The Sun.
London, England, 1860-11-26 00:00:00

TILE STATE OF OUR NAVY.

The following letters have been addressed to the
editor of the limes

Sir,—l have been expecting almost daily to hear
of some fresh emeutes similar to those on board the
Princess Royal and Edgar, which this time last, year
brought such disgrace on our naval service. Those
lamentable instances of insubordination and mis-
management gave the public a slight insight into
the alarming condition to which years of neglect
and ill treatment have now brought the sailors of
the Royal Navy. These mutinies, however, only
fro re] tt.d 02glimpne of the real state of thinget When
are men had been first condemned and then par-
doned, the captain reprimanded, the port admiral
superseded, and the country had sighed or smiled
over the ignorance and folly shown in every single
stage and step of the Princess Royal affair, it '
ceased to he talked of, and people hoped they had
heard the last of such misconduct and mismanage-
ment on the part of both officers and men. There
have been scores of such erneutes on a smaller scale
since then, but they have mostly occurred abroad,
or when at home have been carefully hushed up
and kept from the public ear. I shall be surprised
if this winter passes over without another outbreak,
and if one does occur, sir, mark my words, it will
spread throughout every vessel in the service. It
would perhaps be too strong to say that our fleets
are in a state of chronic mutiny but I know at
least that their crews are so disaffected and dissa-
tisfied that their deep, half-suppressed ill-humour
may become open mutiny at any moment. This is
well known at the Admiralty. Every captain and
commander in the service knows it to his cost: It
is only the good, easy, simple, all-paying public
who are ignorant of the whole matter, who gave
£15,000,000 to the navy this year, and who hear
of iron frigates and read in your naval intelli-
gence of long lists of line-of-battle ships corning
into port and going out, and who therefore think
they have got a fleet in return for their money.
They have got vessels enough, goodness knows ;
but in all that really makes a fleet, good,
contented, and well-disciplined crews, they may
almost be said to be without a navy altogether.
I have said this is known at the Admiralty, where
they wring their hands in impotent dismay at a
state of things which they fear to disclose, and have
not the skill to amend. They hesitate and vacillate
from one petty scheme to another. Now, with a
great spurt and splutter, they proclaim a bounty,
and drain, at vast expense, the very scum of the
li
merchant service into the Navy. Next month they
intend saving the country with a naval reserve, but
the only reserve the public has yet seen has been
that of the seamen to have anything to do with the
Admiralty at all. Such spasmodic efforts, with a
vague unsatisfactory circular now and then, are the
only aids the Admiralty give us to remedy the now
really alarming condition of the Navy. It is not
three months since one of the chief officials at the
" Board" told me frankly and blandly they did not
know what on earth to do. I did not believe it
then, nor do I believe it now. They blink and
avoid the real grievances of the seamen—grievances
which, I shame to say, have made our Royal Naval
service a reproach through the world—grievances
which afflict the men in every stage of their life, in
the shape of bad pay, bad treatment, and bad food.
lam not now writing hastily or angrily. lam
well uw,o-o of thu gravity of these charges,•but I
say it without fear of being disproved, that the sea-
men of our Royal Navy are, as a body, the
worst paid, worst treated, and the worst fed class
of sailors in the world. I know that there are
plenty of good and kind captains—as a rule the
great majority are always so. Some of these may
possibly feel inclined to try and contradict my
statement. If such there be, I challenge them to
send with their reply to this letter the total num-
ber of punishments they have inflicted since their
ships have been in commission, and the number of
their men who have deserted and fled the service in
the same time. Desertion ! Why, sir, the word gives
no idea of the way in which men now risk life and
limb to escape from their ships. They forfeit arrears
of pay, chances of pension,years of good conduct ser-
vice—anything in the wide world, so they can only
get away. It is not a year since that when, failing all
other means of manning the Navy, a £lO bounty
was offered to seamen. Well, nearly 11,000 were
raised. The year is not yet out, and lam told that
already nearly half have managed to escape ! Thus
not only money is wasted, but men are driven out
of their country's service, for they must always
keep in foreign ships if they wish to avoid the
almost certainty of apprehension and imprisonment
on their return to England.
Let us, however, leave the question of desertion
to another time, and look for a moment how the men
are paid. If you or I, sir, want a footman to wait
at table, and be always sleek and comfortable, we
must pay him well, and feed him well, too, or he
gives us notice. But if the nation wants able sea-
men, then a very different scale of remuneration is
proffered, and the country which prides itself on
its race of blue-jackets is not ashamed to offer to
grown men, who have spent years in learning their
most hazardous calling, and who ship into the
Navy to meet war risks and sea risks of every kind,
the sum of 10s. a week ! The pay of an able sea-
man who ships for 10 years' continuous service is
£2 9s. a month. Very few, however, do enter for
10 years, so that the average of able seamen's
wages in the Navy is only about £2 2s. a month,
which for the calendar month gives them, if any-
thing, rather less than 10s. a week. Occasionally
the public see in your columns a letter from a
country clergyman, detailing cases of agricultural
distress, instanced by some labourer with eight or
ten children who only earns Bs. a week. These
cases (though the fact that the children nearly all
earn something is generally kept out of sight) are
sad enough, Heaven knows. But compare them
with the case of the able seaman, who, in addition
to being absent from his family for years together,
has to encaunter every vicissitude of war, weather,
and unhealthy climates, and support his family at
home out of his miserable weekly allowance of 10s.
"Oh ! but," say the Admiralty, there'sthe pension."
The hope of pension, Sir, is one of the most gigantic
and cruel frauds which any Government ever
perpetrated on its seamen. Let us put it in
plain figures, and see what this pension means.
Every able seaman' can earn in the merchant
service from £3 to £3 10s. and £4 a month ;
in the Royal Navy he gets a little over £2. He
has entered the service; but still he demurs to this
reduction, and is told, " Why, my man, you don't
get such high pay here, because we deduct for the
pension you are to have after 20 years at sea."
"Oh ! but," says Jack, " I hav'n't come for 20
years. I have only shipped for this commission, to
take a turn with you, and see how I like it." But
poor Jack has shipped, and is made to abide by
the regulations of the service. If he has entered
for continuous service, he is entitled to a pension
after 20 years. If he has not so entered, as now very
a(
at o adl .t
s noThus,t f
aarc cNov rrdo
oi ngg) tine trhe et
hsaena moanne's
few do, he is never entitled to any pension
o
othir o
ofd n
what he is entitled to for his labour, and nearly half
what he can earn in easier and
better services, is
withheld from him to form
pensions for somebody,
but to which the poor fellow learns, to his dismay,
he will have no claim whatever unless he enters
for continuous service. Continuous service, too, for
20 years Twenty years ; before a seaman has
been sis: months in a man-of-war he is scheming
and plotting night and day how he can manage to
desert and fly, not only his ship, but the very
land he was born in. Not one per cent. of the
seamen in the Royal Navy serve or live to claim the
paltry pension, to form which more than 30 per
cent. is deducted from the wages of all. And this
miserable fraud on the men, which would be un-
worthy the neediest firm, the Admiralty are so
besotted as to think forms one of the attractions
of the service.
But I don't ask you, Sir, or the public, to believe
mere assertions, Let any of your reuclorg yOl9lOll

take the trouble to look into the Parliamentary
papers giving the returns of floggings, desertions,
and instances of insubordination which have oc-
curred in the Royal Navy during the past two
years, and they will find such a state of affairs dis-
closed as is enough to startle the most unthinking.
The captains of :,hips really dont know what to do
with their crews. It follows, as a matter of course,
when the Navy only pays little more than half of
what sailors easily earn in the merchant service,
that almost only the men who are worthless
for the merchant service now join the Navy. Even
these, however, are ;now getting scarce, and cap-
tains of crack frigates have to putup with a chance
medley of longshore boatmen, or anybody else they
can catch. I don't think I am speaking beyond the
mark when I say that there is hardly a line-of-
battle ship in the service of which the captain can
conscientiously say be has a hundred thorough-
good sailors on whom he can depend. If he has he
may think his ship well manned, though much as
he may depend on the men's . seamanship, I would
not advise him to trust to their fidelity in the
matter of not deserting. Every man in the Navy
who is worth his salt knows he can double his pay
by joining the merchant service. If he has not
shipped for continuous service, and is well con-
ducted and steady, he waits till the ship is paid
off, and bids adieu to the Navy for ever. If he is a
continuous service man, in nine cases out of 10 he
makes up his mind for desertion, and sooner or
later he effects his object. There are not very
many continuous service men in the Navy yet.
When, some two years since, the Admiralty offered
to let them take their discharge, and yield up all
claim to pensions, 2,286 instantly jumped at the
chance, and quitted the service for ever. Very fa-
vourable conditions were held out to these men to
reenter the Coastgbard and Navy for five years,
but of the 2,286 only 63 could be coaxed back
again. Lord Clateocq Paget rises in the house,
and, with his capital imitation of a sailor's frank
ness, tells hon. members that sailors are curious
beings, very thoughtless, like children, having no
heed to the future, &c. But this is all a mistake of
his lordship's. Sailors now look as sharply to the
remuneration they are to receive for their services
as any other .class of people, and the best proof of
this is that they won't join the Navy. If the
Admiralty could only conciliate the seamen's wives,
the men would enter the Navy fast enough ;
but they will never conciliate the wives till they
pay their husband's properly. As it is now, sea-
man's wives will do anything rather than let
.their
husbands join the Royal Navy; , or, if they do
join in some wild, drunken moment, they
never rest till they get them out of it.
by fair means or foul. But the wife's inducement to
leave the service is quite unnecessary when once a
man is in it. Do the Admiralty think it is nothing
to have all the seamen's wives against them ? or
can we ourselves wonder at the antipathy of the
women when we know its reason ? Let us say Jack
and Bill are both married sailors, with families.
Bill keeps in the merchant service, where he can
earn £3 10s. or £4 a-month. He leaves his wife a
letter of allotment for £2 or £2 10s., and can always
manage to be home, and smoke his pipe, and see the
children, at least for a month in the year. It used
to be so with Jack's wife, but in an unlucky moment
Jack has been tempted to enter the Royal Navy, •
and his letter of allotment drops at once from £2
or £2 los. to 255., and he is away from all sight of
his family for three years at least, if not for four or
five. Do you think, when that man returns, his wife
will ever let him enter the Navy again ? or, do you
think, if he is on a home station, and let ashore to
see her for a couple of days once in six or nine months
that she won't persuade him to desert ? As a matter
of course, she does so persuade him, and as a matter
of course he often tries, and at last succeeds. And
yet captains sometimes wonder how it is that they
can trap young unmarried men for a time into the
service, but that the married ones never stay. But
whether married or single, the same remedy would
reconcile all. Let the Admiralty abolish the pen.
sion fraud, and pay the men fairly for their labour
while they are in the service. If they are wounded,
or if they serve well and long, promote the good-
conduct men to pensions. Give the men, in short,
not only a future of advancement to look forward
to, but a fair day's wage, to encourage them to enter
on the path. The money that has been spent in
Boyal Commissions and inquiries as to how to man
the Navy would have manned it long ago if given in
addition to the men's pay.
But how can we expect!to man the Navy when, as
I have said, the men are not only badly paid, but
badly treated, and badlyifed ? I, perhaps, have said
enough to show that the men are not only badly paid
but scarcely more than half paid. If you think this
letter worthy a place in your columns, I can give
yet stronger and more convincing proofs of the
shameful inadequacy of the wages offered for the
labour done, and show also how both the food and
treatment are as bad almost as the pay. These are
matters, however, which cannot
.be discussed in a
single letter, even of the inordinate length to which
I have extended mine; but, for the sake of the int•
portant interests at stake, I trust I may look for-
ward to another opportunity of directing public
attention to the question. Unless the facts are
fully and fairly laid before the public nothing will
be done, and it is only through your columns that
the public can be reached. Let this, sir, be my
excuse for future intrusion, and for the length to
which I have already trespassed on your valuable
space.
I enclose my card, and have the honour to remain,
sir, yours most obediently,
ONE WHO KNOWS THE SERVICE.
London, Nov. 23.

Sir,—l agree with your correspondent in to-day's
paper, that the wages in the Navy should be raised
and the pension system modified, but I do not ad-
mit that the writer is " one who knows the ser-
vice ;" and I shall proceed in a few lines to point
out some glaring mistakes he has made ; and I beg
to deprecate most strongly the exaggerated and
bouncing tone of his letter. He says if a man enters
the Navy for continuous service he is only entitled
to a pension after 20 years. By Admiralty circu-
lar of the 14th of June, 1853, the continuous ser-
vice system was established, and under it men are
entitled to pensions after 10 years' service. Your
correspondent also says that "if the man has not
so entered, he is never entitled to any pension at
all." This is equally a blunder. If a man does
not enter for continuous service he is entitled to a
pension ,after 21 years' service from the age of 20
(a continuous service man would be entitled in 20
years after 18), besides pensions, of course, for
wounds, &c., after short suvices. Thousands of
men were so pensioned long before the continuous
service system was heard of.
Your correspondent also says that " there are not
very many continuous service men in the Navy yet."
The answer to this is, there are now 22,000 con-
tinuous service men in the navy, 9,000 boys (all
continuous service), while the remaining men and
officers in the fleet are only 23,000. In other words,
there are more continuous service men than non-
continuance service men, excluding officers, in the
Royal navy.
Your correspondent also omits the various addi-
tions to pay in the navy, which, unfortunately for
the popularity of the service, are paid as additions,
separately in pennies and twopences, and thus lost
sight of by " Jack" and by people who think " they
know the service." Thus, a first-class seaman gun-
ner would have 4d. a-day additional, and if wear-
ing three badges another 3d. a-day, in addition to
the L 2 9s. quoted by your correspondent as an
A.B.'s pay in the navy.
I will not trespass further on your valuable space
except to say that I have no doubt, if the navy pay
were properly readjusted, no great increase need be
made to it to raise it nominally to what it often
really is—as much as in the merchant service.
As for the victuals in the navy, I know not how
many blue-books could be quoted to disprove your
correspondent's absurd statement that the men are
badly fed. But 80,000 men could be found to con-
tradict him, and it is a fact that some £40,000 or
£50,000 is paid annually to seamen in the navy for
provisions allowed to them more than they can eat.
L —I am, Sir, your obedient, servant,
ONE WHO DOES KNOW.
Somerset-house, Nov. 24.

Sir,—Your correspondent, "One who knows the
Service,'' states that an A.l3.'s wages in the mer-
£2 10s. to £4 ;" and
montb. This gives
The usual rate of
again,a chantin os servicet ‘
erroneousf r o m aLv3e rl
aOigsme. s
pt orf
er los
sr from
0"
n.
" a
wages for A.B.'s to all parts of the world is £2 10s.
The exceptions are trifling, the principal one being
in the trade to our North American colonies.
i
In that trade, which s only open during the
summer months, the rate of wages does, under the
highvery as
s 3 o
peculiarr i
30. ; circumstancesis of that trade, go as
and with the comparatively
small number of seamen who man the high class
steamers wages are considerably above the average
I have mentioned. But the common rate is only
page£
210s7.17Ioafnnthexe
Appendixmy
to the Report of the
authority, which is taken from
Merchant Shipping Committee of 1860.
As to the work, food, and lodging in the two

The letter which we published in- our last im-
pression on the state of the Navy will have taken
everybody in the kingdom by surprise. After
adopting, as we fancied, every possible•measure for
improving the condition of the sailor, after charging
a dozen of Commissions in succession with the pro-
motion of this very object, and after lavishing with
ungrudging hand innumerable millions on the
naval service, we are told in plain terms that we
are not much better off than in the days of the great
mutiny at the Nore. The times of violence and
brutality have, no doubt, gone by; but as far as
regards discontent, not only deep-seated, but, what
is worse, fairly justifiable, we are assured, on the
word of " One Who Knows the Service," that the
Navy is in as bad a state as it well could be. We
are told, moreover, that every captain in the fleet
knows this to be the fact; that the Admiralty
knows it, and that it is known, in short, to every.
body except the public. The hope of our corres-
pondent is that when the public at length comes to
know it something will be done, and that a con-
fessed wrong and mest perilous evil will no longer
be left without a remedy.
It is exceedingly striking, and ought to be in-
structive also, to read the story now placed before
the country. It is not the story of old times,
though the results, unhappily, are pretty nearly as
bad. There is no systematic tyranny on board
ship ; on the contrary, it is acknowledged that
the great majority of captains are good and kind.
There is Lo impressment, and, consequently, there
can be no men serving against their will. There
is undoubtedly on the part of the public and the
Legislature a genuine desire to secure the sailor

good treatment, and we can most truly say that
money has always been forthcoming for that pur-
pose without stint or grudge. Then, where is the
grievance which could assume such terrible propor-
tions as the one here alleged ? We can put the case
in half-a-dozen words. The sailor's eyes are opened.
He has shared in the general enlightenment of the
age. The schoolmaster in his roamings has come
across even our seamen, and they are now fully
competent to estimate the value of their labour, the

nature of their treatment, and the scale of their

pay. But the schoolmaster has not got as far as
the Admiralty, and half the regulations determin-
ing the condition of the sailor are framed upon
principles fitted only for times gone by. No heed
has been taken of the rapid progress of the nation,
involving the particular progress of all classes of
society. No sufficient thought has been given to
the fact that the man-of-war's man can now see in

the merchant service a mirror of seafaring life, and
that he is fully competent to compare his pay and
his privileges with those at the command of his

equals in another branch of his calling. Above all,
it has been forgotten that the sailor of 1860 is no
longer the sailor of 1800—a careless, impulsive,
half-childish being,—but a shrewd, calculating
man, who can very quickly find out when he is well
off or otherwise, and who is not disposed to submit
with patience to the consequences even of his own
mistakes. One of these mistakes he discovers that

he has made in shipping on board a man-of-war. If
he had gone aboard a merchantman, he would, ac-
cording to his own reckoning, have been far better
off, and kis wife too ; so he chafes under his work,

his treatment, and his wage, till at length he be-
comes chronically insubordinate, or seizes the first
opportunity to " run." That is the view of the case
opened by our correspondent's letter.
It shows the altered character of the modern
sailor that the great grievance of all is
the pay, and not so much the pay in itself
as the pay when compared with that of
other seamen. To this it is replied that the
pension restores the balance of the account ; and to
that, again, the sailor rejoins that he does not
choose to accept the condition. The deduction is
too heavy and the prospect too remote. He is not
disposed to forego 30 per cent. of his natural earn-
ings in order that he may lay up a little provision,
to be possibly available 20 years later, and who can
wonder at him ? Would such terms be taken in any
other trade ? Would a carter, a bricklayer, or a
weaver, accept wages one-third or so below the
current rate for the sake of a billet on a benefit
asylum when he shall be a score of years older
Of course, he would not. A man in the prime of
youth considers age immeasurably distant, and
looks only to time present. Add a shilling a week
to the market rate of pay, and you may get the
pick of a trade. Deduct a shilling, and all the
pictures you can draw of a contingent gratuity will
not bring an offer to your door. We have only to
look to the merchant service to see the principle in
actual operation. There, excepting under a few
great firms or companies, the sailor can look for
very little consideration. He may be even inhu-
manly or barbarously used, and when his time is
up and his wages paid he may starve, for anything
his late employers care about him. But the wages
are full wages. They enable a seaman to make a
good deal of money, and leave his wife with a good
many comforts. So he and his wife are both of one
mind in the matter, and the result is that any
merchantman can ship as many good sailors as are
wanted at short notice, while a man-of-war, even
under a popular captain, may lie six months in
harbour for want of hands.

We have given the chief prominence to this ques-
tion of pay because it really appears to lie at the
root of the whole matter. Our correspondent in-
timates, indeed, that the food of the men is bad
also, and this will probably appear to the public
the strangest part of the whole story. We can
understand the insufficient scale of wages arising
out of the old theory of pensions; but, if there
was anything which we believed we had really
bespoken and paid for, it was good fare for our
seamen. On this, however, we say no more at pre-
sent, nor can the point, we imagine, be so material
as that to which we have referred, for bad fare is
certainly common enough in the merchant service,
and yet the merchant service never lacks hands.
Those risks, like any other risk, will always be met
for the sake of pay. Pay, present pay, is the great
consideration which commands service. Give the
highest wages and you will get the best men. There
may be a dozen other things telling in favour of
your offer, but, as a general rule, they will not be
taken into account. Few men in the class from
which sailors are taken will allow an immediate
bargain to be influenced by considerations which
can only be operative after 20 years' interval. In
short, they would rather surrender the chance of a
pension, and receive their full share of pay.
All this, it will be confessed, is easily intelligible ;
but how, then, it will he asked, is the Navy manned
at all ? Our correspondent asserts that it is only
manned by sailors who for the most part are not the
best of their class, and who are for the most part
again, heartily sick of their bargain. Hence all the
disturbances and desertions of which we lately
heard so much. The men are in the service, but
they are eager to be quit of it. They have their
eyes about them, and, like all other Englishmen,
they have learnt to talk and think of their con-
dition. They think they have made a bad bargain,
and that for hard work and skilled labour they get
little pay and less liberty. From such impressions
discontent and disaffection ensue only too naturally,
and there, as we are assured, we have a picture of
the British Navy. We should rejoice to find that
amore agreeable view of things could be truthfully
given, but if what is stated is really the case it
behoves us to apply the needful remedies without
loss of time.

The " Green Dragon" of the 3d Buffs, granted
in 1707, was one of the royal supporters of Queen Eliza-
beth, in whose reign the regiment was formed out of the
loyal London citizens, and it possessed the peculiar privi-
lege of marching through the streets of the City with music
playing and colours flying. When the 31st were embodied,
the 3d received the popular appellation of the " Old Buffs,"
by way of distinction to the "Young Buffs :" both, how-
ever, derived their name from their accoutrements of buf-
falo leather. The " Bold Fifth" is a soubriquet of long
standing ; they wore a red and white feather, and aubse •
quently a white plume, in honour of their rout of the French
Grenadiers at Morne Fortune, in the West Indies, when
their success was so complete that every man was able to
furnish his cap with the white plumes of the enemy.—Once
a Week.

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snionikseinsgi,nfittsh,eb:oaarads, rthiseu;atism, gout, impurities, eruptions,
hysteria, neuralgia, irritability, sieeplessntss, acidity, palpi.
tation, heartburn, headache, despondency, cramps, spasms,
fo hcalth,l!

The crop of candidates for the representation of
this borough in Parliament appears to be inexhaus-
tible. On Saturday a new aspirant aK,eared in the
field—Mr. Walter Meller—who at OD ce has reached
a stage to which the majority of predecessors
have not yet attained—the issue r,f an address to the
electors. In that document, v. hich is dated from
Clapham-common, Mr. MelJer states that he is pos-
sessed of considerable pror.)erty within the borough,
and feels much sympathy with local interests. The
address does not afford a very distinct outline of
Mr. Meller's political opinions, beyond containing
the dictum thPA " ultra Toryism is dead, and the
politics of tie Manchester school are a mockery,"
which would seem to imply that he is what is calked
a.Liberal-Conservative. The chief ground ta.l7.en
by Mr. Meller is the necessity for maintaining the
sanctity of the Sabbath, and he,also professeshimself
a warm advocate of extended popular education. This
gentleman, notwithstanding his local interest, does
not appear to be at all known in the borough, and
is not at all likely to take any real part in the
folthcominc, contest. The name of Lord Ranelagh
has been placed before the electors for some days,
and he is still announced as a Conservative candi-
didate, but it is not believed that there is any se-
rious intention on his part of seeking the suffrages
of the constituency. The contest is expected to
lie between Mr. Scovell and Mr. Layard, and
will certainly be a hard-fought one, the first-
named gentlemanlocally connected, and having had the advantage of
some days' start in canvassing, and the retirement
of mr.
A. ie
Layard, however, is the favoured candidate of a
large and influential section of the electors who are
cep. Mlarr.,
desirous of being represented in Parliament by
a man with claims to other than local distinc-
tion. The third candidate, Mr. H. Fawcett, who!
has enlisted a large amount of sympathy and
support during his tau through the borough, is
not likely to proceed to a poll, as the mere
force of spoken addresses, without the aid of a com-
mittee or any of the usual organization of election
tactics, can hardly be expected to obtain a majority
of votes in so large a borough as Southwark. Mr.
Layard made his first public appearance before the
electors on Saturday night at the Horse Repository,
near the Elephant and Castle. The attendance
comprised between 3,000 and 4,000 persons, but
the partisans of Mr. Scovell mustered so strongly,
and were so demonstrative in cheering their
favourite and groaning at his opponent that the
proceedings were little better than dumb show, it
being fully 20 minutes before Mr. Layard could
utter one word that could be heard by any one but
those who immediately surrounded him.
Mr. LAYARD, however, proceeded with his ad-
dress, and, amid a scene of uproar and turbulent
confusion seldom equalled even at a Southwark
election, contrived at intervals to state his views
upon various points of domestic and foreign policy.
A vote approving Mr. Layard's claim to repre-
sent the borough was proposed and carried amid
great disorder.
Mr. H. FAWCETT, who was by Mr. Layard's side,
proposed that a general meeting of the electors
should be speedily summoned, in order to decide
between the claims of Mr. Layard and his own,
undertaking to retire if the decision should be
against himself.

NEWCASTLE-ON-TYNE, SATURDAY NIGHT:
The leaders of the Conservative party have met,
and come to a resolution not to take any part in
the ensuing contest for the vacant seat. The reso-
lution states that in the absence of a Conservative
candidate to supply the present vacancy, it is of the
utmost importance that the Conservative electors
abstain altogether from voting at the ensuing elec-
tion. But the electors generally are invited, after
the present contest is over, to sign a requisition to
Mr. William Cuthbert to become a candidate at the
next general election. The field is now, therefore,
in the possession of the three Liberals, and if the
Conservatives would abstain from voting in
any numbers, which they . will not, the
ensuing election might register the relative
strength of the three sections of the Liberal
body who have appealed to the electors. Mr.
Somerset Beaumont is a moderate Liberal, with no
very marked views upon Parliamentary reform.
He is brother of the Whig member for South Nor-
thumberland, and the Tory paper here asserts that
Lord Palmerston is about to make the latter gentle-
! man a peer; Mr. P. Carstairs, who gives a very
qualified support to Mr. John Bright's programme,
is a Dissenter, and a Financial Reformer; Mr. P.
A. Taylor, the third candidate, supports manhood
suffrage and the " Nationalities." Mr. Beaumont
will probably poll 2,000 votes, Mr. Carstairs from
1,200 to 1,400, Mr. Taylor from 600 to 700. At any
rate, that appears to be the relative position of
parties.

RAILWAY INTELLIGENCE.

METROPOLITAN.

At the Sheriffs' Court, Red Lion-square, on Satur-
day, a special jury was empanelled to assess the
amount of compensation to be awarded in respect
of several houses in the Edgware-road, the corner
of Chapel-street required for the Metropolitan
Railway. Evidence was given on the part of the
claimants as to the value of the property, and after
the case on the part of the company was opened a
verdict by consent was taken for the sum of £lO,OOO.

NEWCASTLE, DERWENT, AND WEAR

DALE.

On Friday a public meeting was held in the
Guildhall, Newcastle, to take into consideration the
best means of providing railway communication
from that town to the populous district of the val-
ley of the Derwent. The Mayor (Mr. Ingledew)
presided.
Mr. J. H. HINDE asked the support of the meet-
ing to a scheme for the formation of a railway from
Newcastle by the valley of the Derwent to the Con-
sett Works, thence to the great Towlaw Ironworks,
by Bishop Auckland, to a point near West Auck-
land, where it would form a junction with the
South Durham and Lancashire line. Their object
was twofold—first, to afford facilities for the local
traffic of the Valley of the Derwent and Consett
Ironworks ' • and, secondly, to open out a through
line from Newcastle to the western coast of the
kingdom. They intended to make their shipping
place on the new quay at Gateshead, immediately
opposite Newcastle. They thought it most desirable
that there should be a station in the heart of the
town of Newcastle, and that a short branch should
form a junction with the Newcastle and Carlisle
line immediately outside the central station. They
would carry the line directly through to Bishop
Auckland, and thence to a junction with the South
Durham and Lancashire, near West Auckland. The
crossing of the Tyne at Redheugh and the carrying
of the line through Gateshead would be very costly.
He believed that the capital which they would
require would be about £400,000. It would be
necessary that £300,000 of that, or thereabouts,
should be subscribed before they went to Par-
odor our_d
unanimously. ece
i n
liament ; and he could almost say that £200,000 9f
that would be raised elsewhere, provided that
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tnnhiconown stwea gouuuwnp
and;
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dbu r gh agreementn a i withhva y the
Company
its affairs. The revenue for the
last half-year amounted to £1,738, being an in-
crease of £B3 ; but, owing to the expenses of
winding up, the directors were only able to mem_
mend a dividend for the concluding half-vear of
their management at the rate of 1 per cent. The
dividend guaranteed by the North British is 4 pc;
cent.

Lnooostw OTI Nyiiint saßit
lotihAreßeDrTeinat
itEA......T
heChina,a
Yarmouth HospitalTONNING.---The
favourably towards recy. It is hoped
deaths is now
that the list of
tchietf engineer, will be able to give his evidence on the re-
sumption of the official inquiry,
xln'den with cotton, and bound from New Orleans
to Liverpool, was totally destroyed by fire, at sea, on the
6th November. The crew were rescued by the ship Ocean
Bride, and afterwards transferred to the steamer Quaker,
and landed at New York.
I'iBURNING
rregluetniisditirn progressing

LADVERTISEMENT.]—IIOIIOWay' Pills.—Sceptics Si-
lenced.—Many persons who have doubted the wonderful
curative and purifying powers of these pills, and afterwards
witnessed the beneficial effect produced by them in diseases
of the digestive organs, have been constrained to admit
their efficiency, have adopted them as their own domestic
aperient, and graciously recommended them to their friends.
Holloway's pills act primarily on the stomach, which they
thoroughly invigorate; they then exercise a most whole-
some influence over the liver, from which they ac,f
ately remove any congestion or temporary staguat
a triumph in art. How much sadness and t.,.;ana
they banished ? Holloway's pills have rescued lay
the bile or blood. The discovery of these pill:owas
from habitual pain awl =fumed ill-healtb• 1
11°I
havee e d

1 Railway was but very partially kno
the town, so that a, meagre concourse of people was
on the platform of the general station to receive
her. There was no attempt whatever at any mill.
tary display, and not even a single policeman was
present. The Ncottish Central train was punctual
to its time, and entered the station exactly at ten
Iminutes to four o'clock. Many of the passengers
who had ecr.ne in at the intermediate stations were
ignorant that the Empress Eugenie was in the
train alon.g with them, and expressed great asto-
nishment on hearing the cheers which arose as
soon as the. train stopped. Small as was the crowd
of spectators, her imperial Majesty was received
Shortly after heries aarrri-divagle,nhtleerm•
with great eithusiasm and hearty huzzahs, which
she repeatedly acknowledged with a bow and a
edrtitihheaetl ladies
mw
base
number
on
fl only
persons
shocnns thebei
nEgmgprraeds
us
al hadl
thrjor,gh the terminus to a cab in waiting outside,
sam:saesninelimteci
am, immediately drove to the Royal George Hotel.
left the hotel and visited the town. It may be
lein"joefstYheraesculnlW:
reached the top of Athole-street that her Majesty
was recognised; something like a crowd then
augmented until the hotel was reached.
Early on Friday morning much anxiety was ma-
nifested as to the Empress's intended route, but
nothing definite could for some time be ascertained.
The Lord Provost and magistrates met at 10 o'clock
a.m., and agreed to present a congratulatory address
to the Empress, which, in the course of the fore-
noon, was delivered to the gentlemen of her Ma-
jesty's suite to be transmitted to the Empress.
Shortly afterwards, a member of her Majesty's suite
waited on the Lord Provost, thanking him and the
other magistrates, on behalf of the Empress, for
their address and kind attention. In the forenoon
onlei Ace°mranied by her suite, she walked
the Marquis of Breadalbane visited the Empress at
the Royal George Hotel: Aliout 12 o'clock it became
known that her Majesty was to leave for Dunkeld
by the one o'clock p.m. train, and a very large crowd
collected at the hotel to witness her Majesty's de-
partura. On the Empress making her appearance
at the- hotel door she was received with enthusiastic
'l4:'fliS, which she politely acknowledged: -- Mean-
Ne7i fe, at the railway station large groups of persbus • •
had assembled, and on the train leaving the station
the Empress was again loudly cheered. On leaving
Dunkeld, it is understood that the Empress will
proceed to TaymouthCastle,the seat of the Marquis
of Breadalbane.

(From yesterday's lifoniteur.)
We are happy tobe able to announce a perceptible
amelioration in the health of the Empress. Her
Majesty, in spite of her extreme desire to keep her
incoymto, has been everywhere recognised and wel-
comed with sentiments of the most respectful sym-
pathy. At Edinburgh the Provost presented an ad-
dress to her, and a Scotch regiment marched in
front of the hotel in which she was staying, while
the military band played the air "Reine Hortense,"
and the crowd that had assembled from all quarters
loudly cheered.