The Sun.
London, England, 1870-03-03 00:00:00

THE MISSING STEAINISHIP.

No news has yet been received by Messrs. In-
man, at Liverpool, respecting the City of Boston
steamship ; and the Bristol telegram is believed to
have no foundation.

TOTAL DESTRUCTION OF DAY AND
MARTIN'S BLACKING FACTORY.

Last night at a few minutes before 11 o'clock
one of the most extensive conflagrations that has
for a long time occurred on the Surrey side of the
river broke out in a large range of premises re-
cently erected by Messrs. Day and Martin, the
well-known blacking makers, whose premises in
Holborn, it will be remembered, were destroyed
by a similar calamity a few months since.
The scene of the present disaster was the Vaux-
hall-road, near the Nine Elms goods station, and the
building in question was from 240 ft. to 250 ft. long,
and two floors high. Each compartment contained
goods used in the manufacture of blacking, includ-
ing carboys of oil of vitriol, hogshead of molasses,
tierces of lamp and ivory black, puncheons of oil,
and other articles of an inflammable character.
The fire was first noticed by a policeman, who found
it raging in the lower floor, and in the course of a
few minutes the flames mounted high into the air
and illuminated the river Thames, the Houses of
Parliament, and the venerable Abbey at West-
minster. With all possible expedition the large
land steamer from Hewitt's Brewery, at
Larkhall-lane, Clapham, attended, as well as
others of the Metropolitan Brigade. In spite, how-
ever, of the torrents of water thrown upon the
flames they continued to progress fearfully, and as
the carboys and bottles burst they made a noise re-
sembling the discharge of firearms. The firemen
kept to their posts, but they were unable to get the
fire under until past two this morning. The build-
ing was then nearly destroyed. The total loss
will amount to some thousands of pounds sterling,
and it is understood that the firm is uninsured.
Nearly 100 workmen will be thrown out of em-
ployment. 'The origin of the fire is at present un-
known.

This morning Captain Shaw made his official
report of the damage done at Messrs. Day and
Martin's blacking manufactory, in the Vauxhall-
road, Wandsworth-road, which was as follows :
"Messrs. Day and Martin, blacking makers ; a
building of two floors, used as paper oil-saturating
and drying rooms, 200 feet long and 27 feet broad,
nearly burnt out, and most part of roof off. Messrs.
Rolfe and Gardiner, lath renders; a building of
one floor 200 feet long and 27 feet wide, all adjoin-
ing ',and communicating, damaged, breakage, and
water. The Lambeth supplementary workhouse ;
the ground floor severely damaged by water, &c.
Messrs. Day and Martin were not insured. The
origin of the fire is unknown."
Divers other fires also took place in the metro-
politan district last night.

Mr. Ede, storekeeper at the Royal Victoria Vic-
tualling Yard, has been pensioned on £5OO per
annum. His successor has not yet been appointed.

Dec 4, Jan. 1,
1869. 1870. Increase. Decrease.
Bank of England 23,181,190 22,708,752' 474,438
Private Banks 2,751,719 2,66 .1e• p 9,599
Joint-stock Banks 2,3 8,739 2,281,198 87,541
Total in England 28,301,6445 27,650,070 6;1.57d
Scotland 5,287,1531:4,875,• 47 312,' I 1
Ireland 7,354,1631 7,056,256 197,907

SKETCHES IN PARLIAMENT.

WEDNESDAY.

Why do the wheels of our Osborne's chariot tarry so
long in coming ? The sprightliness to which his election
gave rise has died away under the heart-sickening delay
which has occurred- in taking his seat. If only he had
been here on Monday we might have pardoned Mr.
Childers his portentous speech of three hours, and while
the First Lord of the Admiralty presented to us the not
very inspiring spectacle of his back, we would have gazed
upon the face of the member for Waterford, and felt more
than compensated for all our sufferings. Then, too,
what a treat we might have had if he who in a
former stage of his electoral existence, his third—his Dover
stage, I believe—was Secretary to the Admiralty, had
but given us some of his experience of crass ignorance and
stupidity in " My lords " of the old time, and wide-awake
cleverness and rascality on the part of palm-itching sub-
ordinates of all time. His immortal predecessor, Pepys
himself, might have been surpassed if only " Bernal " had
been present to tell of the doings and the misdoings of the
Admiralty. As it was, Mr. Baxter did his best to enliven
the evening with some pretty revelations ; but it is no dis-
credit to him to say that he cannot compare with the old
and beloved House of Commons jester, for the sight of
whose cap and the sound of whose bells we all languish.
Last night I went down early in the hope of seeing our
Osborne take his seat. Prayers over, my heart beat high
as the cry " New Member " resounded through the House,
and still higher when my neighbour whispered "from over
the water." It was an Irish member, and he was heartily
cheered by Ministerial members ; but it was not the elect
of Waterford, it was not even " the sham
Fenian;" it was the Irish Solicitor - General
fresh from his triumph at Londonderry over
Spofforth and his patrons in the person of Mr.
Spofforth's partner, Mr. Dudley Baxter, he who is so
skilful in statistics that he has proved incontrovertibly
that Mr. Gladstone's majority at the late election was all
a mistake, and that the Conservatives ought now to be
sitting on the right hand of Mr. Speaker. Then for 20
minutes there was a period of half-suspended ani-
mation, interrupted only by hon. members popping
up in different parts of the House to present
petitions about all and sundry matters. I fancy
some M. P.'s were rather ashamed of their work.
Portly Mr. Locke, for instance, looked rather sheepish
when he presented Martha Sexton's petition for the repeal
of the Vaccination Act. Ido not know if Martha is a
sexton by profession as well as by name. I should think
that she was, judging from the prayer of her petition, and
that she had regard to the welfare of the coffin interest.
Once more my pulse quickened at the sound of "New
Member." Surely this time we should not be diappointed.
But, alas—

He cometh not we said,
We are aweary, aweary,
We would that we were dead.
It was the lion. Auberon Edward William Molyneux
Herbert who last week was
Abroad in the meadows
To see the young lambs;
the lambs of Nottingham, those playful, sportive, young
creatures, whose every movement is grace. Mr. Herbert
had watched these young lambs bound
" As to the tabor's sound,"
and it is, perhaps, not surprising if in watching there
smash the Windows of his supporters, he added---

To me alone there came a thought of grief
A timely utterance gave that thought relief
And I again am strong." ,
This " utterance " was the final declaration of the poll,
and that was surely enough to make the hon. and polyono-
matous member " strong" enough to do without the sup-
port of the two custodians who brought him up, bowing
simultaneously, before they went through the work of
Introduction and taking the oaths.
And now it is half-past four, and the Speaker's sonorous
"Order, or-der" puts a stop to the gossip that has been
going on, and sundry notices of motion are given. There
Is nothing mirth-inspiring in Mr. Newdegate. Very much
the reverse ; he would make his fortune as a mute. Never,
theless, the House laughed loud when the hon. and
funereal member, in subdued tones, as though he were
ushering mourners into sable coaches, announced that
he would on Tuesday, 29th, move for a select committee
to inquire into the existence and character of certain mon-
astic institutions in this country. Immediately after him
rose Lord Claud John Hamilton to postpone, until the
same day, his motion relative to the dismissal of Mr.
Madden. I wonder which will have the precedence. If
the first, Mr. Newdegate will be safe against the other-
wise inevitable count out, for hon. members are looking
forward to "a jolly row" when the Madden case
c3mes on, if, indeed, it do come on; and rather than miss
it, they will endure Mr. Newdegate's maddening
oratory. There was much cheering when Mr. Fawcett
gave notice that he would call upon the Government to
give effect to the memorial recently presented from Tri-
nity College, Dublin, on the subject of religious disabili-
ties, for Radical M.P.'s had wit enough to see that this
will bring on the whole subject of University tests,
which, for some unexplained reason, Ministers seem
strangely reluctant to deal with. Captain Dawson Darner
got laughed at for suggesting that divorce suits should be
heard in private, and Mr. Bruce reminded the House that
the Lords had inserted a provision to this effect in the
Divorce Court Bill, but the Commons had thrown it out
on the ground that publicity was necessary to the admi-
nistration of justice. Then Captain Vivian and Mr.
Grant Duff had to answer a number of questions, which
the first especially did lvith admirable conciseness and
lucidity. The list of questions closed with an answer
to one by Mr. Bowing from Mr. Bruce which caused
great satisfaction. It was a promise that the cab
laws of the metropolis should bo consolidated during the
oresent session.

But where was the question of all questions during this
time? How came it to pass that the series which Mr.
• ;Redstone declared was the longest notice of
luestions ever put by mortal man to mortal man,
.nd which would immortalise the hon. member for
Devizes, was not forthcoming ? I cannot say. I know that
day after day this portentous notice has appeared in the
parliamentary papers, thereby involving a serious increase
In the vote for parliamentary printing. Yet when
we came to look for it yesterday evening it
was gone. It was all, about Mr. Heron, Mr. Butt, Mr.
Madden, and other Irish celebrities, and there was every
prospect that Sir Thomas Bateson would thereby obtain
for himself a fame surpassing that acquired by his prede-
cessor in the representation of Devizes, the great Darby
Griffith himself. Yet, at the ic cry last moment, the
gigantic question disappeared, and the stalwart and swarthy
questioner non erat. Taking this fact in conjunction with
Lord Claud John Hamilton's postponement of his motion
about Mr. Madden, I am inclined to think that the
Opposition find they have got hold of a bad case, and that
they will quietly let it drop. Anyhow, the postponement
enabled us to get to the business of the evening at the
unusually early hour of four minutes to five.
The business was begun by Mr. R. Torrens, M.P. for
Cambridge—a bald-headed, grey-bearded gentleman, svlsg
is not an orator, and did not pretend to be ono. In a
quiet, sensible manner he unfolded his argument. He
urged that the distress of the country was so great that
where there was work for two men three demanded it, and
that their wages had been brought down below subsis-
tence point. Therefore he would ask Government to
assist in removing labourers from a land where there was
no room for them, to one where there was a boundless
field. He could not see why Government should not ad-
vance loans to English emigrants as much as to
the Irish tenants who are to be assisted under
the Irish Land Bill. Mr. Torrens spoke for
thirty-eight minutes, and his motioiV was seconded by a
member on the Conservative side of the Hoilse, Mr. East-
wick, who L. 'ately been engaged in the somewhat hope-
less task of inducing the Venezuelan Government to pay
its English creditors. Mr. Eastwick svas not distinctly
heard, perhaps his bushy moustache and beard inter-
cepted the sound. But X noticed 'a singular 'fact in his
speech—whereas he had to refer repeatedly to his notes
for ideas, he never needed to do so for his figures. His
arguments sometimes failed him, his statistics never ; so I
infer that the member for Falmouth will shine rather as a
man of business than as an orator. He spoke for twenty-
six minutes, and then there was a pause ; but as no other
M.P. seemed desirous to speak, Mr. Mbeisell rose to
expound the policy of the Government. He did this
with true Trish fervour, and though there were many
fallepies in his speech, he carried the House with
hini, and it was clear that Mr. Torrens would have no
chance of carrying his motion. After speaking for 29
minutes, two members got up—Mr. Aytoun (of tea-room
fame), and Lord George Hamilton. It was the turn for a
Conservative, and so the Speaker called upon the latter
M.P. It soon became known that ho was on'his legs, and
hon. members crowded in from the lobby and the
smoking-room to hear how the youthful son of the Duke
or avercorn, the lad wno won the metropolitan county in
such a triumphant manner, would acquit himself. He was
perfectly self-possessed without being bumptious; and
though I could hardly hear a word that he said, I gathered
from the frequent cheers which greeted him, from Mr. Char-
ley's beaming face, and from Mr. Gladstone's subsequent
compliment, that he spoke well. He took a quarter
of an hour. and then Mr. Sinclair Aytoun had his turn,
and M.P.'s went to dinner. He was followed by another
Scotchman, Mr. Macfie, of patent celebrity, and he by
lvfr. J. G. Talbot, one of the West Kent heroes at the
general election, and the brother of the warden of Keble
College. He spoke very well, and shared with Lord
George Hamilton the Premier's praise. It was something
for a new made Baronet to oppose the Government which
had " barrow-knighted Aim, yet this did Sir James Law-
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