The Sun.
London, England, 1868-03-23 00:00:00

THE ELECTRIC TELEGRAPHS.

The CHANCELLOR Of the EXCHEQUER gava notice
that on Thursday he would bring iu a bill to empower the
Postmaster-General to acquire and obtain the direction of
the electric telegraphs.
THE ARMY ESTIMATES.

The house then went into committee of supply, and
Sir J. I'AKINGTON rose to move the army estimates.
The gross total required for effective and non-effective
services wa5.£15,455,400 against £14,388,000 last year. The
right hon. gentleman proceeded to refer to the different items
making up the above totals, and remarked that, with re-
spect to recruiting, it WIL3 at present progressing most
satisfactorily. There was a matter which he hoped soon
to seo abolished, and that was the scenes that were now so
familiar at public houses, a matter altogether most objec-
tionable. (Hear, hear.) He was glad to say that General
Edwards, the Chief of the Recruiting Department, also was
of opinion that the using of public-houses for such a pur-
pose was altogether most objectionable, and it was pro-
posed to form recruiting depots in all the large
towns in the country. (Hear, hear.) They had at pre-
sent two of those depots—one in London and the other in
Bristol, both of which had worked so satisfac-
torily, and an extension of the system could
120 t i?ut be considered :beneficial both for the
country and the recruit. (Hear, hear.) In the militia
there was an increase of £Bl,OOO, bat this was produced
by the receipt of allowing lodging money to officers.
The case of the Quartermasters had also been con-
sidered with respect to the same subject, and it had
been determined to increase the amount given to

them as lodging money, viz., 10s. to 14s. per week. He
also proposed to carry out the arrangement made by his
gallant friend the member for Huntingdon (General Peel)
of forming the mi:itia into a reserve foie° of 30,000
men, ready at any emergency to join the regular
army, and General Lindsay had been appointed
to the command of that reserve force. The hon. gentle-
man then went on to refer to the charge of the volunteer,
for which he said amounted in the present year to
£385,150, an increase of £24,150, and he expressed his
regret that he was unable to increase the capitulation
grant.

[LEFT SPEAKING•]

A contractors' trial of the engines of the double-
screw steam gunvessel Lapwing, 2, took place out-
side Plymouth Sound on Friday. She is 663 tons
burden, and belongs to the new class, of which
there are eight vessels, and was constructed at
Devonport. Four of them are having their ma-
chinery manufactured by the Messrs. Rennie; the
Lapwing is the first of the four tried, and she is
supplied with two pair of engines to work her two
propellers. The trials took place under the super-
intendence of Captain George 0. Willes, C. 8., of
the Steam Reserve, assisted by Mr. William Diunen,
Chief Inspector of Machinery afloat, and by Mr.
Robert Nicoll, of the Keyham factory. Mr. G. B.
Rennie was present on the part of the contractors.
The mean of six runs, at full power, gave a speed
of 10.46 knots at a mean number of 116 revolu-
tions per minute, the mean pressure in boiler being
261 b. The vauum 25in., giving an indicated power
of 830 horses, being five times the nominal power.
These engines are of the ordinary type, without
surface condensers or superheaters, and were tried
under the regulations recently issued by the Ad-
miralty. The result may, therefore, be considered
satisfactory. The mean speed at half-boiler power
was 8.06 knots, the revolutions 97, and pressure of
steam Mb.