The Sun.
London, England, 1866-02-01 00:00:00

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The Wellington memorial at Strathfieldsaye may
now shortly be expected to be completed. The base-
ment and column, which are of Cornish granite,
grey, and beautifully polished, arrived at the Read-
ing station of the Great Western Railway a Lwv
weeks ago. The basement, which is a huge block,
and encased in wood, weighs upwards of 31 tons,
and was brought up by a train from Cornwall, and
transferred from the railway to a strong carriage
supplied for the purpose by a London firm. To con-
vey this mass of stone two traction engines were en-
gaged from Messrs. Aveling, and Porter, of Roches-
ter, Kent. One of these arrived in Reading on
Monday morning, and caused no small commotion
among the people in the streets through which it
passed ; the second engine was delayed several hours
at 'raplow, it was stated, in cen,,,equence of some
damage to one of the tubes. In the interim, at a
somewhat late hour on Monday evening, it was
thought desirable to make a start with the one en-
gine. Accordingly, it was attached to the carriage
upon which was the stone, and the road being on an
incline, it proceeded at a steady pace from the lower
station to the Caversham-road, but the flatness of
the surface at this point proved the load to be too
heavy for the engine, and it came to a standstill.
Another effort was used to goon; the engine strained,
and actually reared up, so ponderous and heavy was
the granite block when on the straight line of road.
In the course of the night the second traction engine
arrived, and about 8 o'clock on Tuesday morning a
start was made. The soft state of the roads several
times checked the progress of the train, but the
longest delay occurred opposite the railway gates in
Friar-street, where the wheels of the carriage had
sunk several inches in the ground, and further pro-
gress for a time was impossible. Screw jacks and
other implements were brought into requisition, and.
in about an hour another start was effected. The
train went capitally along the upper part of Friar-
street, and in the Market-place one engine sufficed.
A careful examination had been made of the
various culverts and bridges over which the
train would have to pass, and as the arch-
way over the Holy-brook, which passes
under some houses in High-street, was feared to be
in too weak a condition to admit of such a pressure
as the train, timbers were laid across so as to ob-
viate injury to the arch. The arrangement proved
highly successful. Some anxiety was felt with re-
gard to High-bridge, though engineers expressed
their belief, from the nature of its construction, that
it would bear any amount of weight. Then the
ascent was conceived to be too great for a traction
engine with thirty tons' load to get up. 'The train,
as it went along, showed the great strain there was
upon the engines, and so slow did the pace become
that at a distance spectators imagined it never could
reach the top of the arch. However, the crown of
the bridge was reached, and the people gave a hearty
cheer as the train descended the bridge into Lon-
don-street. These were the main difficulties con-
templated, but the journey to Strathfieldsaye was
not accomplished without experiencing checks from
the wheels of the stone car sinking at places into
the ground. Mr. Aveliug, jun., took charge of the
engines ; Mr. Weightman, of the Great Western
goods department, was in attendance ; and Messrs.
Freeman and Son, of Cornwall, from whose quarry
the granite was supplied, were also with tbe train
superintending the removal of its heavy burden.

PRICE.... ld.
STAMPED sd.

DWELLINGS FOR THE PEOPLE.

Last night, at the Society of Arts, a paper was
read by Mr. Thomas Beggs on " Dwellings for the
People—how to multiply them, and how:to improve
them." The following extracts from Mr. Beggs'
lengthy paper indicate the views he entertains on
this important subject :-1 believe, after all that
can be done by benevolent associations, or philan-
thropic individuals, or even by Government loans,
that the remedy for defective and insufficient house
accommodation will be found in giving free scope to
commercial enterprise and the employment of capi-
tal in that direction. The man who will show that
dwellings suitable to the requirements of all classes
of the people, within the reach of their means, and
of sound and convenient construction, can be made
to pay a fair interest for the capital invested, is the
true benefactor. It will be a still greater boon to
bring the ownership of a house within the reach of
that very numerous class who have now to pay high
rents for very inconvenient accommodation. I
propose to effect this object by an extension and
further development of building societies and free-
hold land societies. The building society or free-
hold land society supplies the means by which
the humblest workmen who is sober and prudent
may become possessed of a freehold house. If a
man obtain this he will be careful of all changes
likely to affect his own possessions ; he will not be
a ready dupe of the demagogue, nor will ho be the
promoter of strikes and combinations. After show-
ing the immense development of these institutions
Mr. Beggs demanded that the law in regard to them
should be revised and amended. What might be
suited to them when they were small friendly so-
cieties becomes a check and incumbrance when
they have become large investment societies,
with, as many of them have, an income of
from £30,000 to £lOO,OOO per annum. My judg-
ment would be to incorporate them under the Com-
panies Act of 1862, giving them power to purchase
land, build houses, or carry out any of the purposes
for which they are embodied, on their giving the
usual guarantees. I venture to suggest that it would
be well to make it compulsory upon them to deposit
at some public office, open to general inspection, a
properly certified balance-sheet every year. I be-
lieve that this has been suggested as a proper pre-
caution in the case of all limited liability companies.
It was desirable to grant these societies a more simple
mode of conveyance and transfer, and the plan of
the estate might be deposited in the office established
under Lord Westbury's act, or any other properly
appointed office. With regard to London, the great
difficulty in the way was that of obtaining sites.
" To meet this difficulty we must," says the author,
" seek for compulsory powers to obtain land for
building purposes. I ask for a power vested in the
Board of Trade, the Privy Council, or any court
established by the act itself, by which any corporate
body, on giving the usual guarantees, and depositing
plans and proposals, and showing the want of
dwellings for the people, may acquire land for their
erection on the same terms that railway and dock
companies now obtain it, without the necessity of
going to Parliament in each case for a private
bill. I ask also for a power to enfranchise lease-
hold property under certain conditions, and a
power to compel the sale of such property as may
be in the hands of incapacitated persons, or
where circumstances prove the inability of the
owner to comply with the laws laid down for the
protection of the public health. I ask also that trus-
tees of charitable and ecclesiastical institutions
should be empowered to sell, exchange, or otherwise
dispose of property tied up by trust, where suchmay
be required for dwellings. And further that sum-
mary power should be given to the proper local
authorities to remove from out of London prisons,
workhouses, barracks, slaughterhouses, cowhouses,
gas works, and all noxious and dangerous manufac-
tories, and to place the sites at the disposal of public
companies, who would undertake to build dwellings
upon approved models." The paper further advo-
cated the principle which exists in Scotland, of a
man becoming the proprietor of a flat or floor of a
house. If only obstructions were removed, and fair
facilities given, the people would find plenty of means.
I have never yet known (says Mr Beggs) that a de-
parture from sound economical principles led to
satisfactory results in the long run. I believe that if
we could satisfy the public mind that suitable sites
were to be obtained, that a company might be
formed with a powerful and influential direction,
and a sum of money raised fully adequate to the re-
quirements of the case, in five years we should hear
little or nothing of over-crowding or of deficient
house accommodation.

The Vestry of St. Pancras.

Mr. HAWKS, who presided over the meeting, in-
vited a discussion of the interesting paper which had
been just read.
Mr. WALKER (of Rugby) said that while he agreed
in the greater part of the lecture, he objected to mak-
ing the very poor the owners of their own dwell-
ings, as they would be sure to treat them as they
did their own persons, viz., keep•them in a state of
filth and dilapidation. Besides, these dwellings would
become the object of speculation, and would soon
pass away from the owners. He was strongly op-
posed to granting compulsory powers for the pur-
chase of sites. He had himself built cottages in the
country for about £73, which answered very well as
a commercial enterprise, and the facilities for build-
ing cheaply were greater in London than in the
I country.

Mr. Alderman WATERLOW believed that nothing
was more calculated to elevate the working man in
his own estimation, and to make him a good citizen,
than to make him the owner of his own house ; and
that no such results would follow as those predicted
by Mr. Walker.. The great difficulty was the ob-
taining sites, and though opposed to compulsory
powers generally, he thought them necessary where
property became a nuisance and a fever pest to the
surrounding neighbourhood. He approved of the
principle of Mr. Beggs's paper.
Mr. STUART PARKER, the chairman, and other
speakers, took part in the discussion, which was
wcund up by a vote of thanks to Mr. Beggs for his
interesting paper.

A MONOMANIAC'S DEATH.--M. Couvreux, a
French gentleman, aged 54, took up his residence
some years ago at an hotel on the hill of Q
uisiniana, near
Castellamare. Although evidently a lunatic, he was per-
fectly inoffensive, and passed his time in composing songs
and music. His two fixed ideas were passing a life of un-
sullied chastity and dying Without pain. It appears that
ho collected every medical treatise on death by the guillo-
tine, and made up his mind that death by this instrument
was painless. Accordingly, he constructed, in the space
which separated hie sleeping apartment from his dining-
room, a guillotine on an improved principle, the axe of
which weighed above a cwt. Several fowls and cats from
the neighbourhood were missed whose lives had evidently
been victims to the preparatory experiments. Once con-
vinced of the excellence of the machine, M. Couvreux set
about adorning it. Two magnificent crimson curtains
formed a background; against which he erected a sort of
altar table, the steps of which he covered with black velvet;
on the table ho placed a white cushion of eider-down. At
half-past 9at night, having assumed a dress of white flan-
nel, he performed the hymn to the Virgin on his organ, after
which lie mounted his scaffold, lay on his back, head resting
on the pillow, let go the pulley to which the axe was at-
tached, on which it fell and cut off the constructor's head,
which remained on the pillow separated by a feN :hair-
breadths from the body. Next morning the waiter the
hotel found Couvreux in the position described; a will
lying on a centre table by which his property was to be
divided among the hotel servants.

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