The Sun.
London, England, 1866-06-26 00:00:00

SHIPPING INTELLIGENCE.—This Day.

[Br ELECTRIC TELEGRAM. I
GRAVESEND, Tuesday Morning.
Arrived, June 25.—Durham, from Calcutta ; Argo, from
Sundswall ; Fortb, screw steamer, from Hamburg.
Arrived, June 26.—Leopard, steamer, from Hamburg;
Neptune, steamer, from Havre ; Panther, steamer, from
Boulogne.

DEAI, Tuesday Morning.
Passed—Prince Alfred, for Port Natal ; Sarah, Grice, for
Port Phillip both from London ; Maid of London, and
Loyal of Jersey, from the north, for the west.
Sailed—Ann Orompton, and. Early Morn.

TIIE METROPOLITAN 111u.'cICIPAL ASSOCIATION.
-On Monday the general council of this assec.iation issued
an address, which commences as follows ;—" For many
years past the local government of the metropolis has
excited a serious and growing discontent. It is a matter of
notoriety that the first city in the empire is one of tho
worst and most expensively governed. A want of system
is conspicuous in every department of its Management.
The sewers, especially in the poorer districts, are in a sts.te
of dilapidation and decay ; the paving, except in sore of
the leading thoroughfares, is greatly out of repair, and in
many cases dangerous ; the lighting is defective, both as to
the quality of the gas and the number of public lamps,
whilst the prices charged both for public and private light-
ing are in excess of those which prevail in most other large
towns in the United Kingdom. The cleansing and water-
lug are much neglected, and often so managed as to be of
little use; the supply of water is left, without any control,
in the hands of large commercial companies, who have
never been called upon to comply with the require-
ments of
.the Metropolis Water Act as to constant supply
and having their street service at all times charged with
water. As a neceseary consequence, the water available
for general and domestic use is scanty, especially amoug
the humbler classes, who do not obtain sufficient for the
purposes of cleanliness and health. It has also been shown
before a Parliamentary committee that many of the existing
local authorities of the metropolis have neglected to
enforce the provisions of the Metropolis Gas Act, the
Water Act, Adulteration of Food Act, and even the
requirements of the acts expressly passed for the better
local management of the metropolis have not been en-
forced, especially those in. relation to sanitary measures.
Tho inefficiency of the present administrative bodies
arises, no doubt, in some measure from divided jurisdic-
tions, many of them working without concert, and with
no care for the convenience of neighbouring districts ;
and the existing system is rendered expensive by the
number of establishments and the multitude of officers
which have to be maintained. Under the provisions of the
Metropolis Local Management Act alone, there aro 39
vestries and district boards, each having an independent
existence and government, for the purposes of paving,
lighting, cleansing, and the sewarge of the metropolis.
The Metropolitan Board, which is formed of representa-
tives from these several vestries and district boards, in
whom is vested great powers of taxing the ratepayers,
and of expenditure upon public improvements, is,
from its constitution and modes of election, a prac-
tically irresponsible body. The magistrates for the
counties of Middlesex, Kent, and Surrey also exercise ex -
tensivo jurisdiction and large powers of taxation within the
metropolitan districts, uncontrolled by representative
action. The defects of the present system are patent, and

the expense is enormous—amongst these defects there is
no provision made for a proper audit and publication of the
auditors' reportF. As an example of the comparative cost
of management between consolidated and divided districts,
the parish (not the borough) of St. Marylebone and the
city of Westminster may be taken. The population of
each is about the same.

FRENC II ACADEMY OF SCIENCES. —At the last sit-
ting the President announced that the second public
quarterly one would take place on the 4th of July next.
M. Deloss presented a geological map of the subterranean
strata of the department of the Seine. This map is con-
structed on the scale of one to 2.5,000. A letter was re-
ceived from M. Simonin announcing that on the 29th of.
January M. Malard had sent in a paper on certain aurife-'
roue deposits in the Limousin and the department of the
Marne, where it seemed he had discovered neither more
nor loss than a Gallic California. M. Simonin now con-
firms this statement, adding that on the other side of the,
Cevennes he has found other placers, which in his opinion
must have produced all the gold possessed by the ancient
Gauls. Dr. Jobert, probably a candidate for the 100,000 f.
prize, sent in a paper, in which ho endeavours to prove
that a fall of the barometer, a tropical heat, and confined
air aro quite sufficient to cause a spontaneous epidemic
invasion of cholera. We trust that the learned doctor
will allow that these three causes have existed
simultaneously thousands of times, without giving rise to
such an epidemic. But a prize of £4,000 looming in tho
distance will occasionally produce wonderful discoveries
Dr. Rouget read a paper in which, en the strength of nume-
rous photographs, he endeatoured to settle the vexed ques-
tion of muscular motion, generally attributed in Franco to
fibrous contractibility, and in Germany to the phenomenon
of elasticity. Dr. Rouget is of the latter opinion. M.
Charles St. Claire Devillo has for some months past been
communicating papers to the Academy on certain meteor-
ological researches of his for the purpose of proving that
the months of February, May, August, and November are
remarkable for certain periodical variations of temperature.
lie has found in those four months variations of tempera-
ture intimately allied with those of the barometer.

THE ENGLISH PAINTED BY THE FRENCH. No
French draughtsman, no French word-painter, ever
depicts the English young lady save as a tall,
rigid, and
angular female—comely of face if you will, but standing
bolt upright as a life-guardsman, with her arms pendent
and her eyes demurely cast down. She always wears a
straw bonnet of the coal-scuttle form, or an enormous
flap-hat with a green veil. Her hands, encased in
beaver gloves, and her feet, which are in sandalled shoes,
are very large. She usually carries a capacious reticule
in variegated straw of a bold chessboard pattern. She
seldom wears any crinoline, and her hair is arranged
in long ringlets most judiciously drooping. She seldom
opens her mouth but to ejaculate " Shocking !" It is
absolutely astounding to find so accurate an observer
and so graphic a narrator as Monsieur Theophile
Gautier falling into this dull and false, conventionalism in
his charming book on Spain. He is describing Gibraltar,
and is very particular in the portrayal of such a Mees
Anglaise as I have sketched above. The fidelity of tho por-
trait will of course be fully appreciated by all British officers
who have mounted guard over the Pillars of Hercules. . .
It is curious that the French, ordinarily so keen of per-
ception and so shrewd in social dissection, should not,
by this time, have discovered some other and really
existent types of English tourists, male and female,
to supply the place of the obsolete and well-nigh mythi-
cal "Moos," with her long ringlets, her green veil, her
large hands and feet, and her figure full of awkward and
ungainly angles. And may not the British Baronet, with
his top-boots, and his bull-dog, and his hoarse cries for
his servant "Jhon," and his perpetual thirst for "grogs,"
be reckoned among the extinct animals ?—Dickens's "Ali
the Year Round."

THE SOUTH WALES IRON AND COAL TRADES.--
The rupture of the peace of Europe in Germany is
likely to be more disastrously felt in the manufacturing dis-
tricts of Great Britain than many people anticipate. Italy
and some of the German States are among our best cus-
tomers, and any departure from the peaceful pursuits which
latterly characterised the people of those States is surd
sooner or later to make itself felt in England. It was hardly
thought, however, that the evil consequences of an Euro-
pean war would so soon developo themselves. The falling
off in orders within the last week or two has been alarm-

ingly great. In most of the largo establishments of Mon-
mouthshire and South Wales the demand, which a month
ago was more than brisk, is now reduced to almost nothing.
Worth
A month ago there was a general apprehension throughout
these districts that the continual drain of emigration would
pileeetis
impossible
produce an inconvenient scarcity of hands. The case is
now altered—the position of things reversed. We have
reason to believe that at some of the ironworksssoirbdlreeerduacesaredy
place
employesr
a e s rdcaandb that
uat discharge
ttsh,ooenoeo establishmenthands of
thereiworkmens wnohticahs
single
nnagslner already
dboiurpn dtroaer
ordinary
corn_epro-
bability
mayuth Wales will; continue in a
Imaboenutireannindgb on the
nt hdebb oy
reduced
e e At tw
at
ght
take
this
.e
rSthee least, for the whole period of
have already commenced stacking, which means
languishingh en atiusr turn
hsfataotrttetra,htedoebesainttey
anre.utlrarlointymabsytetrshaatnpd.o
potentate will immeasurably ag-
gravate Emperor, as they believe be
assumed
b-
citous about the attitude which may feel
esPeciallYysoli-
tshtreicwt the
that a departure from
gravate the conflict by giving
ttother Powers a pretext for
inopportune period, too, th era worse for them. At this
have determined to strike ecolliers of the Rhondda Valley
for an advance of wages. A few
weeks ago the men sent in their request for an advance,
and the masters thereupon convened meeting
. a
hd anddf.onnlned
deed an opinion was freelyelet eeexpWressed resistthtateif erheanpreseat
state of things continues they will have no alternative but
to reduce the wages now paid to the men. The decision to
resist the application for an advance was communicated to
the men last week, and the latter have \responded by a ge-
neral notice to leave the works in a month unless a set e
tl-
ment can be previously arrived at. We hope some satis-
master
factory arrangement will be made. The s,
ever, can concede nothing• how-
The only thing to be done is
for the men to withdraw their notice, and rest and be
thankful that things aro not worse than they are. The
prospect before them is by no means to be contemplated
witlizatisfaction.
The 48th (Northamptonshire) R nt, under egime
the command pf COL J. G. R. Aplin, and
ing of 33 officers, 128. men, Thorsea," 78 women,
and 98 children, arrived at Aldershott Camp on
Thursday afternoon, from Shorncliffe. The regi-
ment is temporarily stationed in the west block
Permanent Barracks,