The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1838-12-18 00:00:00

MISCELLANEOUS.

It was confidently stated yesterday, that Mr. Maule is to
be the new judge.—Times.
Thomas Wyse, Esq. M.P. has been appointed a deputy-
lieutenant of the Queen's County.
A recent order of the French government has forbidden
that foreign vessels, carrying guns, shall engage any French
sailors as part of their crew.
The Kidderminster Messenger states, that at no period of
time, since the establishment of the iron-works in Stour-
bridge, which have hitherto been so celebrated, has the de-
mand for iron been so great as at the present time.
FuJENDLY NOTIFICATION.—At a house in the Han►pstead-
road a large painted board is exhibited, which stares that
"all persons who attempt to enter these premises after dark
will be shot.'

OPERAVIVE CONSERVATIVE SOCIETY.—Another of these
useful societies has been established at the villat,e of Dod-
worth, near Barnsley ; upwards of thirty sound Operative
conservatives enrolled themselves at the first meeting.
The ages of the present knights of the garter (twenty-(ive
in number, exclusive of the Royal family and foreign princes)
afford an average of 72 for each. The eldest is the Earl of
Lonsdale, 81—the youngest the Duke of Buccleuch, 32.
At the Wesleyan centenary meeting, at Bristol, on Mon-
day week, £6,473 IBs. were subscribed, of which one family,
that of John Irving, Esq., gave 1500 guineas. The Watc.h-
man states that the total amount of subscriptions on Wed-
nesday was £67,000.
Mr. Henry House, on Thursday last, took up in his father's
garden, at Thurloxton, from under a stalk, 188 potatoes,
weighing thirty pounds, the produce of one planted whole;
the stalk measured seven feet in length.—'Taunton Courier.
THE PEERS—LORD BROUGHAM.—The few Peers who are
not Conservatives are chiefly Whigs; indeed, all of any
mark, except the great eccentric thunderer, who has cracked
his own altars with his own bolts, and left himself no chance
of worship.—Times.
WHIGS AND TORIES.—ThIS is just the difference between
the Whigs and the Tories—that the Whigs, who can brook
disgrace, retreat from difficulty—the Tories, unappalled by
difficulty, shrink only from disgrace.—lbid.
It is our painful duty to record the death of Francis V.
Wayland, Esq. which took place on Wednesday last, in con-
sequence of the wound he received on the 7th of April last,
ashen he and the late ever-to-be-lamented, A. Cooper. Esq.
fell by the hands of assassins. Since that sanguipary period
Mr. Wayland languished in great pain, which he bore with
christian fortitude.—Clonarel Herald.
The Solicitor-General, Mr. Sergeant Talfourd, Mr. Wight-
man, Mr. Erie, and several other gentlemen, are spoken of
as likely to obtain the seat upon the bench, vacant by the
decease of Sir J. A. Parke. Should the solicitor-general
obtain the appointment, Mr. Sergeant Wilde is thought
likely to he his successor.---Courier.
"WIG." UNDE DERIVATUR ?—The author of "Loose
Lectures" in Alexander's East India Magazine, insists that it
is derived (or, more properly speaking, corrupted) from the
Latin Pi/us, Hair, through the Spanish Pels (whence De-
luca, Wig,) the French Perruque, the Dutch Pernik, to the
English Perwick, Periwig, and by abbreviation, Wig—Q.E.D.
Slit JOHN COLBORNE.—Mrs. Jameson, in her " Rambles
in Canada" (just published,) says, "Sir John Colborne,
whose mind appeared to me to be cast in the antique mould
of chivalrous honour, and whom I never heard mentioned in
either province but with respect and veneration, was then
oocupied in preparing against the exigency which he after-
wards met so effectually."
Miss Clara Novello has been making a second visit to Berlin
on her return front Italy, where she has been studying during
the summer months under the immediate superintendence of
Rossini and Pasta. On the occasion of her farewell concert
at the Prussiau court, the crown prince and princess sent her
a rich set of pearls and garnets, and autograph letters for the
empress of Russia, to whose court at St. Petersburgh Miss
Clara Novello is now on her way.
BLASPHEMER.—An inquest was held on Saturday last,
at Retondon, before C. C. Lewis, Esq., coroner, on the body
of %V. Howlett, upwards of 70 years of age, and formerly
lime-burner at Springfield. On the 59th ult., deceased,
whilst uttering the most dreadful imprecations, suddenly fell
to the ground, and instantly expired. He was a professed
Deist.—The verdict of the Jury was, " Died by the visitation
of God."—Chelmsford Chronicle.
SIR WILLIAM JONES AND THOMAS DAY.—One day upon
removing some books at the chambers of the former, a large
spider dropped upon the floor, upon which Sir William, with
some warmth, said, " Kill that spider, Day; kill that spider."
"No, (said Mr. Day, with coolness,) I will not kill that
spider. Jones: I do not know that I have a right to kill
that spider. Suppose when-von are going in your coach to
Westminster Hall, a superior being, who perhaps may have
as much power over you as you have over this insect, should
say to his companion, Kill that lawyer! kill that lawyer!'
how should you like that, Jones? and I am sure that to most
people, a lawyer is a more noxious animal than a spider."
Captain Marryatt, finding that his correspondents are be-
coming too numerous, and that the postage on letters makes
too great a havoc among his loose change, has resolved to
adopt the plan of newspaper editors, to take no letters front
the office excepting those which are paid. Hear what the
captain says—" This has become a matter of serious import-
ance, and indeed I have sometimes been inclined to surmise
that I have been deceived in supposing that I have so many
secret well-wishers, and that the whole was a scheme of Mr.
Van Buren and Mr. Amos Kendall to increase the somewhat
defalcating resources of the country."--New York Whig.
REMEDY FOR THE CROUP.—This terrific disease, fatal in
so many cases to children, might have been arrested in many
instances where it has proved fatal, if parents would have
ready at all times a phial, containing two ounces of squills,
forty grains of ipecacuana, one grain of tartar emetic ; and,
wheu the disease is announced by a hollow ringing cough,
resembling rather a bark than a cough, give a teaspoonful
of the above mixture every ten minutes until free vomiting: ensues. The above prescription was obtained from an emi-
nent physician, and is published for the benefit, especially of
parents and others in the country, not wino,' the reach of
immediate medical aid. It is but the common implike of
humanity to save life when we can, even though tilt- pa ient
be fated to endure in after life, " the thousand ills that flesh
is heir to."—Batiniore Chronicle.

"PHILOSOPHICAL" HINTS TO FA RIVERS AND LAND-
OWNERS.—ANTI-CORN-LAW ASSOCIATION.—This associa-
tion, having resumed its weekly meeting, is steadily and
satisfactorily pursuing its inquiries, by which it has already
been enabled to accumulate a mass of information, which,
as containing many new facts tending to place the iniquitous
character of the corn laws in the fullest possible light, it is
the intention of the chairman, Colonel Thompson, to publish
in a series of tracts. Lectures are also intended to be given,
a few weeks before the opening of parliament, by the lead-
ing liberal politicians of the day; so that the whole strength
of the association and its friends being concentrated on the
one grand object, little fear need be entertained as to the re-
sult. The farmers who have been consulted have, with
scarcely any exception, expressed themselves favourably in-
clined. Sir Win. Molesworth, G. Grote, Esq., M.P. ; J.
Hume, Esq., M.P.; John T. Leader, Esq., M.P.; D. W.
Harvey, Esq., M.P.; W. Theobald, Esq., and . Tait,
Esq., are among those who have promised their co-opera-
tion; and it is expected that Lord Brougham and other
friends of the people in the House of Peers, with whom a
correspondence has taken place on the subject, will render
their aid in the good. cause.—Sun.

A physician, who has recently published a " Statistic In•
quiry into Fever." announces the following as one of the re•
sults of his investigation :—" Medical treatment has a power.
ful effect in lessening the danger or number of deaths from
fever." Prodigious!
THE QUEEN'S GIFT TO GRACE DARLING.—Grace Dar.
ling received at Bamburgh, on Tuesday last, a letter written
by command of her Majesty, who bad been graciously pleased
to order 50 sovereigns to be presented to her for her heroic
conduct in assisting her father to save the lives of eight of
the passengers and crew of the Forfarshire.--Newcastle
Chronicle of Saturday.
CANADIAN WINTER LANDSCAPE.—I think that but for
this journey I never could have imagined the sublime deso-
lation of a northern winter, and it has impressed me strongly.
In the first place, the whole atmosphere appeared as if con-
verted into snow, which fell in thick, tiny, starry flakes, till
the buffalo robes and furs about us appeared like swansdowe
and the harness on the horses of the same delicate mateo.ll.
The whole earth was a white waste : the road, on which the
sleigh-track was only just perceptible, ran for miles in a
straight line; on each side rose the dark, melancholy nine;
forest, slumbering drearily in the hazy air. Between us ant
the edge of the forest were frequent spaces of cleared or half:
cleared land, spotted over with the black charred stumps and
blasted trunks of once magnificent trees, projecting from the
snow-drift. These, which are perpetually recurring objects
in a Canadian landscape, have a most melancholy appear-
ance. Sometimes wide openings occurred to the left, bring-
ing us in sight of Lake Ontario, and even in some places
down upon the edge of it: in this part of the lake the enor-
mous body of the water and its incessant movement prevents
it from freezing, and the dark waves rolled in, heavily plung-
ing on the icy shore with a sullen booming sound. A few
roods from the land, the cold gray waters, and the cold, gray,
snow-encumbered atmosphere, were mingled with each other,
and each seemed either. The only living thing I saw in i!
space of about twenty miles, was a magnificent bald-headed
eagle, -shich, after sailing a few turns in advance of us,
alight,: on the topmost bough of a blasted pine, and slowly
folding his great wide wings, looked down upon us as we
glided beneath hitn.—Mrs. Jameson's Letters from Canada.
AMONYMOUS LETTER WRITERS.—This description °finis-
chief-makers is pet haps one of the most contemptible classes
of villains in the community. An open slanderer possesses
more courage, at least, and as far as that trait redeems his
character, is superior to the fellow who shrinks behind acov-
cealinent, and thus confesses his cowardice and his guilt.
There is one fact, however, which goes far to defeat the ano-
nymous slanderer. With the wise his communications and
accusations go to naught, and are regarded as carrying a con'
tradiction by the very mode in which they are asserted;
Anonymous writers to newspapers are not always guilty et
slander, even when their statements affect character. DO
they are liable to such suspicion—now, even though they tell
the truth, and though the public good may be advanced by
the publication of their articles, they have no rigLt to suppose
a newspaper will assume the responsibility from which tbeY
shrink.—Boston Gazette.
SINGULAR PERFORMANCE.—An officer who served under
the Emperor Napoleon has accomplished a singular perform-
ance of patient industry, to which he devoted three whole
years. After the fall of -Napoleon, having procured some of
the hair of the Emperor, of Maria Louisa, and of the King
of Rome, he formed a medallion containing the address of
General Buonaparte to the army of Italy, on the summit of
the Alps—" Soldiers ! we descend from these rocks like an
impetuous torrent, and we will conquer the immense plains
which meet our wondering eyes. Then shall victory dispense
happiness to all." This little speech, which in the original
French contains about 150 letters, is easily read with a good
glass, although the space occupied is almost inconceivably
small. To add to the interest that the little work alone would
excite, several General officers, and among others General
Bertrand, have certified that the materiel is the hair of the
three illustrious personages mentioned.—French Paper.
NEWSPAPERS.—A newspaper taken in a family seems to
shed a gleam of intelligence around. It gives the children a
taste for reading—it communicates all the important events
in the busy world ; it is a never-failing source of amusement;
and furnishes is fund of instruction which will never be ex-
hausted. Every family, however poor, if they wish to hold
a place in the rank of intelligent beings, should take at least
one newspaper; and the man, who, possessed of property
sufficient to make himself easy for life, and surrounded by
children eager for knowledge, is instigated by the vile spirit
of cupidity, in neglecting to subscribe to a newspaper,_
deficient of the duties of a parent or a good citizen, and is
deserving of the censure of his intelligent neighbours.--
American Paper.
NEWSPAPER CORRESPONDENTS.—The correspondent of a
daily paper is, in nine cases out of ten, the most perverse and
impracticable of all literary prodigies out of bedlam. When
a gentleman is unanimously voted by his friends a simpleton
" past all surgery," and a bore beyond all reclamation, be
infallibly takes it into his head to become a correspondent.
When he is proved, even to demonstration, to be utterly and
hopelessly incompetent, be joins the sect of the Epistlearians.
No sooner does he convince his family that his stock of opi-
nions consist of one only, and that a wrong one, than he flies
to pen and ink to commemorate the fact. When he can do
nothing at all, he writes a long letter to the editor of an (in-
variably) highly influential and widely circulated journal.
It would seem from a close and regular perusal of eccentri-
cities, headed "To the editor of," &c., commencing with
" Dr. Johnson has very justly observed," &c., and ending
with " I am, Mr. Editor, }oar's, &e., Humanitas," or Vin-
dex, or Inquirer, or Veritas, or One of the .Old School—it
would seem from such contributions to be the sum of popular
wisdom or virtuous indignation, that people never dream of
writing to newspapers but when they have exactly nothing to
say. When they do not know exactly what iu the world to
think upon a subject that agitates them, they sit down and
write letters to public journalists.—From Notes of the Month
in the Monthly Chronicle.
CANADIAN MILITIA ON A FIELD DAY.—The whole house
was in unusual bustle, for it was the4th of June, parade day,
when the district militia were to be turned out. On a rising
ground above the river, which ran gurgling and sparkling
through the green ravine beneath, the motley troops, about
three or four hundred men, were marshalled—no, not mar-
shalled, but scattered in a far more picturesque fashion hither
and thither; a few loghouses and a saw-mill on the river bank,
and a little wooden church crowning the opposite height,
formed the chief feature of the new scene. The boundless
forest spread all around us. A few men, well mounted, and
dressed as lancers, in uniforms which were, however, any thing
but uniform, flourished backwards on the green sward, to the
manifest peril of the spectators; themselves and their horses,
equally wild, disorderly, spirited, undisciplined : but this was
perfection compared with the infantry. Here there was ne
uniformity attempted of dress, but then appeared in their shirt
sleeves, white or checked, or clean or dirty, in edifying variety!
Some wore hats, others caps, others their own shaggy heads
of hair. Some had firelocks ; some had old swords, suspended
in belts, or stuck in their waistbands; but the greater num-
ber shouldered sticks or umbrellas. Mrs. M--- told us that
on a former parade day she. had heard the word of command
given thus—" Gentlemen with the umbrellas, take ground
to the right ! Gentlemen with the walking sticks take ground
to the left !" Now they ran after each other, elbowed and
kicked each other, straddled, stooped, chattered; and if the
commanding officer turned his back for a moment, very coolly
sat down on the bank to rest. Not to laugh was impossible,
and defied all the powers of face. Charles M-- made
himself hoarse with shouting out orders which no one obeyed,
except, perhaps, two or three men in front; and James, with
his horsemen, flourished their lances, and galloped, a atter-
pered, and curved to admiration. * * The pare one
ended in a drunken bout and a riot, in which, as 1 was
wards informed, the Colonel had been knocked down, an"
or two serious and even fatal accidents had occurred ; but it
was all taken so very lightly, so very much as a thing of
course in this half-civilised community, that I soon ceased
to think about the matter.—Mrs. Jameson's Studies and Ram-
bles.

THE COPYING CLERK.—Nine never struck but my band
uplifted the knocker. After stirring the firethat didn't want
stirring, and doing the hundred and one things that a man
does to avoid commencing a hateful task, I stripped off my
street, and mounted my office coat, (a copying clerk wears
out six sleeves to one coat, a garmental fact that should be
more extensively known,) I pounced my parchMent, for the
skin is, even in its prepared state, unctious with the relics of
mutton-ity (this isn't English, but I can't help it), and com-
menced lease, release, roll, or record.
"Next day 'twas the same, and the next, and the next I"
The blood stagnated within me; and I was rapidly becoming
a mere thing of pen and fingers—a producing power—a copy-
ing machine. In a happy hour, I met a few youths stage-
struck, or moon-struck: nightly did I ponder over Pierre, or
do havoc upon Hamlet; at last, by a desperate economy, 1
saved enough to purchase a character at a private theatre,
and appeared as the Fifth Robber in the Iron Chest : the onerous
duties of which consist in saving nothing, whilst the other
gentlemen say the rest. My success was perfectly unequivo-
cal, for I was neither hisse'd nor pelted. I then assiduously
applied myself to comic singing, and as I am allowed to have
the faculty of making faces, horribly hideous, I am generally
admitted to possess great comic powers. When the daily task
is over, I repair to "The Pickled Eggs," "The Pig and
Thunderbolt," or " The Cow and Compasses," their respec-
tive landlords allowing me eighteen-pence, and a glass of
rum and water, for the pleasure of my company and the ex-
ercise of my capabilities. My mother, who took ill from dis-
appointment at my not becoming attorney-general at least,
has left this world for a better. Jane (with.whom I quarrelled
because she fell in love with a journeyman carpenter) is in
Canada, where her husband's industry (for she married Chisel
after all) has made his fortune. I find myself every day get-
ting older and poorer; I have every now and then odd twinges
of rheumatism in my hands, awl my eye-sight is impaired:
these are sad things where a man's eyes and bands are his
fortune. I have been in the law a quarter of a century, du-
ring which 1 have been employed seventy-seven thousand and
five hundred hours, pent in a dark office, copying the sense-
less absurdities called law-proceedings. Transportation and
imprisonment must be comparative luxuries. 1 have not-
-1 never had—a hope. Unless incapaciated by illness, and
driven to the workhouse, I must, after all my labour, die as
I have lived—a Lawyer's Clerk.—Heads of the People.
A SHREWD GOVERNOR.—The following anecdotes of Capt.
King, an early governor of New South Walcs, quoted by the
Quarterly Review from Ross's _Hobart Town A lmanack, remind
us of the sagacious judgment of our old friend Sancho' Panza,
during his brief government of the island of Barataria :
One day, at Parannatta, he was waited on by two prisoners
sueing for pardon. One presented a petition signed by all
the first men in Sydney, while that of the other was signed
only by one, " How comes it," said the governor, " that
you have only one name to your petition, while this has so
many ?" " I have lived," answered the man, " with only
one master all my time, sir, and I did not know anybody.
The governor immediately gave the latter a pardon; but to the
former he said, as he already knew so many rich friends he
did not need one. At another time a country settler waited
on him, requesting the loan of a man to assist him in shing-
ling his house. " Come to me," said the governor, ". in six
weeks' time, when the harvest is over, and I will find a man
for you " Accordingly,. at the end of that time, the settler,
who does not appear to have been a man of much personal
industry, again presented himself. "Go into that room,"
said the governor, " and von will see him." After a few
minutes the man retured, saying, he could not find him,
though he looked all about the room—even under the table
and behind the sofa. " Not find him !" said Captain King,
" how is that ? Come with me; I will soon find him for
you." Then leading him a second time into the room, he
made him look into a large mirror that was over the mantles
piece. "'That is the man to shingle your house," said he;
take him with you, quick, and see that he does it."
THE LA EA Mn, JUSTICE PARK.--James Allan Park, Esq.,
was a- King's Counsel, and many years a leader on the North-
ern Circuit,'being opposed to the late Serjeaot Cockrell, and
afterwards to Mr. Topping. He had a strong lingering after
a judgeship, and for several years before he received the
hononr if ever a judge was indisposed or expected to retire,
certain London papers invariably puffed off. Mr. Park as
likely to succeed. At length in Michaelmas vacation, 1815,
the late Sir Alan Chambre resigned his office, and was suc-
ceeded by Mr. Park, who shortly after received the honour
of knighted and took his seat in the Common Pleas, and held
it up to the time of his death. Mr. Park in early life pub-
lished a treatise on "Marine Insurance," which has been al-
ways held in repute and was considered to bold forth good
promises of his future celebrity as a lawyer. Whether those
promises have been satisfactorily fulfilled or riot is for the
world to say. Some notice is taken of his Lordship on page
116 of a poem called „The Bar," published by Robinson and
Hurst, of London, in 1825, and a letter addressed to hint
signed "Russell," (printed in 1818, by W. and J. Lowndes,
9, Brydges-street, nearly opposite Drury-lane Theatre,) both
of which will now be read with some interest, particularly by
the junior members of the legal profession. Notwithstanding
his Lordship's long standing as a leading counsel oa the
Northern Circuit, he lines not seem to have had very great
attachment for it as a judge, for we do not recollect him more
than twice, viz., Summer Assizes, 1820, along with Mr. Jos-
tice.Bayley, and Lent Assizes, 1830, along,with Mr. Baron
Parke. Some interesting matter about his Lordship will be
found in vol. 1., page 259, of the "Bench and the Bar," pub-
lished Ia 18N. -

It is said that Peter Purcell, the Precursor General of
Ireland, is certainly to have the honour of knighthood con-
ferred upon him.
It is a curious fact, that while the average yeßrly siel.tness
in the members of the benefit societies of Scotland is
in :he persons employed in the cotton, silk, wool, fioN, and
earthenware manufactures of England, it is only 7
Mount Vesuvius, we find by a recent letter from is
again in a state of erupti,n. The weather has been ILild
in the south of Italy and at l,tes, that many pecr.,e
not yet put on their winter
" Zounds, fellow !" exclaimed a choleric old genticiiti,,.l ro
a very phlegmatic matter-of-fact person, " I shall go i;o:
my wits." " Well, you won't have far to go," said to
hlegmatic man.
A conservative dinner, on a grand scale, is to take
at Birmingham this day, under the presidency of Earl i-rowe.
Among the guests who have accepted invitations, are Sir
Francis Burdett and the Lords Dartmouth and Bradford.
Sir Charles Wetherell has, it is said, obtained a fortune of
£60,000 with his bride, daughter of the late Colonel Warns-
ford. It is, we believe, the hon. and learned gentleman's
third matrimonial alliance. His second lady was the daugh-
ter of Sir Al,xander Croke, a retired coloniiil judge.—Morn-
ing Herald.

SINGULAR TIIIEF.--A mastiff dog, belonging to Mr•
Graves, of Par'jngton, has been detected in the act of steal-
ing turkeys. (hi a search being made at his depository, in a
garden a•!joiniug the farm from whence the turkeys were
stolen, no less than eleven fowls and two turkeys were found
buried in the earth.

JOHN KEMBLE.—" Pray, sir," said a green-room lounger
to Mr. John Kemble during the ran of the elephant at Covent-
garden Theatre, "is the man very nervous who rides upon
the real elephant ?" "Nervous, sir !" replied Kemble, in
that deep hollow tone which was the particular characteristic
of his voice, "What must I have been when, riding on the
sham elephant, I heard the hind legs say to the fore legs,
' Get on, or d— your eyes I shall be down ?'"—Musical
World.

FASHlON.—Fashion constantly begins and ends in the two
things it abhors, singularity and vulgarity. It is the psi pe-
tually setting up and then disowning a certain standard of
taste, elegance, and refinement, which has no other founda-
tion or authority, rather than that it is the prevailing distrac-
tion of the moment, which was yesterday ridiculous from its
being new, and to-morrow will be odious from its being com-
mon. It is one of the most slight and insignificant of all
things. It cannot be lasting, for it depends on the constant
change and shifting of its own harlequin disguises; it cannot
be sterling, for, if it were, it could not depend on the breath
of caprice; it must be superficial, to produce its immediate
effect on the gaping crowd ; and frivolous, to admit of its
being assumed at pleasure by the numbers of those who
affect, by being in the fashion, to be distinguished from the
rest of the world.— Ilazliti's Essays.
Messrs. J. and T. B. Crompton, paper manufacturers, of
Farnworth Mills, near Bolton, received an order on Thurs-
day for a quantity of paper, which was to be delivered on
Friday. The machiae at their works commenced operations
on Friday morning The quantity made was 15001b5., and
the whole was delivered for shipment the same night in a
vessel which was to sail the next morning.—Bolton Chronicle_
EARLY WINTER.—The ice on the Neva, at St. Peters
burgh, was sufficiently strong on the 23d ult., to allow o
passengers crossing over on foot. During the ensuing night
the river was completely frozen over, and the workmen on
the following morning began the customary labour of con-
structing the Isaac Bridge. Accounts from other Baltic
ports agree in representing that the early winter bad set in
with considerable severity.
DESTRUCTION OF MADAME BLANCHARD.-1 was one of
the thousands who saw (and I heard it too) the destruction
of Madame Blanchard. On the evening of the 6th July,
1819, she ascended in a balloon from the Tivoli Gardens
at Paris. At a certain elevation she was to discharge some
fireworks which were attached to her car. From my own
windows I saw the ascent. For a few minutes the balloon
was concealed by clouds. Presently it re-appeared, and there
was seen a momentary sheet of flame. There was a dreadful
pause. In a few seconds, the poor creature, enveloped and
entangled in the netting of her machine, fell with a frightful
crash upon the slanting roof of a house in the Rue de Pro-
vence (not a hundred yards from where I was standing), and
thence into the street,—and Madame _Blanchard was taken
up a shattered corpse! It was supposed that the rockets
which ought to have been made to point downwards were im-
properly managed; and thus the catastrophe was accounted
for. So much for fire-work ascents ! —Pool's Crotchet's in.
the Air.

STEAM TO Is/pls.—Lord William Bentick has addressed
a long communication to the Directors of the East India
Company, on the subject of voyaging by steam to India, to-
gether with various correspondence on the subject, in one
letter of which Sir John Hobhouse declares himself most
anxious to accomplish so desirable an object, and would lose
no opportunity of promoting it by all the means in his power.
His Lordship observes—" For the whole of the service on the
eastern side, I should propose five wooden boats of the follow-
ing size and power. 1,320 tons and 400 horse power; all
these vessels should be similar in every respect as far as pos-
sible. The models ought to be formed upon that principle
which experience has confirmed, and every novel theory
should be carefully avoided, except, indeed,-Hall's conden-
sers, the efficiency of which, in respect to the boilers, has
been established by many experiments, and recently in a long
trial in her Majesty's ship, Macwra, under the careful direc-
tion of Lieutenant Goldsmith, with complete success.
SOCIALISM UNAIASKED.—on Monday evening, Mr. John
Easby, of Manchester, delivered a lecture in the Theatre,
Oldham, to point out the erroneous, immoral, and wicked
tendency of the Socialists. There was a tolerably numerous
audience, and Mr. Easby spoke for nearly two hours, in a
strain of poiisted sarcasm and animated condemnation of the
opinions of Owen's followers. He denounced their theory of
moral marriages as extremely pernicious and monstrous;
and their views as to responsibility as horrid and blasphe-
mous. He was repeatedly cheered.—Manchester Courier.
LITERARY CHARACTERS.—Modern men of letters may be
divided into three daises; the mere scholar or book-worm, all
whose knowledge is taken from books, and who may be
passed by as an obsolete character, little inquired after—the
literary back or coffee-house polician, who gets his informa-
tion mostly from hearsay, and who makes some noise indeed,
but the echo of it does not reach beyond his own club or cir-
cle—and the man of real or pretended genius, who aims to
draw upon his own resources of thought or feeling, and to
throw a new light upon nature and hooks.
CALMS. DEC. B.—Poor Strauss, who has really made so
much noise in the world and delighted so many thousands of
its inhabitants, has probably performed his last conceit. He
gave one at our beautiful Philarmonic-rooms on Wednesday
last, which was attended by our elegantes, French and Eng-
lish. He led the first past with his accustomed talent, but
was too ill to attend the second. He has been suffering some
time, tbey say, from the climate of England. At all events,
on Thursday he dismissed his band, who separated, some
returning to Germany, and others to London.—Morning Post
THE PRESS IN PRUSSIA.—A society has been formed in
Berlin by a number of literary men connected with the pe-
riodical press, with the view of checking if possible the grow-
ing evils of itterary piracy. In the absence of any law on
which to ground their operations, they reckon, we presume,
on their being able to call into existence a moral influence
in their behalf. All editors ofjournals, or of other periodical
publications, are invited to join the society, and, on becom-
ing members of it, subscribe to a code of laws, which pre-
scribe the mode of seeking redress, and the amount of com-
pensation to be made for every plagiarism. The journalists
who keep aloof from the society will, no doubt, be soon re-
garded by the public as persons who voluntarily take their
station beyond the pale of respectability.—Athenarum.
O'Connell proposes to march an Irish legion to the defence
of the Queen, against the combined attacks of the English
Radicals. The Queen of England needs, however, no " Irish
legion," commanded by Mr. O'Connell, to protect her from
any enemy, foreign or domestic. There are hearts and arms
in her own country, and among her own English subjects, to
defend her Majesty against all the Radicals in her empire,
Mr. O'Connell and his legionaries included. Indeed a le-
gion of O'Connellites, led by Mr. O'Connell himself, would
present no very forminable obstacle in the way of any enter.
prise, good or bad. We must not, however, in the absurdity
of this impertinence, overlook its malignity. The Radicals,
having once allied themselves to Mr. O'Connell, perhaps de-
serve all !he insult that he can heap upon them as Radicals;
but it is as Englishmen, not as Radicals, that the braggart
mendicant presumes to insult them, and the affront is there-
fore common to us all. For the ruffian alien to talk of march-
ing a legion of such as would follow hint, against any class of
Englishmen, is an offence that ought not to pass without re-
buke. The purpose of the bravado is, no doubt, to sharpen
the of his wretched followers against all the natives of
this country, against those most closely connected with them
in political feeling as well as others; but if anything more is
intended, we have the type of the project in 1641, when Irish
legions" organised uncler the pretence of defending the King
against his British subjects, forgot at once the' pretext of
their armament as soon as they got weapons in their hands,
employing those weapons in the massacre of 150,000 of their
Protestant fellow-subjects.

We have no desire to conceal our apprenhensions that, by
the decision of Sir Herbert Jenner, yesterday, in the case of
Breeks v. Woolfrey, the most serious blow has been inflicted
on the Church of England that it has sustained since the
days of Laud. One of the rankest and foulest corruptions
of Popery has becn declared to belong to it ! The matter,
however, cannot rest here. A direct contradiction exists be-
tween the doctrines held by our different courts of law and
equity. In the case of West and Shuttleworth, no longer
back than August 16, 1835, the Master of the Rolls (the pre-
sent Lord Cbancellor,) annulled a bequest for masses for the
testatrix, on the express ground that as the testatrix could
not be benefitted by such prayers, they were vain and super-
stitious, and consequently void in This was the plain
commonsense view of the case, over which, however, the
judgment of Sir H. Jenner, rides triumphantly. The Court'
of England must at once bestir itself. If so leading a cor-
ruption of Popery as this be permitted quietly to take up its
abode amongst us, the final result cannot be doubtful. As to
the attempt to draw a line between prayers for the dead and
purgatory, so as to admit the one, and yet exclude the other,
it is mere childishness. Aud this is the real predicament in
which we now stand—that after having composed, and put
forth an homily against these errors, and having made all her
clergy assent to it in the 'lshirty.fifth Article, as containing
" good and wholesome doctrine," the Church is still to be
told, by one of her own judges, that she has never given any
decision against Home on this point.—Staiidard.

DREADFUL EXPLOSION OF GUNPOWDER IN ARMAGH.—
On Wednesday evening last, the inhabitants of Scotch-
street, in the city of Armagh, wet e greatly alarmed by a loud
report as if of artillery, together with the jingling of broken
glass and the crash of falling timber, &c. On hastening to
the place, the noise was found to have proceeded from the
premises of Mrs. Graham, a very respectable bonnet-maker,
the front of whose house exhibited a very shattered appear-
ance, the shop windows being left a complete wreck, end
even the ceiling of the shop being turn off by something in
the shape of a missile, in the explosion; the smell, too, of
burning wood and clothes, with that of human flesh and hair,
the screetching of children, and the alarm and noise of the
inmates and their neighbours, who had hastened to their
relief, may be easily conceived, but cannot possibly be de-
scribed. On inquiry, it appeared that a friend of Mrs. Gra-
ham's, formerly in the police, had that evening returned to
Armagh, and stopped at his sisters his Mrs. G.'s, where he left
trunk, and where his daughter lived as an apprentice. Hav-
ing occasion for something out of the trunk, he sent his
daughter with the key to bring it; she was accommpanied
by two of Mrs. G.'s children, and had a candle in her hand;
the three children having got the article, began, through
curiosity , to overhaul the trunk, looking for some presents
they expected from the owner, when a spark from the candle
unfortunately fell on some packages of gunpowder which
were in the trunk, and the explosion was, of course, the al-
most instantaneous consequence; the trunk was shivered to
atoms, its contents scattered in fragments round the room;
yet strange to tell, not One of the three children was killed,
nor a sevrre wound or broken bone inflicted on any of them
—their faces, arms, and hands were frightfully scorched, and
their lives nearly extinguished by the fright ; the eyebrows,
and even the eyelashes, were burned off them, yet the eyes
escaped unhurt, except in a trifling degree. They were
promptly attended by Dr. Colyan, the medical attendant of
Mrs. G.'s family, and are domgfwell and not ilikely to be
much scared or contracted. Some idea may be formed of
the strength of the explosion, when it is known, that the
two doors of the room, which was behind the shop, where the
explosion occurred, were driven off, and two windows in it
shattered to pieces; also a skylight. over a back door, in a
hall twelve or fourteen yards high from the room, from which
a passage led to the hall at right angles, was driven out and
shattered. The shop windows, already spoken of, were at
least eight or ten yards from the explosion, and a partition
was between the shop and the room. A woman passing the
shop at the time, had her face cut, by the uroken glass, and
was Much frightened.—Newry Telegraph.