The Sun.
London, England, 1850-01-10 00:00:00

APPOINTMENTS.

WOOLWICH, JAN. 9.—Master—Richard Mowll
(1841), to the Phaeton, 50, at Sheerness.
Surgeon—John Macleod, M.D. (1847), to the
Hermes steam-sloop, at Woolwich.
Assistant-Surgeon—Thomas Seccombe (1845), to
the Hermes.

Midshipman—James E. Hunter, to the Hermes.
Maters' Assistants—Herbert H. Jones to the
Centaur steam-frigate, flag ship on the west coast of
Africa; John Hendfield Tully and George Patterson,
to the Fisgard, fl3g-ship at Woolwich.
Clerk—Alexander C. Faryrer, to the Wellesley
flag-ship, on the \Vest Indies and North American
station.

Gunner—James Hambly, to the Dart, employed on
he Coast Guard Service.

Lieutenant Jago, appointed to the Enterprise, took
up his commission and joined tho vessel at Woolwich
to-clay.
The,' Enterprise, Captain Collinson, C.B , and the
Investigator, Commander M'Clure, have been so oc-
cupied in taking additional stores on board to-day
that they will not b^ able to leave Woolwich until 8
o'clock A.M. to-morrow (Thur.iday, Jan. 10) Amongst
the articles taken on hoard to-day was a cask labelled
" presents," no doubt for the Esquimaux, and its con-
ttmts were stated on the top to be 350 dies, 800 awls,
and 201 b. vermillion. A large package of letters was
also received on board in a strong white leather bag,
'addressed to the officers and crews of her Majesty's
ships Erebus and Terror, Bhering's Straits. The
anxiety to visit these vessels continued unabated all
day, and hundreds f persons went on board, al-
though the vessels were so crowded with stores that
visitors could scarcely move on deck, or even below.

There is an excellent libiary on board, and every
comfort provided for the officers and crews during the
long winter of the northern regions. An experiment
took place tf-eday at the principal entrance of the
dockyard, in presence of Captain Superintendent
Austin, C.B , Captain Washington, Captain Collin-
son, C.B , Commander M•Clure, Lieutenant Robert
son, R.N., Captain Stothard, .Roy al Engineers, and
a number of naval and military Offiaers, to exhibit a
plan, submitted by Mr. Shephard, fir sending di?-
patches to a great extent over the country in
the vicinity of the North Pole. This plan
is very simple, and could not fit to be
effective, as it merely consists in sending up
a small balloon, to which is attached a slow match
about a foot in length, and round the slow match
several hundred pieces of coloured paper attached
by a thread surrounding about one hundred of the
pieces of paper in each packet. The experiment
commenced by inflating the balloon at the end of the
gas tube, in the window of the office of the inspectors
cf police; but there was considerable time occupied
in filling the balloon, which was only about four
feet high, owing to its being made of oiled paper,
parts of which were porous. It was at last inflated,
but not sufficiently full to carry up the 400 papers
and slow match attached to it; the result was, that
300 were cut off by Dr. Anderson, of the Enterprise,
and on the slow match being lighted the balloon as-
scended admirably, proceeding at a considerable alti-
tude in the direction of Woolwich-common and El- '
tham at a quick pace on entering the upper current,
there being scarcely a breath of air felt on the ground
at the time. The 100 pieces of paper sent up were
each 5 inches long by 2 inches broad, all of blue, red,
yellow, drab, and various shades of brilliant colours,
without any white amongst them, as the latter colour
would be comparatively useless on the snows of the
northern regions. Captain Collinson expressed an
earnest desire that any person or persons who may
find any of the papers sf,er they fall from the balloon
to-day will communicate the time and place where
they were found to the superintendent or at the dock-
yard. The balloon was sent up at 11-10 o'clock,
A.m., to-day. It is said that 150 similar or larger
balloons will be supplied to each of the vessels of the
searching expedition, with a supply of sulphuric acid
and zinc to generate gas for inflating them. As it would
take considerable time to write on 500 or 700 of these
aerial dispatches, as were exhibited on the slow matches
to-day, and writing ink on such soft description of
paper might soon be obliterated, a small hand-press,
with a moderate quantity of legible type, would he a
very desirable addition to each of the vessels, and with
a few reams of coloured paper would not entail a
great additional expense to the Lords of the Admiralty
who have so liberally fitted out the expedition with
every description of stores both for the searching ex-
pedition and the missing expedition, should the latter
be met vtith. had the plan submitted to-day been
thought of before the departure of Sir John Frank-
lin's expedition some of the papers must have been
met with, as the high elevation to which the are car-
ried before they are detached would carry them
during a strong breeze over a vast extent of country,
and even if they fell in the sea, or on pieces of
floating ice, it would be a considerable time before
they were all destroyed, and many chances would
occur of some of them being found, if not by whalers,
by the Esquitnaux.

COURT CIRCULAR.
WINDSOR, WEDNESDAY,

Her Majesty and his Royal Highness Prince Albert,
with his Royal Highness the Prince of Wales, and
attended by the Marchioness of Douro, Hon. Miss
Lennox, Lord Charles Fitzroy, and Colonel F. H.
Seymour, drove to Frogmore this morning.
His Royal Highness Prince Albert, with the
gentlemen in attendance, enjoyed the diversion of
skating on the Ornamental Water in Frogmore
grounds. The Queen and her Royal Highness the
Duchess of Kent were present.
The younger members of the Royal Family took
their usual airings.
An Address of Condolence on the death of her late
Majesty the Queen Dowager, from the University of
Cambridge, was presented to her Majesty yesterday,
at an audience given for that purpose, by his Royal
Highness Prince Albert (Chancellor), and the Rev.
James Cartmell, Master of Christ College (Vice-
Chancellor of the University).
The Earl of Listowel (Lord in Within(?), and
Lieut.-Colonel Hon. R. Boyle (Groom in Waiting),
were in attendance.
The Marquis of Breadalbane is expected at the
Castle this evening.; on a visit to the Queen and the
Prince.
The royal dinner party this evening includes her
Royal Highness the Duchess of Kent, Lady Fanny
Howard, Baroness de Speth, the Marquis of Breadal-
bane, the Earl of Liverpool, the Rev. James Cartmell,
and Colonel Hon. C. Grey.

MYSTERIOUS CASES AT LYNN.—An officer of the
Metropolitan Detective Force has, in consequence of a
communication with the Secretary of State, gone to
Lynn for the purpose of making a thorough investiga-
tion of the whole circumstances connected with the dis-
appearance of the drover Kirk and of Bell. From the
shortness of the time which has elapsed since his arrival
in that town, nothing material has yet been elicited ;
bnt there is every reason to believe that a third indi-
vidual has, it is said, lately disappeared in a no less mys-
terious manner.

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THE LATE DREADFUL ACCIDENT ON THE EAST
LANCASHIRE RAILWAY.—The Coroner's inquest held on
the bodies of the three persons who were killed on this
railway, on Tuesday week, has at length terminated, by
the jury returning a verdict of " Manslaughter" against
Michael Mason, the engine-driver, and John Morris, the
guard of the luggage train.
A STATION ON THE NORTH STAFFORDSHIRE LINE.
—Traveller—" Now, then, boy, where's the clerk who
gives the ticket?" Boy (aft( r finishing an air he was
whistling)—" I'm the clerk.' Eraveller—"Well, Sir,
and what time does the train leave for London?" Boy—
" Oh! I don't know. No time in pertickler. Sometimes
one time, and sometimes another."—Punch.

OLYMPIC THEATRE.

America is worthily repaying us the dramatic debt
she owes us. The seeds of the dramatic slut which
have been scattered by all our bast dramatic artistes,
broadcast en the American roil, have fructified and
are now bearing fruit. America has, within the
last three years, given us Miss Cushman, the great-
est tragedian at present on the stage Mrs.
Mowatt, the most interesting of young tra-
gedians, the most last) -like of genteel co-
medians, the only lady who has shown herself
capable of taking Miss Foote's line of characters,
since Miss Foote left the stage—Mr. Davenport, one
of the most energetic and powerful actors of melo-
drama that has appeared of late years, and whose
powers as a legitimate tragedian and as a genteel co-
median are of no common order, besides a host of
excellent delineators of Yankee peculiarities ; but
America had not given us, until last night, any play
that would stand the test of representation before a
London audience. Rough and ranting melodramas
have formed the staple of what America
had hitherto sent us, but last night this reproach was
wiped out, and there was represented at this theatre,
with the most deserved success, an original American
five-act comedy, the scene of which is laid in New
York, and which delineates American manners after
the same fashion as our own Garrick, Colman,
and Sheridan were accustomed to delineate
English manners, and which, as re-
gards plot, construction, character or dialogue,
is worthy to take its place by the side c f the best
of English comedies. It is from the pen of
that most delightful of actresses, Mrs. Mowatt, and is
entitled Fashion ; or Life in New York; and the f
lowing is an: outline cf the plot, or rather of the three
plots interwoven with each other, in the most skilful
and artistical manner if this most admirably
built comedy. The vulgar wife of a New York mer-
chant is bitten with the mania to be a leader of f Ishion ;
ignorant of the requisites, she takes her rudiments from
a French waiting-maid and a .coi-dissant Count, who
both f,ol her to the top of her bent. This Count is the
aecet tei suitor of her daughter ; and, after very nearly
marrying the young lady, he is finally unmasked
and shown to have been successively a cook and a
valet, and the faithless lover (in Paris) of the wait-
ing-maid, whom he is urtitnately content to marry in
the hope of becoming an honest man. The extra-
vagance of the merchant's wife has embarrassed the
affairs of the husband, who has had recourse to
forgery to retrieve them. A confidential clerk has
discovered the crime of his principal; and throughout
the piece the servant uses his secret with a vulgar ty-
ranny over the master, even to the extent of in-
sisting on marrying the daughter, sorely against the
will of her mother, who of course favours the
fashionable Count. This part of the plot is disposed
of by the clerk, in the very moment of triumph, being
threatened with punishment as an accessory after the
fact; and his compelled silence thus ensured, the
principal is allowed to be screened under a promise
of repentance. There is yet a third plot in
this piece. In the merchant's family there is a go-
verness, an orphan, who has been persecuted by
the furtive addresses ( f the Count, but honourably
loved by a colonel in the American army. This
young lady detects the imposture practised on the
family, and in her endeavour to expose it she is placed
in an equivocal position. The agent by whom the
whole difficulty is finally adjusted is a rich old coun-
try farmer, a former friend of the merchant's,
whose rough, honest nature brings him into
collision, from first to last, with the pseudo fashion-
aides, and who, at the critical moment, is able
to vindicate the honour of the young governess,
and at the same time to acknowledge her as his
granddaughter and heiress. She has been allowed to
grow up among sharpers, and to struggle in the
battle of life in obedience to a theory of the old man's
—rather dangerous in practice—that she shall thus
be taught the value of independence. Mrs. Mowatt
deserves the credit of having blended and interwoven
these three plots with considerable skill and stage
tact, so that each depends upon the other without
confusion ; while all steadily progress towards the
denouement. The comedy was perfectly acted ; Mr.
Davenport. as Adam Trusman, the old farmer, threw
a feeling of warmth and heartiness into the part which
has not been equalled since the days of Fawcett ; and
Miss F. Vining, es Gertrude, his governess daughter,
was most interesting. 31r. Johnstone acted the part
of Mr. Tiffany with considerable power, and .Mrs.
Marston, as Mrs. Tiffeny, was the pink of vulgarity.
Scharf, as the roguish clerk, was full of truth-
fulness, his abashed manner when threatened with
prosecution contrasting most artistically with his pre-
vious vulgar and overbearing. insolence. Mr. and Mrs.
A. Wigan, acted the French Counti and the French
waiting-maid as' they alone can act such characters,
Mr. J. Herbert was excessively humorous as a high-
miuded Nigger. All the characters grouped round
the Tiffanies were admirably sustained, but, to our
thinking the character of the group, nay,
we are almost inclined to think that, as
far as English audiences are concerned, the cha-
racter of the comedy,l is that of Prudence, the sister
of Mrs. Tiffany, a prim puritanical Yankee old maid,
who has not " fairly given the matter up," and who,
when not making hot love, is making diabolical
mischief. She is the chorus of the piece, re-
minding every one of their faults, and every
parvenu ( f his or her origin ; she is,
in fact, "a dreadful woman," and, what is better
still an original character, a specimen of American
society, to which we had never before been
introduced. This character was admirably acted
by Mrs. Parker, who evidently revelled
in the part. The comedy was admirably
put on the stage ; the drawing-room and ball-
room scenes, in fact, all the scenes of the resort
cf the fashionables, were quite equal to anything
that was done at the Olympic during the most palmy
days of the Vestris management. The comedy was
perfectly acted, and perfectly put on the stage. The
applause was enthusiastic, and at the conclu-
sion there were loud calls for Mrs. Mowatt,
who had taken no part in the performance, but who
at length appeared before the curtain to receive that
enthusiastic applause which she had so highly merited
by the production of this most excellent comedy. The
house was crowded to excess.