The Sun.
London, England, 1868-12-04 00:00:00

A LIBERAL LANDLORD.

At the Westnlinster Police-court, yesterday, Mr.
John Lane of Albert-terrace, Knightsbridge, ap-
peared to a notic.) under the Petty Tenements Act,
to show cause why an order should not be made
upon him to deliver up pos.:.e.3sion of rooms occu-
pied by him.
..Nlr. Smyth, solicitor (instructed by the London and
Westminster Working Mall's Constitutional Associ-
ation), appeared for the ddendant, Mr. W. Bennett,
the secretary of the association, and several !num-
bers of the body were present, and Messrs. Roger-
son and Ford, solicitors, watched the proceedings.
Benjamin Nicolay, the landlord of the house in
Albert-terrace, said that defendant occupied the
shop and lower part as a carver and gilder, under
one agreement, and two rooms at the top of the
house were subsequently let to him as a weekly
tenant at ss. per week. The present notice had
reference to these two rooms, not to the other part
he held.

In cross-examination by Mr. S.nyth, the com-
plainant said—We have had a little dispute upon
political grounds ; it was about the Westminster
election. I voted for Mill and Grosvenor. He
voted, I believe, for Smith. He put two boards
out to vote for Smith, to my great annoyance,
on -the top of the house, and I told him if he did
not take them in he should go. I told him I should
give him notice to leave. I put up Mill and
Grosvenor ou my part of the premises ; but it
was upstairs, at the top of the house, " Vote
for Smith," and downstairs iu the shop, " Vote
for Smith." Ile said he should not take the bills
down from the top of the house for any one. I said
I would not have large bills on boards up there to
deface my house. It was not for putting up bills
for Smith I cared, but it did not improve the ap-
pearance of the top of my house. I told him he
might put as many as he liked about the shop. I
did not interfere with those below. The bills did
not look nice on the top of the house, and I did not
approve of them for that reason. lle.has occupied
the shop for four years, and the upper premises
about three years.

Complainant having, in reply to the Court, said
that he could not get rid of defendant at present
from the shop,

Mr. Arnold thought it looked yindictivo under
those circumstances to require him to leave the
upper apartments. It was hardly worth while of
complainant to do so.

Complainant said he wanted one of them for his
aged mother. Ha further complained they had been
turned into workshops, and that he was annoyed
by the noise. He, however, admitted that that
had been going on more or less for a year.
➢lr. Smyth, addressing the Court, characterised
this as a most arbitrary proceeding. Because his
client had differed from his landlord in politics he
was to be turned out of part of his premises. De-
fendant had established a large business there, and
would necessarily be put to considerable inconve-
nience if ordered to give up the rooms. He was
surprised that complainant should press the matter,
and try to get rid of him in a week, when he was,
in fact, a quarterly tenant.
Defendant was then put into the witness-box,
and deposed that his agreement with complainant
for the upper rooms was at the rats of ss. per week.
to be paid quarterly.
Complainant and Ldefondant's rent-books were
both produced.

Mr: Arnold, after examining them, said they
wore somewhat irregular. Looking at the way the
money had been paid, ho was of opinion that de-
fendant was a quarterly, not a weekly tenant,
and be, therefore, could not make the order to quit.

CHOLERA FUNGUS.—After a serious of long bota-
nical researches, Professor Ernest Hallior, of the Uni-
versity of Jetta, has convinced himself of the preacuce in
the excreta of cholera patients of a mi,roscupic fungus
which exists in them in considerable quantities. On sub-
mitting this minute plant to a careful microscopical ex-
amination, the distinguished botanist found that it has all
the characters of Urocisdas oryzce, which in India is found
sometimes in the rice plantations. Professor llallier then
manured the rico plants with the excreta in question, and
finds that they perish rapidly. A whole plantation may
bo thus destroyed by the Urocistus in a very short space of
titne.—Scientific Review.

Mr. FITZPATRICK.—It gives us much pleasure to
state that the reported illness of Um Right Hon. John
Fitzpatrick has no serious consequences. Although pre-
vented by an attack of gout from appearing on the hust-
ings at his unopposed return for the Queen's County, he
will take his seat on the first day of the meeting of the
stew Parliament.