The Sun.
London, England, 1870-12-17 00:00:00

HER MAJEST Y.

WINDSOR CASTLE, Dec. 16.
The Queen went out in the grounds this morning, ac-
companied by Princess Beatrice.

Princess Louise walked out with the Duchess of Rox-

burg,he.
Earl Granville arrived at the Castle to-day, and had an
audience of her Majesty.

Her Majesty's dinner party in the evening included
her Royal. Highness the Princess Louise, the Duchess of
1 t,,xbrirghe, the Marquis of Lorne, and the Dean of
Westminster and Lady Augusta, Stanley.

,#.1.4

CHRISTMAS GIFTS IN CLERKENNVELL.

Although the severe winter with which we have been
threatened has not yet shown itself to any great extent,
there is much distress existiug among our labouring
classes. The district of Clerkenwell, poor and•populouo!
has enough cases of genuine distress to absorb a good desdi
of seasonable benevolence, and it is to be We
that the efforts being made by kindly volun•
teers in the neighbourhood to make Christ.
mas something more than a name to the
denizens of its quaint old lanes and byeways will not he
forgotten. There are a whole train of good works coo:
stantly going on in connection with 'St. Philip °'
Granville-square, of which the Rev. R. Clutterbuek
incumbent, some of which call for especial notice. A soupkitchen and poor children's dining-room in Hallett 's
place, Upper Rosoman-street, appeals for aid, and some
touching facts are recorded by the managers. It is remarked
that those actually on the verge of starvation eat less
'than those not so reduced, and that children who arc
habitually in want of food cannot eat fat, comparatively
little meat of any kind seeming to satisfy them. The
thought of little children being habitually half-starveu
should surely loosen our purse strings this Christ;
mas time. Mr. Maguire, the energetic incumben"
of St. James's, Clerkenwell, whose name was
so prominently before the public at the time of the
Fenian explosion at the House of Detention, is raising
special fund for a New Year's Tea to two thousand of big
poor parishioners and for general parochial purposes.
Among the institutions assisted last year out of a situil°
fund were the Lamb and Flag Ragged, School, the
Parochial Temperance Association, the Provident Penni
Bank, and the Parochial Home Mission, all undertaking
of great practical merit.

LITERATURE, SCIENCE, AND THE STAUt°'
The Athenceum says :—Mr. Swinburne's new volume cif
poems, which was promised as long ago as last springs i 3
now definitely announced for publication early in the
New Year.—We understand that the Rev, Lewis
Mercier, Chaplain of the Foundling, has in the press
new Life of Christ, the prominent feature of which wail°
a, new chronology of the subject, founded upon astronc'
mical calculations.—The unveiling of the Schiller moll?
ment at Berlin, which was to have taken place
this month, is put off till the spring of next year.'
It will afford pleasure to musical circles to learn that g'
Gounod is devoting his hours of exile to the completion
of his grand opera, the " Polyeucte" of Corneille, and to
the composition of an oratorio, the book of which
has also been written by M. Gounod, the subject being
Calvary and the Redemption, he having versified a pot
tion of the Scriptural text.—Another oratorio will be pro'
duced in due course ; in this instance' by an English con'
poser—Mr. Cusins, the conductor of the concerts of the
Ancient Philharmonic Society. He has taken as hie
theme " Gideon," but he proposes to confine the mush)
within the limits of the sacred cantata, that is, not to.
exceed one hour and a half in the performance of the
work.—The music of the new opera-burlesque of "Aladdin
No. 2," to be produced at the Gaiety, has been compose°
by M. Herve ; the book is by Mr. Alfred Thomson. Alf'
Dion Boucicault's version of Charles Dickens's " Cricket
on the Hearth" is announced as a musical drama at the
same theatre, the music selected by Herr Meyer Lutz.--
Drury-lane and Covent Garden alone among `Vest-end
houses will produce pantomimes this Christmas, but this
class of entertainment will, according to custom, be given
at all eastern, transpontine, and suburban theatres.
Burlesques, by various writers, will be produced at the
Adelphi, the Gaiety, the Princess's, the Strand, and the
Globe. Only one house announces a new comedy : this
ie
the St. James's, at which a new play, entitled " War," hY
Mr. T. W. Robertson, is promised.