The Sun.
London, England, 1856-07-10 00:00:00

HAY MARKETS.

SMITHFIELD.—OId meadow hay, 31 FS to 51 155; new
'do., 31 Os to 41 Os ; old clover, 41 103 to 61 153; new do., 41
to 5, ; and straw, 11 12s to 11 16s per load. A moderate
demand.
CIIMBERLAND.—OId meadow hay, 31 8s to 51 15s; new
dd.. 31 Os to 41 Os ; old clover, 41 103 to 61 124 ; new do.,
4/ to 51; and straw, 1/ ns to I/ 16s per load. Trade steady.
WHITECHAPEL.—OId meadow hay, 31 5s to 51 123; new
do., 31 Os to 41 Os ; old clover, 41 108 to 61 15s ; new do., 41
to 51; and straw, 11 12s to 11 16s per load. A slow trade

GREAT NORTHERN RAILWAY.—Traffla return for the
week ending June 29, 1856 v 21,257 6 7
Corresponding week last year 20,655 16 3
LANCASHIRE AND YORKSHIRE RAILWAY. —Traffic re•
turn for the week ending July 6, 1856 £24,897 19 8
Corresponding week last year .........
CORK AND BANDON RAlLWAY.—Traffic return for week
ending July 5, 1856 £3lo 0 4
Corresponding week last year 261 13 6

THE NATIONAL GALLERY AND TRE
NEW "GIOVANNI BELLINI." , I

27, Soho-square, July 7.

TIIE STEAM-BOAT COLLISION ON TIM'

REY.

INQUEST ON T.ELE BODIES.

LIVERPOOL, JULY 9.
The inquest on the bodies of theeight untortunate Irish-
men who died from injuries sustained in the collision of the
iron steam-boats Mail and Excelsior, on the Mersey, on
Sunday morning, was continued to-day before Mr. F. P.
Curry and a respectable jury, in the Crown Court St.
George's-hall. ,
Mr. 'Blair, barrister, instructed by Messrs. Duncan,
Squarey, and Duncan, watched the case on behalf of the
owners of the Mail; Mr. Aspinall, instructed by Messrs.
Lowndes, Bateson, and Robinson, for the owners of the
Excelsior; Mr. T. S. Raffles, instructed by Mr. John
Yates jun., for the representatives of the deceased; and
Mr. Bremner, attorney, for Brewer, the pilot who was in •
charge of the Excelsior at the time of the collision.
Captain Cooke, superintendent of the pilots of Liver-
pool, and Mr. Ho:igson, Harbour-master, sat on the bench,
assisting the coroner and the jury with models and charts
showing the positions of the vessels as the evidence Imo-
ceeded.

The court was crowded, and the greatest interest was
manifested throughout the hearing.
The jury having been to inspect both vessels, for the
purpose of making themselves acquainted with the posi-
tion of the lights, ,
Joseph Bailey, the captain of the Mail, was sworn. He
i said—l am master of the iron screw-steamer Mail. 194 ions
register, plying between Dublin and Liverpool. The crew,
including officers, consists of 16 mea. There are two en-
gines of 30-horse power each. We sailed from Dublin on
Saturday, at 1 55 p.m., with 76 deck-passengers, eight
cattle-dealers, and four cabin-passengers. We had a lair
wind, but took the sails in. The chief-officer (White) was
on the first nightwatch, which consisted of chiet-officer,
carpenter, and two sailors on the look-out on the forecastle.
One of the sailors was at the helm. When the night set in,
we had our usual lights all right. We approached the
Mousey by the Rock channel, all going well till we got
there. We rounded the Rock light at 130, half an hour
after entering the channel. At that time the boatswain,
Thomas Gurney, was in charge of the helm, and all
hands were then on deck, in accordance with custom on
-coming into port. We kept as close to the Cheshire
shore as we could get. Immediately after rounding
the Rock light the chief officer reported a steamer coming
down the river, about half a point on our port bow. We
were going at full speed at that time. I then distinctly
observed the three lights of the steamer. The head
of the Mail was S., a little westerly. I was standing
close to the man at the wheel, in the centre of the vessel,
which was the most commanding place for a look-out. The
strange steamer was then about a wile off. It was a little
cloudy, not to say dark. The position No. 3 on the Admi-
ralty Regulations is the nearest approach to the positions
of the steamers. My lights were properly placed, and had
been trimmed about half an hour before. Ido not know, of
, my own knowledge, that they had been trimmed so recently,
bat was told so. The other steamer was coming stem on,
a little on the port bow of the' Mail. Immediately I saw
her I gave directions to port the helm, and it was ported.
I was standing alongside the man at the wheel. The ves-
sel immediately answered to the helm. The effect
would be to allow the other vessel to pass on the port
side. The chief officer reported a ship at anchor right
ahead, and I gave orders to steady the helm in order not,
to pass over her, and the moment we had cleared her on
the east, or Lancashire side, the helm was again put to
port. I lost sight of the red light (on the port side) of the
steamer; and knowing from that that he mast have star-
boarded his helm, I gave orders to " slow " and " atop " at,
one breath. I then saw the other steamer coming right on
oar port bow about a quarter of a mile off. My chief offi-
cer was close by the foremast, on the spar deck, which I
should think is six or seven feet above the main deck. I
heard the chief officer hail the steamer to port his helm.
There was no reply. The way of tho Mail was deadened a
good deal. We had not time to reverse, as the collision oc-
curred within about a minute after the engines were
stopped. At that time I believe the other steamer wee
going 'full speed. She Ltruck us on our port bow, and
run the cutwater to within three or four feet of our fore-
mast, tearing up the deck and cutting through the iron
nearly to the water's edge. The windlass was upset,
and forced through the hatch on to the people below.
I went and rendered every assistance below. The moment
she cut into us we hailed to know her name, and the an-
swer was, " Excelsior." The collision took place near the
Cheshire side, about a quarter of a mile from low-water
mark. At the time of the collision it was within 5 minutes
of high water. We might have gone closer in, but vessels
lay at anchor, and we could not do So with safety. The
bower anchor and chain of the Excelsior got over our
pawl-bit, and became entangled. They hauled up 15
fathoms of their chain, .unshackled it, and left it with us
before they could get free. They also left their bower
anchor with us. After getting free the Excelsior stayed a
short time off the old magazines, at New Brighton, and
then went on. The collision took place about three minutes
after we had passed the vessel at anchor. That vessel was
the brig Maria. When the vessels struck the Mail was
heading right for the Cheshire shore. I saw then the
Excelsior's green light, and that only. After the vessels had
got clear of each other I saw that six of the deck pas-
sengers bad been killed and a number of others very
badly hurt. I went to Clarence Pier-head, and landed
them before going into dock. The dead bodies were
taken to the dead-house, and the wounded were removed
to the Northern Hospital. I have had to do with attain-
vessels about .n 5 years, daring five of which I have had
command of one. I had not a pilot on board at the time. '
I have not a certificate to pilot my own vessels. When a
pilot hails me I take him. lam not compelled to take
one if he does not offer his services. I have a master's ]
certificate of service from the Board of Trade, and also one
for competency. No pilot offered to take charge of my
vessel, or made a signal for that purpose.
This witness was under cross-examination when our par-
cel was despatched at 5 p.m. Several other witnesses would
be beard, and the case would then be adjourned until Sa-
turday at 10 a.m.

The body of one of the deceased, Michael Dovan, who,
with another man on board the Mail, was in charge of 150
sheep, was removed to Dublin to-day; and this morning
the rem lining seven bodies in the dead-house at the
Princes-quay were buried at the parish burial-ground (St.
Martin's) The funeral was followed by a very large con-
course of people.

The Viceroy of Egypt has given to M. Benedette, act-
ing as consul•general of France at Cairo, 30,000 fr. fur
the victims by the late inundations.
THE FRENCH LOSSES IN THE CRIMEA.—Tbe Alf ortiteur
1. Armee con.ains an article on the subj .ct of the losses
suffered by the FrenO army in the Crimea. According
to the statement of this paper, apparently fou,ded on
official inf. irmation, the number of deaths, as set forth in
two tables, embracing re.pectively from May 1, 1854,
toe date of tie lamizionif of the army iu Turkey, and from
that to March 30, 1856, when peace was signed, was as
follows :—Officers of ail graies, 1284; rion-crirnmissioned
officers, 4403 ; and rank and file, 58,805—0 r in all,
62,492 men ; in the Baltic, during the expedition of
1854, there died 1059, and in France 13,635 making a
total of 21 028, which, added to the deaths in Turkey
and the Crimea, Rive a sum of 83,520.

TREMENDOUS FEAT.—Mini Kate Cook has nnnounce,d
for her forthcoming benefit at Astley's that she will take
a flying leap over a lady in full dress, and clear the en-
tire body without touching a single flounce. The dis-
tance, measured from skirt to skirt, is calculated to ex-
ceed by two or three yards that of the longest lePp on
record. There are wagers to a considerable amount, both
in sporting and equestrian circles, that the daring yi ung
lady will not be able to accomplish the difficult task.
She has been strongly advised by all her friends to
abandon the foolhardy undertaking, and to jump over
sixteen hoops, or half-a-dozen elephants, or a Green
wick hotel bill, or any other bulky object, instead.—
Punch.

LITERATURE.

TO THE EDITOR OP THE eIIIN. Little Vomit. No. VIII. ,By Charles Dicke/IS.
Sin,—This morning I paid a first - visit to the Tattycoram runs away from the House of Mr.
new "Giovanni Bellini." Imagine, instead of the , Meagles, at Twickenham—taking refuge (!) with
limpid, sunny, and gem-like surface of Giovanni ' Miss Wade in a dilapidated mansion iu -Mayfair—.
Bellini, a besmeared, dull-purple, rotten-looking
daub, stippled up to. the .highest pitch of -the whence those two amiable females subsequently
" trade," and you have, a, faint -idea
of what you take their departure together mysteriously. Would
, that neither of the young hags could ever trouble
Will realise in all its offensiveness by a visit to the
western roonl of the National Gallery. There is ' the readers of " Little Dorrit" by any subsequent
nothing in this picture upon which to fix a belief reapparition ! Such, however, of course , 'is inevit-
that it ever was a work of moment ; but whatever /able : at any rate when they do ultimately appear
out a square inch of the flesh, or the sky, or the
its former pretensions, reduced as it is now, with-
again we may hope at least that it may then at
scarcely more of
landscape, and with the drapery length be revealed, why on earth they were either
Ir
in even a proximately original state,
_it is not less ,of them introduced at all into the narrative !
turning from the contemplation of
Great Patriarch of the Venetian school._ I shall Meanwhile,
a libel on the intelligence of England than on the
that, abominable Miss -Wade, and her perfectly
scarcely be suspected of partiality for the indivi- congenial handmaiden Tattycoram—we may now
duals, whether separately or collectively, now at briefly enumerate some other of the striking
the head of the National Gallery • but should the incidents narrated in the present instalment.
surprise which I felt on my first glance at this, their Foremost among these, Harry Gowan is the
latest triumph, be insisted on us an involuntary accepted suitor for the hand of Pet, other-
homage to their former achievements, I shall. not wil/4e. Minnie ; more than this they are formally
dispute the claim. bethrothed ; more even than this they are actually
On leaving the Gallery I met an acquaintance on the eve of being married. As the natural
who had already paid a visit to the "Giovanni Bel- consequenCe of all which, we learn in due
lini." A less experienced student of National Gal- course all about " Nobody's Disappearance."
lery economy than myself, he was somewhat It is the title of the twenty-eighth chapter
ruffled upon my informing him that the taxpayers of Part I. of " Little Dorrit "—one of the love-
of this country had been mulcted in the sum of liest and moat loveable love-passages ever
1,0501. for a daub, the summary ejection of which penned by novelist ! A chapter so sweet, so fresh,
from the Gallery would be a gain, even at the so tender, so graceful, that as we read it the tears
sacrifice of its purchase money, and a fee for its brim up into, our eyes spontaneously. Charles
removal—for a bad picture 'is worse than none. Dickens, even glorious Charles Dickens, has but
He exclaimed, " Are these men (meaning the very seldom written anything more beautiful.
purchasers of the ' Bellini) mad, or do they take It is a love-scene full of nature, full of poetry, full
us for fools ?" Sir C. Eastlake has certainly little of pathetic truthfulness. There is not a syllable in
reason to respect the wisdom of a people who per- it either hackneyed or conventional. It has no-
sist in retaining him in the directorship of their where about it the faintest vestige of mere senti-
National Gallery, in the teeth of his reiterated ad- mentalim—a thing unendurable alike to gods and
missions of his incompetency for the office. With znen—and by this time happily restricted to the
regard to the first clause of my impatient compa- Rosa-Matildas of literature. Here is the scene of
nion's exclamation, areferenue to the spurious or be- Arthur Clennaufs interview with Minnie :
daubed Holbeins, Titians, Paul Veroneses, Mauteg-
nas, Botticettis, dre., from abroad, to say nothing of
home " restorations," soon convinced him that if
the men are insane their madness has at least the
virtue of " method ;" for a more methodical selec-
tion of bad and vamped-up objects than theirs
would tax even the most imaginative to conceive.
Yet our resthetical director complacently an-
nounces, at pages 53, 54, 55, and 56, " Estimates,
&c., Civil Services for the year ending March 31,
1857," that his " Adoration of the Magi" is "'sit
the whole well preserved ;" that his Mantegna is
" happily not touched by restorers; and that his
Botticelli is in " excellent," and his Giovanni
Bellini in "perfect, preservation."
The judgment which I, have pronounced upon
this new " Giovanni Bellini" is the result of
as much consideration as a work in such a condi-
tion deserves. The intelligent will endorse it ;
those of the opposite category are unworthy of a
thought. I will maintain that judgment and make
it prevail.—Yours obediently,
MORRIS MOORE.

" A tranquil summer sunset shone upon him as he ap-
proached the end of his walk, and passed through the mea-
dows by the river-side. He had that sense of peace, and of
being lightenel of a weight of care, which country quiet
awakens in the breasts of dwellers in towns. Every-
thing within his view was lovely and placid. The rich
foliage of the trees, the luxuriant grass diversified with
wild flowers, the little green islands in the liver, the beds of
rushes, the water-lilies floitino• on the surface of the stream,
the distant voices in the boats° borne musically towards him
on the ripple of the water and the evening air, were all ex-
pressive of rest. In the occasional leap of a fish, or dip of an
oar, or twittering of a bird not yet at roost, or distant bark-
ing of a dog, or lowing of a cow—in all such sounds there
was the prevailing breath of rest, which seemed to encompass
him in every scent that sweetened the fragrant air. The long
lines of red and gold in the sky, and the glorious track of
the descending sun, were all divinely calm. Upon
the purple tree-tops far away, and on the green height near
at hand up which the shades were slowly creeping, there was
an equal hush Between the real landscape and its shadow
in the water, there was no division ; both were go untroubled
and clear, and, wile so fraught with solemn mystery of life
and death, hopefully reassuring to the gazer's soothed
heart, because so tenderly and mercifully beautiful."

In the subsequent chapter in which " Mrs. Flint-
winch goes on Dreaming," there is a brief but won-
derful description of a wild stormy twilight in the
City, forming a marvellous contrast in every way
to this exquisite sketch of the summer's evening at
Twickenham. It is immediately anterior to the
abrupt reappearance of the assassin Rigaud, with
his moustache going up and his nose coming down
as he grins upun poor dazed Affery shut acciden-
tally out of the house-upon-crutches by the bang-
ing-to of the.street door by an unexpected gust of
wind. Here is the description alluded to, imme-
diately before Affery is swung out into the paved
forecourt by the wind aforesaid—
" She stcod at the open door, staggering herself with this
enigma, oil a rainy, thundery evening. The clouds were
flying fast, the wind was coming up in gusts, banging
some neighbouring shutters that had broken loose, twirling
the rusty chimney-cowls and weathercocks, and rushing round
and round a confined adjacent churchyard as Mit . had a
mind to blow the dead citizens out of their graves. The low
thunder, muttering in all quarters of thtt sky at once, seemed
to threaten vengeance for this attempted desecration, ar.d to
matter, ' Let them rest ! Let them rest !' "

The mumber altogether ends this month in a sort
of wild,..wierd, grimly, ghostly disorder. Affery
having just fetched old Flintwinch of the cut-down
aspect from.a neighbouring public-house, where he
has been carousing ! Rigaud the murderer,„ muf-
fled in a large cloak, and looking eagerly far them
over his hooked nose and ragged moustache; as'he
awaits their coming in the dark gusty doorway of
the house upon crutches! Mts. Cleunauz calling
from her zoom up staiis iu the darkuess—bewit-
dere,l by so many strange sounds and footsteps—
" Who is it? What is it ? Why does no one an-
swer ? Who is that, down there ?" And so the
number terminates ? What is it all coining to
What is going to happen ? Tne reader is- left
breathlessly expectant, but at the same time-ut-
terly bewildered.

It: should be observed, before putting the present
number aside that there are introduced:here and
there iu the course.of it, quite incidentally, some
little sketches of street sceneryand street character
that Boz alone, we do believe, could ever ha-Ve
thought of, or, having thought, could possibly have
described. Here, for example, is Boz's description
of—