The Sun.
London, England, 1866-08-01 00:00:00

The President's Reply to the Queen.

The President of the United States has replied
as follows to the message from her Majesty, which
we published on Monday :
" From Andrew Johnson, the Executive Mansion,
Washington, to her Majesty the Queen of the
United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.
" JULY 30, 11.30 a.m.
" The President of the United States acknow-
ledges with profound gratification the receipt of her
Majesty's despatch, and cordially reciprocates the
hope that the cable that now unites the eastern and
western hemispheres may serve to strengthen and
perpetuate peace and amity between the Govern-
ment of England and the Republic of the United
States."

The following telegram has been forwarded by
the Earl of Carnarvon to Viscount Monck, Ottawa,
Canada :

"I am commanded by the Queen to convey to
the Governor-General of her North American Pro-
vinces her Majesty's congratulations on the com-
pletion of the Atlantic telegraph, and the strength-
ening thereby the unity of the British empire.
" Her Majesty includes her ancient colony of
Newfoundland in these congratulations to all her
faithful subjects.
"July 26, 1866." " CARNARVON.

POLICE INTELLIGENCE—This Day.

-

MARLBOROUGII-STREET.

STABBING THROUGH ALLEGED JEALOUSY.—Thos. Mans-
field, a labourer, was charged before Mr. Knox with stab-
bing a man named Williams in Silver-street, Golden-
square.

The case was originally before Mr. Knox a few days
ago, when the evidence of police-constable Pride, 92 0,
showed that he was called to a house in Silver-street, and
told that a man had been stabbed by another. He saw
Williams, who told him that the prisoner had stabbed him
in the abdomen, and on taking the prisoner into custody
he said, "I'll kill the -." Ho afterwards took the
wounded man to the Middlesex Hospital.
Sergeant Smith, 1 C, now handed Mr. Knox a certificate
signed by the house surgeon of the Middlesex Hospital, to
the effect that Williams was still unable to attend, and Mr.
Knox further remanded him.

Llt appears that the injury was caused in a quarrel be-
tween the two men in consequence of Mansfield's wife
leaving him and forming a connection with the other man.
ANNOYING A JUDGE.—AIico Herbert, a good-looking
young female, was charged with disorderly conduct and
assault.

It appears that the defendant went to the Judge and
Jury Society, Leicester-square, the previous night, and
tried to force her way in. The porter to Mr. H. G. Brooks,
the proprietor, refused to let her go in, and she then
struck the porter in the face. Mr. Brooks then went to
the assistance of his servant, and the defendant tried to
strike him, but only succeeded in knocking off his hat.
Mr. Brooks, therefore, gave her into custody.
Mr. Brooks said he was sorry to appear so often at the
court, but he was compelled tc, do so, in consequence of
the annoyances to which he had been subject of late, as
the result might possibly be that he mightlose his refresh-
ment license. Ho admitted no lads nor females to his
place, and he wished to keep it respectably conducted, but
it was well known to the police that he had been similarly
annoyed several times of late. He did not wish to press
the case harshly towards the defendant.
Mr. Knox said he would order the defendant to find one
surety in £5 to keep the peace towards Mr. Brooks, and
he had no doubt he would be perfectly satisfied with that:
at the same time he would caution the defendant not to
annoy him again.

Mr. Brooks—his "lordship"—expressed himself with
some amount of dignity satisfied with the decision.

MARKETS.--This Day.

- ^O.---

MARK-LANE.

The quantity of wheat on sale in our market to-day
from Essex and Kent was very moderate. Very few
buyers were in attendance, and the transactions, conse-
quently, were by no means extensive. Factors, however,
were firm in their demands, and all qualities were held a
an advance of is to 2s per qr.

There was a fair amount of foreign wheat on the stands,
the trade for wheat ruled firm, and importers demanded
from is to 2s per qr more money.
Floating cargoes of grain changed hands to a limited
extent, at about last week's quotations.

Moderate supplies of barley were on sale. The demand
was quiet, on former terms.
Malt moved off slowly, at late rates.

Large supplies of oats were on sale, chiefly foreign pro-
duce. Most qualities wore in moderate request, at Men-
day's quotations.

Beans and peas commanded but little attention. The
prices realised were about equal to Monday.

A moderate business was passing in flour, on former

terms.

SHIP ARRIVALS THIS WEEK.
Wheat. Barley. Malt. Oats. Flour.
English and Scotch 760 10 540 250
Irish —
Foreign 6,860 2,500 26,890 30 sks.
570 bls.
COMPARATIVE QUANTITIES AND PRICES OP GRAIN.
For the week ending July For the corresponding week
28, 1866. last year.
Qrs. Aver. Qrs. Aver.
Wheat 33,138-52s Od Wheat 63,828-42s 10d
Barley 441-33s 10d Barley 684-28s 6d
Oats

LITERATURE.

Lionel Merval. A Novel T 3 vols. George Rout-

ledge and Sons.
" Lionel Merval" is evidently a first work, and as
such it is full of promise, and indicates future ex-
cellence on the part of its author. The story is in-
teresting, and some of the characters are well por-
trayed, and with a vigour and originality not often to
be met with in the first essay of a young author. That
the work is a first essay is unmistakeably evidenced
by an exaggeration of the style, and an over-profu-
sion of epithets in the descriptions. These faults
arc onthe right side, and have sometimes been visible
in the earlier writings of authors who have afterwards
become conspicuous for their polished and harmo-
nious diction. The author of "Lionel Merval," with-
out literally fulfilling Boileau's stern advice to the
poetic aspirant—

Vingt firis sur le metier remettes rouvrage,

Polissez souvent et souvent ejlacez,
must prune the over luxuriance of his flowers of
speech, and he will run little risk of falling into
over simplicity. , Lionel Merval, the hero of this
tale, is the eldest son of Sir Lionel Merval, and the
heir to his large estates. Side by side with the
manor of Merval is another large domain belong"
ing to a younger branch of the same family, and
commonly designated Church-Merval, as to its pro-
prietor belongs the church patronage of the fancily

The two kindred families had lived long in great har-
mony. But the same divine creature that brought mis-
chief into the vale of Eden brought it also into the vale of
Merton, although it was not this time her fault. An only
daughter was born to the spiritual house of Merval, and in
due time had to be given in marriage. Tho same old gen-
tleman, now at the Castle, then in the flush of youth, bad
thought this a favourable period for uniting the two houses,
and their respective honours and estates. The heiress of
Church-Merval, as it was often called, was very fair, and
the manor, with its old Norman church tower, its mea-
dows, moors, and woods, was almost—perhaps old
Lionel Merval then thought, and may think still, itS
he looks grimly into the past—as lovely. Loveliness
to the mind seems to resemble what is loveliness to the
outward eye—it depends on the medium through which
the object is seen. There is also the same pigmentum
nigruin for the absorption of superfluous light. Old
Lionel, for instance, might have been then utterly dazzled
by the beauty of his far-removed cousin, Mary Norval ;
but the rich, brown land acted like the dark fluid of the
eye—it absorbed the excessive light, so that he could dis-
tinctly see that it would be a wise thing to marry her.
Poor Mary might possibly have been a happier woman if
she had taken what is now a strange unshapen piece of
humanity, like a huge hard basaltic boulder, rolled in cold
ice, with its edges unhewn and unpolished, from unknown
wintry regions, into the lovely vale of Merton. Perhaps
she might have struck in time to the core of this lump, and
have made it plastic in her hands as clay. One wrong turn
to the right or to the left in the first mists of life may carry
the wanderer so far astray that he can never reach his home
on that day: Woman may too often be the slave of man,
but the fine issues of heroic life may also often depend on
the toss of that little head, which may be more decisive of
fate than the great shaking head of Burleigh. Yes, it must
be confessed that Mary, the heiress, tossed her head at the
heir of the Castle, and the two manors refused any other
chemical affinities. How this happened, whether from
the too easy assumption of the lover, or from the superior
attractions of the Rev. Augustus Merval, her present
spouse, who took the maiden, the manor, and the name in
one swoop, perhaps she alone might be able to tell, per-
haps even she could not at this moment remember. NO
matter; life is too short for digging up the ruins of old
feelings. Let them lie in the soil, and become, like the

green. graves, the cradles of daisies and cowslips.
Henceforth the line of separation between the two
families was as plain as the boundary of the two
estates.
Augustus had no blame in this quarrel. What he did
was done in open, honourable warfare. It was not his fault
that he was bland, polished, and of insinuating manners-'
or that he was of good family in a distant county—or that
he was the duly licensed curate of the parish about the
time that Mary Merval was budding into life—or that he
preached the most affecting and elegant discourses—or that
he was poor himself, and loved the poor, at least was often
in their houses—or that, in short, he seemed designed
by nature to complete the traditional union between
Church and State that had so long existed in the happy
valley. It has just been said that one wrong turn in the mist
at the outset of life may disturb tho whole future course.
In like manner, it seems, one good slice of sunshine et
the right time may also fix that luminary in your VIII
for ever. Many full-grown men, at that witching timo of
life, are apt to mistake moonshine for the pure sunshine,
and thus run after the false light into the Slough °I
Despond. But the Reverend Augustus knew that the
manor of Merval was not of the lunar sort, and 010)
having turned the cornerof the Hill of Difficulty, he pushed
on joyously to his golden city. Fortune always seemed
to stop her wheel for this Augustus as for Augustus the
gfeat Roman Emperor. The aged incumbent died dur-
ing the honeymoon, and Church and State were made one
—that is, the Reverend Augustus Merval, who had just
taken that name in honour of the heiress, had the further
honour of presenting himself to the rectory, as the fittest
person to minister to the souls in that neighbourhood.
It is true, the opinion on this point was not unanimoile•
Indeed there was one gentleman, already mentioned,
who threatened to tear the now rector from the family
pulpit, even if he were preaching like Paul or Apolloe.
But Augustus, like his namesake, had great skill in dealing
with foes of that kind, and was as clement a conqueror'
A victor can afford to be generous—even though his pr°S-
trate foe should disdain to sun for mercy, and should OP
as the captive king said to his conqueror, " I expect you to,
do to me what I would have done to you, had I conquered.'
Thus, at any rate, Augustus became, like the Russian
Czar, both pope and emperor in one corporation sole.
Fortune continued to smile upon Augustus. 11/
was made a justice of the quorum, and he attended
the quarter sessions and convocations. He held all
kinds of rural dignities, and we are even told with
happy humour that " an archdeaconry might almost
be seen coming to him through the air !" The eli3-
racter and career of Augustus, with his ambition,
and his avarice, his parental affection and his parent3l
cruelty, his apparent courtesy to his heiress wife/
and his real assertion of his conjugal supremacy, ar°
by far the best drawn and most original in the three
volumes. Those peculiarities of temperament which
are happily described to us at the commencement of
the tale are very cleverly exemplified before the CO'
elusion. Again, iu the new generation love brings
sorrow to the rival houses of Merval. Like Itonle°
and Juliet, Lionel, the son of the discarded baronet'
and Miranda, the daughter of the favoured AugustuB'
set at defiance parental enmities 'and interi
diets. Very troublous is the course of this fatli
affection, and the conclusion of the love story is
of a mournful pathos. We will not betray the PriV.
titular results of the denouement, as the story is s 0;
ciently interesting to reward the trouble of perun;
As another specimen of the author's style, whictl
earnest and original, although marred by extrafol;
gance, let us take the following passage, in whit
Lionel Merval is the speaker.
BEAUTY IS GOODNESS.
Theso plain women are always said to have the kin clegt
hearts and the sweetest tempers. It may be so, but I 113 s
e
111%
another theory. I don't believe in beauty without a 01,0
I believe the good makes much of the beautiful—asato
Greeks thought, when they called both by one word.
monsters, Agrippina and Messalina, could not be beatific'
their faces were only masks for what was all foulness l'.
neath, and their masks were constantly cracking or eat,
ting, so as to be seen through. The Greek, who rag'
everything beautiful, gave beautiful faces to the Furic;
and even to the relentless Fates. So, Milton makes Sill 0
face most beautiful. The Italian poets, and the rogisl3tioc
writers, delight to wrap the wicked woman in wondrtu
beauty. But in real life, the evil passions that play be fir.
must soon change the loveliness of Eve, or Helen, or P.' to
anda—l mean Miranda of the Tempest, of course-
11;0
hideous ugliness ; to take that mask off would be
f'l
0131
tearing the skin from the bones, or the velvet grass
these mountains. The face is the soul's index, if you or
only mark it properly. Look at Titian's portraits, are t.ta..
not exactly as you read of them in Machiavelli or Guiccirito
dini ? No man or woman can long play the 110°c Ic,
without the colour and the line coming through tho orto
, The beasts are no hypocrites. Compare the faces 0` old
tiger with the innocent lamb—the eagle's ruthless eY° Tod
sharp nose with the mildness of the dove. Tile, 00.
flowers show their innocence or their guilt in their 't'oto(l
Look at the dark deadly nightshade that the monks yltoe,
beside those ruins, and the viscid purple-veined 11,0° d At
and the fetid hellebore, offering its winter blossoms, 01,0 t,
the bright, blue, frank-eyed speedwell, or forget-Pe-toy
the meek violets bending to the earth, and the, st% of .
white water-lilies, spreading their purity to the 09
Heaven itself. °
f&an
As a companion and a contrast to the sweet ,-ti-, the
Merval is her sprightly and charming friend,
clever and imperious Clara Ludwell. The waloyo
which this fair lady, like another Portia, lays d.
the law and sets the world to rights, is toldireot
right lively and pleasant manner. Very din or,
is the portraiture of Clement Merval, the dra,, the
whose extravagant melancholy is described wilr..ol,
most extravagant exaggeration. Clement 2,-":0 31,1
when in the midst of dreamy abstraction being,e ep•
intents and purposes a sleep-walker without the of
ruse of being asleep ! With all 'these err'.7oit.
judgment which we have not thought
evident
to overlook, " Lionel Merval" is full of the evlcitverest
of ability and originality ; and while it will inter
for
the reader on its own account, it promises Mu
the future excellence of ito author,.