The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1850-10-29 00:00:00

Sr. A/DAN'S COLLEGE: BIRICENHEAD..--MOSt Of OUT
readers are aware that it has long been in contemplation
to erect a theological college at Birkenheatl, to supply
more effectually the purpose of the existing Institution.
The plan and objects of St. Aidan's College have so often
been referred to that any particulars are now unnecessary;:
it may, however, be repeated that the proposed college
is intended to effect much more than the economical
training of candidates for the ministry. It i= proposed
by its means to provide additional clergymen for the ex-
igencies of the town and port of Liverpool. The present
staff is confessedly remarkably deficient in force .ever to.
hope to bring scriptural teaching to the hearth ,of the
thousands of our humbler population, and the scarcely
less numerous bands of seamen who resort to our shores,.
bringing in their trains the wealth which adds to the pros-
perity of our community. it is computed that there are
no less than 250,000 souls of our permanent population
whose religious wants are totally uncared for ; to those
add, at least 15,000 foreign seamen annually drawn hither
who were also totally neglected in this respect. The
heart and energies of the Rev. J. Baylee are strenuous in
the noble purpose of effecting a means by which this
deplorable state of things may he remedied, but his re-
sources, unfortunately, were not so expansive as his heart;
individual aid is also too restricted for so vast a project,
and it is now proposed to carry out the godlike design by
an appeal to the community of Liverpool. It is thought
that a subscription of one penny per week from- each
labourer's family, double that insignificant sum from
each tradesman's, &c., would be sufficient to do all that is
required. With a view to the embodiment of this happy
idea a meeting will be held next Monday evening, at the
Collegiate Institution, at which, amongst a vast body of
the local clergy and influential laymen, the following
distinguished friends of religion will be present, and ad-
dress the meeting, the Marquis of Blandford. Lord Ash-
ley, Lord Robert Grosvenor, Rector Camrbell, &c. We
trust the meeting will, by its numbers and hearty sympa-
thy with the projectors, forward the speedy foundation of
an institution which, if carried out in all the extent of its
design, will assuredly be the most effectual engine for the
evangelisation of the masses ever in existence in this
country.

CHAMBER OF COMMERCE.—This Chamber. which is
rapidly progressing in usefulness and influence, holds its
quarterly meeting to-day. The principal matters to be
submitted by the Council are, a report on the stamp duties
and a memorial on the subject of the Brazilian and Cape
of Good Hope Mails. We trust that the latter question
will not be lost sight of by the Council. It is not im-
probable that the question as to the use of fires and lights
on board ships in the docks, and the establishment of an
Emigrant? Home in Liverpool, will also be introduced at
the meeting.

FIRES ON SHIPBOARD.—In consequence of the Cham-
ber of Commerce having used the correspondence of
Messrs. Brown, Shipley and Co. with the Birkenhead
dock trustees published in the last Standard, as the
ground of a memorial to the Dock Committee, on the
importance of having fires and lights on shiphnard, the
Birkenhead Dock Trustees have written to the Chamber,
expressing their astonishment at such a use being made

of the corres

pondenc,e "by a mercantile bod

Who are

supposed to consult the general welfare of the trade and
commerce of the Mersey, irrespective of local prejudices."
In reply to this complaint, the secretary of the Chamber
was instructed to write the following pithy note :—" In

reply to your letter received this morning, addressed to
the President of the Chamber, I am instructed to remind
you that this is the Liverpool Chamber of Commerce."

PRESENTMENT.—On Tuesday the grand jury made a
presentment to the Recorder at. the Quarter Sessions fa-
vourable to the establishment of a penitentiary for the re-
formation of juvenile offenders, and expressive of an opi-
nion that the police-force of Liverpool has been too much
reduced. The third part of the presentment is as follows:
—" That the general instru.:tions to the police, founded
on the common law of the land, (existing previous to the
establishment of hourly railway transit by land, and daily
departure by steam-ships,) require amendment, inasmuch
as Liverpool and London have become the asylums of the
cosmopolitan vagrants and thieves of the kingdom ; that
assaults are committed in the streets, and, unless a po-
liceman witnesses the assault, the offender cannot be de-
tained, no matter how many or respectable the witnesses
may be : the consequence is the criminal is not detained,
and, if a summons is had recourse to, is most likely to be
miles away, and not to be found. The grand jury are
aware that the law was framed to protect the liberty of
the subject; but, under the altered circumstances of the
times, the peaceable subject is not now protected against
the licentiousnss of organised bands of pickpockets and
housebreakers. To amend the law will require time ; to
increase the police force to an extent that would admit of
sentries being placed within one hundred yards, to carry
out the law, would lead to a ruinous expense to the pa-
rishioners ; but the grand jury submit that the evil might
be met, and the law vindicated, by the magistrates swear-
ing in resident .£lO householders as special constables,
whose evidence the law would recognise, and thus a de-
tective police would be established without cost, and va-
gabonds deterred from committing outrages in the streets
and suburbs of Liverpool!' The document was signed
by the foreman, Henry Cleaver Chapman.