The Sun.
London, England, 1846-04-14 00:00:00

ST. DUNSTAN, STEPNEY.

A meeting of the rate-payers of the hamlet of Mile-
end Old Town, which forms a greater portion of the
extensive parish of Stepney, was held yesterday, at the
Town-house, Mile-end-road, to elect churchwardens and
other officers for the ensuing year. A society, called
the Stepney Anti-Church Rate and Parochial Reform
Association, sent out placards, recommending Mr. Morse
and Mr. Howlett for churchwardens. The Church
party sent a requisition to Messrs. Head and Hawkins,
churchwardens for the past year, to allow themselves to
be again put in nomination. The contest was looked
upon as a struggle between the church-rate and anti-
church-rate parties. After several speeches, the ques-
tion was put to a show of hands, by the Rev. Mr. Van-
drey, the rector, who presided on the occasion. The
majority was three to one in favour of the old church-
wardens, aad they were declared to be re-elected fur the
ensuing year. The anti-church-rate party demanded a
poll, but they abandoned their intention, and said they
should fight the battle of church-rates in another way.

POPULAR PREACHERS IN PARIS.
In appreciating the congregations of the various
churches of Paris, we might learn the character of the
quartet, the ideas, the habits, and the social condition of
the population who dwell there. The various quarters
of Paris do not resemble each other, and each parish has
its distinct character, and its peculiar physiognomy.
The conferences at Notre Dame form the exception.
The auditory who throng to the interior of the cathedral
belong to alt quarters of the city. Each parish is repre-
sented by a deputation of the elite—they who should
assign this numerous and distingue assemblage to the po-
pulation of the parish of Notre Dame would fall into sin-
gular error. The inhabitants of this quarter, for the most
part, go very rarely to church, and, except during the
conferences, the vast aisles of this edifice witness the
performance of divine service in comparative solitude.
The Abbe Lacordaire and the Abl6 de Ravignan,
whose characteristics are so utterly opposed to each
other, of talent so different, present a remarkable con-
trast with the Abbe Bautain, the preacher this year at
Madeleine. M. Bautain is a thinker of the German
school, is in the pulpit the philosopher who discusses,
the logician of close argument who presses you forcibly
with his reasonings, but who does net move, affect you.
M. de Ravignan has a manner peculiarly his own—me-
thodical, austere, and somewhat cold, but lucid, close,
precise : he addresses himself to the understanding, and
endeavours to enlighten and convince. His reasons are
not always the most conclusive, but he speaks with con-
viction, and this conviction seems so deeply identified
with himself, that he ends by persuading his hearers.
Alter the triumph of most exalted eloquence, we believe
that there is nothing more admirable .han this, and we
hardly know if it be not the more effective of the two.
A brilliant orator of the Chamber lot' Deputies (M
Thiers), who covets every kind of glory, became a pro-
phet with regard to M. de Ravignan. The Hon. Mem-
ber predicted, at the beginning of Lent, that the cele-
brated Jesuit would preach in the desert, and that Notre
Dame would bewail her solitude. But M. Thiers was a
false prophet, for the conferences are quite as much fol-
lowed as thoie of last year.
The Abbe Lacordaire has a vivid imagination, full
vigour and impulses. Under the white gown ut the Do-
minican we find the young and impetuous editor of the
iivertir of 1831. M. Lacordaire appeals to the imgina-
Lion, excites, affects it; he has fire and enthusiasm, and
he would influence his auditory, if in these our times
such a thing were possible. Yet his style is something
too free, and his sallies, which are not always in the
best possible taste, are sometimes eccentric. He amuses
his auditory at times even to laughter, and derives his
ideas from it instead of inspiring it with his personal
feeling. At one of his late discourses, M. Odilon Barrot,
as he quitted Notre Drne, characterised him thus--
"He is neither Christian enough nor Catholic enough."
The honourable member conforms this opinion with one
of the most distinguished prelates in France, who lately
remarked at a clerical meeting, that the Pere Lacordaire
was dangerous, frun the character he gave to his con-
ferences, departing, as he did, so much from the theo-
logical severity and gravity of a sermon. It may be said
that the Able Lacordaire is an orator, Perk Bautain,
philosophical thinker, and M. de Ravignan, (who left the
bar for the pulpit), a preacher. The first interests—the
second attracts—the third persuades.

DENISE or AN AGED RADICAL.—At Parkhead, in
the house of his son, on the 29th ult., after a long period of ill
health, which terminated in dropsy, Mr. John Allan, in the
64th year of his age. It may be said of this excellent man,
that throughout the whole course of his life his mind was de-
voted to his God, his country, and the human family. Reli-
gious, but not fanatical—patriotic, but not visionary—and
glowing with a generous wish for the emancipation of his
fellow-men in every land. His sympathies, and his efforts,
as far as his humble rank permitted, were uniformly enlisted
in every righteous movement. About the end of the last
century, when but a very young man, he became the un-
flinching advocate of civil and religious liberty. In 1815,
his whole energies were directed against the enactment of the
corn-laws, and the description which he then gave of the
ruinous consequences of that measure was truly prophetic.
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eht
ienappeared
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fey, a and
againstt e
oppression ; but his high-toned and discriminating mind
saved him and those under his influence from becoming the
victims of the hired emissaries of Government. In 1819,
urged on by the spirit of the age and his ardent love of jus-
tice, he was found among the foremost in the agitation for
Parliamentary Reform. A few weeks prior to the crisis in
the history of that movement, he was delegated to England
to ascertain the state of public opinion there, and on his re-
turn he assured his constituents that they were deceived,
and reiterated his former exhortations in favour of enlight-
ened and peaceful agitation. Unfortunately, however, his
judicious counsels were not attended to, otherwise the con-
vict-ship would not have been required to convey its poli-
tical victims to a penal colony, nor would the gibbets of
Stirling and of Glasgow have been stained with the blood of
their martyrs. 1831 came, and be was again in the ranks of
freedom, rejoicing in the prospect of his country's deliver-
ance, and from that time till the period of his dissolution he
maintained, without a blemish, the character he had ac-
quired, of beirb, an upright, uncompromising Reformer; even
when be felt himself drooping to the grave, he was thankful
to his Creator that he had lived to see the day when the
iniquitous monopoly of the people's food was about to be
numbered among the things that were.— Glasgow Chronicle.
NARRoW ESCAPE.—About ten o'clock yesterday
morning, as the Hampton Court steam-boat Locomotive was
leaving the Old Shades Pier with several passengers on
board, a small boat, which was crossing the river from
Dyers' Hall Pier to the Surrey side, with three men in her,
was unable, in consequence of the number of Greenwich and
Woolwich steam-boats which crowded the river, to get out
of the way. The captain, after calling several times to the
men, stopped and backed the steam-boat, but it was too late
to prevent the Locomotive from capsizing the small one,
and precipitating the three men into the river. The boat
immediately sunk, and the men sprang to the side of the
steam-boat to get on board, but in this they filled. One of
the crew leaped into the water, and succeeded in rescuing
one man ; the other two were picked up by the men on
beard the steamer.

A SOLDIER FOUND WITH HIS THROAT CUT.—CHAT°
Amur, 13.—0 n Saturday afternoon, the 11th inst., J.
Hinde, Esq., coroner, held an inquest at the Canteen, St.
Mary's Barracks, on the body of James Grant, a private of
the 2d Battalion Rifle Brigade, who was discovered by a
private soldier of the 40th Regiment lying in one of the
empty casentates in a quantity of congealed blood. The
soldier gave immediate alarm, when it was found on exami-
nation that the deceased had cut his throat with a razor, as
that instrument was lying covered with blood about two feet
from w where the
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ebodyar to
tl a yileThe
other, .awoundnd it () f
appearedthe throat t ex-
tended
thedeceased, after cutting his throat, had stuffed his pocket
handkerchief into the wound, as it was firmly cemented and
stiffened with gore. The man had been missed from the
barracks for several days; he was first found absent on the
sth inst. at tat-too, and no tidings could be gleaned as to
where he had gone, until the 10th inst., when a private of
the 40th, wishing to exchange his tin can for a better,
applied to one of the staff sergeants, and he was directed to
go into the said empty casemate to change it, and in doing
so he discovered the body in the position above described.
Evidence was given that the deceased, since his return from
Halifax to this depot, had been noticed by his comrades to
be silly in his conversation and eccentric in his conduct.
Death was caused by the loss
throat had not divided the windpipe, or any of the principal
arteries. Verdict—" Temporary insanity." The deceased
had been 16 years in the service, was 35 years of age, and
was waiting at the depot to receive his discharge. On his
person was found 1/. 55. 2d. He was a single man.
EPIDEMIC AMONG RABBITS. The rabbit-fanciers
have had great losses from a disease now prevalent among
fancy and other rabbits.
EARTHQUAKE IN NORWAY.—Three violent shocks of
earthquake were felt at Nannstad, near Chiistiaaa, on the
night of the 14th ult. Each shuck lasted three seconds, and
was accompanied by a loud rumbling noise; the direction of
the shocks was R.N.W. to S.S.E. The intervals between
the shocks were not more than two seconds. Five houses
were entirely destroyed at Nannstad, and many others much
injured. There had been several preceding shocks of eaith-
quakes in various parts of Norway, but none comparable in
point either of duration or violence to the Ch ast.— rutzan a
Journal.