The Sun.
London, England, 1850-03-30 00:00:00

the performance of deeds which it has fallen to the lot of
very few at such an age to achieve.

RAILWAY RETURNS

Rani/AY THAFFIC.—The following are the Total Receipts of Rail•
wit; s tbr the past week—that is to say, up to the date to which the
respective returns are made, together with the receipts of the SAWS
in the previous year:—

•;=a,
„
Week Last ' & 0,1
ending N A3IE OF RAILWAY. week. 7,., :.,,..
G .
~.,
x x
Mar. 23 Aberdeen .. ...... ...........• ••• • • 937 455
Amiens and Boulogne . ......... •• •• - 1,332
23 Belfast and Ballymena .. .. .......... 541 590
24 Birkenhead, Lancashire, and Cheshire 815 ' 800
24 Bolton, Blackburn, Clitheroe, and W. Y. 409 372
24 Bristol and Exeter .................. 3,355 -
17 Caledonian • •••
• ...... 6,291 4,8e5
24 Chester and H01yhead............... 1,453 1,210
21 Dublin and Drogheda ••• . • • ... .. .. .. 920 744
26 Dublin and Kingstown •.• • • . .......• 566 655
23 Dundee, Perth, and Aberdeen .. :..... 1,030 1,017
24 East Ang1ian........................ t. 07 622
23 Edinburgh and Glasgow . ...• ...• 3,036 3,501
23 Edinburgh and Perth ..... ..... .. 2,116 1,814
24 Eastern Counties and North Eastern.. 14,379 12,668
24 East Lancashire .................... 2,809 1,988
24 Eastern Union...-. .. •...... ....... 1,809 1,150
23 Glasgow, Kihnarnock, and Ayr ...... 2,761 2,868
23 Glasgow and Greenock.. .... ... .... 1,032 952
17 Great Northern and E. L........... 3,090 1,635
'23 Great Southern and Western ........ 4,149 3,411
24 Great Western, tkc.................. 18,379 18,077
24 Lancashire and Yorkshire ..... ....... 11,170 11,609
17 Lancaster and Carlisle • ..... ........ 3,171 2,033
- Leeds and Thirsk ....... ..... ...... - -
24 Liverpool, Crosby, and Southport.• .. 96 84
23 Londonderry and Enniskillen ...... .. 140 143
24 London and North Western, &c. 40,659 37,141
24 London and 81ackwa11.............. 604 417
23 London and Brighton ........ ...... . 7,694 7,436
24 London and South We5tern......... 8,468 8,455
- Manchester, Sheffield, and Lincolnshire •-• 3,374
24 Midland, Bristol, and Birmingham.... 20,106 20,384
24 Midland Great Western (Irish) ...... 1,072 1,072
791 736
24 North British .... • 3,075 2,615
23 Paris and Rouen .••• • • • ............ 5,332 4,429
23 Rouen and Havre • •• •••• •••• 2,080 2 3:6
24 Scottish Central •• • •
23 Scottish Midland •••••••••• • . • • •• •• 379 249
24 Shrewsbury and Chester
24 Shropshire Union .. • •• •• -
23 South Eastern and Branches ........ 8,592 6,570
17 South Devon.-- „. . . ........ 1,707 1,413
23 Taff Vale .........................• 2,055 -
24 Ulster .
- Waterford and Limerick............. - -
17 Whitehaven Junction ............... 201 174
- York and Newcastle . .... • ......... - 11,336
24 York and North Midland ........... 6,793 6.557

COURT CIRCULAR.
WINDSOR, FRIDAY.
Her Majesty and his Royal Highness Prince Albert
took their usual morning walk.
The Royal Family took their walking exercise
in the Slopes and Windsor Park.

-
The Queen and his Royal Highness Prince Albert,
the ladies and gentlemen of the Court, and the do-
mestic household, attended Divine service in the
private chapel of the Castle.
Her Royal Highness the Duchess of Kent also
attended the service.

The Hon. and Rev. Gerald Wellesley officiated and
administered the Holy Communion.
There is no addition to the royal dinner party this
evening.

The Earl of Carlisle left town on Thursday, for his
seat, Naworth Castle, Cumberland.

Dispatches from the Governors of Ceylon and New
South Wales were received at the Colonial-office on
Thursday.

GREAT CIRCLE SAILING.

Mr. Towson has the merit of introducing in navi-
gation a new feature, of such obvious truth and de-
cided advantage that it is only surprising that navi-
gators have waited till this time of day to adopt so
self-evident a fact. The importance of the principle
appears to us to be so great that we think it will be
interesting to our scientific readers to quote in our
columns a short popular account thereof:—" The un-
precedented short voyage made by the Constance has
been acknowledged to have arisen from the applica-
tion of a simple scientific principle to navigation, by
which a month has been saved from the average time
occupied by modern voyages. There is nothing
visionary or abstract in the principle on which this im-
provement is founded ; but it is one that has obtained
the universal consent of civilised mankind—that this
earth is a globe. But as a practical principle this fact
has been too much disregarded by the mariner. His
chart is a plane, and by it he has been accustomed to
navigate the ocean, and we can scarcely persuade him
that the portions of distant lands are otherwise than
they appear on the chart. This error was of little
importance whilst the Mediterranean sea was the
principal seat of commerce, and the transit of the At-
lantic Ocean was an event of rare occurrence. Then
it was that Mercator's chart was received from the
hand of its inventor as a most acceptable boon to the
navigator. But now a ♦ery different order of cir-
cumstance exists. The members of the same British
family are antipoded to each other, and the chart of
half the earth's circumference is more frequently em-
ployed than that of the Atlantic had been a few score
years. since. Under these circumstances, the Merca-
tor's chart has become inadequate to meet all the
requirements of the navigator. He is now called on
by the men of science to regard the earth's trite
form, and when he undertakes voyages to distant
lands to take into consideration the circumstance that
the chart is an artificial contrivance, which in many
instances may lead him to false conclusions. To
avoid the erroneous conclusions drawn from Merca-
tor's chart, we would refer the mariner to a work
published by the British Admiralty two years
since, entitled " Tables to Facilitate the Practice of
Great Circle Sailing," constructed by Mr. John Tow-
son. We do this with greater confidence, since by
its aid the Constance emigrant ship has shortened ber
voyage at least a month. But he will undervalue
these tables if he imagines it will only enable him to
follow Captain Godfrey in his track to Australia,
which route his late voyage has demonstrated to be
the best practicable track. It is serviceable in all
cases of voyages to regions situated at a great dis-
tance east or west of each other, both in shaping his
track, and in choosing his tack when unfavourable
winds prevail, for we are convinced that errors in both
these particulars are of daily occurrence, arising from
his disregarding the globular formation of the earth.
The track pursued by the Constance is denominated
by the author of the work alluded to, " Composite
Crreat Circle Sailing," and is usefully employed when
the great circle route would lead to impracticable la-
titudes. In the southern oceans it is peculiarly
applicable, since in Captain Godfrey's maximum
latitudes, 50 deg., favourable winds continually prevail
for going out by the Cape and coming home by the
Horn. To Australia 900 miles is also saved, and in
a voyage to New Zealand 100 miles more. Besides
this advantage, the region of storms is avoided.
Around the Cape of Good Hope is the only track in
which storms prevail which an emigrant ship has to
pass after she has crossed the tropic of Capricorn. In
future voyages the mariner, by following Captain
Godfrey's track, will, to use a sea term, " give the
Cape a wide berth ;" so that we may anticipate that
voyages on Captain Godfrey's track will not only be
completed in a shorter period than previously, but
that this improvement in navigation will confer the
additional advantage of a greater degree of safety
from wreck. We are assured by scientific men who
are peculiarly qualified to give an opinion on this
question, that the syztem of great circle sailing offers
immense advantages ; and we find America and sE-
veral continental states are already adopting Mr.
Towson's tables.—Atheneeum.

FOREIGN POTATOES.—The vessel Pearl, which has
just arrived from St. Michael's with a cargo of oranges, has
brought a quantity of new potatoes, the growth of that
southern district.

VERY BAD INDRED.—AII exchange paper says—
" The girls in some parts of Pennsylvania are so hard up for
husbands, that they take up with printers and lawyers."--
Canadian paper.
" Massa, Dandy Sam made comblunderum !"
" Well, what is it ?"—" Pose I shoot bullet troo deal board
wid him pistol, what else I make beside round hole?"—"-Gib
him up ?"—" Why I make a riddle."
THE CuoLarta IDI LONDON.—The Board of
health have published a neat diagram, on card, showing
the deaths from cholera in the sixty weeks ending the 24th
of November, 1849, to every 10,000 inhabitants in each dis-
trict of London, and the animal mortality from all causes,
the water companies supplying each district, the average
elevation of the inhabited parts of the districts above the
Trinity high-water mark; also the density of the popu-
lation, the average annual value of houses, and the amount
paid for the relief of the poor. From this table it ap-
pears that the inhabitants of the north side of the
Thames arc at an average elevation of 51 feet above
the high water mark, while the density of the popula-
tion is in the proportion of 52 to an acre and 8 to a house,
the houses averaging the annual value of 461. The water is
supplied chiefly from the Thames above Battersea, from the
New River, and the Lea. The inhabitants of the south side
of the Thames are on an average only 5 feet above Trinity
high-water mark; and as regards density, in the proportion
of 14 to an acre and 6 to a house, the houses averaging 251.
in annual value. The money expended in the relief of the
poor by the inhabitants of the north side was Is. in the pound,
by those of the south side ls. Ed. in the pound house-rent.
The water is chiefly from the Thames below Battersea and
the Ravensbourne. The general mortality did not differ
much on the north and south sides of the river; it was 251
annually in 10,000 inhabitants of the north; 257 in 10,000
inhabitants of the south side of the Thames. The density is
less in the Surrey districts of London, which have only thy
great advantage over their northern neighbours. The mor-
tality from the cholera was very different. It was 44 on the
north, and 127 on the south side of the Thames, in 10,000
inhabitants. It also appears that the value of houses de-
creases very regularly in the bands of districts proceeding
eastward from Marylebone, Hanover-square, and SL Mar-
tin's-in-the-Fields to Bethnal-green. Thus, the average value
of houses is, in Hanover-square 1531., St. James 1281., St.
• Giles 601., Holborn 521., Clerkenwell 33/., St. Luke 281.,
Shoredtteh 20/., Bethnal-green 9.

Politeness of the heart consists in an habitual bene-
volence, and an absence of selfishness in our intercourse with
society of all classes.—Eliza Cook's Journal.

John Stitt, captain of the smack Earl Grey, of
Wigton, was drowned off the Bell Buoy on the pth, a
steamer having run foul of his vessel whiLst she we.; lying
at anchor.

The Chancellor of the county of D arhatn, by a late
decision, declared that odd-fellows' lodges are illegal.