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

POLYTECHNIC INSTITUTION.

Mr. George Barker commenced an engagement
here last night, and gave his lecture upon music, illus.
trated by some of his own ballads, with complete
success. The audience, which was very numerous,
frequently interrupted the performance by applauding
the lecturer. One of the greatest perfections of Mr.
Barker's singing is, you hear every word he utters.
During the lecture several new ballads were intro-
duced—such as the "Irish Emigrant" and " Patrick
Ma Cushla ;" and the entertainment concluded with
" Shall I, wasting in despair," which was encored.

COURT CIRCULAR.
BALMORAL, SEPT. 28.
Her Majesty went out driving this morning in an
open carriage, accompanied by the Princess Royal
and Princess Alice.

His Royal Highness Prince Albert went out
deer.stalking.
The Prince of Wales and Prince Alfred took their
usual exercise.

The dinner party this evening will include her
Royal Highness the Duchess of Kent, Lady Augusta
Bruce, Baroness Speth, and Sir George Couper.
The Earl of Aberdeen left Rl!moral this morning.
OSBORNE, SEPT. 30.
Their Royal Highnesses Prince Arthur, and the
Princesses Helena and Louisa, take their rides and
drives daily in the Park.

Dispatches were received yesterday at the Colonial
office from the Governor of the Cape of Good Hope.

JOHN MITCHEL.

A young artist, named Dowling, who was trans-
ported from Lonlon in 1848 as an Irish confederate,
has written to his brother in Dublin, on the arrival
of John Mitchel at Hobart Town. The Nation pub-
lishes the subjoined extract from his letter :
" On the s:h of April last the Neptune arrived here
ith John aiitchel. He was kept on board several
days' and no one was allowed to visit him. On
Tuesday, the 9th, I felt very anxious to get a peep at
bite, and was going down to consult O'Donohoe on
the best means. I met O'Donohoe in Elizabeth-
street. The first words he said were, lam going
to see Mitchel ; if you have time I'll take you to him.'
I went with him to a stationer's shop, where, for the
first time, my eye rested on this truly great man. I
don't think I should have known him from the
portraits published of him ; for, although the
features are alike, they have not caught the
character of his face. O'Donohoe introduced me
to him. He shook my hand cordially, and said he had
heard about me. He asked my sentence; O'Donohoe said,
Only life.' Mitchel laughed indignantly and said.
You were very fortunate that you hadn't to mount
the hurdle, like Sir W. Wallace. We walked about
half a mile, and he said, in the course of conversation
that the state of things at home was not to be borne,
that we had at least solemnly protested against it,
and that at all events we had cleared ourselves of all
share in the guilt of it. At another time he said he
felt a freer man here as a ticket of leave holder than
when he was dancing attendance day after day at the
Four Courts, Dublin. He was obliged to leave this in
a few hours, but he says in a letter to Mr. O'Donohoe
that Mr. Martin (with whom he is located in Both-
well, and who, it appears, has studied medicine) has
undertaken to be his doctor, and the first prescrip-
tion was a ride of 24 miles over the bush, with sleet
and snow beating in his face, followed by copious
draughts of hot tea, accompanied by an immense al-
lowance of mutton and damper, a colcnial cake
baked in wood ashes. He says, so successful has
been his leech, that he never enjoyed better health
than he does on this back of the earth.'"

THE HIPPOPOTAMUS.—YOUr correspondent " L."
(vol. ii., rage 35) says, "None of the Greek writers appear
to have seen a live hippopotamus :" and again, " The hippo-
potamus. being an inhabitant of the Upper Nile, was imper-
fectly known to the ancients." Herodotus says (ii. 171)
that this animal was held sacred by the Nomos of Papremis,
but not by the other Egyptians. The city of Papremis is
fixed by. Biihr in the west of the Delta (ii. 163); and Man-
nert conjectured it to be the same as the later I.ois, lying
between the Sebennytic and Canopic branches, but nearer
to the former. Sir Gardner Wilkinson says several repre-
sentations of the hippopotamus were found at Thebes, one
of which he gives (Egyptians, vol. iii., pl. xv.) Herodotus's
way of speaking would seem to show that he was describing
from his own observation : he used Hecate us, no doubt, but
did not blindly copy him. Hence, I think, we may infer
that Ilerodotus himself saw the hippopotamus, and that this
aninial was found in his day even as far north as the Delta;
and also, that the species is gradually dying out, as the
aurochs is nearly gone, and the dodo quite. The crocodile is
no longer found in the Delta. —Notes and Queries.
EFFECTS OF THE BITE OF A MAD DOG.—III
July last a dog was taken in Kirkless Park by the" nawter"
at that place.. It was given to a carter of the Low Moor
works, but when he got it to the Royd's Hall farm, he let
it loose, and it bit a horse and donkey by the nose. Both
went mad and died, in what the doctors called in declared to
be hydrophobia. Subsequently• a large mastiff at Kirkless,
which had been fighting with this. dog at the time he was
taken up, went mad also and was destroyed. Two ewe sheep
with lambs, which were in the park at the time, also mani-
fested symptoms of madness and were destroyed; and since
that time upwards of 20 deer,which have manifested similar
symptoms, have been destroyed. How the virus was com-
municated to the deer, except it was by the bitten sheep,
is not known. It is impossible to tell whether the contagion
is yet run out. Wourali. poison has been tried With the
deer but has proved of no avail.—lfulifax Guardian.

Yesterday Mr. 11. M. Wakley held an inquest at
Kensington Workhouse, on the body of a man, apparently
about twenty years of age, who was found suffocated on the
top of a burning brick-kiln, belonging to Mr. Earl, on the
bank of the Kensington canal, on Friday morning last. The
deceased was evidently a " navvy," out of work, and in a
destitute state, and the probability is that he went to lie
down. on the kiln for warmth, when he was overtaken by the
sulphuretted .hydrogen from the burning bricks which pro-
duced suffocation. He had ,no money, and the only things
found on him were two pawnbrokers' duplicates, for a shawl
and gown, pledged in the name of Haye, in St. Giles's. Ver-
dict—" Accidentally suffocated."
AMERICAN l'uonucE.—The American line-of-
packet ship Sir Robert Peel, from New York, has brought
15;942 bushels of wheat, 4,000 barrels of flour, and a general
cargo ;. and the packet ship American Eagle arrived in the
docks on the same day from New York with 3,850 barrels of
flour, 602 casts of oilcake for cattle, and a general cargo of
American produce. The ship Patrick Henry brought 4,315
barrels of flour; the Atlantic, from New York, 880 packages
of cheese; the M. Wheeler, from New Orleans, 883 barrels of
flour; and the Shenandoah, on the same day, from Phila-
delphia, 8,410 bushels of Indian coin, 269 boxes of cheese,
500 barre's f flour, and 100 packages of beef, the produce of
the United States.

A short branch railway is now in course of for-
mation from North Iletton Colliery Railway, to form a
junction with the Durham and Sunderland branch of the
York, Newcastle, and Berwick Railway, at ➢loorsley. This
branch is intended to be used in leading coals from the
North fiction Colliery, the property of the Earl of Durham
and the lietton Coal Company, to Sunderland Lock for
shipment.