The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1851-05-13 00:00:00

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FLORAL EXHIBITION.—The first grand floral display
of the season has taken place at the Horticultural Society's
G2-dens, Chiswick; but owing to the remarkably unfa-
vourable state of the weather, the unsparing exertions of
the managers and exhibitors to render the show worthy
of May, 1851, have resulted in comparative failure. It
was more like a wet and windy February day than a May
morning. We anticipate much from the exhibitions this
year, and sincerely hope they will be more fortueste then
the last. No exertions are spared either at Chiswick or
the Regent's-park to render these displays worthy of the
national character, which they have so deservedly assumed.
At this, the first show, one of the most brilliant displays
of roses, in pits, and Indian azalias, surpassed all previous
years ; but in the plant department, although the science
of cultivation had evidently progressed, very few novelties
were shown. Cantua buxifolia was sent in flower by
Messrs. Veitch and Son, of Exeter. It is long since we
have seen a flower of so much promise as an exhibition
plant. Its habit is free and graceful, and its flowers large
and brilliant. We trust the future exhibitions may be
favoured with the success they deserve.
PENDULUM EXPERIMENT.-011 Thursday last, an op-
portunity was afforded of witnessing the new pendulum
experiment, now causing so much philosophical excite-
ment, by which the diurnal motion of the earth is said to
be made visible or verified. The apparatus was erected
in the observatory of Henry Lawson, Esq., under the su-
perintendence of Mr. George Wadham. The radius of
the plummet's suspension was twenty-two feet, and the
arc of vibration, at darling, was two and a half. Tho
divided board over which the plummet swung was about
two feet in diameter, and the circles inscribed upon it
were divided in 360 equal parts or degrees. The experi-
ment succeeded admirably, and in five minutes the devia-
tion of the plummet from the point or plane in which it
was first started became perfectly visible, being about a
degree to the East of North in every five minutes. The
apparatus had been put together on the spur of the mo-
ment, and several improvements were suggested, among
which was the power to restore the vibration of the pen-
dulum for twenty-four hours or more in succession. The
instrument was put in motion at two o'clock in the day,
and at twelve at night the swing on the plane of the pen-
dulum) was satisfactory.—Hereford Journal.

CURIOUS ORIGIN OF A SURNAME.—Martha Denial,
widow, aged seventy-five, was buried in Ecclesfield church-
yard, 3rd February, 1851. Her husband, Joseph Denial,
told the parish-clerk that his grandfather was found when
an infant deserted in a church porch, and that he was sur-
named Denial, as one whom all deny; and was christened
Daniel, which is composed of the same letters. This is
the tradition of the origin of a surname now common in
Ecclesfield parish.—Notes and Queries,

An alarri3ing riot took place at the old Calvanistic
Chapel at Hawkesbury, Somersetshire, on Thursday.
The minister in possession is supported by the congrega-
tion, but the trustees wish to oust him. An action was
brought in the county court to recover possession, but
the judge said he had no jurisdiction. In consequence of
this, on the day above named, the trustees assembled with
a party, and tried to carry their object by an appeal to
physical force, but were signally vanquished. After the
affray, a stable, adjacent to the premises, was burned to
the ground, and much damage done to the windows of
the vestry.