The Sun.
London, England, 1870-02-15 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON, TUESDAY EVENING, FEBRUARY 15, 1870.

elections of boards of guardians or local boards. The
ballot proposed by the present bill was that known as
the Australian system—viz., the ballot by ticket. The
various clauses of the bill would carry out the matter in
detail, and he should be able to defend. the various
proposals as thoy came before the House. These
details were exceedingly simple—so simple, indeed,
that persons not able to read, or count above five'
would be ablo.to understand them—a provision he thought
that ought to go a great way in favour of the bill.
The bill made it a misdemeanour for a voter to
show his ticket before he left the polling booth, a provision
that would go a great way to prevent corrupt voting, and it
would seem when the measure was under consideration that
all the safeguards it was possible to embody had been im-
ported into that measure.

Mr. LIDDELL, protesting his invincible hostility to
secret voting, held it most objectionable to propose to legis-
late before the Select Committee on Elections had reported.
The Marquis of HARTINGTON, while assenting on the
part of the Government to the introduction of the bill,
:Treed with Mr. Liddell that it would be hardly respectful
to the Committee to press it forward before their report was
before the House. On this account he urged Mr. Leathern
to postpone the second reading to a period sufficiently re-
mote to allow the Committee to decide on its report. As to
the expediency of a private member taking up the question
the Government, he said, reserved its opinion.
Mr. Beresford Hope and Mr. Sclater-Booth joined in re-
presenting the propriety of adjourning the debate until the
committee's report was received ; but Mr. Gilpin, Mr. Bib-
bert, Sir W. Lawson, Mr. Melly, and Mr. Eykyn were op-
posed to further delay, and ultimately leave was given to
bring in the bill, Mr. Leatham agreeing not to take the
second reading within a month.

Mr. SHAW-LEVEVRE next explained the general piovi-
sions of two bills introduced by the Board of Trade—one,
consisting of 800 clauses, to amend the ]aws relating to
merchant shipping, and the second to abolish compulsory
pilotage. In the discussion which followed a general ap-
proval was expressed of the bills by Mr. Cave and others ;
but Mr. No -wood, Mr. Stevenson, and Mr. Gourley regretted
that the light views were not abolished ; while Mr. Graves,
Sir J. Hay, and Mr. It. N. Fowler were opposed to tho abo-
lition of compulsory pilotage, and recommended the consi-
deration of the subject by e select committee.

Bills were brought in by Mr. Raikes to protect the pro-
perty of married women ; by Mr. Denman, to amend the
Evidence Act of last year; and by Mr. W. Johnson, to re-
peal the Party Processions Act.
Mr. CRAUFURD obtained a committee to consider the
operation of the Scotch Poor Law ; and on the motion of
Mr. °TWAY a Select Committee was appointed to inquire
into the constitution of the Diplomatic and Consular
Services.

Mr. Rylands and Mr. R. Shaw took thq opportunity of
making some observations on the expense of those ser-
vices; to which Mr. Eastwick roplied that the services were
not overpaid in this country as compared with other
countries.
The House adjourned at 11 o'clock.

MISCELLANEOUS NE WS.

,~__~

Trn WEATHER 131.001 C.

The weather, added to general causes, threatens to
strip the Government and Opposition benches. Mr.
Disraeli's dinner to Lord Derby and a largo party of
the House of Commons has been unavoidably post-
poned, and it is not likely that the Conservative
leader will be in his place in the House during this im-
portant vyeek. On Saturday four Cabinet Ministers
were absent from the Council. Mr. Childers was at
Osborne ; and the Foreign Secretary, the President
of the Board of ' Trade, and the Home
Secretary were suffering from indisposition.
Mr. Bruce is affected with a cold ; Mr.
Bright, however, is a little better. The terrinle
weather has spared neither high nor low. The
churches and chapels on Sunday resounded with the
coughing and sneezing of afflicted ministers. In
several places of worship in West London alone the
clergymen had to apologise for not preaching.

THE ALABAMA CLAIMS.
The important correspondence which has passed
between the Earl of Clarendon and Mr. Fish,
American Secretary of State, has been published as a
parliamentary paper. It contains very little that is new.
Mr. Thornton, the British Ambassador at Washing-
ton, writing. on November 22nd, says that he
delivered Lord Clarendon's despatches to Mr. Fish,
and the latter expressed his hope that some means
might be found of coming to an amicable issue. But
it appears that the English Foreign Secretary's
detailed answer to Mr. Fish's arguments was not to
be presented to Congress, on the ground that -it was
of an unofficial character. Lord Clarenden thinks
this wrong. If one part of the discussion
were submitted to Congress, the whole ought
to have been. Writing to Mr. Thornton, he says :
" The publication of the correspondence was, in my
opinion, to be regretted, as having a tendency to
prolong discussion, and not to allay irritation ; but
when it became known here that-the correspondence
had been sent to the Senate, her Majesty's Govern-
ment had no other alternative than to publish the
whole, as the British public had a right to expect that
important information should be furnished to them
by their own Government, and not be derived from
the newspapers of another country." On this ground,
the EnglisleForeign Secretary sent the entire cor-
respondence to the London Gazette

.rated the -town of Darlington and the .North or
England on the happy termination of the diffi-
culties which had existed in the iron trade. For
the settlement of the vexed points between masters
and men, Mr.-Hughes had himself been one of the
Board of Arbitration and Conciliation, and he was
proud,- he said, of the arrangement that had been
come to. Terms have been settled on which the
men are to work for a whole year. A glorious,
but still a serious, time. for the working
people of England might be said to
hare already begun. The late political crisis
had conferred their majority on the working people,
who were now admitted into partnership with the
nation. The future position of the country depended
on the way in which they chose to exercise that great
power which had been placed in their hands. Although
Mr. Hughes believed that there were no better
workmen in the world than Englishmen—and even
in matters of art, in which foreign nations are sup-
posed to excel us, he considered that the aid the
State is going to afford would enable us -to compete
with them—still there had been, and was
at present, a dangerous amount of untbrift,
drunkenness, and carelessness among our working
people, which, it.continued, would render impossible
our success in the futur3 as an industrial people. It
was to be earnestly hoped that the working men
of this country were going to prove in the future
that they were worthy of their fathers, who made
England so groat a nation.

COMMUNICATION WITII FRANCE.

Mr. Fowler writes in exposition of his scheme for
securing better communication with France by means
of large ferry boats, which would carry a train and
its passengers without need of disembarkation. These.
vessels are to be 450 feet in length, and proportionate
breadth, drawing. about twelve feet of water. From
their form and size they will be free from all
tossing and rolling in the heaviest Channel seas. It
has been objected that the Great Eastern rolls in
rough weather ; but Mr. Fowler answers that there
is an obvious difference between an Atlantic swell
and the short chopping sea of the Channel. It is
not proposed to place the carriage on the deck, ex-
posed to wind and rain; but in a space
between the upper and the main deck, and com-
pletely.protected. On the main deck, accommoda-
tion be provided for passengers (who will gene-
rally alight from their carriages, as they would at
any railway station where a stoppage is made for re-
freshment), and they will find well-lighted, well-
warmed saloons, with means of reading, writing,
&c., which Will make the sea voyage the most agree-
able part of the journey. Private cabins will also be
provided on the same deck, and large rooms for the
officials of the Custom-houses of the two countries, so
that all luggage may he examined and the weary
delay from :that cause at the end of the journey
entirely avoided. Mr. Fowler estimates that the
voyage in these boats will be performed in ono
hour.