The Sun.
London, England, 1851-05-07 00:00:00

LONDON, WEDNESDAY EVENING,

STATE OF TRADE.

(From the Manchester Guardian of this day.)
MANCHESTER, TUESDAY.—In our last report we
stated that the loss of confidence had become greater and
prices
lower subsequently to Tuesday's market. To-
day, mule and water twist,in the bundle, has been sold
at id. to id. per lb. below the quotations then current;
and goods also have generally yielded more or less, in the
light and medium qualities lid. to 3d. per piece. Prices
may be considered sully as low as they were on Friday and
Saturday; certainly, the decline is batter ascertained, for
business was rendered next to impossible last week, by the
prevalence of a feeling very much akin to panic; where-
as, there have been transactions to-day, particularly in
shipping yarns, and offers to a fair extent have been
made, both for them and for some descriptions of cloth,
which serve at least to indicate an opinion amongst the
buyers that it is as well to be purchasing some of the
supplies they may want. The fall in prices is now
very serious, and, singular as it may appear,
stocks are light in the hands of spinners, and by no
means heavy in those of the manufacturers at large.
From Bombay the advice as to yarns and goods are
more favourable than they were expected to be, but they
are not very satisfactory from Calcutta. For the former
market there have accordingly been inquiries and offers
for yarns and goods tc-day, but scarcely any for the
latter. The impression produced by the American
letters is, that they point to a larger supply than the
precious ones did.
ROCHDALE, MONDAY.—Tbe flannel market remains
dull and inactive, and the merchants are offering lower
prices. In kerseys and coarse goods there has been very
little doing. The wool market is still, and former prices
are fully maintained.
HUDDERSFIELD, TUESDAY,—NOt so much has been
done in our market to-day. The stocks in the Cloth
Hall are on the increase; there have not been many large
buyers in town this last week, and consequently delive-
ries have not been very large. The wool market is
slack, as the manufacturers cannot be induced to buy
until the forthcoming sales have commenced.
HALIFAX, SATURDAY.—There has been but a slender
attendance of buyers in our Piece Hall to-day ; and the
amount of business transacted has been very limited.
The spinners are asking a slight advance upon yarn,
and a check has consequently been given to the purchases.
On some sorts of wool the staplers have obtained a
trifling advance in price, and the quantity changing hands
is scarcely so large as it was.
LEEDS, TUESDAY.—The markets at the Cloth Halls
to-day were dull, neither can we report much doing to
order. The shipping houses are rather busy ; but for
the home trade there is not much doing.

WHERE SHALL WE BURY OUR DEAD?
(From the Leader.)
A long and interesting Report, dated " Whitehall,
April 2, 1851, and signed "Ashley, Edwin Chad-
wick, and T. Southwood Smith," hes been presented
to Parliament and published, on Extramural Inter-
meets in the country towns. According to the report,
the country generally is in favour of an Act of Par-
liament for prohibiting the burial of the dead within
the limits or towns; and certainly the evidence fur-
nished by the corps of inspectors acting under the orders
of the Board of Health, of the ever-crowded and dis-
gusting state of our graveyards, sufficiently warrants the
conclusions of public opinion. The inspectors have ex-
amined the burial places of 200 towns, and found them
mainly in as bad a condition as those of London.
A fwri instances will give an idea of the general
condition of the inspected districts. At Great Yar-
mouth 9,235 bodies have been buried in the parish
churchyard in twenty years. At Burslem and other
towns, bodies are brought into the town from the
country; and at Norwich the churchyards, which
Evelyn declared to be 200 years ago, a " congestion
of dead bodies, one on another for want of
earth, even to the vary top of the walls, and some
above the walls," have since received no less than halt
a million in addition; consequently, in the words of the
report, "a very large portion of the soil, for the depth
of many feet, consists of decomposed human bodies."
Dover, Huddersfield, Portsmouth, and other towns are
in the like condition. In Pearith the churchyards con-
tain, some twenty-one, others fourteen and fifteen layer.
of bodies. The stench arising from these patches of
corruption in summer is so strong and baneful, that one
instance is reported of the windows of a church opening
on the yard being boarded up.
At Banbury and Beaconsfield, we are told that the
coffins swim about in the vaults; the sexton of the
former stating that he always got the water out as nigh
as he could when the parties were coming out of church.
The remedy of these evils the Board of Health find in
a general prohibitory Act, giving adequate power to the
local boards for establishing cemeteries, and reserving to
the central board the duty of supervision. Tee machinery
created by the Public Health Act would be available for
this purpose; end it is recommended that general district
rates be levied under such Act where it is in operation,
for meeting preliminary expenses; and where it is not,
those expenses to be charged on th poor-rates. Choice
of sites, plans, burial arrangements, all these are to be
subject to the approval of the Board of Health. An ad-
ministrative functien, the raising and eontrol of the
necessary funds, would be entrusted to the local boards.
Not the least important paragraphs of the report
are those which detail the obstacles in the way of im-
provement. These may be indicated as consisting of
enormous expense attending special Acts of Parlia-
ment; difficulties of inducing unity of action among
the interested parties ; and ignorance among the
local authorities. It is also stated that the provincial
cemeteries have generally failed hitherto, and that, in
spite of the over-crowed state of the graveyards, bodies
are continually sent to ho buried.
On the whole the report contains ample proof of the
necessity for burial without the limits of towns ; but it
may be questioned whether the centralizing tendency
is not too much iatroduced into the plan recommended
to Parliament.

" On a mode of Computation for excluding Floodwater
from a Set of Guagiegs at Regular Intervals," and Mr.
Blackwell's " Results of a Series of Experiments on the
Discharge of Water by Overfalls," were announced to
bs read, and the monthly ballot for members to take
place.