The Sun.
London, England, 1867-06-19 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON, WEDNESDAY EVEN

to mid-summer. The sun has made his reappear-
ance, the rain has ceased, and the temperature,
though low for the season, was agreeable.
A fisherman named Piveau, well known for his
dexterity in catching carp, and the inventor of the
bait which bears his name, has committed suicide
on the railway between Paris and Nantes. On
leaving the Clermont tunnel the driver thought he
perceived a man on his knees, and at the same time
the train received a slight shock. He put on the
brake and stopped the train, but not perceiving any
blood and there not being any derangement of the
machine, he continued his route. An account of
the occurrence, however, had been received by tele-
graph at Nantes on his arrival. The-poor man who
was dashed to pieces had often expressed his inten-
tion to commit suicide. his reputation had ex-
tended to all the departments of France.
It is now certain I believe that there will be a
second session of the Chambers. The -discussions
upon the press, public meetings, and other impor-
tant subjects,will not be prolonged beyond the 15th
July. An adjournment will then take place till the
early part of November.
A ic
, Felix
has
a newspaper editor of emi-
nence,
d after a long and painful illness.
n e just Mo r n aud'
He was attached to the Liberal cause, and was
formerly one of the Editors of the Siecle. His
funeral took place to-day. It was attended by a
host of literary men, including vast numbers of the
society of the Gera de Lettres.

RIOTS IN BIRMINGHAM.

(From the Times.)

BI oirsmu; Tuesday Evening.
The rioting of Sunday and yesterday has been
for the moment checked, and is is hoped if any
attempt is made to renew the disturbances the
authorities have sufficient force at command to sup-
press it instantly. The streets which were the scenes
of the recent affrays were thronged all this morning
and afternoon, but the people seemed to have come
from curiosity, and their demeanour was far less vio-
lent and threatening than yesterday. Soon after 3
o'clock Carr's-lane and two or three of the neigh-
bouring streets were cleared, and kept by the infan-
try. Until long past midnight of Monday there
were great crowds in the streets, and it is not much
to say that from 3 in the afternoon until 8 in the
evening mob law prevailed. The police, even with
their cutlasses, had great difficulty in getting the
best of the rioters; in fact, in several encoun-
ters they failed to do so, and in Park-street
and some others adjoining it the amount
of damage done is very great ; in the street
named many of the houses are io ruins, the furniture
of the occupants has been destroyed, and the poor
people have been driven to seek shelter where they
could obtain it. In a disturbance of this character
it is needless to enter into details of the numerous
encounters which took place ; many of the wounded
went to the General and Queen's Hospitals ; others
got away as best they could.
Shortly after 7 o'clock the Mayor read the Riot
Act. His Worship did this in three places, in Park-
street, in Bull Ring, and Moor-street, and then,
accompanied by a troop of the Bth Hussars, he passed
through the streets where the disturbances were going
on. The magistrates and military were cheered as
they passed along. At 10 o'clock a-troop of Hussars
arrived from Coventry ; they were accompanied
through the streets by Mr. Holliday and Mr. Avery,
two of the magistrates ; in their progress a
brickbat was thrown at a trooper, wounding him
severely ; the perpetrator of this outrage was seen
and taken into custody. At half-past 11 o'clock a
detachment of 100 infantry of the 82d Regiment
arrived from Weedon. Such were some of the pre-
cautions which the authorities took to be prepared
against further tumult.
We have written in advance of some other of the
events of the day. In the course of the morning
there appeared on the scene a coadjutor of Mr.
Murphy in the person of Mr.Whalley, M.P. Ile had
an interview with the Mayor and magistrates, and
in the course of his remarks claimed for Mr. Mur-
phy the right of " freedom of speech," and denied
that Mr. Murphy " had been indiscreet in his
language." The Mayor, in reply, said that he
declined to enter into any discussion on the ab-
stract question as to the right of " freedom of
speech ;" he held, he said, Mr. Murphy morally,
if not legally, responsible forlthe riots, and he re-
quired that he should immediately quit the town.
Mr. Kynnersley, the stipendiary, concurred in the
sentiment, and added that he should advise the
magistrates to order the street to be blocked up, so as
to prevent any one entering Mr. Murphy's building.
At half-past 6 o'clock Mr. Murphy delivered a
short address the Tabernacle, in the course of
1 have a building. This building
is a witness this day against Popery and Tracta-
s whichr
he said
Tracta-
rianism. (Applause.) I say it is a witness of the
right of speech and the liberty of conscience. (Ap-
plause.) And I will carry out my lectures if they
walk over my body as a dead corpse. (Loud ap-
plause.) And I say to the Mayor of Birmingham he
y slersvaayn
ttowteleMpyaomr
in
cheers)—and as my ser-
(Renewed cheers.) He
Majesty the Queen, I say
t
protect me. (Loud applause).
vßmßaiiunrr
Birmingham—(enthusiastic
andmhh
anumust
Birmingham
shalltd (oape
trnhobit tshone:Ci;suhi
tam;enret:
is placed as Mayor and Chief Magistrate, and as I
thrown at him to-day. I hope it
(laughter and applause)—and
that the Popish stone will let him see what Popery
l
is. (Hear, hear.) And he will get better if he gets
Ttawhmihel will ar
There
oloway asyha mraF 31
stonebgn jouocsdtt—
a couple of more stones. (Laughter, and ' Never
mind him." We didn't attack nor you didn't attack
Dr. Manning when he came to the Town-hall. (No.)
You didn't attack the Popish bazaar held in the'
Town-hall. (No, no.) And because you are Pro-
testants, and because you love liberty, I am
wasHu
rtakensom fixed for the evening lec-
ture, would crush you
by the Rev. Dr. Arm-
strong, to
threatenedatoms."A t
8 owitho(eAk mp
thel ynu
hour
life.o. )
fdid also Mr. Murphy, the staple of
Mr. Whalley delivered a
hltouisnrgedastderureer scesthseo:riaros being abuse of the Mayor for refusing
him the Town-hall. He spoke amid much interrup-
tion.

In the course of yesterday upwards of 70 persons
were arrested, making the number in custody 100
up to last night.
This morning the magistrates commenced swear-
ing in special constables, and the pensioners, under
Major Smythe, Were called out yesterday ; the Rifle
Volunteers, under Major Ratcliffe, have also been
in readiness.

Telegrams have been sent to Manchester for more
soldiers.

nersley (stipendiary),
At the police-office this morning before Mr. Kyn-
and other magistrates, a large number of the rioters
were brought up; some of the principal of them
sentenced to terms Messrs. Graham, Cooksey,
were committed for trial at the Quarter Sessions ;
others were remanded, and a third section summarily
a fortnight to six weeks each.
There is a strong feeling in the town that the
Per-
fect propriety, have of imprisonment varying from
Mayor, who has shown so much disposition to do
his duty in trying circumstances, might, with Per-
in fact,in view of the peril threatened, he should at
all risk have taken means to prevent Murphy from "
T
entering his exercised greater power ; that,
abernacle" after the exhibition of
Sunday.

In the telegram which appeared in the Times to-
day it is stated that a soldier had been shot at. Such
was the rutuour at the moment, the truth appears
to be that a missile was thrown at him.
Murphy is announced to deliver a lecture again
this evening.

WEDNESDAY MouNING.
Up to half-past 12 no serious disturbance occurred.
It was rumoured that it was intended to make an
attack on the Catholic Cathedral and the armories
in the gun-making district of the town ; but, warn-
ing having been given to the authorities, any out-
breaks, if they were intended at all, were prevented
by the presence of the police and the military.
Mr. Murphy delivered his lecture at the " Taber-
nacle" as usual, and the proceedings were orderly.
Over 100 soldiers of the 81st Regiment arrived
from Manchester last night, and are now quartered
at the Town-hall.
The streets are quiet.

NG, JUNE 19, 1867.

LITERATURE.

Harrison Ainsworth's New Story.

Old Court. A Novel. By William Harrison
Ainsworth. Three Vols. Chapman and Hall.
Another delightful fiction has, in " Old Court,"
been added by llarrison Ainsworth to his already
numerous and brilliant contributions to the ima-
ginative literature of England. If a companion +pic-
ture is anywhere discoverable among its predeces-
sors, it would perhaps be discernible in " Mervyn
Clitheroe." Yet even there the resemblance can be
regarded as merely superficial. " Old Court" and
"Mervyn Clitheroe" simply fall, so to speak, within
the same category, for inasmuch as they are storms
the time of which is within the knowledge of the
present generation, and the scene of which is here
in England. Otherwise, they are for the most part
very dissimilar. They resemble each other, apart
from these two considerations of time and place,
no more than they either of them bear any resem-
blance whatever to the other tales told by the same
inexhaustible story-teller. And how various his
themes, and how divers the methods of their treat-
ment, who is there amongst us who does not very well
indeed remember " Rookwcod" for example—
a work that might be accepted as the very type, as
the very arch-typo of pure Romance, ending with
its breathless incident of the Ride to York by
Dick Turpin the Highwayman. Contrasting
vividly with which, we have that picturesque narra-
tive of the early part of the last century, " the
teacup times of hoop and hood," when beaux
vied with each other 'S in the nice conduct of
a clouded cane," when brocaded petticoats
rustled among the quincunxes and carvelled yew-
trees of such old-world gardens as those haunted by
heroines like " The Miser's Daughter." Contrasted
yet more vividly again with these—we have a
long array of historical romances penned by the
celebrant of two such astonishingly different
persons, as, on the one hand, let us say, The Ad-
mirable "Crichton," and, on the other, the house-
breaker and prison-breaker, " Jack Sheppard)"
Such historical romances, for example, as those with
which Harrison Ainsworth constrained his readers
thenceforth to associate inextricably fictitious inci-
dents of his own conception with national edifices as
important as " Windsor Castle," and the " Tower
of London," and " St. James's" Palace, and " Old
St. Paul's,"—the romance last mentioned compris-
ing within it events as dire and as enthralling as
the Great Fire and the Plague of London. It were
simply superfluous, however, to undertake here
anything like a synopsis, or even, we will
say, anything like an exact or detailed cata-
logue of the imaginative writings of the author
(among other works) of " Cardinal Pole" and
" John Law," of " The Constable of the
Tower" and " The Lord Mayor of London," of
" Lancashire Witches" and " Guy Fawkes," of
"The Star Chamber" and "The Flitch of Bacon,"
of " Sir John Chiverton," and of " 0 vingdean
Grange." Selecting, now one theme, now
another—now me epoch, now another— our
alternate Novelist and Romancist would seem
to have shown us long since the whole range of his
capabilities, wide arid various though they are.
This, however, he apparently has not done, after
all, nevertheless ! Instance, in truth, this latest in-
dication of his sustained and unexhausted origi-
nality. " Old Court," as we have already inti-
mated, for inasmuch as -it is both modern and
English, is so far (but no farther), like " Mervyn
Clitheroe," but, apart from that, it is really and
truly, upon the whole, entirely unlike any one of its
various and numerom predecessors. It is full of
interest—an interest that begins with the very be-
ginning and ends with the very end of the narra-
tive. It is noticeable, by the way, at the outset, iu
regard to the construction of the story, that
there is a tragic d proem, or prelu le, or
prologue, or overture, or introduction, or
however you In3y like to call it, that rivets the
attention in regard to the work almost upon the
reader's first opining of the first chapter of the
first volu lie. From this introduction to the
novel or romance proper of " Old Court" we take
cognisance of au incident which furnishes" a key
to the whole mystery of the subsequent plot,
a clue enabling us afterwards to thread the most
devious windings of its entangled labyrinth.
Kit's Coity House, in fact, is the scene of an
apparent murder, which in simple truth, how-
ever, is nothing worse than a purely accidental
homicide, in which a Younger Brother falls the
victim of a pistol shot fired during a struggle be-
tween himself and his Elder Brother—the younger
one being armed (and to all appearance with
the most murderous intentions) with the very
weapon by which he himself is, through a pure
casualty, destroyed. Both the brothers are in love
with the same woman—the victim (unknown to his
accidental destroyer) being at the very time of the
fatal contention at Kit's Coity House, secretly this
bewitching creature's husband. Sir Hugh Chet-
wynd, Baronet, of Old Court, is, in point of fact,
the unintending fratricide, Captain Clarence
Chetwynd being his ill-fated younger brother.
Clarence, therefore, it is, whom Alnico, the came
of this fatal struggle, survives long enough to
become the mother of a boy who eventually makes
good his claim, not only as heir to the, baronetcy, but
--more than that—to the remorseful adoption of him
by Sir Hugh, as heir to his ancestral estate of Old
Court, and in effect to the whole bulk ofs his pro-
perty. This, notwithstanding that Sir Hugh himself
has an only daughter of his own by a marriage
which appears to have lasted but for a very brief
interval, leaving him thenceforth (with his only
daughter) a sombre and saturnine widower. The
natural, the almost inevitable conjecture would be
of course, upon mentioning this, that Amice's son
and Sir Hugh's daughter espouse each other. Such,
however, is not by any means the case. The pre-
cise manner, however, in which Mr. Ainsworth, with
all his practised skill, weaves together the tissue of
their fortunes—the readers of " Old Court" will be
charmed to learn through a perusal of the book
itself. As affording them upon the instant an
enticing glimpse of its alluring heroine, we will
here give Mr. Ainsworth's intending readers, at any
rate, one of his delicately-pencilled outlines of
Lucetta, as those outlines are drawn in the manner
following :

There were many lovely girls dancing, but one eclipsed
all the rest. So singularly graceful was she, that it was a
positive pleasure to watch her movements. Her figure
was perfectly symmetrical, and its exquisite proportions
were now admirably displayed in the mazy dance. She
was tall and slight, with the tiniest and prettiest
feet imaginable. We have not said a word as yet
about her features, but they corresponded with her figure,
and were of the highest order of beauty—a lovely oval
face, lighted up by black eyes of Oriental size and splen-
dour, exquisitely pencilled brows and luxuriant black
tresses, taken back from a forehead smooth and white as
Parian marble. Her features wore of a pure classical
mould, with a beautiful mouth and proudly-cut chin; and
when her rosy lips were parted by a smile and what an
enchanting smile it was—two rows of pearls might be
discovered.

Beginning, as we have seen that the book does,
with a startling and melodramatic Homicide, it
closes with an enthralling description of a Fire at
Old Court—a fire that at one time seems to
threaten the whole of that picturesque and
ancient edifice with destruction. All ends
happily, however—(the villain of the tale, La Hogue,
meeting a dreadful death the while)— Capt. Fan-
sha we and Lucetta being married at the same time
that the heroine-number-two, by name Ida Fan-
shawe, is taken to wife by ,Sir Clarence Chetwyn,
the new baronet, and as such the new master of Old
Court.

A MAN TORN TO PIECES.—On Saturday Wm.
Pickard, aged 60, was oiling a shaft at the corn mill of Mr.
Benjamin Murgatroyd, near Bradford, when his clothing
becoming entangled, he was taken up and dashed against a
wall, his head being instantly smashed to pieces, and his
arms and legs torn off.

THE Moons.—We are glad to be able to state
that the fatal disease prevalent among grouse in other
parts of the country has not yet penetrated to any of our
northern moors. On the contrary, wo are informed that
grouse have not beau so abundant for many years. On the
extensive moors of Badenoch, Strathspey, Strathdearn, and
Stratlinairn, the prospects of the sportsman were never
brighter. The young birds are strong and healthy; the
coveys numerous, and averaging from eight to eleven in
each.—lnverness Courier.

L TEST INTELLIGEZZOF.

(REUTER'S TELEGRAMS.)

AMERICA.
ARRIVAL OF THE CITY OF LONDON.
NEW YORK, June 8, 5.50 a.m.

General Sickles has issued an order requiring
all civil officers charged with the maintenance of
the peace in his district to report to arid obey
the paramount authority of the Provost Marshals
in their districts.

General Sheridan has appointed Mr. Benjamin
Flanders Governor of Louisiana, Mr. Durant de-
clining to accept the office.
It is reported that President Johnson is about
to issue a proclamation declaring' that military
district commanders have no right to remove or in-
terfere with Southern State officials.
President Johnson arrived at Richmond en route
for Washington, yesterday. On Thursday he
visited the University of North Carolina, and deli-
vered a brief speech, reiterating his former declara-
tions to defend and obey the constitution, and
protested sincerity in his actions.

Numerous Conservative meetings have been held
in Georgia, Alabama.
Chief Justice Chase opened the Circuit Court at
Raleigh ou Thursday.
Mr: Davis has returned to Montreal.
Advices received here from Mete() state that
Juarez and his Cabinet held a consultation at San
Luis on the 17th May relative to the disposal of the
Emperor Maximilian, but the result is not known.
It is reported that the cause of the fall of Quere-
taro was the bribery of the commander of the prin-
cipal fort.

The Emperor Maximilian stipulated that he should
be treated as a prisoner of war, but that if anybody
was shot he should be the first.

Escobedo has ordered all Imperial officers now
refusing to surrender to be shot.

The Inman steamer City of London, from New
York on the Bth inst., arrived at Queenstown at
4 a.m. to-day (June 18) with 124 passengers and
P 44,538 in specie. After having landed the mails
and passengers, she proceeded for Liverpool at
4.20 a.m.

NEW YORK, June 18.

The steamers Tarifa, City of Cork, and Louisiana
arrived out to-day.

TURKEY.

CONSTANTINOPLE, June 18.

A collective Note, from France, Russia, Prussia,
and Italy was presented to the Porte on Saturday,
urging the suspension of hostilities in Crete, and an
inquiry into the grievances of the islanders, by
commissioners appointed jointly by the great
Powers and the Porte.

The Imperial Ottoman Bank has published the
half-yearly statement of the Government debt ac-
count,-showing that 117 millions of piastres have
been received in cash, and that 27 millions will be
dna on the 13th July, and 45 millions after that
date. Of these amounts there have been remitted
to Europe 103 millions on account of the Foreign
Loan Service, and 86 millions still remain here on
account of the general debt service.