The Sun.
London, England, 1870-11-23 00:00:00

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HER MAJESTY.

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BALMORAL, Nov. 20.
The Queen was present at Divine service at the parish
church of Crathie.

Princess Beatrice and Prinee Leopold were also pre-

The Duchess of Roxburghe and Viscount Bridport were
in attendance.
The Rev. Dr. Taylor officiated.

THE EDUCATION ACT.

Professor Huxley, a candidate for Marylebone on the
new London Board, attended a public meeting which was
held on Monday evening in Providence Hall, Paddington.
Professor Huxley, who was well received, said he desired
simply to administer this Act as an honest man,
according to the letter and spirit of the law, so that
they might make the present epoch one of the
greatest in the history of England. The Act
could, however, never be fairly carried out if
the new Boards of Education were made the battle-fields
of party. There were certain branches of instruction to
which the poorer classes must submit in order to make
their education worth having. In the first place, he
thought that much attention should be paid to physical
training. He did not say that all the evils to which the
poorer classes were subjected could be remedied byeducation,
but he did say that during the tender years of life children
should have a sound physical education. Without that a
strong race of men could never grow up. Then he thought

they ought to teach children something of the domestic
conditions of life, so that they might assist in earning the
means of living and bringing out the best advantages
of these means. He thought also that children
should be taught something of the history of
the country in which they live, the relations of capital
to labour, and some of those great problems, the mis-
understanding of which was agitating the whole fabric of
society. A mistaken notion prevailed that when a child
had been taught to read and write, it had been sufficiently
educated. He would not say a word against reading for
instruction, but he thought that children should be taught
to read for amusement, for he was a believer in amuse-
ments, which ought to form a part of the work of daily
life. A resolution pledging the meeting to support -Mr.
Huxley was carried unanimously.
Mr. Hepworth Dixon addressed a crowded meeting of
the ratepayers of Marylebone. In the course of his
address Mr. Hepworth Dixon, referring to the 200,000
. children in the metropolis who had to be rescued from
the army of disorder, said that five-and-twenty years
ago he had begun to study the condition of the poor in
schools, workhouses, and gaols, and he gave this as the
result of much thought and investigation, that every child
that was neglected and allowed to go astray cost five times
as much as the child that was tenderly taken hold of and
made an honest mau. A vote of confidence in Mr. Dixon
was passed.
No fewer than ten public meetings were held in Bir
mingham on Monday night on the School Board question.
Of these four were in favour of religious teaching, and in
support of the eight candidates nominated by the Educa-
tion Uniou. A fifth was in support of the candidature of
Dr. Melson, who is also an advocate of religious teaching.
Four of the meetings pledged themselves by resolution to
use. their efforts to secure the return of the fifteen League
candidates nominated by the Liberal Association. The
tenth was in favour of Mr. Kirkwood, who comes for-
ward as a working man's candidate.

THE BENEFIT OF ATHLETICS.
Oxford and Cambridge have just been holding their
athletic festivals. No doubt there is much to be raid
against the excessive development which athletism at the
universities has recently attained. The undergraduate
who is nothing more than a " pot-hunter"' and whose
highest aspiration is to cover his side table with tankards
and trophies which his pedestrian or saltatory prowess has
procured him, is not a particularly pleasing phenome-
non. Still, making all due deductions on these and on
other grounds, there are still some things to be urged in
favour of the system of athletic sports. Their economical
and moral influence has been decidedly satisfactory. Be-
fore they became recognised institutions there was a not
inconsiderable class of young men who found themselves
without any attractive and available kind of physical re-
creation. There was the river and the huntingfield, and
during the short summer term the cricket-field. Physical
reasons or tastes kept as many from the latter as
financial reasons did, or ought to have done, from either
of the former. The undergraduate who did not care
about boating was tempted irresistibly to hunt, and the
expenses of hunting at Oxford or Cambridge are in
most cases unjustifiable. Athletic sports supply a whole-
some and inexpensive safety valve for the ebullition of
the superfluous animal energy and spirits for which
some outlet must be found. The stables of Mr.
Charles Symonds and of Mr. Mortlock havo suffered
as perceptibly by the popularisation of athletic
sports as the pockets of undergraduates and their parents
have gained. Athletic sports have given a motive for
active exertion to a whole host of young men who under
other circumstances would have devoted themselves to
the unprofitable occupation of loafing, of hanging about 4
the High-street, now diving into a tobacconist's, now
lingering amid the close atmosphere of billiard-rooms.
It may well be said that loafing at Oxford or Cambridge
is the root of all evil. It is not the man who has a healthy
pastime, even if it engrosses too much of his time, who is
apt to go wrong, but he who has none. It will be possibly
urged that athletic sports have given a stimulus to betting.
The answer to this is that a taste for speculation is innate
in all Englishmen, and if the object is not given them
they will create it. As it is, athletic sports have really
tended to improve the moral as well as the economical
habits of Oxford and Cambridge undergraduates.—Pat
Mall Gazette.

SEVERE STORK IN THE NORTH.—The steamer
Clydesdale, of Glasgow, from the North, reports that a
severe storm from the north-east had visited the various
islands on the north-west coast, and considerable damage
had been done to shipping and fishing-boats. The storm
has been raging at intervals during the past 10 days. At
all places of shelter a number of vessels had been forced
in from the weather, particularly to Stornoway and
Tobemory, where there were several foreign trading
vessels lying at anchor. A large steamer bound from
Riga had also run into Stornoway. The Clydesdale was
unable to call at several of the ferries, either going north
or returning. At two or three of the ferry stations there
had been no communication for six and even ten days.
On Friday a complete change took place in the direction
of the wind ; the Islay, which arrived on Saturday,
reporting the wind outside as south-west, and still blow-
ing hard.
THE RIFLE OF THE FUTURE.—The Army and
Navy Gazette is premature in announcing the definitive
adoption of the Martini-Henry rifle. The trials which
were ordered to be carried out by the troops are not yet
completed—at any rate, we understand that all the
reports have not been received. And it is improbable that
any decision will be come to until the whole programme
has been worked through. The committee which has
been appointed to digest the reports on these final trials,
and which will be required to pronounce on the evidence
of these trials for or against the arm, is still sitting. We
trust, however, that a decision will be come to in time te,
enable arrangements to be made to discontinue the manu-
facture of the present large-bore rifles at the close of the
financial year, and to commence the rearmament of our
regular troops with the more perfect small-bore Martini-
Henry. If by that time we are not in a position to pro-
nounce decisively as to this arm, we shall begin to despair
of a decision ever being come to at all. Assuredly no
military arm has ever been subjected to such an exhaus-
tive and thorough trial before its introduction as that
which the Martini-Henry has very properly been required
to undergo.—Pall Mall Gazette.
AN ENVOY FROM ABYSSINIA.---A correspondent
writing from Alexandria informs us that Dejar Girgis,
President of the Council of Prince K.sa, of Tigrd, whom
we mentioned a short time ago as having reached Cairo,
in company with several other Abyssinians of rank,
charged with presents for her Majesty, was expected to
leave shortly by Peninsular and Oriental steamer for
Southampton, the Home Government having expressed
their readiness to receive the envoy and to shew him
every attention. Prince Kasa,
_it will be remembered,
rendered good service to Lord Napier of Magdala when
our invading army entered Tigrd ; since then he assisted
Mr. Powell in bringing the murderers of his brother to
punishment ; and it was he who seized Aba Eminiatu,
who instigated the attack on M. Munzinger, and sent
him a prisoner to Massowa. We understand 'that this
mission has no political object, and originated in a simple
desire on the part of Kitsa to cultivate friendly relations
with the English, and to secure, if possible, our co-
operation in developing the trade of Abyssinia. The great
drawback to the country in this respect is the want of a
seaport on the Red Sea for the egress and ingress of its
commerce. The Viceroy of Egypt, we are pleased to
learn, has not been backward to entertain the envoy, a 3,„
much out of respect for us as for his master, M13.'1.-1404'
Mall Gazette.