The Sun.
London, England, 1867-12-13 00:00:00

EARLY CLOSING ASSOCIATION.

The friends and promoters of the East London
Early Closing Movement met last evening at the
Beaumont Institution, for the purpose of making a
demonstration in favour of the above excellent pur-
pose. The proceedings consisted, as is usual on these
occasions, partly of speeches and partly of music,
the latter portion of the entertainment being pro-:"
vided by a choir of a hundred voices, under the
direction of Mr. Jules Benedict. The hall was well
occupied by friends of the movement, which deserves
the best encouragement from all who are interested
in the welfare of a large class of the population.
The chair was taken by Mr. C. 11.)ed, F.S.A.,
and he was supported, among others, by the follow-.
ing gentlemen :—Mr. Walker, Captain Campbell,
Rev. M. Kennedy, Mr. Wilkinson, Mr. Hamilton, &c.
Letters of regret at unavoidable absence were
read from Messrs. Cohen, Venables, Ealaud, Clay-
ton, Lonsdale, &c.

The Local Secretary (Mr. Wall) read a statement
of the proceedings during the week, which showed
in reference to the present statement of the move-
ment in the East-end of London, that the committee
had to deplore a retrogression on the part of some
of the drapery establishments in the Commvrcial-
road, owing to the withdrawal by one of the firms
from arrangements entered into in the spring of last
year, for closing on Saturday at seven instead of
nine o'clock. The committee had spared no pains
to obtain the revival of the original understanding,
and they thought it right to state that, in spite of
the defection referred to, two of the large drapery
firms—Messrs. J. Crane and Co. and Messrs. Bur-
dett and Ealand—had liberally maintained their
promise of closing at five o'clock on Saturdays.
With the exception of the woollen-drapers
and the leading ironmongers, who close at seven
o'clock, the following are the earliest hours of closing
at the present season in the various trades in the
Commercial and Mile-end-roads. The leading linen-
drapers close at eight (and one firm, Messrs. Yen-
ables and Sons, at seven) ; grocers at nine, cheese-
mongers at nine, hosiers at half-past nine, boot-
makers from nine to half-past nine, hatters at nine.
Amongst the later closing houses are some of the
drapery establishments, which remain open till be-
tween nine and ten o'clock. In summer the hours
are still later, extending, in the largest and most
favoured establishments, to later than nine o'clock.
the actual hour of release for the assistants being
nearly ten o'clock. On Saturdays Messrs..Venablea
close at two o'clock, and the other houses at three.
The leading ironmongers of Whitechapel close at
six; one of the leading linen Irapers in S!ioreditch
at four, and one in Whitechapel at five ;" two in the
Commercial-road at seven, other establishments at
eight. In other trades the hours are eleven and
twelve. It is found that the late hours prevailing
in Whitechapel and Mile-end are found to seriously
retard the movement i❑ the Commercial-road, and
much yet remains to be done. The importance of
the object in view will be understood when we say
that in the east of London there are 3,000 assistants
of both sexes in conncctiou with the retail trades,
wh3 get released on an average at half past.
nine o'clock, on ordinary nights, while
about two-thirds of that number *are really
at leisure at the average hour of eleven
o'clock on Saturday nights, and of these the
young women are the greater sufferers, as in such
case they are the later of the two, being in many
instances not able to retire at the end of the week
till one.o'elock on Sunday morning. The object of
the association is to secure the closing of the prin-
cipal shops at seven in the winter and eight o'clock
in the sunainer ; and they earnestly appeal to the
public to support the movement by abstaining from
shopping after the hours named.

The CHAIRMAN then, in a brief and enkible

SMITHFIELD CATTLE SHOW:

TILE PRIZE CATTLE.

Yesterday the sales of the prize stock were con-
tinued with as much activity as the greatly decreased
number to be sold would permit. The Duke of
Beaufc,rt's first prize shorthorned steer in Class 13
has been sold to Corbett, of Newgate-market ; Mr.
Wm. Taylor's Devon steer, third prize in Class 2,
has been sold to T. Reeve, New-street, Dorset-
squ ire ; Mr. Farquharson's third prize Devon steer
in Class 3 has been sold to Ssarlett, ;
her Majesty the Queen's third prize Devon heifer in
Class 4, from the Prince Consort's Norfolk farm,
has been sold to Swingler, of West Brotnpton-road ;
her Majesty the Queen's third class prize Hereford
heifer in Class 9, from the Prince Consort's Flemish
farm, IVisdsor, has been sold to Cowell and Co., of
Knightsbridge; Mr. Grove's second prize Hereford
cow in Class 10 has been sold to Rogers, of Goswoll-
street, Clerkenwell ; Mr. Stratton's first prize short-
horned heifer in Class 14 has been sold to J. Mason,
of Chelsea ; Lord Feversham's second prize in the
same class to Rogers, of Goswell-street, Clerken-
well ; and the Earl of Hardwicke's third prize iu the
same class to Nash, of Bexley-heath ; Mr. Dugdale's
first prize shorthorned cow in Class 15 has been sold
to 'Wray, of London-road, Southwark ; Messrs. John
and Alfred Hearman's second prize Sussex steer in
Crass 16 was sold to Harrison, of Vauxhall-cross;
Mr. Coote's third prize Sussex steer in Class 17 has
been sold to Harris, of Foubert's-place, Regent-
street ; Mr. Sewell's second prize Norfolk polled
steer in Class 20 has been sold to Bottrell, of
Rochester-row, Westminster ; W. Longmore's
second prize Scotch polled steer in ClasS 20 has been
sold to Helsdon, of King's-cross-road ; Capt. Platt's
second prize Welsh steer in Class 30 has been sold
to Johnson, of Bermondsey; Mr. Burton's second
prize cross-hied steer in Class 32 has been sold to
Stephens, of North Audley-street ; Mr. Overman's
first prize steer in the cross or mixed breed, Class 33,
has been sold to Boulding, Sittingbourne, Kent ;
and Col. Loyd Lindsay's third prize in the same
class has been sold to Glass, of Sydenham. The
additional sales iu the sheep classes are : ---Mr•

Hitchcock's first prize pen of fat Cotswolds in Class
37 has been sold to Radburn, of Peckham ; Mr.
Casswell's fat Lincoln wailers, the first prize in
Class 38, have been sold to 'Lynes, of Marcha:ont-
street.

Mr. Murton's first prize pen of wethers, of Kentish
or Romneynirsh breed, in Class 39, have been sold
to Page, of Iloxtin street; Mr. Steele's first prize
pen of fat wether long-woolled in Class 40 has been
sold to 'learn, of Notting-hill; Lord Braybrooke's
fat wether South Downs, the first prize pen in Class
42, have b en sold to W. Butts, of Knightsbridge ;
Lord Walsingham's first priz., pen among the fat
wet her S.:Anil D has been s )1.1 to Doi-
well, of T%viekenhatu ; Mr. Canning's first prize
pen in Class 41 has been sold to King, of Padding-
ton ; Mr. Nock's first prize pen in Class 35 has been
sold to Cross, of Islington-green; Mr. Topp's fist
prize pen in class 48 has been sold to Rhodes and
Son, Upper Holloway; Mr. IV. M'Combie's first
prize pen in Class 49 • has been sold to Slater, of
Kensington ; Mr. Overman's first prize pen in Class
51 has been sold to Bottrell, of Pimlico ; and Mr.
Overman's first prize pen in ClasS 52 has been sold
to Ilayr, of Richmond.

A CONSTITUTIOATALIS7'S COMPLAINT.

Mr. Newdegate, M.P., responding to the toast in
honour of an worwiegsnire at
the Rugby and Dunchurch Conservative Associa-
tion yesterday, discarded the title Conservative,
since it nowadays involved he knew not what, and
styled himself a Constitutionalist. He was a Pittite,
too, and justified his vote in favour of the Reform
Act of last Session, because its best part—the dis-
franchisement of peccant boroughs—was based upon
a principle laid down by Pitt and Chatham ; but he
complained that a reduction of the franchise in
boroughs to household suffrage was a sad falling
away from the principles of those two Constitutional
statesmen, especially because no compensation was
at the same time given to the upper and middle
classes for their loss of political influence. Ile re-
gretted that the Constitutional cause had lost a scat
by the defeat of Mr. Pell, and he regretted this the
more because the loss might have been prevented by
better management. Mr. Pell at first declared him-
self a supporter of Mr. Disraeli, and this told against
him, because a feeling prevailed in South Leicester-
shire that Lord Derby and Mr. Disraeli had dealt
very short measure to the counties. Then, when it
was too late, Mr. Pell announced that he was a
friend of the Church and a Protestant, but that he
also desired to seethe differences between Protestants
' and Dissenters healed. That was a very proper '
sentiment, but Mr. Pell should have published it
earlier with appropriate clearness, for " when a
man is in a fight the first thing be has to
do is to throw his hat into the ring, and then either
folio wit up or tell his second to fling up the spunge."
If a candidate hoped to succeed he should not
offer himself merely as an adherent of one poli-
tician or another, but state his opinions clearly,
and stand by them. He had acted for nine or ten
years on the principle Mr. Pell had adopted, un-
fortunately, too late; during that time he had tried
to persuade Mr. Disraeli to endorse his proposal to
make church-rates into a charge upon property,
similar to the property-tax, and to place the pro-
duce at the disposal of the vestries ; but he com-
plained that Mr. Disraeli had always dis-
countenanced his proposals, and, although he did
not vote against him, he systematically cleared the
house when the matter was brought forward. The
concluding topic touched on by Mr. Newdegate
was Lord Russell's educational propositions, which
had " nearly paralysed the House of Lords," and
seemed to be put forth as the sequence of the great
revolutionary change introduced by the Reform
Act. Believing with Hooker that education was
one thing and instruction another, lie objected to
Lord Russell's resolutions; he desired to educate
the people by strengthening their intellectual and
moral faculties, while Lord Russell only sought to
give them tools wherewith to work. As a test of
the Irish system of national education, be asked
how many Irish schoolmasters had been tried for
Fenianism, and declared that the Prussian school-
masters were the nlost active of the revolutionists
of 1848.

A BRAVE LAD.--During the recent hurricane
th.i brig Miner,y, ,of And front Sunderland for Dieppe, was
wiccked. Ta'nfaSter and five- men took" to tote,
but, unfortunately as it then seemed, they were unable to
bring off a lad named Thomas Dudgeon, an apprentice,
the rope attaching the boat to the vessel breaking and
carrying the frail craft into the roadstead. The brig
drifted into the broken water on the Scroby Sands, but
being in ballast she drove right over the dangerous
shoals, and Dudgeon, despite the fearful gale which raged,
contrived to loosen the foresail, and. by constant perseve-
rance and unremitting attention he brought the briE safely
Of the Tercel

The Pont concurs in a widely-spreading belief that the
necessary power should be conferred on the coroner by
Act of Parliament, that in no case should a fire b.,3
adowed to pass without a full and complete inquiry into
its origin, and that no claim should be settled by any
insurance company without the production of a
certificate shewing the result of the investigation.
On the Continent, and in Australia and America,
inquiries of this kind are held in every instance,
and the result has been to " reduce the number"
of fires, a fact which furnishes the best possible argmnent
for the adoption of a similar course in this country.
There is another growing danger of a different kind in the
increased traffic in explosive and inflammable merchandise.
Something has already been done to diminish the risk
arising from these, but further legislation app ar to be
required on this point also, especially with regard to the
storing of petroleum, turpentine, nitro-g-!yeerine, and such
like dangerous substances. All ti es r 1 .tters require
treatment at as early a period as possible.
In the opinion of the Daily Hors, the immediate canoe
of the Lambeth Conference, in which Pau-Angli-
canism has found its highest expression, was the dis-
satisfaction felt in some quarters with the deci-
cisions of the ecclesiastical tribunals, and especially those
of the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, in cases
involving points ( f doctrine. It was therefore resolved to
set up a body capable of neutralising by its utterances such
judgments as Lord Westbury pronounced in the case of
the " Bishop of Salisbury v. Wilson." The Judicial Com-
mittee could neither be attacked in front nor subverted; but
it seems to have been thought that what was known in the
American civil war as the "anaconda system" might be ap-
plied to it. If the Pan-Anglican plan can be carried out, the
lay judges of the Ecclesiastical Courts may sit and decide
whether this or that clerk has forfeited his benefice in the
English Establishment, but the doctrine of the whole
Anglican communion will be laid down by " spiritual"
persons of the highest order of the hierarchy, gathered
from all parts of the earth, and sitting in a council or
synod. As far as moral or doctrinal authority is con-
cerned, the Ecclesiastical Courts will be crushed in the
ample folds which the bishops are already preparing to
wind round them. The ecclesiastical judgments of the
Privy Council may be more or less objectionable from a
doctrinal point of view, but the bishops are not on that
account entitled to constitute themselves a grand council
for the government of the Church, and still less to bring
in strangers to meddle in the affairs of a national institu-
tion.

The Standard approves or the action or the Mayor of
Liverpool in interdicting the projected Fenian procession
in that borough, and has a good word to say for Dr. Goss,
the Roman Catholic bishop, who has warned his flock
against joining in such a demonstration. It does not think
there is much danger that after this exhortation from the
bishop, and the precautions taken by the authorities , any at-
tempt will be made to form the procession. Its authors have
been very slow in determining upon it, and they will pro.
bably be glad to have an excuse for abandoning a project
about the success of which they had evidently considerable‘
misgivings. A similar proceeding is threatened by the
Fenian sympathisers in Glasgow for Sunday, and there,
too, the Orangemen have announced their intention to
make a counter-demonstration. Large as is the Irish
Catholic population of Glasgow, the Fenians would stiffer
the same discomfiture there as they would in Liverpool.
At all events, there will certainly be a riot if the proces-
sion is permitted, and we trust, therefore, the magistrates
of Glasgow will do as the magistrates of Liverpool have
done, and preserve the peace of the town by prohibiting
the procession.

This, the stock topic of M.P.'s during the recess, is tno
subject of a leader in the Telegraph. No doubt, it observe;
the machinery for instructing the people is inadequate ; but
the results would be far different from what they are if
the endowments were rigidly applied, and if the educa,
tional system were adapted to the popular wants. Indeed.
some districts which are scandalously ignorant have "lots
of schools," even as in the Government offices there
are " lots of forms." Seeing the sorry result, some
people clamour for inquiries into modes of education
and educational statistics ; bnt the shelves of our public
libraries and our club reading-rooms are cuirassed with
educational blue-books. We have been inquiring and
heaping up statistics for fifty years; numbers of clergymen
and barristers of seven years' standing, who have been
appointed educational inspectors, go forth periodically and
furnish reports full of mild remarks, that in the county of
Merionethshire the children of such and such a school all
answered readily to inquiries about the number of the
Beast, and that in West Somerset the readiness with which
the pupils at another school spelt the name " Jehosh-
aphat " was quite charming. And so we go on, and so
we shall go on, until Lord Russell's " Coming Man," the
Minister of Education—a Minister with a capacity, a
power, and a will— shall arrive.

Let it, urges the Star, be adopted as a principle by the
enemies of the Irish Establishment that they will not
even discuss this vexatious and superfluous question, but
will insist upon the disendowrnent pure and simple, with-
out reference to petty difficulties, which may safely be left
to remove themselves. This resolution would be the best
earnest of speedy victory, and we trust the country at
large will thoroughly appreciate and retain in mind Mr.
Miall's remark in closing the London Conference, that
the man who raises at this juncture the question how the
property of the Church is to be made use of is either st
staunch friend of the Establishment or a very lukewarni
advocate of its abolition.