The Sun.
London, England, 1868-06-20 00:00:00

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STEEPLECLIA.SES.
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Brow.lo,y

DECE3IIII73II.
St. Albans
Kingsbury 8 I

TliE BARRACKS OF THE HOUSEHOLD

CAVALRY.

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The Lancet devotes its sanitary report to the
Knightsbridge B ►rrack, which is condemned as un-
fit for either officers, men, or horses. The whole
place is redolent of horses and horse manure, the
buildings being huddled together, and the litter
thrown out directly under the windows of the bar-
rack-rooms. An instructive example is given of the
way in which increased accommodation may be
economically obtained. The mess-rooms of the
privates have been taken from them for regimental
offices, and they are now compelled to take their
meals in their bedrooms. The ablution rooms are
dark, uncomfortable, and their floors perpetually
wet. There is no looking-glass, no place to lay a
towel or the soap. The married men and their
children are lodged in the most shameful manner.
They have no supply of water, no watercloset, no
domestic conveniences whatever. They are worse
off than they would be in a.workhouse or a prison
The managers of the Zoological Gardens would be
execrated if they kept their animals in such an un-
happy state. The young become stunted for want
of air and light, and. no one would suppose these
puny children to be the offspring of such stalwart
parents. There appears to be an almost total ne-
glect of sanitary laws ; bad ventilation, offensive
urinals, disgusting privies, untrapped drains, and
badly ventilated barrack-rooms. Baths are so short
that the men cannot immerse themselves, and hot
water is not allowed. In the hospital the bath for
these six-foot troopers is 4ft. 3in. long, and propor-
tionately wide, while the supply of hot water is on
a corresponding scale. The sick wards are dull and
badly furnished. Extraordinary pains appear to
have been taken to secure ventilation and pure air
by complicated tubes over the gas burners, louvre
openings near the ceilings, Sherington valves and
0-alton stoves, to the utter neglect of the simpler
but far more efficient, expedient of making a suffi-
cient number of windows opening at the top. There
are neither day nor recreation rooms, so that music-
halls and love-making are the chief resources for
amusement. The Lancet Commissioners are of
opinion that this barrack cannot be materially im-
proved, and recommend that it should be at once
rebuilt. They speak highly of the site in a sanitary
point of view, and if London is not to be denuded
of its troops, the neighbourhood of the parks is the
best situation for them. There is, however, no rea-
son that the buildings should be made so unsightly
as they now are.

COURSE OF EXCHANGE—Last Evening.

Amsterdam Short ... 11 18 ... 11 18}
Do
Rotterdam... 11 191 ... 12 0
Antwerp ... 25 35 ... 25 42i
... 25 35 ... Brussels

Haruburgh — 13 9} 13 10
Park.
Ditto

FIRE ON THE WOLDS.—It is believed that an act
of incondiarism was committed on the Yorkshire Holds on
Tuesday evening. A lounger was noticed at Eastborne,
and shortly- afterwards one of three straw stacks was found
on fire in the yard of Mr. Jordan. The fire spread to and
destroyed all three, and had all but roasted a valuable bull
alive, the animal being saved by pulling his house down.
The damage is considerable, and no reason beyond the sus-
pected one can be given for the occurrence.
THE WHITEBAIT AND THE HERRING.—At the
last meeting of the Zoological Society, Dr. A. Gunther,
of the British Museum, gave a resume of his researches
into the distinctions between the different fish of the her-
ring family. The British species of this important group
are the herring, the sprat, the pilchard (which is identical
with the sardines of the French coast), and the two species
of shad. These species aro readily distinguished from ono
another by the numbers of their vertebrae and that of their
scales, the relative position of the fins and that of the teeth.
One of the most important results arrived at by this emi-
nent ichthyologist is the absolute identity of the white-
bait and herring. In the last volume of the " Catalogue
of Fishes in the British Museum," Dr. Gunther describes
the whitebait as a perely nominal species introduced
into science in deference to the opinion of fishermen and
gourmands, and states that every example of whitebait
examined by himself were young herrings. The late
Mr. Yarnell, who has been followed by most natura-
lists, regarded whitebait as a distinct fish, but the
circumstances that it has the same number of ver-
tebrae (56) as the mature herring, the s tine number
of lateral scales, and an identical arrangement of fins and
teeth, a combination of characters found in no other fish,
prove conclusively that it is the fry or young of the her-
ring; moreover, an adult whitebait in roe has never been
discovered. With regard to the effect on the supply of
herrings occasioned by the destruction of the young fry
it is probable that the number of eggs deposited by the
mature herring is so largo and disproportionate to the
number of fish that attain maturity that the capture of a
portion of the fry could have no„eppreciable result in di-
minishing the multitude of mature fish.