The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1853-03-22 00:00:00

meddle with a business question, they take the shine
entirely out of the Commons. So it was with the rail.

way discussion I have allu

Jed to, when I dropped in on

The chief speakers were MALMESBURY (with
whom the question originated), Lord STANLEY of Alder-
ley, Lord BEAUMONT (STAPLETON that was, and is, of
Yorkshire), Lord GLENGALL, Lord lIARROWBY, and
Lord WICKLOW. Oh, I had forgotten—Lord MONT-
EAGLE, called once by the " thnnderer" Lord Mount-
crow. Perhaps you will wonder why Lord BROUGHAM
had not a word to say. His lordship travels seldom by
rail ; besides, he had his Scotch Law Reform " dodge" to
bring on, which he did, and had it read a first time,
t ough some good judges say that HARRY'S Scotch law
is not worth much. Be that as it may, MALMESBURY led

Tuesday

off in a rather for him spirited manner, expressing a wish
that Government would appoint a Commission of Inquiry
as to the best means of preventing the recurrence of those
fearful accidents which frighten the traveller, and for pro-
viding government superintendence. STANLEY of Alder-
ley said, as the subject was under the consideration of a
committee of the other House, it would be better to
await their decision. Lori BEAtiMONT was for the inflic-
tion of penalties—so is your correspondent, and heavy
ones. The Earl of GLENGALL—simpIe peer that he is—
supposed that accidents on railways might be obviated by
the travellers not sitting opposite to each other. His
lordship said something—almost inaudible—about horses
escaping (which peer was it who inquired asses 1) The
Earl of HARROWBY, a perfectly business-man, came
nearest to the true state of the question, in my poor
He considered there was always too great
weight and too great speed. Lord MONTEAGLE forcibly
spoke on the want of punctuality at the stations as a fruit-
ful source of accidents. The conversation, though it led
to nothing, on Tuesday night, will, no doubt, be attended
with beneficial results. In the course of the talk, a good
deal was said about the necessity of having strong car-
riages. This is mere robbileh, as my old Italian master
used to pronounce rubbish. No carriage, were it made by
HERCULES, and its iron work forged by VULCAN at Etna's
glowing fire, could stand a collision, caused, it may be, by
the negligence of a drunken servant. Here is one

thinking,

secret—there are too few people employed at the
stations, and on the lines. Why is it that at some
of the most thronged stations, which dot as it were your
own county, we shall find one individual officiating as
clerk, ticket-porter, in addition to other offices placed
under his supervision ? It was but the other day, at one
_ _ _

of the stations in a neighbouring county, the poor, under_
paid, slow-writing caitiff—he looked like an old stone-
breaker—was so busy making out tickets for one set of
passengers, others waiting on, that he had not actual time
to get out of his office before the next train arrived ; he
had to look after it : ribs broken, noses disfigured, lots of
concussions, &c., &c., &c., must be the inevitable conse-
quences. Surely, directors could get intelligent lads of
16 or 17 years of age to be on the look-out at each station.
The directors won't do it. No ; if they did, there would
he a per centage less dividend to shareholders. They will
catch it soon. I know Parliament will pass a measure this
session which will make railway directors look sharper.

" Codification of the Statutes." These four words
were uttered over and over again in the House of Lords on
Thursday evening. lam much mistaken if they—the
four words—do not prove fruitful parents of much ex-
to the country, and a long list of legal blunders and
used to say, jeeringly,
but with too much truth, that one might drive a coach
and six through an act of Parliam.nr Now, we are
going to'have the thing altered—codified—the language-
jargon altered—modified,l made more fit for unlearned
ears, and the purposes of every-day life, whether as exern-
lified in the Court of Banco Regis or Police.

. Great heights are hazardous

To the weak head."
Our lawyers may codify, simplify, explain away as much
as they please, there are some men who fancy a
wide door is now being opened to even greater ob-
scurities—if such a paradox be understood. Then, a
number of " eminent barristers" have been selected
for the task of codification, at the expense of " a
few hundred pounds a year each." Ten barris-

ters at £5OO, is £5,000. Lord ST. LEONARDS said, pithily,
just as their lordships were going away, that he hoped the

noble and learned lord (the CHANCELLOR) would realise

his expectations ; but he (ST. LEONARDO must repeat
his caution,°that the alteration of a single word in an Act
of Parliament might alter the force'and effect of the act,
and no one could predicate what ultimately it would be
held to mean. These are sensible observations & and
though Lord CAMPBELL affects to draw out an Act of
Parliament so briefly that it can be engrossed on the
back of a letter,—brevity, though said.to be the soul of
wit, may not have the same essence in law. Lord CAMP-
BELL vindicates brevity thus :—The last sentence of the
law, the highest, indeed, is embraced in three-words—no,
not three, but abbreviations of two thereof ; the fiat that
hangs a murderer is sus. per col. written and initiated by

the Judge. Simplify law procedure, codify the statutes,
expunge jargon, repetition, pleonasm and what not, ren-
dering our law-papers insufferable in the perusal ; but
unless care of no ordinary character is taken, darkness
will only be made visible, and the last error worse than
the first. However, the barristers have commenced the
Herculean task, and I wish them well out of it. The late
Sir ROBERT PEEL produced his law reform in a codifi-
cation, curiously enough called Peel's Criminal Acts ;
Lord JonN RUSSELL, after Sir ROBERT, tried his hand
at the same game, and every LORD CHANCELLOR and new-
made law-lord—your ABINGERS, DENMANS, BROUGH-
AMS, LANGDALES, LYNDHURST'S, CAMPBELLS, CRAN-

WORTHS, &c., during the last five and twenty years ; and
after all we find that the job is to be handed over to

" barristers of eminence,

who are to have only " a

fem hundred.

r a piece." From what I learn, the

work, if not nearly finished, is well begun.
The professors of the elegant art of water-colour paint-
ing are all on the qui vies this week, preparatory to the
opening of the annual exhibitions of their charming pro-
ductions in fruit and flower, sweet domestic scenes, pic-
tures of English life and English manners, English land-
scape, too, and portrait—strong in this last department,—
after all I am afraid,—for the interests of what is com-
monly and properly enough termed "high art,"—the most
remunerative branch of pictorial skill. A new gallery,
called the " Portland," opened its doors this week to the
public : it has a goodly array of pictures on its walls, and
the members deserve praise for their self-reliance. If one
hundredth part of the practisers of the brush and pencil
were to hang on the skirts of the Royal Academy for a
" lift," they might hang on, hoping against hope, till the
end of their days. The Academy, however, is becoming
more liberal, both out and in-doors. The associates have
no longer to sit on stools at the meetings, like so many
dunces, but have their aristocratic red-backed chairs, like
the best of the academicians ; and likewise with regard to
the "fourth estate"—the press : until lately, that—to
artists—most necessary body, had no privileges whatever:
all was pay, pay ; and the grand banquet in the midst of
the pictures, given on the Saturday prior to opening, was
closed to all save the elite. Now and then, it is true.
a literary don might be seen here and there,—a poet also
—SAM ROGERS and TOM CAMPBELL,-the latter glorious
in talk even long after the dinner. CAMPBELL knew
when he had enough, but what with the pictures, the
fascination of the exalted
s company,the conversation, and
the countless other agr6mof such a society, the poet's
heart became full to overflowing,'
and we know that out
of the fullness of the heart the
THOMAS CAMPBELL would talk on such mouth
speaketh. How
occasions ! Nor
was he over-nice of his auditorsam
than rnnot quite sure
that he has not " held forth" to more one of the
plushed servitors of the Academy after some of these fes-
tive gatherings ;—they had anecdotes enow to tell of
" rum old FusELI," who used to say to the studentsat the
foot of the old staircase in Somerset-house, fast by the
Hercules Farnese, that they—the students—were bears,
and that he—FUSELl—was their keeper; and so on down
to the more recent days of the elegant LAWRENCE, and
the prim but learned Sir ARCHER. My introduc.
tion to ROGERS was funny. Somebody, I think it was
the late Sir JOHN 11IALcotai, either brought or sent
a mummy three thousand years old from Memphis ;
all the world was invited to see it ripped up, in the
theatre of the Royal Institution. TOM CAMPBELL sat
next to me, SAMUEL ROGERS opposite, with his
fine head and countenance, both as white as the
driven snow; the sun-light was streaming through the

glass on the roof, full on ROGERS ; it produced an un-
earthly effect.
" Who is that remarkable-looking white
man ?" exclaimed one. " That man," said THOMAS
CAMPBELL, "is SAM ROGERS." Anon the parties became
a little more intimate, I trove. Mentioning ROGERS, re-
minds me of his portrait in the Portland Gallery, as well
as that of THACKERAY, both wonderful heads; the former
lofty and quite Shaksperian, the latter broad and massive.
You remember THACKERAY published one of his works
some time ago, setting forth that it was by MICHAEL
ANGELO TITMARSH. With that droll nose of his, and
the " storehouse of thought " above it, THACKERAY
presents the most striking resemblance to tile best busts
of the great, the magnificently-minded MicHaELANGELo,
BUONAROTTI, I have ever seen. ROGERS, though old, is
yet most cheerful, and cracks joke and pun—if not with
as much frequency as heretofore, certainly with equal
pungency. How in the name of wonder does he sustain
that deadly pallor ? He is very fond of living on white
food, but that cannot have anything to do with it surely.
Another and another is gone to " that bourne," &c.
ORFILA, great toxicologist—the French poison-monger,
died the other day, and was awarded all but a public
funeral. ORFILA was well nigh the last of a great class
of scientific men who dignified the literary circles of Paris.
CUITIER, DUPUTREYEN, MAGENDI, these, and others
about this season of the scientific solstice, used to be visiters
,t our societies. The Royal, the Antiquarian, Astronomi-
cal, Geologi:al, Geographical, the little, quiet, unostenta-
tious, but useful and more pleasant than useful, Linnean,
held in Sir JOSEPH BANKS'S old house, Soho-square.
There these foreign savans most did congregate every night
in the week. Splendid fellows for cigars after the meeting ;
out with the box was the order of the night, and in a
moment a huge regalia, price ninepence at the West Bad,
might be seen blazing away, even in the mouth of royalty.
The Duke of SUSSEX, when president of the Royal Society,
the instant he got out of the chair of NEWTON, doffed
his velvet court suit, and had himself shoved into a pair
of wide gray trousers, and jerkin, and smoked like
fury. Nobody said the smell was vulgar; to be sure,
though there were old women present, there were no
ladies. The game is all up now : go to any of these so-
cieties—it is all stiff and square toe. But to return to
ORFILA ; he was a great creature, and his compatriots—
they used to write papers which were read at the weekly
meetings. I remember one very curious, by LUCIEN
BONAPARTE, on the migration of swallows, full of in-
teresting natural history points. Then we had for a
change Louis NAPOLEON, Emperor of the French—he
had a taste that way when he was here. T recollect him
just before he left his lodgings in King-street, St. James's,
not expecting the " blushing honours" that awaited him,
making one of a party, the first to witness lithotomy
under chloroform. It was at one of our public cutting-up
shops—hospitals. The operator, young but careful and

of a good stock ; the patient, a 'country lad, who never
had got drunk; glorious subject for the stupifying effects
of chloroform. Your " boozer" may as wed inhale the
fumes of cold spring water—if it any have—as try chloro-
form. However, the young countryman of whom I
write, bad been sorely pained with stone for nineteen
out of three and twenty of his years, that being his age.
We sat down to a capital luncheon during the time the
patient was being got ready. The piece de resistance
was a huge pie, with venison in it, and a lot of
small birds—larks especially. The dainty dish fit for a
king (Louis is now an emperor) was made by the young
surgeon, the operator ; I trembled for the fate of the
poor suffering " hawbuck" as I saw the surgeon eat and
eat on, and never stop drinking till he reached his sixth
glass of Xeres I " That's my way, my boy," he said,—
"it was my father's. I must have my belly full of wittals
before I commence an operation. Liston, you know, pre-
ferred a long ride on horseback." I remembered this,
and said my prayers on behalf of the afflicted man, led in
by this time blindfolded. In two minutes it was all over.
The Emperor had the extracted stone, as large, corru-
gated, and hard as a peach's, put into his hand. I stood
next to him. "It is hot," said Louis." " I should
imagine so," said I, as be handed it to me, " it has been
nearly twenty years warming." He grunted Bon
They are all at sixes and sevens in the victualling
department of the Parliament houses. The Roman
Catholic members want a Fish Committee ; then, again,
comes the confectioner, in the corridor; be don't stick at
cherry-brandy with his cates, but comes out like a man,
with Old Tom, hollands, whiskey, rum, and other strong
waters. So much so, that more than one witness has
staggered into the Committee-room, and stuttered in his
evidence—groggy, in short. The matter has been brought
under the LORD CLIANIDERLAIN'S notice, as well as that
of Mr. SPEAKER. They think that they have a right
to permit spirits to be " drunk on the premises"—so do
not the publicans in the neighbourhood, whose main
harvest is reaped during the sitting of Parliament. Let
the house-steward or kitcheuman sell spirits to those
members and their friends who dine in the rooms set
apart for the latter purpose, but keep the retail of spirits
out of the passages,—is about what the public-house-
keepers say. The fact is, any varlet off the street, if he
know the way, can walk in, have his " go" or two, look
about, and retire as big as a lord. The right of sale is
worth something—as much as £1,500 is spoken of. The
matter is under inquiry.

The metropolitan theatres are closed this week for dra-
matic representations,—it being Passion Week, the great
division of the theatrical season, making a gulf between
Christmas and Easter—pantomime and spectacle. The
Brothers BROUGH, clever lads, known, if I recollect
arigbt,in Liverpool, have concocted a burlesque for Drury-
lane Theatre, of which great things are expected. I went
the other night to D.L. to have a close inspection of the
modes operandi of SANDS walking head downwards on
the ceiling. I was right under him : it is very droll, but
one can only guess at the principle ;—some say it is
magnetic, and that Mr. SANDS breaks the current at one
foot before he lifts the other; some again fancy that he
adopts the exhausted air-pump fashion. He has great
apparent difficulty in " putting his beat foot formost."but
he does it with firmness and no fear. He is very jealous
of the stucco-looking platters he puts over the soles of
his sandals ; the moment his feat is performed—not to be
encored, you may be sure—he wraps his platters in a
handkerchief and double locks them in a trunk. I under-
stand the maker of the aforesaid platters is under bond,
not to make another pair for two years. SANDS is a fine-
, looking fellow, as wiry as a Bedouin. A French piece by
SCRIBE has been got hold of by some of our smart dra-
matic prigs here—l beg their pardon—ads tars. and is to
ca.,. clue or Diarco bpado," at the
Princess's and Olympic, as the Easter offering. Mr.
WEBSTER, you will have observed, has made his last
speech at the Haymarket ;—manly and to the purpose,
though pardonably egotistical. If Mr. WEBSTER takes
care at the Adelphi—always a gaining concern—he will
make money. Will he keep it ? There's the rub. Scores
of literary and dramatic clever fellows make hundreds of
pounds, which they are not up to the art of keeping, like
your " dull fools." BUCKSTONE has put his feeler out
at the Haymarket—a good company, but a world too
numerous ; and herein was a great cause of Mr. WEBSTER
laying by so little, or perhaps laying out so much.
CHARLES KEAN contrived up to the last night doing well
at the Princess's, slipping quietly in now and then to
COUTT'S Bank with his book under his belt ; he is some-

what more careful that way than was his great father-
actor. CHARLES KEAN must now be worth £50,000, if a
penny. Mr. GYE, the director of the Royal Italian
Opera, has been very unwell, for some time past, but

edmes to town immediately, having got better, to direct

the affairs of his establishment prior to opening in eight
or ten days. Mr. CHARLES NUGENT, long the trust-
worthy and experienced attache of her MAJESTY'S
_ _

Theatre, Mr. ROBERTSON, the treasurer, and Signor
Puzzt, a well-known and respected musician, are to make

an effort to keep this lyrical temple open. Everybody
wishes them success. They are going to try to get JENNY
LIND to put forth her angelic powers to aid the attempt.
If JENNY does this, all will be right. I am afraid, how-
ever, that beyond scena singing, non-dramatic JENNY
Will do no more. Acting lyrical characters on the stage
had a dangerous effect on the health of this gifted creature.
The excitement was too much, producing results in the
circulation to be dreaded. She may have got over this
during her absence.