The Sun.
London, England, 1869-03-06 00:00:00

One of die most notable articles in the Cornhill is that
on the Civil Service. Many years ago a commission under-
took to consider the state of this service, and came to the
conclusion that its organisation was far from perfect.
On many occasions afterwards the subject was brought
before the House of Commons, and a select committee was
appointed to investigate the matter. The 'complaint that
is urged against the present system is that it does not tend
to encourage exertion or to develope intellect. " Good
men are kept down in the junior class for twenty-fivi
years waiting for vacancies in the superior class." Some
of the suggestions which are made here are very
good, especially that which points to a more judicious
division of labour. It is must desirable on every
account that a line should be drawn between
the intellectual and the mere mechanical work. The
system of promotions is also at fault, and the defects
in the present arrangement may be seen by the fact that
it requires twenty years' service to attain a salary of
£4OO. The consequence of all these drawbacks is that the
able, the ambitious, and the energetic are alike dissatisfied,
and the service suffers from their depression. Many of the
remedies which are here proposed seem likely to meet the
exigencies of the case, and it is only strange that the sepa-
ration of the intellectual from the mechanical duties of
the service should not have been resolved upon before.
There is an abundant supply of fiction in the pages of
this magazine. " That Boy of Norcott's "is brought to a
conclusion, and the hero finds himself at last in the posses-
sion of his old place in society, from which he had been
banished by the caprices of his father. " Lettice Lisle "
meets with some more remarkable adventures, and her
visit to the old cathedral city is described in a most inte-
resting style. "Put Yourself in His Place" is the
beginning of a story by Mr. Charles Reade, which bids
fair to be an exciting one, and records some
dark details of the trades unions. " Railway Signal-
ling " is the title of a paper that contains a good
deal of information. The part which will attract
the most attention is that referring to the Abergele acci-
dent. If the " block-system" had been in rise on the
Chester and Holyhead Railway, that lamentable occur-
rence would not have taken place. This system is enforced
on the South - Eastern and South Devon Railways,
and has been found to work most successfully. Its
object is to preserve an interval of space be.
tween the trains, and it takes its name from
the railway being -divided into " blocks" or divisions,
by signal-boxes, which are placed in communication by
means of the electric telegraph. " Military Administra-
tion " is an article that well deserves attention, and takes
a comprehensive view of the subject. It must be observed,
Eci*ever, that the writer hardly forms a just estimate of
the responsibility of Parliament. He steknOwleageethitt
the present system is doomed externally and internally,
and that a new one must be created forthwith. "Some
Remarks on Travelling in America" are written in an
entertaining manner, and present some graphic pictures of
Transatlantic life and scenery.
The Art Journal is- particularly readable. Professor
Ansted leads off with an article on the `Volcanic Character
of Italian Scenery. The author of a paper on " The
Influence of Character upon Art" lays down the canon
that " a bad man, a man determinately bad by choice as
well as by habit, never yet did any really good work."
This is conceivable enough. A man "determinately
bad" would do only bad work • I imagine work for
Holywell-street and the French' picture-dealers. The
eightieth of the series of British Artists, whose biogra-
phies Mr. Dafforne is writing, is devoted to Mr. J. A.
Houston, R.S.A., known best north of the Tweed. The
same biographer devotes his third chapter on the Picture
Galleries of Italy to Venice. Mr. Charles Hetnans has
a long and interesting account of the monastery of Monte
Oliveto near Siena. Mr. Murray having treated in a
former number of Kamptulicon, now decribes cocoa-nut
matting. The manufacture originated in the following
manner. Captain Wildey, a gentleman who had long
resided in Ceylon, on Lhis return to England, in 1836,
brought *ith him a mattress stuffed with cocoa-nut fibre.
He found his bed most comfortable, having, among other
properties, a fatal effect upon vermin. He praised it
highly, and soon afterwards entered into partnership with
Mr. Treloar for introducing the fibre into England.
Agencies were established in Ceylon for collecting and ex-
porting the fibre, and it is now received in large quantities,
and applied to a variety of uses, such as mats, hassocks,
and netting for sheep-folds, but' not, it would seem, to the
original use of bedding. Mr. Hall, the editor selects
Cobham Hall for the third of the "Stately Tomes of
England." The selected engravings are " The Defence "
by Mr. J. T. Pott, Ary Sehefrer's The Kiss of Judas'"
and Mr. Birch's prize statue " The Wood Nymph."
The " conductress " of Belgravia has, done wisely, in my
opinion, by ceasing to occupy one-half of the magazine
with her own writings. Remarkable to relate, the present
number contains not a single line from her; the divorce
between the Belgravia and Miss Braddon, whom we once
considered all but identical, is, at all events for the present,
complete. I cannot say I grieve much on that account.
The fiction is supplied by Mr. Justin M`Carthy, Mrs.
Cashel Hoey (these names savour of Merrion rather than
Belgrave-square), Mr. Walter Thornbury, and another
writer whose name is not mentioned. As for the
"padding," it is of a better sort than is
usual in this magazine. Mr. Thornbury tells
some good stories about London actors in the old
times, and Mr. Sala, taking a kindred subject, discourses
of stage costume more than 30 years before Lord Sydney
awoke one morning and found himself virtuous. Under
the heading of "A New Game for Ladies" Mr. Tulloch
describes golf, known to the far northern dwellers of St.
Andrew's, and the far southern visitors to Northam
Burrows. Mr. James Hutton, who ought to know about
Indian matters if any one does, writes on the Central-
Asian question, and says that a Russian invasion is by no
means the impossible event in the future which the Times
supposes it to be. It will not come off at present, and we
can prevent it happening at all if we will only make friends
of the Affghans, and treat our Indian feudatories justly
and kindly. Mr. Scoffern, who is as fond of villainous
saltpetre as though lie were a born soldier, describes, under
the title " White Gunpowder," Mr. Schultze's process.
Good Words for the Young maintains its first reputation,
It could scarcely do otheriv.ise when some of the ablest
men of the day are the writers. Of all strange things
contained in the present number, surely the strangest is
Professor Kingsley's confession, twice repeated, that lie
has never seen a glacier except from a distance. He had
better arrange with Mr. Cook, the excursionist, to take
him to Cliamonni next summer, and he will then be within
a lady's walk of two glaciers ; or, if that sounds Cockney.
fled, let him try Norway, find his way up the Hardanger
fjord to its head, and he will have a capital opportunity
of making acquaintance with the " snow-plough," ps he
well calls the glacier, within an easy morning's excursion
from Odde.

London Society is as light and sketchy as of yore.
"With the Court at Compiegne" is an interesting
account of a stag-hunt in that royal forest on the day
that the Prince and the Princess of Wales were among
the Emperor's guests. "The Piccadilly Papers" include a
chapter on the new pier at Brighton, and reviews of Sir
John Coleridge's " Memoir of the Rev. John Kebie," and
Lord Campbell's Lives of Lyndhurst and Brougham.
The writer of the latter thinks it may be said of both
noble lords that the last days were the best days. In
these last days they were best understood and best
honoured. Lyndhurst was " the old man eloquent," the
British Nestor, the warning patriot, the unselfish parlia-
mentary debater. " When upwards of eighty he reco-
vered his sight, and his youth was_ renewed as an

eagle's. The new generation had forgotten Brougnam's
perversity, and dwelt on the listorical glories
of cheap knowledge, freedom of the press, the
Edinburgh Review,
and the trial of Queen Caroline.
And of each of these eminent men, Brougham and Lynd.
hurst, sundered so long by political animosities, and then
united in loving amity to their ninetieth year, it may be
said, as of Cardinal Wolsey, that—what was best of all—
he died fearing God." Mr. G. M. Towle has a first article
on " American University Customs," narrating some of
the characteristics of Yale University, New Haven, Con-
necticut ; and there is a practical and sensible chapter on
" Days at the Crystal Palace." Altogether, although it
cannot be said that London Society is a strong magazine,
it will bear comparison with many of its older contempo-
raries.
- - - -

St. Paurs is disappointing. Ido not complain of the
quantity, but the quality is not up to Mr. Trollope's
usually high standard. The most interesting paper is a
review of the late Emperor Maximilian's " Recollections

of My Life." That life the writer thinks deserving of
especial admiration, for the Emperor had a mind open to
the reception of all kinds of beauty, and a power of
expression which enabled him to reconstruct his ideas and
cast them into a tangible shape. It has often been stated
that men doomed to an early death are wont to be
visited by strange apprehensions of their fate, and that in
certain moods they have distinct visions of their
approaching end. Maximilian's sensitive fancy subjected
him occasionally to painful presentiments, and in the
midst of pleasure the sight of a churchyard,. or the jar of
discordant sounds, would suggest a long train of painful
images to his mind. It is satisfactory to hear that the
time is past when the officers of the English army
were, almost to a man, ignorant of the commonest
principles of the art of war. According to an
article on " The Influence of Modern Improvements
upon Strategy," the art is taught now at both the
military colleges, though the tradition that officers
of the scientific corps were not to hold commands,
t. h studyhe mayother
long kept it away from Woolwich. The future, we are
told, is brightening before us. and the day is not far dis-
mtaankt'ewcheerntaian
ofm aancawriewer
papers deal with President Johnson's Last Message,
winmthbeinßesritaisbhilitayrmwiy
Other Inhabited Worlds," and the Marriage Commission
Report. The two tales—" The Sacristan's Househpld."
and " Phineas Finn"—are continued.
There is a good paper in the Victoria Magazine on
"Gipsies," with timely warnings against dealings
with them, and exhortations to teach and civilise
continued, and
and and
them. The translation of Madame Dora d'lstria's
" Women in the East" is continued, and the present
chapter is devoted to the Dutch women, whose beauty
fairly took me by surprise the first time I travelled in
Holland, even though I was then fresh from Italy. Miss
between
is a
thereCauli ei
si 1 da's tolerablysto, "Theo
Last
scene dOunce,"
one of his clients.

Mr. William Thomson certainly does turn out an inte-
resting sixpennyworth in The Gardener, interesting even
to the unhappy dwellers in cities ; how much more to
those who have an opportunity of obeying his directions,
and trying the experiments which he recommends,

General Adam Badean, private secretary to the
President-elect, is busy on the second and concluding
volume of his Military History of Gen. Ulysses S Grant.
Professor Alonzo Jackman, of the Norwich University
(Vermont), claims that he originated the idea of an ocean
telegraph, and in proof of this republishes an articl,
from Lis pen, public hed in the Vernwat ilftrcyry in 1816.
THE MANUFACTURE OF WATCHES AND CLOCKS.
A most interesting and instructive little work, describing briefly
but with great clearness, the rise and progress of watch and
clock makin , has just been published by Mr J. W. Benson, of
25, Old Bond-street, 99, Westbourne-grove, and the City Steam
Factory, 58 and 60, Ludgate-hill. The book, which is profusely
illustrated, gives a full description of the various kinds of watches
and clocks, with their prices, and no one should make a purchase
without visiting the above establishments or consulting this truly
valuable work. By its aid persons residing in any part of the
United Kingdom, India, or the Colonies, are enabled to select for
themselves the watch best adapted for their use, and have it sent
t o the
tom thewithPrince perfect
of safety.Nvale
Mr. Benson,
who
holds
to any
this
pamphlet
on receipt of two postage stamps, and we cannot too strongly
sends
the appoint-
ment
address
recommend it to the notice of the intending purchaser