The Sun.
London, England, 1870-05-21 00:00:00

A LISBON STORY.

A strange tragedy is announced from Lisbon. SenhorViera
de Castro, formerly Deputy, and an author of some note,
has strangled his wife. He found that she was carrying
on, an underhand correspondence with Senhor Maria de
Garrett, who was considered one of his most intimate
friends, and in the end she confessed her actual guilt.
The husband then half smothered her with chloroform,
after which he completed her death by strangulation. 1)e
Garrett, to whom he afterwards sent a challenge for a
duel d l'outrance, declined to fight him, but intima:;ed
that he was willing to lose his life as an expiation fur the
injury inflicted, adding that he should pass a
certain spot at such an hour. The injured man, how-
ever, did not carry his revenge further, but went to
the Prefecture of Police and constituted himself prisoner.
The other has, it is rumoured, entered a Trappist monas-
tery. The murdered lady was only nineteen.

At the Preston Petty Se3sions a juryman in oae
of the cases was " caught napping." Mr. Addison the
counsel for the defence, said he trusted that those of the
jury who had been asleep during the hearing of the case
would not endeavour to influence the decision of those
who had been awake.

The last term before the Long Vacation com-
mences on Thursday next. The anticipations respecting
the business of last term were not fulfilled, and stagnation
is loudly complained of throughout the profession.
Trinity Term does not promise any improvement, and
the Long Vacation will, it is thought, chew no signs of
improvement.

The Irish rimes mentions a report that the Lord-
Lieutenancy <,: 1-4z)ndonderry, now vacant, will be offered
to Mr. Baron Martin, who has property in the county to
the extent of between £3,000 and £t,ooo a year. The
learned judge, who has been for twenty years on the Bench,
express?d the wish last year to retire from active judicial
service.

Summonses for amounts due on rates on the pro-
perty of charitable institutions have been taken out by
the Birmingham overseers*The summonses are returnable
for Thursday next, but as the second reading of Mr.
Muntz's bill exempting charitable institutions from the
payment of rates comes on in the House on Wednesday
for a second reading, it is probable that the application
for distress warrants will not be enforced.

Mr. Edmund Yates, in the Western Mail Bag,
has the following in reference to the Newspaper Benevo-
lent Fund dinner :—" Your readers will perhaps have
observed that no report of the proceedings was given by
the Timm That journal has been resolutely opposed to
the Newspaper Benevolent Fund since its institution, and,
true to its usual practice, carries out a sorry spite by
ignoring the existence of the charity. Dr. Russell, how-
ever, thinks diffelently from his colleagues on this subject,
and makes a point of attending the anniversary festival."
A- diabolical act was committed at Bromley -on
Thursday. It appears that some person contrived to throw
down the chimney of a house in Market-street a canister
of gunpowder, which immediately on reaching the fire ex-
ploded with a loud noise. The force of the shock threw
the servant girl on the floor, burnt a portion of her hair off
her head, and scorched her severely. Had the outrage
bt.,:n 'perpetrated a few minutes earlier the conse-
cp.• . would probably have been more disastrous, us the
laudia.dy had been sitting near the fire with an infant on
her lap.