The Sun.
London, England, 1861-01-10 00:00:00


below the freezing point, and the cold is intense.
On Sunday night and Monday there were great
accumulations of snow, and the, ground is now
covered to a depth of eight to ten inches, and even
more where there has been any drifting. By great
exertions the railway trains have been kept run-
ning with tolerable regularity, but this has only been
effected by means of extra engines and the employ-
ment of numbers of additional men. The country
posts are completely disorganised, and no improve-
ment can be anticipated at present, as the hard frost
has rendered travelling on ordinary roads a matter
of very great difficulty. Such a winter has not been
known in this neighbourhood for many years.
The frost at Newcastle on Monday and Tuesday
night was as intense as ever known in this district.
On Monday night a dense fog made the weather
more cold than even on Christmas Eve. A number
_ _

of passengers in the Shields steam ferry suffered
severely from the effects of the frost and fog. They
put off from South Shields in the steamer at nine
o'clock, and no sooner had they got out into the
channel of the river than the boat was enveloped in
an impenetrable fog. The passengers and crow were
in great danger, but they fortunately got the boat
alongside a schooner, where they had to lie till five
in the morning. A number of women and children
were aboard the boat. All out-door employment is
at a standstill, and the icebound condition of the
upper reaches of the Tyne has thrown a number of
keelmen and wherrymen out of work. Great poverty
is likely to be sustained by a large number of work-
ing men's families, for there is less prospect than
ever of fresh weather. In this town and Shields, and
in Blaydon and some other places on the Tyne, the
poor are supplied with quantities' of soup three
times a-week, and the coal owners have been very
liberal in distributing coals among the unemployed.
The sea has fortunately got down, and the steam-
ships and some sailing vessels have proceeded on
their voyages. The trains from the south have
been delayed very much to-day.
During Sunday night and throughout Monday
there was a heavy and almost continuous fall of snow
at North Shields. Many of the country roads ha veto
a great extent been blocked up, and the coal-waggon
ways have been a good deal stopped, and the traffic
en the North-Eastern line is much impeded. The
difficulties and dangers incident to travelling in
the north-west of Northumberland last week
are described in the following communication :—
" On Thursday morning the highway to Rothbury,
Glanton, Whittingham, and other townships lying
to the west of Alnwick, was a scene it for a pain-
ter, and his easel would have exhibited some strange
sketches indeed. It was the first day that the
traffic had been opened out for carts after the late
heavy fall and tremendous drifts of snow. The
road had only then been made passable by cutting,
and the width of it no greater than to allow one
conveyance to 'get along at a time, excepting at
intervals of a few hundred yards, there were short
curves, or sidings into which one conveyance might
shunt until an approaching one from an opposite
direction passed. It was between those sidings
that the scenes we allude to took place. Cold and
bitter was the blast that blew across 'the dreary
common of Aydon Forest, through which the road
winds for nearly four miles, without a sheltering
tree, and the drivers of carts and occasional eques-
trians—both blowing their fingers and anxious to
get forward—were alike unwilling to be waiters
upon the others. Then again, after passing those
side cuttings, it was next to impossible to back any
conveyance, as of necessity one party must do, or
run tie risk of horses and cart being nearly swal-
lowed up by venturing a little to one side. Two
equestrians had a narrow escape of it, one of them
at least fairly putting spars to his horse, and gal-
loping back to the cutting which he had just des-
pised the use of. One four-wheel had two travellers,
who had just congratulated each other on their
freedom from accident so far, though the joltings
were matters for record to future generations, when
bang went one of their shafts in two places. tAfter
binding up with six or seven yards of stout rope
they got within one mile of their destination, when
the rope yielding gave too much work for the other
shaft to perform, and off it came too, in a couple of
pieces. The roads will be bad yet, probably for
some days.
The weather in the North Sea still remains in a
very boisterous condition. The wind is N.E., and
the steamships are still detained in the harbour.
The weather in:many parts of the West Riding
and in Nottinghamshire is most severe. The prin-
cipal rivers of Yorkshire have been frozen over for
some days, with the exception in some places of
the Ouse and Humber, and on both the navigation
is seriously impeded by the quantity of ice passing
down, some of them blocks from three to four feet
thick. The tributary rivers, the Don, the Derwent,
the Wharf, and the Aire, are completely closed up,
and all transit for the present is suspended. One
of the most striking instances of the severity of the
weather has been seen on the River Wharf, above
Harewood-bridge, where five rats were embedded
in the ice. It is thought that the rats were at-
tempting to cross the river, and while so doing were
frozen. The ice on the Ouse is very thick—so
• thick indeed that at the end of last week a cart
passed over at Booth Ferry, near the residence of
1 Mr. John Wells, J.P., of Booth Ferry-house. The
ice in the Trent is of great thickness, and at But-
terwick, on the borders of Lincolnshire, pieces five
feet in thickness have often been noticed. Wild
fowl have been driven nearer the towns than for
some years past, and several wild swans have been
seen in the neighbourhood of Wheatley hall, the
pleasant seat of Sir W. Ridley C. Cooke. Many of
the class of birds that ordinarily visit the district
in the winter season have been noticed, particularly
the fieldfare. The intensity of the frost is affecting
the plumage of the birds, and in the neighbourhood
between Pontefract and Doncaster several that have
been shot have proved quite piebald. The frost con-
tinued with much severity last (Tuesday) night.

ROYAL B UJIANE SOCIETY.

- - - -A+

The annual meeting of the members of this
society was held yesterday, at the offices, Trafalgar-
square; Mr. Benjamin Bond Cabbell in the chair.
In the course of the proceedings it was mentioned
that the annual subscriptions were not enough to
pay the iceman's wages for one month of frosty
weather, so that were it not for the bounty of a
past age, the society would have to come to a stand-
still for want of funds, and that the last anniversary
festival, instead of increasing the finances of the
institution, involved a loss of more than £80. The
following are the facts stated in the report :—The
total number of cases of drowning brought under
the notice of the society during the past year was
156, in which 187 persons were concerned. Of
these 137 were successfully treated by the medical
officers of the society, while 15 proved beyond
recovery; 27 were cases of attempted suicide, and
in 22 cases the gallant rescuers were rewarded by
the society. The general court granted 24 silver
medals, 65 bronze medals, 14 testimonials on vellum,
16 testimonials on parchment, and 72 pecuniary
rewards during the past year. The number of
bathers in the Serpentine last summer was 68,792,
and the number of casualties 27, including 5
attempts at suicide, 2 of which proved fatal. Up
to Tuesday night 112 had been rescued from
drowning in the parks during the present frost,
the number of skaters having been 396,850.
The total income of the society for the
past year, including a balance of £410 2s. 5d.
brought forward from the accounts of the
preceding year, was £1,897 12s. 7d., and the
expenditure £1,689 12s. 2d., of which £604 19s. 11d.
was paid in wages to icemen, &c., leaving in hand
a balance of £208 Os. 5d. This report having been
adopted, silver medals were voted to the following
for their gallant intrepidity in saving the lives of
others :—Mr. J. Pilbrow, 3d officer Peninsular and
Oriental Company's ship Hindostan, saved the life
of Major Ormsby, who fell off the gangway into
the Hoogley, at Calcutta ; James Gant, A.B., on
board H.M.S. Termagant, leaped into the sea and
saved Jas. Harrington, a boy who, in a fit of insa-
nity, attempted suicide ; Mr. Laurence Cluny,
midshipman on board H.M.S. Fawn, rescued an
A.B. seaman, Alfred Dray, who had fallen over-
board at sea off the Cape of Good Hope ; William
Anderson, master's assistant on board the Nile,
saved on three occasions four lives under perilous
circumstances. Had the funds of the society ad-
mitted of it Mr. Anderson would have been
awarded a gold medal, Mr. J. Hawkins, acting
mate, her Majesty's ship Curacoa, at Monte Video,
saved William Dowsell, who, in falling from the
rigging, fractured his leg in two places and was
perfectly helpless. Anastacio Romaldo, at Para,
in Brazil, saved John Brown, who, in a state of
intoxication, had fallen into the river, which
abounds with under-currents and is exceedingly
mephitic. The particulars of this case were, for-
warded
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N.B., saved five persons who had been in a boat
capsized while crossing theForth. Ensign Chute and
Private Quigley, 8th Regiment, at Spithead, saved
J. M•Kennys, a private belonging to the same
regiment. Rev. Dr. Dill, at Portsteward, county
Perry, saved a lunatic named Hammill, who had
leaned off the rocks into the sea. Lieut. Kennedy,
R.M., her Majesty's ship Wasp, at sea between the
Cape and the Mauritius, saved John Sier, A.B.,
who had fallen overboard. Captain E. Hardinge,
her Majesty's ship Persian, at sea. saved a boy
who had fallen overboard. Mr. W. J. Harton,
medical student, saved, at Banagher, Miss Matilda
Broadbent, who had flung herself off the bridge
into the Shannon ; and Joseph Killingbeck. who,
At Hamlett, near Leeds, at a great risk to his own