The Sun.
London, England, 1866-03-27 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON, TUESDAY EVENING, MARCH 27, 1866.

ELECTION COMMITTEE—This Day.

NOTTINGHAM.

The members of this committee reassembled this
morning, and proceeded with their inquiry into the
merits of the petition against the return of Sir
Robert Clifton, the evidence being chiefly confined
to proofs of rioting and intimidation.
Henry 0. Bornee, the first witness called, said—
I am a lace manufaCturei, and carry on my business
at Nottingham. lam acquainted with Mr. Spenser,
of Welford, and Sir Robert Clifton and Mr.
Acland, whom I met on several occasions during
the election proceedings. On the day before the
election I saw them in conversation together in the
neighbourhood of Nottingham, Mr. Spenser being
in his carriage at the time. I heard Sir Robert
say that he would go into the town as there would
be a row there, and it would be very Inadvisable
to do so. I understood him to say that there was
sure to be a row in the Market-place, and Mr.
Acland was standing close to him at the time. There
was a large crowd of persons present, and when
Sir R. Clifton walked away from the carriage he
was loudly cheered. I heard Mr. Acland say, in a
loud voice, "There 'will be a row there now."
By the Chairman—l understood that to be in
reply to a question from one of the crowd relative
to Mr. Paget and Mr. Morley.
Witness in continuation--Mr. Spenser spoke to
me in reference to the election, and said he would
not go into the town for £lO, as his carriage would
be smashed to pieces if he went near the market
place. He said to me also that the platform would
be smashed. I was in Stoney-street on the day of
the polling, and saw a crowd collected before Mr.
Sweet's shop. Sir Robert-Clifton was passing at
the time in a cab, and stood up and smiled when he
was opposite the shop. There was another gentleman
in the cab whom he believed to be Mr. Iledington, who
was then Chief-Constable of Nottingham. The win-
dows and shutters of Mr. Sweet's shop were smashed,
and a number of books and papers thrown into the
street, which he assisted in collecting together, and
restoring to Mr. Sweet. The cab was not going at
the rate of more than five miles an hour, and was
proceeding in the direction of the polling booth.

Wm. Dawson, an omnibus driver, and Mr. W. G.
Wood, Lice-chairman of the Chamber of Commerce
at Nottingham, gave similar evidence.
The committed resumes their sittings to-morrow.

POLICE INTELLIGENCE.—This Day.

MARLBOROUGH-STREET.

CHARGE OF STEALING A CHEQUE, &C.--A KIND PROSE-
CUTOR.—Henry Freeman, a lad, was charged before Mr.
Tyrwhitt with stealing a cheque for £9 ss. and about £25
in money, the property of Mr. Frederick Hedger, estate
agent, 40, Pall-Mall.
A clerk in the employ of Mr. Hedger said that in conse-
quence of being told on the morning of Wednesday last
that the prisoner—who was in the employ of the house-
keeper who looked after the offices—had absconded, he
looked in a drawer of a table in Mr. Hedger's office—the
drawer having been safely locked overnight and still re-
maining locked—and he missed a cheque for £9 ss. and
about £25 in money. The cheque produced (found on the
prisoner when taken into custody by Butcher, 137 C) was
the one he missed.

Mr. Hedger said he had no wish to press hardly on the
lad, as he thought the prisoner had yielded to a sudden
temptation. He had seen the lad's father, a respectable
man, and he had taken every care of the lad, and would
continue to do so. He had no wish to lock anybody up,
and therefore would withdraw from the prosecution.
Mr. Tyrwhitt said the lad ought to be very thankful to
Mr. Hedger, for if he had gone for trial he might have
received a sentence of 12 months' imprisonment.
DISORDERLIES IN THE UAYMARKET.-1101117 Moss, of 38,
Oxford-terrace, Hyde-park, wine merchant ; H. Howard,
clerk, of 172, Camberwell, New-road ; and Ellen Leslie, an
unfortunate, were charged before Mr. Tyrwhitt with being
drunk, and behaving in a disorderly manner in the Hay-
market.

The case having been proved, Mr. Tyrwhitt fined the
defendants ss. each.

Edward Carroll, clerk, of John-street, Berkeley-square,
was charged with assaulting Police-constable Redford in
the Haymarket.

Redford said that at three o'clock that morning the de-
fendant was quarrelling with two women in the Haymar-
ket. Rs requested the defendant and the women to leave,
when the defendant said, " Who the devil are you 2" and
kicked him in the legs ; and he still felt the effects.
Mr. Tyrwhitt fined the defendant 10s., or seven days.

THE NEW REFCRM BILL.

81R311NG11431, Monday Night.

A town's meeting (convened by the Mayor in
compliance with a requisition signed by 800 persons)
to consider the Government Reform Bill was held
here this evening. The Mayor (Mr. Edwin Yates)
presided.
Mr. THOMAS LLOYD, J.P., moved the following
resolution :

" That, relying on the promise of her Majesty's Govern-
ment that a measure for the redistribution of seats will be
introduced as soon as possible, the members for the borough
be requested to support 1,(3 bill for the extension of the
franchise now before Parliament."

The Rev. R. W. DALE, M.A., Dissenting minister,
seconded the resolution, which was supported by
Mr. J. Dixon, J.P., also by Mr. Grew, a working
man, and carried by acclamation.
Mr. J. S. WRIGHT, Vice-President of the Cham-
ber of Commerce, moved the following :

" That, as in the opinion of this meeting the provisions
of the Government measure fall short of the just expecta-
tions of the people, the borough members be requested
strenuously to resist any attempt that may be made to limit
the scope of the bill, and to exert all their influence to in-
duce the House of Commons to put the most• Liberal inter-
pretation possible upon all its clauses."

- The foregoing was seconded, and supported by
several speakers ; it also was carried unanimously.
A petition to Parliament was adopted. The hall
was about three parts full.
In the course of the proceedings the following
letter from Mr. Bright was read :

44 Rochdale, March 25.

"I feel sorry that I cannot be at your meeting to-morrow
night to witness and to help the expression of the senti-
ments of Birmingham upon the question which is now ex-
citing so much interest throughout the country. I cannot
write as I could speak, but I must write a few lines to you.
c‘ The Franchise Bill now before Parliament is a per-
fectly honest bill. It will, if it become law, give votes
more extensively to tho middle class, both in counties and
boroughs, and it will overthrow the principle of working
class exclusion, which was established by the Reform Act
of 1832.

" It will admit to the franchise so many of the work-
ing men in all important and populous boroughs that they
as a class, will no longer feel themselves intentionally
excluded by the law.
" In the counties it will enfranchise 200,000 men, and it
may be expected in some counties to make the representa-
tion less than that of the class of landlords and more that
of the great body of the occupiers of houses and land
within the county.
" It will enfranchise in London and in all the great cities
a considerable number of young men and of artisans who
live in lodgings or in parts of houses, and it will thus ex-
tend the franchise to many not included in the suffrage
granted by the Reform Act.
" I say the bill is an honest bill,-and if it is the least the
Government could offer it may be that it is the greatest
which the Government could carry through Parliament.
"Parliament is never hearty for Reform or for any good
measure. It hated the Reform Bill of 1831 and 1832, It
hated the bill which repealed the Corn Law in 1846. It
does not like the Franchise Bill now upon its table. It is
to a large extent the offspring of landlord power in the
counties, and of tumult and corruption in the boroughs,
and it NN ould be strange if such a Parliament were in favour
of freedom and of an honest representation of the people.
But notwithstanding such a Parliament, this bill will pass
if Birmingham and other towns will do their duty.
" There is opposed to it the Tory party, of whose blind-
ness and folly we have abundant proofs in all its history.
We have no reason now to expect from it a wiser course,
and:we have a small section of men who do not accept the
name of Tory, but zealously do its work.
"These combine to form a conspiracy on which all the
hopes of Mr. Disraeli and the Opposition are based. I
thick a more dirty conspiracy has not been seen in the
House of Commons during many generations. It is directed
against this bill, and not less against Lord Russell, by
whom the Liberal and popular policy of the Governent has
been determined.

" What should be done, and what must be done under
these circumstances ? You know what your fathers did 34
years ago, and you know the result. The men who in every
speech they utter insult the working-men, gescribing them
as a multitude given up to ignorance and vice, will be the
first to yield when the popular will is loudly and resolutely
expressed. If Parliament-street, from Charing-cross to the
Abbey, were filled with men seeking a reform bill, as it was
two years ago with men come to do honour to an illustri-
ous Italian, these slanderers of their countrymen would
learn to be civil, if they did not learn to love freedom.
1 This Bill appeals to the middle and working classes
alike. It is a measure of enfranchisement to both of them,
and they should heartily unite in an effort to make it a law.
That which the Tories and the ' dirty conspiracy ' oppose
cannot but deserve the support of every liberal man in the
kingdom.

" If the population of the Birmingham district would set
apart a day, not for humiliation,' but for a firm assertion
of their rights, in great meetings or in one vast gathering,
they might sustain this Franchise Bill and beat down as by
one blow the power that threatens to bolt the door of Par-
liament against the people.
" I hope we shall see in all the towns of Great Britain
during the coming fortnight a great support of the Govern-
ment and the bill. If the vote of want of confidence is
carried against the Government there will be a change of
Ministers or a dissolution of Parliament. If the towns do
their duty the Government will be safe, because the bill
will be safe, and the suffrage once established on a more
rational basis, the country can then turn its attention to
the arrangement and distribution of seats, which is just as
needful as a wider suffrage to give us a fair representation
of the nation.

" Great meetings and great petitions will be not only
useful, but effectual.

" I am very truly yours,
" JOHN BRIGHT."

An American Professorship in an English
University.

A proposition somewhat novel in its character
is exciting considerable interest among the edu-
cated classes in England. It is made by HENRY
YATES THOMPSON, upon behalf of Harvard Uni-
versity of -Massachusetts to the English Univer-
sity of Cambridge, and embraces an offer to
endow a lectureship upon the history, literature,
and institutions of the United States, the lec-
tures to be delivered at Cambridge every two
years. Mr. THOMPSON, who is an English gra-
duate, proposes to donate a fund for the main-
tenance of this lectureship, and it is understood
that the lecturer is to be an American. The
idea has somewhat startled the British aristo-
cracy. They look upon it as a scheme to repub-
licanise the ideas of Englishmen ; in fact, to in-
struct them that Democratic institutions may
have something in them which is worthy of ap-
probation. A commentator upon the plan says,
with truly Conservative alarm, that it is " a wild
scheme, and harm might come of it." He says
further—" Nothing can be more dangerous than to
" establish a strong political feeling in our younger
" members. Considering the large number of high-
" spirited young men we have among us just
" emerging from boyhood, to allow such a
" course of lectures to be delivered, would be
"to be put a light to gunpowder, unless the
" lecturer was gifted with superhuman--cer-
tainly with preter - American—prudence, or
" were content to make his lectures poor and
" passionless retrospects, emasculated of all that
44 might render a course of this kind so interesting
" to a less inflammable audience."

This is the tone of aristocratic prejudice, and
it is an argument which has for its foundation
the assertion, " Things are well enough as they
are ; let us not injure ourselves by inquiring
whether there are not better things." A uni-
versity is established for purposes of education,
not merely to perpetuate political systems,
or defend hereditary abuses. No man can be
truly ',learned who confines his knowledge to
affairs of his own country, and rejects all infor-
mation as to the manners, customs, and laws of
others. Students of universities and colleges are
minutely taught the history of the ancient republics.
Everything that was done in Greece and Rome they
ought to know ; but of what value is that knowledge
iu comparison with a thorough understanding of the
world in which they live ? Without full apprecia-
tiation of the manners customs, and Governments
of other nations than their own, they are pro-
foundly ignorant, and their thoughts and opinions
are bounded by their own horizon. This must
be the opinion of enlightened men all over the
earth.—Anglo-Anierican Times.

The Oil Springs Chronicle of Canada West says
that an extraordinary oil well has just been discovered in
Canada. It yielded on the 21st of February 2,259 gallons
of oil in one year, which was at tho rate of 1,692 barrels
of 32 gallons each a day.

George A. Trenholm, late Rebel Secretary of the
Treasury, has presented Bishop Davis, of South Carolina,
the property known as the Orangeburg Female Seminary,
for the purpose of a theological seminary.

A CAUTION.

A writer in this morning's Times says—Can you
spare a corner of your valuable space to expose a
most disgraceful proceeding ?
My niece adverted in your columns some few
days ago for a situation as a governess, and stated
qualification and her age-19. One of the first
answers she received was the following :

"If -, who advertised for a situation as governess in
this morning's Times, will call to-morrow at 4 o'clock at 4,
Arundel-street, Coventry-street, and inquire for Mr. Shir-
ley, she may hear of a situation to suit her."

Luckily she showed me the letter, and suspecting
from the style of writing, coupled with the name and
locality given, that all was not right, I determined
to accompany her, and before allowing her to enter
the house to make some inquiry. On asking for
the street we found it was a narrow sort of
court, ending in a small square, at the top of the
Haymarket, and o❑ inspecting the outside of the
house I saw that all the blinds were carefully
drawn on the ground and first floors, though there
was not too much sun on the foggy March after-
noon even out of the court. This naturally increased
my suspicions, but wishing to give it the benefit of
the doubt, and thinking it might by possibility be
an office of some kind, I directed my niece to knock
at the door and ask, but by no means to enter. She
did so, and the door was opened by an old woman,
who evidently expected her to walk in. She
then asked, "Is this an office? What is Mr.
Shirley ?" The answer was, "It is not an office.
General Shirley is here." On hearing this she at
once returned to me. Need I adds she did not go
back to seek the situation ? No doubt my niece
was not the only intended victim of a scheme, the
real purpose of which I leave your readers to judge.

MARKETS.---This Day.

HAY

SurrnierELD.—Meadow hay, £4 4s to £5 10s ; clover,
£5 5s to 16 12s 6d ; and straw, £1 18s to £2 4s per load.
Trade firm.

CIIMBERLAXD.-31 ea dow hay, £4 4s to £slos Od; clover
£5 5s to £6 12s 6d; and straw, £2 Os to £2 5s per load.
A active demand.

WIUTECHAPEL.—Meadow hay, £4 4s to £5 lOs ; clover,
.£5 5s to £6 12s 6d; and straw, £1 18s to £2 4s per load
Trade firm.

COLONIAL.

TEA.—Business remains very quiet, and prices generally
are unaltered.

SUGAR.—The market continues dull, and the few trans-
actions entered into have been at previous rates. In the
refined market there is little change of importance to report.
COFFEE. There has been only a moderate amount of
business negotiated, but superior qualities of both planta-
tion and native Ceylon command fully former rates.
RICE.—A very limited business has been reported owing
to the high rates demanded by holders.
TALLOW.—This market has been ranch agitated of late,
an advance being paid of 2s per cwt on the previous Mon-
day's rates, which gave place subsequently to a decline of
2s Gd per cwt from the highest point. The market became
more steady at the close of the week, and to-day quotations
aro 50s Gd on the spot.

COAL MARKET.
Price per ton at the close of the market.

s. d.
c. d.
Hastings Hartley...... 16 3 Hetton Lyons l6 0
North Moor Pelton South Hetton
19 6
Gas l4 0 Caradoc
19 3
Eden Main
Brancepeth Cannel ... 18 0 Hough Hall lB 9
N. Staffordshire
Braddyell's Hetton.... 18 6 South Kelloo
Walls End Haswell... 20 0 Tees
Walls End Hotton ... 20 0
- - --

Ships at market, 40; sold, 31.

COUNTRY MARKETS•

NORTHAMPTON—MARcH 24.

There was a tolerable show of wheat at our corn market
to-day, the supply consisting of white and red sorts.
Buyers purchased slowly, and rates were rather easier.
Barley was in request, and a tolerable share of business was
done. A small supply of oats, which met a ready sale at
quite former terms. For beans extreme prices were ob-
tained.
New white wheat, 43s to 48s ; new red, 40s to 46s ; old
white, 48s to 53s ; old red, 43s to 47s per 36 stone. Barley
for malting, 40s to 44s per qr. ; grinding, 28s to 42s per 30
stone. Oats, old, 30s to 34s ; new, 20s to 28s per 24 stone.
Beans, old, 46s to 49s ; new, 40s to 44s per 38 stone. Peas,
36s to 40s per 36 stone.