The Sun.
London, England, 1870-01-04 00:00:00

GLOBE THEATRE-ROYAL.

THIS EVENING, at 7, A HOUSEHOLD FAIRY. At 7.'5,
NOT SUCH A FOOL AS HE LOOKS: Mr 11. J. Byron. And
LORD BATE3IAN : Miss Fanny Joseph; _Mr J. Clarke, &c.

THEATRE-ROYAL, HOLBORN.

THIS EVENING, at 7, THE BATH ROAD. At 7.45, LOVE'S
SACRIFICE: ➢lr. Barry Sullivan, Mrs. Bermann Vezin,
And STATE SECRETS.

ROYAL STRAND THEATRE.
Sole Lessee and Manageress, Mrs. Swanborough.
Tnrs EVENING, at 7.30, AMONG TETE BREAKERS: Mr
aarke. With THE TOODLES. And INO. Concluding with
THE CHOPS OF THE CHANNEL.

CHRISTY MINSTRELS. St. James's Hall, Every Night, at 8
Wednesdays and Saturdays, at 3 and 8 all the year round. -

ZOOLOGICAL G A.F.tDENS, Regert's-pack, OPEN daily (ex.
cept Sundays). Admission, Is.; on Mondays, 6d. Children
tinder twelve. 6d.

ROYAL ALHAMBRA PALACE. THREE BALLETS
Promenade Concert. Band of 60. Begin at 8. le. Box-office
o pen fromll to 4.

F-o • • Abl
DA,
•

LONDON, SATURDAY, JAN. 1, 1870.

'Mere is now Some prospect that the !‘ Contagiotie
Diseases Act" will receive a degree of public atten-
tion somewhat in proportion to the importance of the
question with which it deals. The nature of the
subject makes it unsuitable for discussion, and ad-
vantage has been taken of this circumstance to pass a
measure which is repugnant to the moral sense of the
community. However disagreeable:the topic may be, it
is now become necessary for the public to make them-
selves acquainted with the facts of the case. A. few
strong-minded men have carried a bill through th
House of Commons by the very simple expedient
getting a committee, calling before that committee
only persons who were favourable to their views, and
then publishing the conclusions so arrived at
as the result of a full consideration and di: •
cussion of the question. But this full consideration
and discussion has yet to come. The principle of
the Contagious Diseases Act is one so absolutely un-
just and degrading to women that, even if it were
expedient, it would be impossible to advocate its
adoption. But so far from the measures co:tem-
plated by the Act being expedient, we find that simi-
lar action in other countries has entirely failed
to produce those results which, we are confi-
dently told, will follow its adoption in
this country. It is notorious that disease has not
been eradicated in Paris, although far more stringent
measures have long been adopted there than will ever
be possible in
,Etigiand. Bur, unwise and unjust
is are the measures which are now
being taken in reference to the vice of
prostitution, they aro almost harmless compared
with the principles which are often enunciated in
their advocacy. The Act proceeds upon the
principle that the wrong-doer ought to receive
all the assistance which the Government
can afford to secure him from inconvenience,
and to provide him with victims. Against
QM; 2.3.7iLLOVA_Pil_u.§_t_.PrgtOt _theMSelYeS.._and for

°trier messes women must do the best they can. If
the honest, hard-working servant girl gets the house-
maid's knee from constant scrubbing, she must cure
herself, but if a girl contracts a disease from the
practice of immorality she is to be provided for and
cured at the national cost. A splendid hospital must
be built for her reception, and doctors, chaplains,
matrons, and a whole relay of servants are placed at
her disposal. When she leaves, a certificate is given
to her to the effect that she is fitted to pursue her
vile calling. This certificate is as delusive in a
physical sense as it is dangerous and degrading in a
moral point of view. The sin is one which can never
be made "safe," and even if it could, it ought never to
receive the semblance of a sanction. The doctrine
that the Government have nothing to do with moral
considerations, and must regard only the physical
health of the community, we utterly repudiate. But
from a purely physical point of view it would be the
greatest possible mistake to hold forth the idea
of "safety" where safety cannot be obtained. The
delusive idea of security has led numerous victims to
ruin and destruction. Many young men have found
out to their cost that the " system " adopted in Paris
is literally a delusion and a snare.
It must not, however, be supposed that the Govern-
ment have no duties to perform in reference to this sub-
ject. Their duty is very clear and very imperative. A.
certain contagious disease is devastating our army and
spreading amongst the civil population. Measures can
bo and should be taken to arrest its progress ; but these
measures must be repressive, not regulatory. There
is no country in the world where prostitution and
brothel keepirig are allowed to be so rampant
as in this country, and the Government
will fail of their duty if they do not arm the
police with additional powers ; and in like manner
all local authorities will fail of their duty if they do
not more vigorously exercise the powers which they
already possess for the repression of prostitution. There
is novice more readily checked ; it is always practised
precisely in proportion as latitude is allowed for its
exercise. The supposed difficulties in the way of
preventing women from selling themselves in the
streets have no foundation in fact. Wherever the
authorities of any town, supported by public opinion,
act with vigour, there public prostitution can be re-
stricted. We are not of the number of those who
suppose that the liberty of the subject will be in-
fringed if the police take action in this matter. At
best, policemen are necessary evils, but in this case
they certainly are necessary. It answers the purpose
of those interested in the traffic to make a good deal
of a case where an honest woman may have
been annoyed by the police, but where there is
one case of this kind there are twenty cases of honest
women annoyed by ruffians of both sexes, froM whom
the police should protect them. So common is pros-
titution, that honest girls are frequently pursued as
prostitutes in sheer mistake, and very recently a case
came under our notice where a respectable
servant was followed and so seriously alarmed
that she has never recovered from the
fright, and has lost both her health and her situation.
In cases of this kind, girls can rarely obtain. any
redress, and a sense of shame often keeps them from
making any reference to the circumstance. They
are, therefore, far more numerous than is generally
supposed. Mr. Gladstone tells us that the object
of legislation should Ae te. Make':it as, „eaBY
as possible to go right, and as difficuir irfibosible to
do wrong. We have reversed this principle in, refe.
ronee to prostitution, and we cannot .DOWPATQ49
our steps. _ . .

The subject is one which cannot-be" A1.1:1 Oustie,d
in the columns-oi a newspaper where it impossible
to give all the details and explanationji which are
necessary to confirm our statementi, it also
requires much fuller treatment than has ye( been
given to it In pny publicatlonsewhigh. Art yvq-
able to the public, but we have Miceli '.tleailife
calling attention to a pamphlets
recently Written' by
F. W. NEwmear entitled. 14 the? Cure of '-tie" Great
Social Evil,". which. Containi much valuable intor.
• •
mation anti, bound reasoningupoA tl4ll IRlkatalit
Question,/

"The GAVROCHE party." What is the GAVIWCHE

party ? This is a question which very deeply
concerns M. OLLIVIER to have answered. Mr.
BLANCHARD JERROLD has given the answer in a
book which Mr. HoTTEN has just published. Tho
author gives no definition of his term. It is not to
be found in ordinary dictionaries ; yet it has a very
real and very formidable existence. It is the party
in Paris which believes in nothing except itself—
which begins with a sneer, passes on to a bitter sar-
casm and a cruel jest, progresses further downwards
to a general onslaught on all institutions, human and
Divine, and ends in a battle at the barricades and a
Red Republic. No, it does not end there. It is found
so intolerable that some "Saviour of Society" is
necessary in order to rescue society from its own
folly. He saves with the cannon and the bayonet—
a sharp remedy, yet not quite so bad as the disease.
Mr. JERROLD has described the rapid progress of
this party in a series of letters extending from March
1868 to November 1869. Unfortunately, Nonditin
estfin's. He does not know, we do not know, what
the end will be; but he, at all events, fears a tragic
end. The development of this madcap spirit has been
most formidably rapid. Is there any stratagem
in the liberty which has been given to this develop-
ment ! The latest hero of the GAVROCHE party,
M. FELIX PYAT, is ready himself, and has induced
thousands of Parisians to be ready to "pull
down the entire fabric of 'society, that they may
share the coins in the cavity of the foundation
stone." Thereby they are "putting the liberties of
the people in jeopardy." Tho question is, if this be
not part of a concerted plan by that sovereign
who is supposed • to have got up the riots of
last summer, who is thought by many persons
to be a very 11Inc cniAVELLI. We cannot
say. We only notice the fact. We only listen
to the ravings of PYAT and the Hooos, and to the
frantic shouts of approbation which greet their
wildest, maddest outbursts, and say if this be impe-
rial sport it is rather too much like playing with gun-
powder to be pleasant to the onlookers.
First among the satirical writers of the Second
Empire is HENRI ROCHEFORT. His weapon is cold
and glittering. He is pitiless and plain-spoken.
He conveys to his reader his own sense of enjoyment
when he is using:the scalping-knife. " The mocker
revels in phrases that degrade the diplomatic uniform
to the footman's plush, and humble the princess to
the chffoniere. He delights to pin a ridiculous some-
thing upon a man's coat ; to stab with a mot; to
strip artfully-clothed deeds and things, and discover
the mean motive of that which the blind world has
agreed to call a noble action." His little weekly
pamphlet in a red cover became the chief event in
Paris. It sold to such an extent that in a
few weeks the three proprietors were able
to divide nearly £O,OOO profit between
them. Tho wit was the most polished, as well as of
j the keenest sort. There was no invective; there was
endless epigram. Laughter in France is fatal; and
so in order that the dynasty might n be ex-
ting—ished La Lanterns was. Nay, not extin-
guished, but hid under a bushel, and surreptitiously
lighted when messieurs the poli!e wore not by to see.
The author thereof was condemned to a fine of £4OO,
and six months' imprisonment. He paid neither
penalty. A few months later we see him laughing
at the sentence, and those that pronounced it, and
offering himself, and becoming a candidate for ;the
Legislative Body. Mr. JERROLD is severe upon the
miserable figure cut by the brilliant writer when he
came to speak, and most of all upon the servility
which he displayed towards his liege lord King
Mob. Ro cm:Fowl' has started a new daily paper of his
own, with the significant title of La Afarseillaise.
" With a daily paper to direct and provide with
lampoons ; and a sovereign people to serve—taking
his MAJESTY'S orders weekly from a Throne to be
paid for out of his own pocket—ROCIIEFORT'S work
is cut out largely for him. His reward will be the
unbounded ingratitude of his masters. He may die
Grand Cross of the Inestimable Order of the Sabot,
and be honoured with a ' secular funeral,' but if he
should live the allotted am of Immaalife.his shoutinsr A

constituents of to-day who shall have sintived thbiis
political messenger will be impatient with their even-
ing paper for writing a paragraph upon him. He will
have been long ago

` Embalmed in hato, and canonized by scorn."

A melancholy prophecy; but likely pough to be
realised, for Paris has already got sated with the
daintily served dishes of M. ROCHEFORT. Pungent
though they were they now seem tasteless. Vinegar
and cayenne must give place to grains of paradise and
oil of vitriol. Epigrams about the excellent monarch
NAPOLEON the Second, whose innocuous reign France
remembers so gratefully, have been succeeded by wild
denunciations of property and government. When
ROCHEFORT made his elocutionary fiasco, his friends
apologised for him, saying that even ROBESPIERRE
failed at first. The ROBESPIERRE of to-day, M.
FELIX PYAT, shews no signs of failure. He is fluent
enough, fervid enough, Red enough ; yes, let us not
mince words, bloody enough to shew that Mr.
CARLYLE'S "sea-green incorruptible," has left a
successor who has no need to serve any apprentice-
ship to the trade of Revolution plus the Guillotine.
There are some people whom PYAT would save from
the guillotine. BEREZOIVSKI, who shot at ALEXANDER
and NAPOLEON, JUAREZ who killed MAXIMILIAN,
the Manchester Fenians who murdered Sergeant
BRETT, O'FARRELL, who all but murdered Prince
ALFRED. Those whom he would bring to the knife are
" the night-man of December," called NAPOLEON
and "the Parliamentary Opposition, who have steadily
advanced Imperial institutions to a degree of liberty
that tolerates language which would land an Eng-
lishman in Newgate." All programmes—allreforms.
are contained in this one word—Revolution. Says Mr.
JERROLD, " Citizen PYAT is the EMPEROR'S best friend
It is the men who have served him who have been
his bitterest enemies." We believe it well. It is
these most unfaithful of counsellors who have con-
verted the ruler of France—the man who, be his
faults what they may, has done much to promote the
material prosperity of France—into the man of all
others detested by France, so hated that, when a few
weeks ago, he lay sorely sick and like to die,:news-
paper editors danced on his sick bed, were
bitterly inhuman, analysed with hilarity his
death-sweat, banqueted on a couch of pain,
and, with finger on his pulse, shouted in his ear with
glee that in a few days he would be carrion. Had
France been only free all these years, the sorry spec-
tacle would not have been seen. And now it seems
as if, when freedom is once more offered, there is no
room for it, no wish for it, but only an insane cry of
"Overturn, overturn, overturn." It is not only the
Bourbons, but the French people also, who have
" learnt nothing and forgotten nothing."

The touting practice amongst 'soi=disant sawyers
has become such an evil at the metropolitan police court,
Worship-street, that the magistrates have had to issue a
notice, stating that only barrister; attorney; or solicitors
will be allowed to practise in the court. An exception is
made in favour of articled clerks, whose principals are un-
avoidably absent.

A coloured man named John Codrington, was
charged at the Birkenhead Police-court on , Saturday,
with having caused the death of his wife. The poor
woman was found by a policemen lying in the street, and
she had been brutally kicked by the prisoner who was
standing near. She was removed to the hospital, but died
directly. Prisoner was remanded. ,

It is stated on "good authority" that the Princo
of Wales intends shortly visiting Lord Fitzhardinge, at
Berkeley Castle, for several days, during which ho will
shoot with the noble owner over the extensive Berkeley
estates, which now abound with game, and will also hunt
with the Fitzhardingo splendid pack of foxhounds during
his stay.

On the 6th of this month, and thenceforward,
the postage on letters posted in the United Kingdom ad-
dressed to any part of Canada, Nova Scotia, or New
Brunswick, will be reduced to threepence per half ounce
or fraction thereof, when cenveyod by direct packet or
private ship, and to fourpence per half ounce or fraction
thereof, when sent vid the United States.

The Western Mail states that the promoters of the
scheme for tunnelling the Severn at Portskewit, consider-
ing the geological difficulties that might be involved in
the carrying out of the project, and calculating the finan-
cial consequences of complying with the new standing
order of the House rf Lords, have resolved not to proceed
with their bill.

Lord Camperdown arid the other Royal Commis-
sioners appointed to inquire into the whole system of civil
administration in Scotland, accompanied by Mr. Vernon
Broughton, the secretary of the commission, left London
this morning for the Doug'as Hotel, Edinburgh, where the
inquiry will be conducted. The commission held a sitting
at the Treasury on Saturday, when Mr. Craufurd, M.P.,
was exranined.

A deplorable accident happened in Breck-road,
Everton, on Saturday afternoon. Two horses and a cart
wore left without anyone in charge, the animals took fright;
dashed through a crowd of children who were watching a
drunken man, and five of the children were seriously
injured, some of them, it is feared, fatally. The carter, a
man named Glover, who had gone into a public-house, was
taken into custody.
There can be now no doubt whatever as to the
reforms which Mr. Cardwell proposes to effect in the Volun-
teer force. The suggestions he has made are no longer to
be regarded as mere casual hints, as some of our contem-
praries thought, for Lord Ranelagh announces that he has
obtained from the War Office a copy of the proposed altera-
tions in the Volunteer system, and will be happy to submit
them for the consideration and opinion of such metropolitan
or other commanding officers as will do him the favour to
meet him.

The magistracy seems to be obtaining an unwel-
come notoriety. Two have, within a few days, been re-
moved from the Commission of the Peace forintemperatelan-
guage, and now another is the subject of public comment by
reason of abusive speaking and attempted assault. Lieut.-
Colonel Hunter, a mag'strate for the County of Montgo-
mery, was on Saturday charged at the Petty Sessions of
Llanidnois with assaulting the town magistrate's clerk.
The case was settled privately. It was understood both the
plaintiff and defendant were bound over to keep the peace,
each in £lOO.

The Pope officiated on Christmas-day in St. Peter's.
The ceremony was a magnificent one, but the procession of
bishops was omitted, as too long for the Pope, who
suffers severely from sickness. Among the archbishops
assisting was Mgr. Manning. The crowd of visitors was
immense, and the coup d'cril of the sanctuary, with 750
bishops robed in silver copes and mitres, and backed by
the heavy crimson velvet draperies of the royal and
diplomatic galleries, with their galaxy of brilliant
uniforms and royal and princely ladies, offered a most
picturesque spectacle.

At the Sheffield Town Hall, on Saturday, Mr,
Edwin Cadman, of West Bourne House, was charged with
having stolen some stationery from a shop kept by a
widow, named E. Matthews. The defendant occupies a
high position in society, and is the reputed heir to a peer-
age. Prosecutor said that whilst defendant was in her
shop buying some cards fJr the season, he contrived to
secrete a number in his sleeve, which he afterwards
dropped in the fire when accused. A witness corroborated
this. Mr. Cadman's solicitor asked for a remand, which
was granted, the prisoner entering into his own recog-
nisances far £lOO. The prisoner was recently respondent
in the Divorce Court, the charge against him being
adultery and cruelty.
The mortal remains of the late Mr. Thomas Cres-
wick, RA., were consigned to their last resting place in
Kensal-green Cemetery this afternoon. The funeral was
one of the most unostentatious character, and the coffin
plate bore the simple inscription—" Thomas Creswick,
Esq., R.A., died December 28, 1669, aged fifty-eight
years." Amongst the mourners were Mr. R. Ansdell,
A.R.A. ; Mr. IL 0, Neill, A.R.A.; Mr C. Sylvester, R.A.;
Mr. W. P. Frith, R.A. ; Mr. G. Fulford, R.A. ; Mr 0.
Smith. At the grave were Mr. Mark Lemon, Mr. Topham
R.A., &c. Mr. Elmore, R.A., intended following the cortege,
but was seized with
,an attack of sciatica, which rendered
him unable to do so. The funeral took place amidst a
shower of drizzling rain; the Rev. Mr. Stuart, chaplain to
the Cemetery, being the officiating clergyman.
On Saturday a married woman named Anne
Philipson, living at Whittle-10-Woods, near Chorley, was
found burnt to death. On Friday night she and her hus-
band called at the house of a married daughter. The hus-
band left his wife and went to a relative's named Crook,
who lived near, and remained there the whole of the night.
His wife called at a public-house and had some ale,
and it has not been ascertained that she was again
seen alive; but her daughter states that she was then far
gone in drink. The husband went home at seven o'clock
on Saturday morning, and was horrified at finding his wife
on the kitchen floor near the fire-place, and burnt to death
in a most shocking manner. Her body presented a fearful
spectacle, the lower portion of her clothing being burnt
away. A candlestick was on the table, and the candle was
burnt away ; but there is no mckng of Ip9wipg how the
ontva ono t 9 bs tnitt

FALSE DIXI RI ES;

Vi ee are not (d4pl the Atanchostet auaraian) among those
who attach a superstitious value to a university degree,
but in England, at least, men are in the habit of assum
ing certain antecedent conditions to such a combina-
tion of letters as MA., LL.D., and so on. The Ger-
man receipt for turning out doctors has been often
enough exposed, but not, it would seem, with effect. We
cut the following from a journal of high standing :
"Degrees :—M.A., Ph.D. &c. in absentia.—Qualified gen-
tlemen desirous of proceeding to the following honorary
degrees, BA., M.A., Ph.D., Ph.B., LL.B., LL.D., D.D.,
M.D. receive official instruction and advice, without
charge by writing to * * N.B.—These degrees and
diplomas are guaranteed bond fide, and they are
issued by colleges and universities empowered by
charter to grant the same. Only the applications of
Authors and other decidedly qualified candidates will be
replied to. Unqualified men and " busybodies " need not
trouble themselves to write, and their personal application
will not be attended to." There is something infinitely cool
in that " N. 8." to "unqualified men "and " busybodies."
In the nature of things, "unqualified men " and " busy-
bodies" can be the only persons for whom such an
advertisement can have any interest whatsoever.
There is, we fear, a steady growth of this form of doing
things by false pretences. It is something for a clergy-
man or a schoolmaster to be able to write M.A. or LL.D. or
D.D. after his name, and we are sorry to say that the thing
is sometimes done under circumstancos which would hardly
bear investigation. The clergy sin especially in this re-
spect. A degree is an affair of some importance to them,
and, too often, without troubling themselves to secure
even the seeming basis of fact which a few obscure foreign
universities place within their reach, they do not hesitate
to label themselves in the reading desk and at the altar
with (so to speak) a forged trade mark. We have seen a
St. Bees man clothe himself in the scarlet glories of a
doctor's hood, and it is notorious that when non-university
men take to this kind of thing they prefer a fine bright
colour. The Cambridge M.A. hood is much more safefrom
desecration of this sort than the corresponding Oxford
badge. Indeed, we remember with what bitterness of soul
an Oxford man once appealed to literates and men ordained
from theological colleges to turn their attention now and
then to Cambridge. But the white silk is less brilliant
than the red, and Oxford, we fear, has been, and continues
to be, grievously wronged in this respect. Has a literate
ever been detected wearing the blue—a very honourable
distinction, by the way—of Trinity College, Dublin, or
the lilac of Durham ?

THE INSTALLATION OF IRISH MAYORS

Mr. William Hegarty was installed as Mayor of Cork
on Saturday, this being his second year of office, and
received the thanks of the Council for his conduct during
the past year. The ceremony was conducted with
business-like brevity on all sides, and occupied only a few
minutes; but at its conclusion, Alderman O'Sullivan,
ex-mayor, to the surprise of most persons present,
insisted on explaining the motives which had induced
him to resign the office last year, as he phrased it, "to
make a great act of justice." The gist of his statement
was that feeling the fate of the Ministry depended on the
result, he, acting under the advice of his friends, sacrificed
himself to keep the Government in power. " If I," he said,
" had continued as Mayor of Cork, and opposed the Dis-
ability Bill brought in against me, the chances are the
Gladstone Government would have been shattered, and
Disraeli now in power. We have passed through times of
great excitement, and I now ask any good Irishman whe-
ther he would wish for the interest of this country that
Mr Disraeli and the Tory party of Ireland should be at the
head of affairs in this country. I made a great sacrifice,
but I believe it will still turn out for the best for the in-
terests of this country."

The installation of the Mayor of Limerick, Mr. Spil-
lane, was marked by a curious scene. The outgoing
mayor, Mr. Boyce, who does not seem to enjoy much
popularity with the democratic and "national " sec-
tion of the community, had stationed a strong force
of police at the entrance to the Council Chamber, with
orders to keep out the mob. Against this proceed-
ing Mr. Ambrose Hall, and other members of the
Council, protested in terms more forcible than complimen-
tary to his worship, of whom Mr, Hall spoke as "that man
who calls himself Mayor of Limerick ;" and Mr. Boyce, in
turn, sent for the head constable to put Mr. Hall out of
the chamber. The dispute was arranged without recourse
to so extreme a measure, and as soon as Mr. Spillane had
been invested with the insignia of office, Mr. Hall called
on him to order the "public" to be admitted to the
chamber and have the policemen turned out. Mr.
Spillane gave the requisite order as regards the "public,"
and the mob flocked into the chamber with noisy demon-
strations of delight at their victory over the unpopular
ex-chief magistrate. The rest of the proceedings were
rather turbulent.

An amusing incident cropped up in the installation of
Alderman Kenny as mayor of Clonmel. During the pro-
ceedings a councillor asked the ex-mayor whether it was
true that two of the town sergeants bad been arrested
by a military picket as Fenian emissaries a few nights
before, and his worship replied that it was. It appears
that the ex-mayor has a luxuriant turnip field close to the
walls of the military barracks, and having suffered from
depredations lately, he availed himself of his authority as
mayor, and set the two town sergeants to watch the
field. They were observed from the barrack wall
prowling about, in what seemed to the sentries a
suspicious manner, and a picket was despatched to
capture them. The surprise was cleverly effected, and
the sergeants, notwithstanding vociferous assertions of
their innocence, were detained in the guardroom for the
night. In the morning they were brought before a civil
magistrate, when explanations were given, and the men
liberated. Alderman Kenny, in returning thanks for his
election, made rather a "national" speech, ridiculing the
formation of flying columns in the country, and, alluding
to the late election, said he hoped when they had to return
a member again they would not have to apply to a Dublin
barrister.

The Pall 211-all Gazette contradicts the report that a
coastguard cruiser, supposed to be the Fanny, had been

lost near Cape Clear. The Admiralty have every reason
to believe that the vessel lost in that neighbourhood was
a small smack, taken up on freight, with Government
stores on board.

Marlborough College (says the Medical Times and
Gazette) has set the example of introducing the study of
physiology into our public schools. As all teaching to be
effective must be tested by examination, the class of phy-
siology at Marlborough College has just been examined.
Dr. Burney Yeo, of King's College, was the examiner. No
fewer than fifty-two boys sent in answers.

MORE SHOOTING IN IRELAND.—Mr. Crotty, a
farmer, was shot on Saturday night, near Ballincove,
county Mayo, while returning on a car from the fair at
Westport, and near his own house. Some of his hair wts
shot off the crown of his head, and the crown of his hat
blown away. The assassin, who was inside a hedge,
walked coolly away. Another man is reported to have
been shot near Crossmolins, in the same county.
BEVERAGES FOR SICK SOLDIERS.—The Secretary
of State for War has approved of soda-water being issued
to patients in army hospitals, in cases where the issue is
specially approved by the principal, or, in his absence, the
senior medical officer of the command. The issue of
bottled lemonade is prohibited. When fresh lemons cannot
be obtained, lemonade is to be prepared from lime-juice, in.
the proportion of two ounces of the juice to one pint of the
beverage.

AN OFFICIAL LNSPECTION OF THE SUEZ CANAL.--
Captain Richards, R.N., the hydrographer (who is not,
rumours to the contrary notwithstanding, going to resign
his place), will leave the Admiralty this week for Egypt,
for the purpose of thoroughly inspecting the Suez Canal,
and reporting to their lordships his opinion upon the
practicability of despatching vessels of war by the new
route ; but the gallant officer will not confine his observa-
tions to this solitary subject, but will take an enlarged
view of the probable uses to which M. de Lesseps' under-
taking can be turned.
- - -

TIIE YORICSIIIRE COAL MINERS.•-011 Monday a
meeting of five or or six hundred miners, who represented
three thousand men employed in the Leeds and Wakefield
district, was held at Castloford, in the Mechanics' Hall, to
discuss the advisability of soliciting from the employers
an advance of 7 per cent. in the present rate of wages.
A resolution was passed, asking the employers in mode-
rate t erms, to restore the men to the position they occu-
pied before 1358. Deputations were appointed to wait
upon the employers.

THE ADMINISTRATION OF TIIE CONTAGIOUS
DISEASES ACT.—The Secretary of State for War has issued
an order, under the powers of the Contagious Diseases
Act, which was formally served upon the police magis
trate at Woolwich, on Monday. The order provides that a
complete register shall be kept by the police in the dis-
tricts to which the Act applies of all the women residing
therein who come within its provisions, and that these
women are to be urged to sign a form of voluntary sub-
mission to medical inspection, being informed of the
penal consequences which may follow their refusal. If
they decline to do this the police will then summon
them to appear before the magistrate, to have an order
made against them under the 4th section_ of the amended
Aot of nev,

PROFESSOR TYNDALL TO THE CHILDREN.

Professor John Tyndall, F.R.S., delivered the third of his
series of lectures to children upon " Light," at the Royal
Institution on Saturday. He began by proving, by the
aiclt of simple experiments, that light travels in
stiaight lines. He proceeded to....„:Ocplain the action of
double-convex lenses upon. rays of light. He bril•
liantly illuminated the face of a boy with a parallel
beam from the electric lamp, and 9iefi he threw a large
image of the boy's face upon the screen by means of a
lens. Hs explained the principles governing the
construction of the magic lantern. First, a bri:liani
source of light is necessary, and in front of it, between
the light and the slide, it is necessary to place a double
convex lens, somewhat larger in diameter than the glass
picture, and of great curvature—two piano-convex lenses
mounted close together, with their convex surfaces next
each other, answer better than a double convex lens. The
object of the lens between the light and the slide is simply
to strongly illuminate the picture. A double convex
lens mounted in front of the picture is then all that is ne•
ce3sary to throw an enlarged image of the painting upon
the screen. The lenses are mounted in tubes, and the
light is enclosed in a lantern, in order to keep the room in
darkness. In this way a home-made magic :lantern may be
very easily and cheaply constructed.

LORD CAMPBELL UPON LIFE PEERAGES.

Lord Campbell and Stratheden has been discoursing to
the Liberals of Harwich on life peerages. He said that
the project of life peerages had been rejected as entirely
inadequate. It had been rejected because it was thought
likely to disturb the House of Lords rather than re-
form it. At the outside it would enable legal digni-
taries to escape what they sometimes regarded as the
burden of an hereditary peerage. Imperfect as it was, he
(Lord Campbell) had supported it. It had brought the
whole question of the House of Lords under parliamentary
discussion. The mind of that House had been awakened
to a kind of self-examination. Unless the topic was
stirred again next session, the opening would be closed.
and self-complacent indolence would again present a rigid
front to every invader. If they desired change to
be effected in that House, it was essential to follow
up the blow which had been given. Anyone might ask,
however. " Why should it be altered?" and to
that question, as a person intimately versed in its pro-
ceedings, he should not hesitate to answer. His lordship,
having admitted the great merits which the House of
Lords displayed in the late debates on the Irish Church,
went on to remark that the assemblage consisted of
about 450. From circumstances which, as he should
afterwards explain, involved no great reproach, 400 were
habitually absent, and the remaining 50 conducted
the business and debates. The 50, however, could
not all be present on every occasion. Their number
was frequently reduced, and important motions come on
before 20 and 30. By a law well known to men of parlia-
mentary experience, the dullness of proceedings increased
with the paucity of numbers. Those who came,finding the
fatigue they suffered insupportable, were less apt to come
again, and so the inanition was continually increasing. No
doubt, on critical occasions, the 400 went to London in a
body, and then the House assumed a very different aspect.
But whenever this occurred another class of evils rose
to activity. The House, according to its standing orders,
had not any functionary appointed for the mainte-
nance of order. They overlooked what, all over the world,
in this country, in America, and in Australia, the
Anglo-Saxon race acknowledge as the first necessity of
an assembly met together to debate and determine. If
violence occurred, no one was under and obligation to
rebuke it; if usages were trampled under foot, no one
had the least authority to vindicate them. If a dozen
members rose at once—and in the late debates they often
did so—clamour only settled a priority. No one had disputed
the anomaly, no one had defended, and no one could
reform it. Committees had sat in vain to intimate a
remedy. The principle which he submitted, with
fearless confidence to them and every man in the com-
munity, was that if superstition, torpor, or decrepi-
tude rendered an assembly incapable of those internal
changes which its dignity required, external change was
necessary to enforce them. If in point of numbers an
assembly fell below the necessary standard of efficiency,
external change was necessary to invigorate it. It was no
disparagement to 50 men, however able, sensible, and
business-like, to regard them as unequal to the
vast responsibility of balancing the other House
of Parliament. But in point of fact the two
defects were entertwined 'with one another. Men
of judgment and experience—and they were frequent
!.n that House—would not habitually attend a body
which had not any functionary to • control it.
Some would be inclined to ask what plan ought to be
adopted, and that question must be answered by the gifted
persons to whom political employment had been
given in the country. He had formed his own ideas
as to a change, but did not think it prudent to disclose
them. In the meanwhile he should support any proposi-
tion, from whatever quarter it might come, which would
.nsure an efficient Speaker on the woolsack, and a
working audience of a hundred. But although it was
lot possible to say what exact scheme ought to be fol-
.owed, he would suggest the steps to be adopted if any
good was ever to be done upon the subject. It was
essential that the Liberal Associations of the country
should declare themselves. The question could only be
initiated, or, as it was initiated, rather advanced in the
House of Lords; and no one could encounter the lethargic,
superstitious, indolent resistance it would meet with in
some quarters unless a strong opinion out of doors
were ready to assist him. On the other hand, there
were, no doubt in that House, the elements of acqui-
escence and of sympathy. A large number of the Opposi-
tion were inclined to go with Lord Salisbury upon this as
upon other subjects. The Government, having supported
the recent measure on life peerage, were bound to listen
to proposals for effecting the result which that unsatis-
factory suggestien had arpired to. There remained another
element of sympathy which was easily apparent to those
who mingled in the body. The men who influenced pro-
:eedings, and attended at debates, had nearly all been
educated in the other House of Parliament. They cast
nany "lingering, longing looks behind" upon the
!radio they had quitted. They often pined for its
genial warmth, its animation, its vicissitudes, its num-
bers, and its movements; they were apt to quote its pre-
cedents, and even reasoned from its usages. They had not
therefore, much alacrity for wholesale vindication of a
plane in which their faculty and industry were frequently
suspended. If the defence of Babylon had been imposed
apon the exiles of Jerusalem, a more reluctant garrison
ould not have been summoned to exert itself. At the
lame time there might, no doubt, be party battles on the
.object. On no other ground had he presented it as dis-
tinguished from other topics to their notice. But the
party might act upon the sense an ancient line had con-
veyed—" Let us become the men by whom our early
dangers were encountered.'

At the commencement of the next financial year
three of the foremen in Chatham Dockyard will be super-
annuated, with a view to reduce the staff, ten years being
added to the service of these officers to increase the amount
of their pensions.

•
The question was recently propounded in a Sunday
school—rather an odd question for such a place—how we
know that it was intended a man should have but one
wife. " Because," promptly answered a little girl, "it says
In the Bible that no man can serve two masters."

EXTRAORDINARY ANECDOTE.—The Rev. H. Ward
Beecher,in a sermon preached at Boston (U.S.), onthe 19th
tat., said :—" Men got the notion that they had committed
the sin against the Holy Ghost, very often as the result of
bodily weakness operating upon the mind. It assumed then
the form of a religious melancholy or insanity; but when
men had any anxiety at all about it, it shewed that
there was a conscience left, and they were not reprobate.
Good Christian men sometimes got that notion. One of
the predecessors in his father's church—Dr. Champin, of
Litchfield, Connecticut—had this conviction, and he never
•hewed himself so much a Christian as when he thought
that God was about to send him to hell ; for if it was His
will he said he would go willingly. Well, he was very
miserable about it until one bright day the thought struck
him that when he got to hell he would open a prayer
meeting there."

LECTURE BY A FENIAN.—The Fenians of this
city and vicinity filled the hall of the Cooper Union last
evening to listen to Mr. John Boyle O'Reilly, who was
engaged in the Fenian demonstration at Manchester, Eng-
land, and who has just escaped from Australia, where he
was serving a sentence of twenty years for complicity in
that outbreak. Mr. O'Reilly, who was formerly a
member of the 10th British Hussars, assured his hearers
that the mass of the British army was with them in their
cause. " The fire of civil liberty had been lighted in
their hearts, and English strength, and gold, and cruelty
would never extinguish that fire—nothing but English
blood would do it." Ho then alluded to his arrest and
confinement in no less than six different prisons in Eng-
land, after being badly treated for attempting to escape,
and finally being sent to Australia in a convict ship with
150 criminals. From Australia he escaped in a row-boat,
and was pick6d up at sea by a whaling-ship, the Gazelle of
new York, and from her transferredto the Sapphire, which
carried him to Liverpool, and from there he came to New
York. Mr. O'Reilly yris frecitinifitintenntq
_4lVew