The Sun.
London, England, 1870-10-21 00:00:00

METROPOLITAN GOSSIP.-THURSDAY.

Never was there a more miserable failure than the
great torchlight procession to Palace Ward last night. It
beat even the Shakspere centenary on Primrose-hill. The
attendance was small. The speakers were insignificant and
all but inaudible. The weather was most unpropitious,
and the " torches " were such an unmitigated nuisance
that the demonstrators had to get rid of them. The police
had expected something more imposing, and had mustered
strongly ; but they might just as well have been snugly
at home, hard by in Scotland-yard, or have'been sheltering
themselves from the inhospitable elements in some
friendly and cheerful kitchen. Count Bernstorff will
have a fine story to tell his chief, Count Bismarck. The
Man of Blood and Iron will now more than ever despise
talk, and deny its efficacy. Even the strongly Galilean
Standard is compelled to make fun of the miserable
manifestation.
This miserable fiasco was due not only to the disorderly
elements and the political insignificance of the demon-
strators. It arose in some measure from the greatly
diminished interest which is now felt in the war. We no
longer open our morning papers with the avidity where-
with we grasped them two months ago. The unbroken
series of Prussian successes have become wearily monoto-
nous. We take for granted that the Prussians will do
whatever they wish to do, and the that French successes,
though they be " displayed " in the boldest type, are, like
the last of Gambetta's, mere blague. The question
which interests us mainly just now is the
election of the Education Board. This event
comes off on November 21st, and great preparations
are being made for it. The metropolitan boroughs will
elect 49 representatives. Four are allotted to each of
the following Parliamentary boroughs :—The City, Chel-
sea, Greenwich, and Southwark ; five to Westminster,
Ilackney, Lambeth, and the Tower Hamlets severally ;
six to Finsbury ; and seven to Marylebone. The candi-
dates already spoken of are legion, and represent every
variety of creed. In Westminster, for instance, Lord
Sandon, Mr. W. H. Smith, M.P., and Dr. Rigg, of the
Wesleyan Training College, will probably be nominated.
In Lambeth, Lord Midleton, late M.P. for Mid-
Surrey, and Sir Thomas Tilson will be two of the candi-
dates nominated by Canon Gregory and his church
friends. In Marylebone Miss Garrett, the lady doctor,
has consented to stand, and has issued an address on a
post-card, in which she states herself to be in favour of
reading the Bible in the schools with such explanations as
the teacher may find desirable ; the liberty to withdraw
children from the religious lessons being strictly en-
forced. Miss Garrett adds that " those who desire to see
all classes represented on the board will, by electing her
secure a member specially conversant with questions
relating to the education of girls." Mr. Chubb, a Con-
servative dissenter, will be one of the candidates for the
City, and will probably receive the support of the Church
party. Mr. Charles Reed, M.P. for Hackney, and Mr.
31`Cullagh Torrens, M.P. for Finsbury are also candi-
dates in two of the boroughs, and it is probable that one of
these two gentlemen will be elected to the chairmanship of
the Board, a post of £2,000 a year, and therefore
worth getting. Professor Huxley will probably stand in
the Secularist interest for Marylebone. The right of
election will be enjoyed by female as well as male rate-
payers, and every voter will have as many votes as there
are members to be elected, and have the power of accumu-
lating his votes on as many of the candidates as he
pleases, or on any one of them. The first result of Mr.
Forster's Act nas been as remarkable as it is satisfactory.
It has brought together Churchmen and Dissenters, and
has induced them to co operate in a way that a little while
ago would have seemed impossible. Both are animated
by the same desire that of presenting a religious
education, and thus it has become abundantly clear that
Mr. Miall and his friends represented but a very small
portion of the Nonconformists.
Yesterday was high festival with High-Church West-
enders. A new aisle has just been added to the Church
of St. Mary Magdalene, Paddington, mainly through the
munificence of one lady, who presented to the trustees
of the church a house, which sold for over £1,700. There
were four celebrations of the Holy Communion, and at the
eleven o'clock service there was a procession with banners.
An able sermon was preached by Mr. Carter, of Clewer.
The evening sermon was by " Father " Rivington, who
has lately founded the preaching order of " The Holy
Spirit," in Shropshire. Of his discourse the less said
the better. It was one of the most grievously illogical
and inconsequential harrangues that I ever lis-
tened to. It had nothing to do with the text,
though the text was repeated every two or three
minutes of the fifty, and the climax of irrelevance
as well as of bigotry was reached when the Rev. "Father"
told the laity that it was wholly impossible for them to
have any part in synods or conferences. This, at a time
when there is scarcely a bishop who is not devising means
for obtaining the co-operation of the laity !
The Bishop of Winchester has just given great delight
to the Low Church party by consenting to become presi-
dent of all the branch Bible societies in his diocese, as his
predecessor in the See was before him. The magnificent
sermon preached by the Bishop of Peterborough at Win-
chester Cathedral at the close of the Church Congress was
a fine specimen of eloquence, all the more remarkable as
within a very short time beforethe service commenced the
bishop had not even fixed upon his subject.
The election contest at Colchester will have special
features of interest. Sir Henry Storks is not only a
Liberal, but a Government candidate. Being a singularly
able man, the Government has been most anxious to get
him into Parliament, in order that the army may have a
somewhat stronger representative than sweet-tempered
but rather weak Mr. Cardwell. Sir Henry will, in fact,
if elected, occupy the post of Chief of the
Control Department, with a seat in Parliament, which was
recommended by Lord Northbrook's committee. It so
happens, however, that Sir Henry Storks is in favour of
the Contagious Diseases Act, and this circumstance lost
him his election at Newark last spring. Colchester is
differently situated from Newark. The latter town is
near Nottingham, which is the headquarters of the oppo-
nents of the Act, and as soon as it was known that Sir
Henry was a candidate, Mrs. Jacob Bright telegraphed
off to her friends at the lace metropolis, that they must
use all their efforts to keep Sir Henry out. This was the
more easy because he was not the only Liberal candidate,
and Liberal electors had therefore the opportunity of
voting for another representative of their views. Col-
chester, being the locale of a military camp, is practically
acquainted with the working of the Act, and the verdict
of this borough will therefore be looked for with especial
interest. Colonel Learmouth, the Conservative candidate,
has some local interest. The person who comes for-
ward in behalf of the Revivors of native industry, which is
Protectionists writ large, can hardly be in the reckoning.
As to the election for Mid-Surrey, which has just come
off, that has resulted as everyone expected. Sir Richard
Baggallay had the misfortune to go out of office within a
very few weeks of his becoming Solicitor-General, and to
lose his seat at the general election. He was defeated a

second time at the election which followed the unseatin,
of Mr. Clive and the late Mr. Wyllie.

Now that Mr. Childers has returned to the Admiralty
a searching investigation is going on into the circum-

stances attending the loss of the Captain. Mr. Reed's
evidence at the court martial was very damaging to the

Admiralty; but we- have not yet heard the other side,

and Mr. Childers's friends affirm that the First Lord has

a rod in pickle for the ex-Chief Constructor.

The three breast-work monitors, the Devastation, the
Thunderer, and the Fury, designed by Mr. Reed, are fast
approaching completion. Each is to be armed with four

35-ton guns, which will sweep the horizon. Some idea o 1

the size of these guns may be gathered from the following
figures :—To begin with, the gun is estimated to weigh
35 tons 7 cwt. The calibre is 11.6 inches. There
will be nine grooves. The length of the gun
over all will be sixteen feet three inches. Each
shot will weigh 700 lb., and the cartridge 120 lb. In spite
of their enormous weight and size, these guns will be
moved with the most perfect facility and rapidity by means
of the carriage invented by Captain Scott. Several of
them are now being manufactured at the Royal Arsenal,
Woolwich. Each round will involve a large expenditure

of money, but then it is confidently calculated that each
shot will hit. Woe to the vessel which it does hit.
The quarterlies are advancing with the times. Here is
The Quarterly, for instance, with a review of Sir H.
Bulwer's "Life of Lord Palmerston," before the book is
out, thanks to the courtesy of the author in allowing Mr.
Murray to have the advanced sheets. The same
periodical has an article on the war which brings the
reader down to the fall of Strasburg. The London

Quarterly, out in the second week of September,broughtth—ev
chronicle down to the proclamation of the Republic on
September 4. The author of the article on Lanfrey's
Napoleon, in the latter periodical is Mr. Fagan, late head-
_

master of the Bath Grammar School, well known to
readers of the Contemporary Review, and who has lately