The Sun.
London, England, 1856-08-06 00:00:00

LITERATURE.

Little Dorrit. No. IX. By Charles Dickens.
Very rapidly, indeed, wo are getting to the c aid
of " Part I. Poverty." Another number Lifting
about to bring us in, all probability, to "Part 11.
Riches." For th© present one terminates eigni&
cantly enough with "More Fortune Telling"--of
course by Pancks the Gipsy. The said Bohemian
grubber being so elatedat his discoveries that we find
him smoking cigarslike a small steam-engine--taking
part in "White Sand and Gray Sand," in theSnug-
geryof the 111arshalsea though he adds, in regard
to
his carolling, "I don't know anything about
it. Never mind. I'll take any part in anything.
alllt's
if you're loud enough"—oxcitedly
the same.
sticking his hair up "like a dark species of cocka-
too"—roug,hening it into so many additional prongs
that it flies up all over his head "like the myriad
points that break out in the last change of a
great firework"—and finally, after getting fresh-
ened up under the pump, and snorting himself dry
again in his handkerchief, flying in a wild burst of
leapfrog over the head of Mr. Rugg, of Pentonville
" You are to understand," he says to Arthur Clen-
nam, at last, in explanation of his boisterous
hilarity, " that we are this very day virtually
complete. We shan't be legally for a day or two.
Call it at the outside a week." Call it, we say
as among the breathless readers of Little Dorrit, a
month. Then " we" shall in all human likelihood
La admitted by Pancks the Gipsy, Pancks the
Tug, Pancks the Grubber, into some at least
among the many myteries affecting the good or
evil fortunes of the Dorrits of the Marshalsea.
Such creatures they are—these Dorrits Little
Amy being the only endurable one among them
she herself, in truth, being not merely endurable
bat very loveable indeed, a pearl picked up by a
tender fancy from the kennel of the old, sordid,
squalid, cruel, execrable Marshalsea ! Two other
chapters besides the one already particularised lend
their charms to the August number of Little Dorrit.
" The Word of a Gentleman "introducing us again
to the Murderer Rigaud under the guise of a tra-
velling man of fashion named Blandois, introduc-
ing us to him, and introducing him to Mrs. Cien-
nam ("Fate in a go-cart") in the grimly, old,
ghost-haunted, spectral " House upon Crutches"
where Flintwinch of the cut-down aspect shakes at
intervals the small remaining sanity of poor
Affery under her up-thrown apron. " Spirit"
the title of the other chapter—being
the strangest disclosure of that commodity
by the sister, brother, ana father of Little Amy
Dorrit—Fanny, Tip, and the Father of the Mar-
shalsea. In the development of very much of
which " Spirit"—Mrs. Plornish's father (" Old
Nandy" in the Workhouse, but " Old Mr. Nandy"
in Bleeding Heart-yard), is principally but at the
same time quite unconsciously instrumental. Here
is Boz's Picture of—

THE PAUPER !
" Anybody may pass, any day, in the thronged tho-
roughfares of the metropolis, some meagre, wrinkled, yel-
low old man (who might be supposed to have dropped
from the stars, if there were any star in the heavens dull
enough to be suspected of casting off so feeble a spark),
creeping along with a scared air, as though bewildered
and a little frightened by the noise and bustle. This old
man is always a little old man. If he were ever a big
old man, he has shrunk into a little old man ; if he were
always a little man, he has dwindled into a less old man.
His coat is of a colour, and cut, that never was the mode
anywhere, at any period. Clearly, it was not made for
him, or for any individual mortal. Some wholesale con-
tractor measured Fate for five thousand coats of such
quality, and Fate has lent this old coat to this old man, as
one of a long unfinished line of many old men. It has
always large dull metal buttons, similar to no other but-
tons. This old man wears a hat, a thumbed and napless
and yet an obdurate hat, which has never adapted itself
to the shape of his poor head. His coarse shirt and his
coarse neckcloth have no more individuality than his coat
and hat; they have the same character of not being his—
of not being anybody's. Yet this old man wears these
clothes with a certain unaccustomed air of being dressed
and elaborated for the public ways ; as though he passed
the greater part of his time i❑ a nightcap and gown. And
so, like the country mouse in the second year of a famine,
come to see the town-mouse, and timidly threading his way
to the town-mouse's lodging through a city of cats, this
old man passes in the streets."
A picture as wonderfully life-like and grotesquely
truo as any ever touched in upon copper by the
magical etching-needle of WM. Hogarth ! Some-
times there is the glimmering of a moist and marshy
light in the eyes of the little old man, says
Mr. Dickens. " Then," he observes, " the
little old man is drunk"—adding, " A very small
measure will over set him ; he may be bowled qt.
his unsteady legs by a half-pint pot !'' Just for all
the world precisely such a little old man as this,
" a little, reedy, piping old gentleman, like
a worn-out bird," is Mrs. Plornish's father,
John Edward. Nandy, sublimely patronised
by the Father of the Marshalsea under the
name, style, and title of his " Pensioner." After
one of the occasional tea drinkings in Mr. Dorrit's
room, where the rather of the Marshalsea regales
his Pensioner upon ham and shrimps in the win-
dowsill--wheu the " company" has at length got
scattered again, leaving Arthur Clennam and Amy
Dorrit alone with poor old Maggy—therecomes the
most exquisite half revelation of love between the
hero and heroine of the tale—a revelation not to
be perfected howbeit, we fear, nevertheless, until
the spinning-wheel of one inestimable life is stopped
for ever, as in the fairy legend related once upon a
time to a " poor thing of ten" about a Sacred Secret
and a Curious Princess !

MARSHAL PELISSIER AT MARSEILLES.

MARSEILLES, Aug. 2.—Marshal Pelissier, whose
return from the Crimea was so long expected, ar-
rived yesterday, and nothing could be colder than
the reception lie met with from the mass of the
population. By some extraordinary inadvertence
the arrival of the corvette Roland, carrying the
Marshal and his suite, was not announced from the
telegraph station at Notre Dame de la Garde, and
when the steamer arrived in the Old Port there
was nobody to receive the Marshal. Tho first per-
son who presented himself on board the Roland to
pay his respects was the captain of the Caradoc,
which arrived here on Wednesday evening last,
bringing Sir William Codrington. Next came
General Roguet, the Emperor's aide-de-camp, who
congratulated the Marshal on his arrival in the
name of his august master. After a delay of nearly
two hours the Marshal landed at the Cauebiere,
under a salute from the guns of forts St. Nicholas
and St. John.. Having landed, the Marshal stepped
into the carriage of M. Lucy, the Receiver-Gene-
ral, an old and intimate friend, and the proces-
sion moved forward. First came a detachment of
gendarmerie, next the carriage of M. Lucy, in
which the Marshal was seated, having opposite to
him an aide-de-camp and an English staff officer ;
next the Mayor and the Municipal Council, fol-
lowed by the carriages of the principal merchants ;
next the staff of General Rostolan, the Commander
of the Department, who is confined to his house by
a severe accident. The procession was closed by a
squadron of Lancers. The line followed was the
Canebiere, the place Royale, the rue Paradis, to
the house of M. Lucy, in the rue Sylvabelle, the
most frequented streets in Marseilles. During the
entire line of march not a cheer was to be hoard,
nor was any demonstration of respect visible.
There was no crowd, and the few people who
stopped gazed in stupid amazement. The Marsel-
laise, whom I have reproached for their want of
enthusiasm and patriotism, excuse themselves by
saying that the hour at which the procession took
place, half-past 2, was an unfortunate one, being
the moment of the siesta after dinner, and that
the few people in the streets were half asleep.
Tho Marshal was dressed with great simplicity,
and wore a kepi on his head, He looks remark-
ably well, and appears to me to be very little
changed since the day I saw him embark for the
Crimea. To-day he drove in the Mayor's carriage
to Roquevaure, to see the remarkable aqueduct by
which the waters of the Durance are conveyed to
Marseilles. To-night there is to be a representa-
tion at the Grand Theatre, to which none aire to i
be admitted except by tickets issued at tl
To-morrow he is to attend the inauguration of a
-
cascade in the Zoological-gardens
and at half-past
Bottle-
5, the grand dinner is to take place on the Bul
yards, where tables suflicient to accommodate 1,500
soldiers are to be laid.
More than 200,000 hectolitres of wheat have ar-
rived this week at Marseilles ; but as fast as it is
landed it is carried to the interior of France. The
41b. loaf sells hero at 20 sous.

LOUIS PHILLIPE WHEN Duc D'ORLEANS....44 The Duke
met me on my entering the room with 'I wish you a
very good night, Mr. Moore he, however, speaks Eng-
lish perfectly well. There was only their own family
party ; and though the thing was at first rather royal
and formidable, I soon found myself perfectly at my ease
among as unaffected and domestic a circle as ever I wit-
nessed in my station. The Duko drank -vine with me
l'Anglaise, and I was placed next the Duchess, who
did all the civilities of the partridges, paVs, &c., be-
fore her in a very quiet manner. After the dinner,
which was over unusually soon, the Duchess-sat down
to work, and four or five fine children were admitted,
with whom the Duke played most delightedly, making
polichinclle caps for them, &c. Mademoiselle showed
me a lithographic work lately published, " The Anti-
quities of Normandy," and the Duke and she at each
side of me looked through the whole of the engravings.
They then asked me to sing, and I have seldom had a
more pleased audience ; indeed the reiteration of ' char.
mant," delicieux,' &c., became as last.agoist
a• Dew. ,reueinded--me of the songs he had
taught me at 'llonniugton Park, Cadet Roussel' and
Polichinelle est par tout Bien no, and I played them
over, which amused him very much. He said he did
not see the least alteration in my looks since we last
met, near eighteen years ago.":
arc ro7hrsioh must
of ztiountst ro doors.be now --

Tubercular Diseases
Diseases of the Brain, Nerves and Senses
Diseases of the Heart and Blood-vessels 35
Diseases of the Lungs and other Organs of
Respiration
Diseases of the Stomach, Liver, and other Organs
of Digestion
Diseases of the Kidneys, &c.
Childbirth, Diseases of the Uterus, &c.
Diseases of the Joints, Bones, and Muscles
Diseases of the Skin, &c.
Malformations
Premature Birth and Debility
Atrophy
Old Age
Sudden
Violence, Privation, Cold, and Intemperance 2B
Causes not specified

• 29
..i 48
• 27

1,025

DEATHS /PEON ALL CAUSES .
Population Deaths in corre- Death
Enumerated. spending week in th
1851. of 1805. Week
• West Districts
North Districts 490,396
Central Districts 393,256
East Districts 485,522
South Districts

Totals 2,362,236

Males
Females..

1,025

ASSIZE INTELLIGENCE.

WESTERN CIRCIIIT.—WELLs, AUG. 4.

WIFE MURDER.

James Ford was indicted for the wilful murder of his
wife, Sarah Ford, at Publow, on the 30th ult.
Mr. Prideaux appeared for the prosecution ; the pri-
soner was undefended.

The prisoner and his wife were labouring people, re-
siding at Publow, in this county and the deceased woman
bad for some years worked for Mr. Daniel Charles Wait,
a farmer. On the 30th of July Mr. Wait was married,
and he gave an entertainment to his workpeople on the
occasion. Among the persons invited was the wife
of the prisoner. From some reason or other, in which
jealousy appeared to have a share, the prisoner was
annoyed at his wife's going, and used several threaten-
ing expressions respecting her. He went to the King's
Arms public-house and drank to a considerable extent.
One of the deceased'S sisters seeing the state of excite-
ment the prisoner was in, sent for his wife to come
and pacify him. She came accordingly, and endeavoured
to persuade her husband to go home. He refused, and
struck her two violent blows. The woman got away from
him and went into the tap room. No other persons were
present, but the landlady heard some violent talking,
followed by two heavy blow, and the moment she got
into the room she saw the deceased lying dead upon the
floor with her head under the table, which was hooped
with iron. The prisoner who was somewhat sobered by
the event, being remonstrated with by some of the neigh-
bours, and asked how be could use his wife in such a
manner, said he would serve the whole- lot the same,
and previously to that he had used expressions of
towards his wife. Mr. Collins, of Chew Magna, and Mr.
R. Crisp, house surgeon of the Bristol Infirmary, made a
careful post mortem examination of the body, and haa
no doubt whatever that death was caused by concussion
of the brain, resulting from a blow, which bad driven the
woman's he'd against some substance like the table
which was in the room where the occurrence took place.
These facts having been proved by various witnesses,
the learned judge expressed his opinion that the case did
not amount to murder, and the jury almost immediately

fund a verdict of manslaughter. -
His lordship, in passing sentence, said that if a case of
wife murder had been established he would certainly have
passed the extreme sentence of the law, which in all pro-
bability would have been carried into effect. As it was
he should inflict the heaviest penalty, viz., transporta•
tion for life.