The Sun.
London, England, 1850-09-14 00:00:00

COMPLETION of the BRITANNIA

BRIDGE.
lIENAI STRAITS, FRIDAY, SEPT. 13.—After some
years of unremitting labour, the engineers connected
with this great work safely lowered the " last" of the
Britannia tubes to its permanent resting place to-day.
The Carnarvonshire end of the tube was lowered three
feet, the opposite end being joined on to the Anglesey
large tube in the interior of the lower on the Britan-
nia rock, and, obedient to the law of the novel opera-
tion, the centres of both tubes, as before, were raised
up several inches. The Government officer will be
down on an early day to inspect the entire structure
preparatory to its permanent opening. Nothing beyond
a mere fractional deflection has been observed to take
place in the tube that has been opened since March,'and
which has been subjected to the constant transit of
heavy trains and traffic. Some curious acoustic ef-
fects have been observei. Pistol shots, or any sonorous
noises, are echoed within the tube half a dozen
times. The cells of the top and bottom are used by
the engineers as speaking tubes, and they can carry
on conversations through them in whispers; by ele-
vating the voice persons may converse through the
length of the bridge—nearly a quarter of a mile. The
following (not hitherto published) is an official re-
turn of the cost of the entire structure :—Pedestals
and abutments on Carnarvon side, 17,459/. ; Carnar-
von-tower, 28,6261.; Britannia-tower, 38,67]1.; An-
glesey-tower, 31,430/. ; pedestals and abutments on
Anglesey side, 40,470/. ; lions, 2,0481.; total, 158,7041.
Wrought iron used in tubes, 118,946/. ; cast iron in
tubes and towers, 30,619/. ; construction of tubes,
226,234/. ; pontoons, ropes, capstans, painting ma-
terials, 28,0961. ; raising machinery, 9,7821.; car-
pentry and labour in floating, raising, and completing
bridge, 25,498/.; experiments, 3,9861.; total, 601,8651.
The total weight of each of the wrought iron road-
ways now completed represents 12,000 tons, sup-
ported on a total mass of masonry of a million and a
half cubic feet, erected at the rate of three feet in a
minute.

THE OPERATIONS BY THE SAPPERS
AND MINERS AT SEAFORD.
The preparations for the great explosion antici-
pated here are at length so far advanced as to enable
us to name the afternoon of Thursday next, probably
between two and three o'clock, as the time at which
the mines will be fired. The operations have been
intrusted to Captain Frome and Lieutenants Ward,
Crossman, and Greatorex, of the Royal Engineers,
and they appear to have been conducted with a
degree of skill highly creditable to that deserving
branch of the service. The operations have not been
unattended with danger, but they have hitherto been
unaccompanied by any serious casualty. Thousands
have visited the spot during the last few weeks, and a
brief description of the character of the works will
doubtless be interesting to the numbers who will as-
semble on Thursday next to witness a sight which
can only be presented to us at rare intervals. A
sort of staircase leads the visitor to a chasm in the
lofty cliff about thirty feet above low-water
mark. On entering, he finds a gallery of 6 feet high
and 5 feet wide penetrating the interior of the cliff to
a distance of 80 feet. lie traverses this passage,
dimly lighted by candles and supplied with air by
shafts, and finds at its termination two smaller
galleries branching off in opposite directions,
Tstns, onehe'
a distance of 17 feet and the other 22ht
smaller galleries are only 3 feet in height, g
, and each of
6 feet 6 inches
them terminates in a chamber which is
each way. In these
edhamhers, which for greater
security have been
ascending to
this parth
finds
Leaving
g were depooefaseittehede with boards, 24,0001 b. of
gunpowder ownoTrklturasoddaylast.
five shafts have been sunk
ttoheatopdeopfththeofclft ,feeet,
each of which will contain a
no
chargeless of
th than
02071
,b 0 0
00 f
Ib. gunpowder,
will
be
theso
tremendous
in the
mt e
nd
u whole
explo-
sive force applied to the.cliff in these operations. A
voltaic battery has been placed in a temporary build-
ing on the declivity of the bill, at a short distance
from the upper mines, by which the whole will be
fired.
The object of these operations, and the cause of the
assistance rendered by Government, may be very
briefly stated. The sea, for some time past, has been
encroaching on that part of the coast between New-
haven Fier and the Cliff-end at Seaford. Such an

FATAL OCCURRENCE AT LEEDS.
An inquest was held at the Court-house, Leeds, on
Thursday, before Mr. Blackburne, the coroner for
that borough, on the body of Anthony Devine, aged
52 years. The deceased was an Irish labourer, and
resided in the neighbourhood of York-street, Leeds,
which on Sunday night last was the scene of great
tumult and violence, occasioned by the apprehension
of a drunker! Irishman, at the Lloyd's Arms public-
house, on a charge of felony. No sooner had the
prisoner been brought into the street than he uttered
a cry which brought a great number of his fellow-
countrymen and women who inhabit that quarter of
the town to the rescue. Brickbats, stones, sticks,
broken pots, and all the dangerous missiles that could
be procured were hurled at the heads of the police
officers—lnspector Child, Ottwell Kell, and Samuel
Gregson—while they were endeavouring to convey
the prisoee: to the lock-up, and after withstanding
the knocks and blows for some time, they were
ultimately quite overpowered. The prisoner, after
nearly all his clothes had been torn from his back,
was carried off in triumph by the lawless rab-
ble, with two pairs of handcuffs on his wrists, and
he has not been heard of since. In the riot the police
were compelled to use their staves, and one man,
Anthony Devine, the deceased, who was a ringleader,
received a blow on the forehead which caused his
death, at the Infirmary, on Tuesday evening. The
policemen and other witnesses, who might be sup-
posed to be disinterested, described the riot as one of
a most violent character; and, according to the evi-
dence of policeman Gregson, he struck the deceased
with his staff and knocked him down, after the de-
ceased had struck him several times. Policemen
Child and Kell spoke to seeing Gregson strike the de-
ceased over the head and knock him down, and they
also saw that his head was bleeding when he got up;
and, according to the evidence of one of them, which
was confirmed by other witnesses, the deceased again
struck Gregson. The Coroner stated that several
witnesses had been summoned at the request of the
son of the deceased, and he thought it was but right
that they should be examined. They were called, as
was al.() the deceased's son; and their evidence was
altogether contradictory as to the nature of the tu-
mult—some of them stating that there was no riot at
all, that no missiles were thrown at the police, that
the police were never struck, that policeman Kell
went up to the deceased (who was standing quietly
on the causeway looking at what was going on) and
struck him a blow which knocked him down, and that
afterwards policeman Child punched him in the side
with his staff. They also said that Gregson never
struck the deceased at all.
The CORONER summed up with great clearness. He
remarked on the contradictory evidence which had
been given both as to the person who struck the de-
ceased and the circumstances under which he was
struck ; on the impossibility of believing the testi-
mony of some of the last witnesses that there was no
riot at all, and that the decease& was altogether an
unoffending person (in which case, in bis judgment,
the party who struck the blow which killed the de-
ceased would have been guilty of murder); on the
difficulty which he had always experienced in get-
ting the truth from Irish witnesses respecting mat-
ters of this kind, through the prejudices they had in
favour of their own race ; and on the unlikeliness of
Gregson saying that he struck the deceased if be did
not do so. lie thought the jury would have no dif-
ficulty in coming to the conclusion, from the evidence,
that Gregson was the officer who struck the deceased
and knocked him down. There was no doubt that
the deceased died from the wound on his head ; if the
jury came to the conclusion that Gregson struck the
blow, the next question would be whether he was
justified in doing so. As to the law of the case, if a
constable was resisted with violence in the legal
execution of his duty he had a right to repel force by
force ; and if in so doing he killed a person who was
resisting him, it was justifiable homicide. If the
jury were satisfied that Gregson was the party who
inflicted the blow which caused death, then he (the
Coroner) thought that all the circumstances would
fully warrant them in saying that that officer was jus-
tified in what he did, and their verdict in that case
would be justifiable homicide. Some of the witnesses
had said that Kell gave the blow, but he (the Coroner)
thought the jury would be of opinion that those wit-
nesses had not stated that which was correct. If the
jury thought that the fatal blow was not given by any
policeman, then he did not know what verdict they
could return except that the deceased received a blow
which caused death, but that how or from whom he
received it there was no evidence to show.
Mr. Burniston (one of the jury)—We are of
opinion that the conduct of the police was above all
praise.
The jury, after a very short consultation, gave the
following verdict:—" That the deceased appears to
have come to his death by a blow or blows in a riot-
ous affray and an attempt to rescue a prisoner ; that
it appears from the evidence adduced that the
police-officers used no more force than was necessary
for the protection of the prisoner and the preserve •
tion of their own lives. Verdict—Justifiable ho-
micide "

The CORONER supposed that the jury meant justifi-
able homicide against Samuel Gregson.
The Town Clerk said he did not understand the
verdict as applying to policeman Gregson any more
than to any other officer.
The foreman of the jury explained that they did
not fix a fatal blow upon Gregson, Kell, or Child ;
but their opinion was, that whoever struck the blow
was, under the circumstances, perfectly justified in
so doing.

T IC
was p E
demonstrated CT rVI he
onSunday great
f
telegraph
Ecellowa had induced the son of a respectable
ng.
StmcitizenboeelectriclieuE young toErL
ob his parent of 201. The parties left Lincoln for
Hull by the six P.M. train, consoling themselves with the re-
flection that they could not be stopped, as there was no tele-
graph along the line. The father, baring discovered his
loss, and communicated with the superintendent of police,
the latter, at twenty minutes past seven, communicated by
telegraph, via Derby to Hull police •station: the message ar-
rived at forty minutes past seven, upon which one of the
officers went down to the Humber side, and apprehended
the young delinquent as ho was stepping from the packet at
8.25. Unwisely, the father would not permit direction that
the others should be stopped ; and, consequently, though be
recovered his son, he lost his 201. It seems that, when paa.
sing Rasen in the train, the companions of the youth adrise4
him that the money was not safe, and prevailed upon him to
entrust it to one of them. The lad has since informed his
father that they chose this route because they imagined there
were no means of telegraphing from Lincoln to Hull.—
Stamford Mercury.

PARTRIDGE SHOOTING.—The breed of birds is very
partial. There are many barren pairs—many cosies of very
small birds, evidently second broods; taken altogether the
breed is not a good one. Hares, where preserved, are pretty
numerous. The birds are wild, owing to the number of
persons at work in the fields finishing the harvest. The
scent has been unusually bad; dogs have been of little ser-
vice, and the sportsman must fag hard (as he cannot expect
much assistance from his dog) to make a respectable bag.
The heat has been very great, the ground hard and dry; the
dogs have consequently suffered much from sore and swollen
feet. The harvest bobs are plentiful. If sportsmen will rub
their legs with strong vinegar (which kills them) on their
return home, it will prevent the tormenting itching they
create.—Devizes Gazette.

MRS. CROWE'S NEW WORK.
Just ready, in 3 vols. post Bvo.,
LIGHT and DARKNESS;
Or,
MYSTERIES OF LIFE.
By Mrs. CATHERINE CROWE.
Author of
" The Night-side of Nature," " Lilly Dawson," Sec.
Henry Colburn, Publisher, 13, Great Marlborough-street.
Orders received at all the Libraries.

THEATRE ROYAL, HAYMARKET.
Mr. B. Webster. Sole Lessee and Manager, Old Brompton.
For a few nights only, Adelphi Company and Adelphi PleceS.
Second Week of Mr. Hudson.
THIS EVENING,
Will be performed BORN TO GOOD LUCK; or, A.n Irishman's
Fortune. Pau leen O'Rafferty, Mr. Hudson ; Count Malfi, Mr. Lam-
bert; Manfredi, Mr. Boyce; Nina, Miss Woolgar.
Alter which a home-made Etravaganza, entitled DOMESTIC
ECONOMY. John Grnmly, Mr. Wright ; Mrs. Grumly, Mrs. F.
Matthews.
To be followed by BOW TO PAY THE RENT. Morgan Rattler,
Mr. Hudson.
To conclude with THE ENCHAIN-TED ISLE; or, Raising the
Wind on the most Approved Principles. Alonzo, Mr. P. Bedford ;
Ferdinand, Miss Weolgar ; PrOapero, Mr. 0. Smith; Aricl, Miss
Fitz williarx.
On Monday, an entirely new Comedy, in Three Acts, entitled
G:TtALDA. ; or, The Miller's Wife.

ASTLEY'S ROYAL AMPHITHEATRE.
Proprietor and Manager, Mr. W. Batty.
The best ventilated Theatre in London.

Crowded Houses to witness the attractive and magnificent Spectacle
of Mazeppa, which, with brilliant novelties in the Wonders of the
Arena, form the most varied and attractive Entertainments in the
Metropolis, which will be continued a few nights longer. Second
Week of the accomplished Vocalist, Miss Annie Hardie.

THIS EVENING,
Will be produced Lord Byron's gorgeous Spectacle of MAZEPPA
end the WILD HORSE. Mazeppa, Mr. N. T. Hicks.
To be succeeded by an inimitable Display of Batty's Feats of
Tquitation in the Cirque Olympique, by the male and female Eques-
trians of the Establishment.
To conclude with THE WHITE FARM.
Box-office open From Eleven till Four
Stage Manager. Mr. W. West.

Wider the Patronage of her Most Gracious Majesty, his Royal
Highness Prince Albert, &c. &C.
ROYAL SURREY ZOOLOGICAL GARDENS.
MONSTRE DISPLAY OF FIREWORKS.
LAST WEEK OF THIS UNRIVALLED EX.riIBITION.
PRONE NA DEIC ONCERTS.
• OPEN every MONDAY, TUESDAY, WEDNESDAY, and
THURSDAY. _ .

Prodigious Success of the entirely new-modelled Dioramic Pic-
ture representing the PASSAGE of the ALPS by Napoleon and his
Army t the largest Picture in the World! with innumerable moving
Figures the size of life. Modelled, painted, and produced by Mr.
Musson and Son, assisted by Messrs. Adams, Wilson, &c. &c. The
Picture has occupied the Messrs. Danson for many months, and it is
confidently submitted to the Public as a chef-d'oeuvre of art, and not
inferior to any production of the day.
Another splendid Elephant.
The Splendid MENAGERIE has lately been enriched by several
valuable Presents from the Queen.
The Musical Department is conducted by Mr. Godfrey. It will
be the aim of the Establishment to offer for the gratification of the
subscribers and the Public, the most Splendid Military Band in the
Kingdom ! ! Selected from the Bands of her Majesty's Horse and
Font Guards, and the most eminent Artistes in the profession.
The following list of engagements will, it is hoped, convince the
Public, that the long-acknowledged excellence of the Band of this
Establishment will be folly maintained ! The Repertoire of Music
Will be most extensive and varied, arranged from the most Popular
Operas in this and other countries. Solo-Players—Messrs. Lazarus,
Prosperre, Egerton, Crozier, Webb, Holt, &c.
During the evening a grand Colossal, Scenic, and Pyrotechnic
Tableau illustrating the celehrated Picture by David, of Buonaparte
Crossing the Alps ! Showing a general view of the Region of the.
Alps, stretching from the small mountain lake in the foreground to
the distant snow-clad mountains, crowned by the stupendous Mount
St. Bernard and its far-famed Monastery. A portion of the French
Army is first seen " en bivouac," presently the drums beat to arms,
and amid the clash of Military Bands and Martial Music, the Troops
commence the Ascent. The Soldiers are seen dragging the Artillery in
Trunks of Trees, now ascending almost Perpendicular Heights, and
traversing the most Terrific Ravines, but all difficulties are overcome,
and the Gallant Army is seen pursuing its course to the Fertile
plains of Italy.
The whole to conclude with a Gorgeous Display MP Fireworks, by
Messrs. Southby, introducing, amongst various novelties, the most
admired faux d'artifice of former seasons, jets d'eau, water rockets,
revolving pieces, a magnificent Transparency fifty feet in height,
painted by Messrs. Denson, representing Buonaparte on Horseback
cheering on his Troops, surrounded by warlike emblems, insignia of
honour, flags, trophies, &c., amidst a cerruscatlon of various coloured
Ares.
The complicated and difficult machinery, and the erection of the
picture under the direction of Mr. Thos Lowe. The extensive gas
fittings by Messrs. Botcherby and Dixon, 23, King-street, Covent-
garden.