain—the new commotions which are beginning in that
country, are coeval with the accession of the Tories to
office. That has inspired the lovers of disorder, the
friends of Don Carlos, the protegees of Louis Phillipe,
with renewed audacity. They reckon on the indifference
or the supineness of England under the Tories, and they
renew their attempts to disturb the peace and obtain pos-
session of the Government of their country.
COMMISSIONERSHIP OF GREENWICH HOSPITAL.—Mr.
Hope, the Member for Linlithgowshire, has vacated his
seat, in consequence of having accepted the appointment
of Commissioner of Greenwich Hospital. What has
created a vacancy ? We have heard that the Tories
asked Mr. Bannerman to resign, and that he refused.
Have they ejected him ? They are quite capable, we
believe, of trying to eject him; but till we are better in-
formed, we shall doubt whether they have succeeded.
They have probably created a place for their friend.

We quote from the Chronicle the following allu-
sion to her Majesty's Speech :—" Here, in this do-
cument, which would be ludicrously-laughable, were it
not shamelessly indecent, we have announced—what ?
A great change in our commercial policy ? A great
prospect for national industry ? A great relief to suffer-
ins,. millions ? No ! a change of Ministry ; and this
change is—completed ! Positively, if men were not fa-
miliar with what has transpired during the recent short
and shabby Session of Parliament, such an announce-
ment, constituting the very `head and front' of the
Speech; were enough to knock them down. A Parlia-
ment assembled, with the cries of suffering thousands
ringing in its ears, and recommended, in a Royal Speech,
to enter on the best and most effectual remedy for these
sufferings, is dismissed with the announcement that there
has been a change of Ministry, and that the change is—
completed ! A completer and a more heartless insult was
never flung in the face of a people calling themselves
free I" The most sagacious remark we have been able to
discover in the Royal Speech, is the statement that the
" arrangements for the formation of a new Ministry
have been completed." Yet there is nothing brilliant or
original here, though we demur not to its accuracy. It
is really a fact that the new Ministry is completed ; but
who did not know this already ; and knowing it, who
required to be told it a second time, in the very first
paragraph of a Royal Speech ? With quite as much
propriety might Ministers have told us that Queen Anne
was dead !—When we compare the amount of matter
contained in thelWhig Speech which opened the Session,
with that contained in the Tory one which closed it, we
are forcibly reminded of Falstaff's famous tavern-bill.
The Whig Speech is his " ten shillings worth of sack";
the Tory Speech is his " halfpenny worth of bread."
The one is bold and full ; the other, sneaking and empty,
The Times, like the Post, is exceedingly modest and
moderate in its praises of the 'loyal Speech, observing :
—" The first Session of the new Parliament has been
brought to a close, and, although the Royal address de-
livered on that occasion partakes of a brevity commen-
surate with the shortness of the Session, and with the
necessary disability of the newly installed Government
to expatiate upon affairs which they have not had suffi-
cient time to pronouncCupon, it at least declares her
Majesty's perfect harmony with. that Government,
as well as their own steady determination to pro-
ceed in a deliberate and rational manner in devising
their plans for the general welfare of the country."—
The Times, it will be observed, contents itself in the
above passage with simply alluding to' the " brevity" of
the Royal Speech. It is brief enough certainly; and if
—as the old adage says—" brevity is the soul of wit," it
ought to be remarkable for its brilliancy ; but, alas, it is
an exception to the general rule; for anything duller or
more stupid was never yet spoken, even by a Peter
Borthwick—which is saying a great deal for it.
The following is from the Advertiser :—" Parliament
is prorogued, and the Royal Speech by which the act
was accomplished, read yesterday by the Lord Chancel-
lor, surpasses any similar document yet on record in the
utter inanity of its expression. It may be summed -up in
the announcetnents that her Majesty deems it advisable
to close the Session of Parliament—that she thanks the
Commons for the supplies—that she sympathises in the DESTRUCTIVE FIRE,
public distress, and will give her cordial concurrence
'to any measures which shall appear, after mature deli- On Thursday night, a few minutes past eleven o'clock, an
beration," best calculated to prevent its recurrence-- alarming and destructive fire was discovered by police
which are all very fair in appearance, but being more constable 136 F, on duty, passing the premises of Mr.
plainly interpreted, mean nothing more than that the Twelvetree, an extensive cow-keeper, residing in Princes-
shooting season having arrived, it is more agreeable to street, Lincoln Inn-fields. He immediately gave an
the Members of the Legislature to take to the sports of alarm, anti the fire-engines were sent for, and in less
' the field than to stop in town, deliberating in lone- and than five minutes afterwards were en the spot., and were
heartless debates, whether it be better to leave the peo- go'
pie a prey to actual starvation, or to ease their sufferings into immediate operations, followed by others in
rapid succession, but the flames .had in a few minutes
by removing, even in part, the restrictions which exclude after the outbreak gained such uncontrolled ascendancy,
them from food." that they, despite all exertions of the firemen, com-
The Dublin Pilot, alluding to Lord Shrewsbury's re- municated to an extensive pianoforte inanufactthoerye,ore-
longing to Messrs. Champion, which, fro
be-
cent pamphlet, observes :--"'That a man pretending to
discuss and condemn our Repeal agitation should know bustible materials on the premises,
extensiveburntmmopsrtemfuisreis-
ously, and communicated to the
110.
so little of us, our agitation, our clergy, or our country,
as to say that the Irish people had no grievance* to copi
plain of, that her clergy were linendraners and shawlmen, Nos. 226, 227, an
satisfied with the condi- . • • •
at the back, belonging to Messrs. Hewitt, Brdoth2e2rBs:
ton of their flocks, and knew no secret for future pro- Stone, grocer, No. 229, on
and hosier, No. 225; and Mr.ii
High Holborn, and adjng those of Mr. Adlard, hatter,
don and improvement than submission to, and confidence
conceits,but
in, Peel—argues a man besotted in his own cu • is
Mr. Adl d'-
ar S.
totally ignorant of the country." (lintel), caught fire and communicated.
the east side; the back of Mr. osyite • premises, imme-
The Nottingham Review makes the following remarks,tforrorme
nttleie
were CityCity , t andll
ro,stlli eirne
all being
Several enginesfalr‘r,aist'eerd,
an abundance u
di-
on the subject of the good understanding between the
rections, fromseventeen
Church and the present Ministry :—" Until we see the hoses were carried through the adjoining
large and powerful fire-engines;
friends and advocates of an Established Church, carrying the
tops of them, by which the firemen had great power
o
out the true principles of Christianity, we cannot accordand b • twelve o'clock they began to sue-
themr.
credit for that sincerity which is due to the hoest c subduing them and, by half-past twelve o'clock,
teed
the ie flames, y
,-and,
assertion of principles ; and while we see the people the :all further fears.
neglected, thousands famishing, and thousands willing At one period the whole range of buildings in Holborn,
to work and unable to obtain it, one has no hesitation in from Queen-street to Turnstile, were threatened with de-
saying that the present Government, if friends of the struction. The damage is very extensive, several ad-
Church, are only so for political purposes." joining houses being extensively damaged by fire and
The following is from the Sherbourne Journal :—"The i water, besides the destruction of the buildings in the cow-
people are justly served ; they have returned a large ma- yard, pianoforte-manufactory, and the entire backs of the
jority of Conservatives, and have placed the coinage of premises of Messrs, Hewitt Brothers, and Mr. Adlard ;
Reform under their control ; and if they find it conside- as also part. of the premises of Mr, Stone, a grocer. It
rably adulterated, it ought not. to surprise them." - is not known in what manner the fire originated. The
The North Devon Journal observes, in an article on 1 police belonging to the F and E division, rendered the
the Whig New Poor-law—" Right gladly did-the Tories , firemen most essential service. The damage clone is esti-
! join them in the undertaking, although they had not the t pitted at upwards of 12,0001., the whole of which is in-
moral courage to. originate the-plan. The Whig'lllinistry stared in various fire-offices.
dared the task, and accomplished it. That there arc . • THE THAMES TUNNEL.—This stupendous
blemishes in the New Poor. law' whielilliar its useful-
, ness, is merely saying that man's work is not, perfect; iswork rapidly advancing to completion. The sub-
When some of its harsher lineaments are: -:
.softened:: marine cutting has been finished some months, . but in
I
down, working men Will recognise ill it the 'fitoe;of a tall() order to secure easy facility of entrance, it has been
1 friend." . - t found necessary to bore farther beyond the high-water
.. . ...... _._., ' mark than was originally intended.

MR. ALDERMAN T HOMPSON.
TO THE EDITOR OF THE SUN.
Barnes, near Sunderland, Oct. 6, 1841.

SlR—Perceiving in your Newspaper of the 4th instant
an article representing that a meeting had been held at
Sunderland, at which several resolutions, insultingly re-
flecting upon Mr. Alderman Thompson, M.P. for that
borough, had been passed, I think it my duty to inform
you that no such meeting was ever held, and that the
whole statement is a base fabrication.

I presume you have been led to make this publication
from an advertisement which appeared in the Durham
Chronicle newspaper of last week, in which such a meet-
ing was represented to have been held, and such resolu-
tions passed, and to which the publishers of that paper
had the audacity to print my name as Chairman.
I cannot believe that a newspaper of your established
character will lend itself to so gross and scandalous an
imposition on the public, and so infamous a mode of at-
tack upon a man of Mr. Alderman Thompson's high
position and character, for mere political purposes ; and
I shall therefore expect that you will immediately pub-
lish a contradiction of the gross misrepresentation into
which you have been betrayed.
I am, Sir, your most obedient servant,
RICHARD PEMBERTON.

[The name of Mr. Pemberton was not given in The
Sun ; but he presumes justly that we would not lend
ourselves to any imposition for political purposes. See-
ing an account of the alleged meeting in the Durham
paper, we did not for a moment doubt its authenticity,
knowing that many of the Conservative electors of Sun-
derland were grievousl3 annoyed at being left unrepre-
sented, because Alderman Thompson chose to desert
them.)