The Sun.
London, England, 1868-07-18 00:00:00

31. DROUYN DE LHUYS AT BEDFORD.

His Excellency M. Drouyn de Lhuys, with a distin-
guished party of Frenchmen, who have come to England
to observe the operations of the Royal Agricultural
Society, visited the Britannia Ironworks on Friday
morning, having arrived by the 10.45 express from
Leicester. At 12.45 the workmen, to the number of 400,
assembled, ana
His EXCELLENCY addressed them in the following
terms :—I view with satisfaction this peaceful park of
artillery, raised by so many laborious hands, so many
soldiers of industry. Several years ago I had occasion to
view this wonderful and magnificent display of your
commerce and industry and agriculture— (cheers)—to
see and learn how, arrayed by you, they contribute
to your abundance. While your vessels plough the
deep, and carry to distant shores your golden cargo,
your plough—(loud cheers)—opens the bosom of
mother earth, and autumn brings forth her genial
harvest. I remember with some pride that in former
times it was my lot to fulfil my sovereign's command, by
linking our two nations by relations of a peaceful kind ;
and I feel confident that the Emperor would still further
approve of my efforts were I to succeed in establishing a
durable tie between the husbandmen of our respective
countries. (Cheers.) Let us join in this wish. Let us
go hand in hand, and may the agriculturists of Gfeat
Britain and France join in the same prayer: "God speed
the plough and bless the driver." Adieu.
His Excellency was loudly applauded, and left in com-
pany with Mr. James Howard to lunch at his residence,
after which the party drove to the Britannia Farm, two
miles away.

THE HARVEST.

ESSEX.—The harvest has very generally commenced in
this neighbourhood. A few pieces of oats were cut last
week, and this week the wheat, which has within the last few
days assumed its complete harvest hue, has been generally
attacked by the scythe and the sickle, the reaping machine
not being brought so much into use as we expected
to see it. Several fields in this district are in trave ;in
most other parts of the county the harvest work is in full
operation ; and there is every prospect that the crops will
be gathered in at an earlier period than for many seasons
past. In the adjacent counties of Herts and Suffolk the
wheat is being cut, and in the upper part of the latter,
bordering on Essex, it is stated the crop is likely to be
above an average.—Chelmsford Chronicle.
SOUTH LANCASHIRE AND CHESHIRE.—The harvest hag
commenced in earnest in Cheshire and the neighbourhood
of Liverpool, and the wheat crops are falling rapidly
before the sickle. So far as wheat is concerned the yield
will be heavy, though the straw will be small. Oats, too,
will be abundant, but turnips and mangold-wnrzels,
owing to the rain, will be poor and thin. The rain of any
consequence was that which fell on the 4th and 16th inst.,
and considering the heat of the past six or seven weeks,
the downfall has only refreshed the lowland crops. There
has not been such hot weather and such absence of rain
in Liverpool since the year 1826, when there was a drought
which lasted, we belie\e, from the beginning of May to
the commencement of September.

TIIE STING OF A WASP.—A wasp was the cause
of an alarming accident in the parish of Tinwell a day or
two since. A load of corn drawn by three horses, the
property of the Earl of Gainsborough, was being con-
veyed from Exton to Tinwell Mill. When descending
the lane leading to the side-bar the shaft horse was stung by
a wasp, which caused the horse to kick violently and then
start off. By some means the other two horses became
detached from the team and entered the village, but the
horse that had been stung turned into a garden plot by the
roadside, and knocked down a pigsty. The waggon was
overturned, and the horse seriously injured. It is said
there are two wasps' nests in tho lane, which ought to be
destroyed, and persons have been deterred from passing
that way in consequence.—Stamford Mercury.

THE WEATHER IN THE NORTH.—The unex-
ampled drought, which has lasted continuously for the last
two months, was, on Thursday afternoon, succeeded by
rain. The two previously days had been extremely hot,
the thermometer reaching in some parts of the county of
Durham a point that it had not attained for previous ten
years. In South Durham and the contiguous parts of the
North Riding the registered heat was 91, well protected in
the shade ; in North Durham about two or three degrees
less. Ou Thursday the temperature was rather lower,
and in the afternoon a gentle rain commenced to fall,
which continued almost uninterruptedly for eight or ten
hours. Up to Friday afternoon there had been no recur•
rence of rain from an early hour in the morning, and the
day was turning out brighter.

WRITE HEAT AND BLACK COATS.--Why QO
not the members of our profession set a good example by
clothing themselves in a rational manner during the
present weather? We learnt from Franklin a century ago
that the solar heat is absorbed with greater or less facility
according to the colour of the object exposed to the
rays. Everyone remembers how he put pieces of cloth,
similar in texture and size, but different in colour, upon
fresh-fallen snow in the sunlight, and how he found the
snow melted under the pieces of cloth quickest when the
cloth was black, less quickly under the blue, green, purple,
red, yellow, in the order enumerated, and very slowly
indeed under the white. Each day's experience shews us
that we do not need to he made of snow in order
to melt rapidly under a black coat. What we require for
comfort is of course a white material, in order that the heat
rays may be reflected as much and absorbed as little as
possible. The material should be porous—should imprison,
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