The Sun.
London, England, 1841-01-19 00:00:00

FLANDERS MAIL.

BRUSSELS, JAN. 16.—The Directors of the Rail-
ways have taken measures to secure them against the
inundations. At all the points which are exposed little
dykes have been raised on the sides of the railway.
Yesterday afternoon the Magistrates of Brussels
caused a dyke to be raised along the canal of Charleroi,
between the Flanders and Ninave gates, that part of
the canal, swollen by the waters of the Senne, threaten-
ing to inundate the lower part of the city.
The Senne continues to rise, and the inundation is
extraordinary. There is reason to hope, however, that
the river will not rise any more, and that the waters
will have subsided in two or three days. Thanks to the
timely precautions that have been taken, the iroa rail-
way is not overflowed as in 1839, and no interruption of
the trains has occurred.

It is not thought the Scheldt is yet free enough from
ice to allow the steam-packets to come up to Antwerp.
Some persons finding no Court Circular in our columns
have believed that the King was really gone to Ar-
dcniie, as he intended. This is not the case, but we
learn that an indisposition, which is happily nearly over,
has obliged his Majesty to keep his room for some days.
VIENNA, JAN. 6.—The Constantinople mail of the
23d, which arrived to-day, brings little news. Ibrahim
Paella was still at Damascus the 13th of December.
His vanvaard, which had taken the caravan-road to
the coast, had been defeated and driven back at Mes-
aerial. The situation of the Egyptian army, if the de-
moralised fragments of it deserve the name, was be-
coining more critical every day, and it is not impos.,ible
that it ►nay be obliged to capitulate, unless Ibrahim re-
ceives timely information of the submission of Mehemet
Ali. The population of Damascus was in a state of
great excitement, and some trifling occa3ion might suf-
fice to cause an insurrection. Emir Reacher El Kessiw
was on his march from Zahlc against Damascus.
. _

...,
:ThLtil .-11.,., P ii:ND-21111;esSI.A, J.N. 15,
Actual Dcht, 2!,,', per Cent.
Rothschild', Loan, 5 per C•ht 97
Loan of Thirty Millions, I per Cent....
----- - (I 40) 9778
---- 3 per Cent.
----Thirty.seven -- .. ...... 6•:.)
Loan of city, 132, 4 per Cent flit
Societv of Cominorce, 'l5, per Ccnt 11,3
Bank of Belgium, 5 per Cent ... 87
National Society .
Exchange on LondoiA (short)
—Brussels Papers, Jan. 15.
AUSTRIAN FUNDS..—VIRNNA, JAN. 7
five per Coots. Metalliques
Four per Cen ts.
Three p•-:r Cents.
Bank >hares :693
--Ailgemeine Zeitung. Jan. 12

SPIRIT of the PUBLIC JOURNALS

FROM THE MORNING PAPlilts OF THIS DAY.
(From the Morning Chronicle.)
In another part of this day's Chronicle will be found
an exposition of the course of medical study, and the
mode of testing candidates for medical degrees, in the
University of London, together with the most satisfac-
tory proofs of the successful progress of that institution,
in reply to the mis-statements and misrepresentations
of the Quarterly Review.
In the Morning Chronicle of 10th January, 1:37,
we entered into an explanation of the objects for which
the Metropolitan University was founded, and the
article in our paper of this day affords conclusive evi-
dence that our anticipations of its success are fully
realized. Does the writer in the Quarterly Review
believe that the public will long tolerate that the gra-
duates of the University of London shall be prevented
from practising their profession, for which they have
qualified themselves by a good previous literary
and scientific education, by an extended course
of medical study, and by submitting them-
selves to -1 more searching examination than
that enforced by any other institution of this
country ? We trove not. The period has arrived
when the Government cannot much longer resist the
almost universal call of the medical profession, to which
will soon be added that of the public, to place the
medical institutions and profession in this country in the
position which the advanced state of medical science
dictates and the welfare of the public requires.
We are far from considering the University of London
as a perfect institution ; bat its faults, which have been
rendered sufficiently apparent by its workings, are of a
nature to be easily remedied. The senate of the Uni-
versity, as it is now constituted, is too large for an exe-
cutive body, and too small to admit of such a body being
selected out of it. Let the members of the senate be at
once raised from its present number (38) to 80 or 100,
and let them choose from among themselves an executive
council, composed of a due proportion of members of
the different faculties, and it may then be made an
efficient institution. The effect of such a change i❑
the constitution of the University, provided the new
members were well selected, would be to strengthen the
institution, to raise it in the estimation of the public,
and extend the sphere of its influence and usefulness.
This increase in the number of its members would
enable the senate to place its administration, as regards
the carrying out its details, in the 'hands of an efficient
body, the individual members of which would be kept
from lapsing into inactivity by the surveillance of the
larger body, and by the consciousness that the work to
be done rested with them, and that they were responsible
for the character of the University during the period of
their administration. Such are the more important altera-
tions in the constitution of the University of London,
which we consider absolutely necessary to render it
a really efficient institution, capable of carrying
out the important objects which we believe it destined
to accomplish. At the present moment, therefore,
when a new charter, we understand, is about to be
granted, we would urgently press the consideration of
our suggestions upon the present members of the uni-
versity, and upon the Government who instituted it,
and whose duty it is to watch over its operations, and
to do everything in their power to render it efficient.
In its present state, we do not hesitate to express our
conviction that it cannot maintain the rank among
similar institutions which the Metropolitan University
ought to hold ; and we confess that it has been matter
of surprise to us, that it has effected so much as is this
day recorded in our pages. This could only have been
done at an expense of time and labour on the part of
its members, which men worthy of being intrusted
with such important duties could not be expected to
continue.

(From the Times.)
The Journal des Debals, anxious, as it would ap-
pear, to make the various departments of its political
system hang well together, has travelled far for weapons
wherewith to bastinado French democracy, and, by im-
plication, Thiers and his friends. This grave Con-