The Sun.
London, England, 1869-02-03 00:00:00

MEETING OF CONVOCATION.

The Convocation of the Province of Canterbury assem-
bled on Tuesday morning, although it was understood that
the meeting would be simply a formal one, and that no
actual business will be dispatched until the 23rd inst.
The Archbishop attended, accompanied by the Bishop
elect of London, and other prelates, Sir Travers
Twiss, the Vicar-General of the Province, Mr. Dyke, the
Registrar, and other officials. The Venerable Archdeacon
Denison and the Very Rev. Dr. H. Goodwin, Dean of
Ely, advanced, and the former, in a Latin speech, said they
had to present to him theVen. Edward Bickersteth, D.D.,
Archdeacon of Buckingham, who had been for the third
time elected Prolocutor of the Lower House of Convoca-
tion. The Lower House had many most important
duties to perform, and he trusted it would ever be found
fighting for the maintenance of the true faith, for the in-
tegrityof the Scriptures, and the privileges and authorities
of the Church. He blamed those who had inconsiderately
gone to excess in ceremony in honour of the Sacrament,
although he admitted that both in the Sacrament of
Baptism and that of the Lord's Supper the utmost reverence
ought to be observed. But from both those Sacraments
of the Church many greatly detracted (impenee
derogant). The decrees of the Catholic and Primitive
Church were clear upon these matt-,,rs, and yet no remedy
was to be obtained by those who were desirous of upholding
the Church's laws. With regard to the state of the epis-
copate, the Church of England, he said, had twenty-seven
bishops, of whom some were disabled, while there was
work for eighty. In consequence of this defect, diocesan
synods languished, and the just plan of the laity
of the Church taking counsel with the clergy—
which would be found to be the main safeguard of the
English Church—was hindered. He warmly urged the
necessity of maintaining in its integrity the Irish Church,
and urged that if the branch of the United Church esta-
blished hi Ireland were given over to the designs of men,
however astute, however perverse, or however inflated
with the vanity of philosophy, the branch of the Church
established in England would be in imminent danger.
He urged, also, a more efficient representa-
tion of the clergy in Convocation, and a revision
of the present Court of Ecclesiastical Appeal.
The Archbishop, who appeared surprised nt the multitude
of topics introduced by the Archdeacon into an address
which in former times has mainly been confined to an
eulogium on the new Prolocutor, replied in a brief Latin
address. He congratulated the new Prolocutor on the
position he had attained for the third time, and hoped
that the same sound sense would characterise the exercise
of his office which had marked it hitherto.—The Arch-
deacon of Buckingham briefly acknowledged his re-
election, and the proceedings were adjourned to the 23rd
instant. The Archdeacon's speech in the original Latin
was published in a special edition of the John Bull, and
largely circulated at the meeting of the S.P.C.IC.

The Leeds Reform League bad a demonstration
on Monday, at which Mr. Baines, M.P., Mr. Cantor, M.P., and
Mr. Mundella were present. Speeches were delivered and
resolutions were passed in favour of Mr. Gladstone's policy,
and a vote of confidence in the Premier was adopted.

The Russian Government has devised and begun
to carry out a gigantic scheme in connection with the navi-
gation of the Volga, by which it will be enabled, in the
course of a very few years, to discharge a largo army of
picked troops, fresh and ready for battle, somewhere in the
neighbourhood of Balkh.

The first corps of the Turkish army is in posi-
tion on the loft shore of the gulf of Volo, not far from
the Olin of Pharsalia, and quite close to Zoitoin. It is
twenty-four thousand strong, and is composed of picked men,
well appointed and provided with excellent artillery. If the
emergency should arise, it will forthwith occupy Zeitoin and
march diroct on Athens, before which it would arrive in
four or five days.

A correspondent writes :—" On Frilly last, at
about 1.10 p.m., was felt a distinct shock of earthquake at
Newton-k-Willows and neighbourhood. I myself, sitting in
a room, felt a movement, which at the same time was accom-
panied by a rattling of doors and windows, the perpendicular
bolts to French windows causing a very considerable
rattle. This was succeeded by a loud though apparently
distant noise, like the bursting of a powder magazine, or
other similar causes. In about ten minutes afterwards
there set in a very heavy thunderstorm, which continued
more than half an hour."