The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1842-03-01 00:00:00

" Well-informed persons," the Temps observes, " say
that it is not in England alone that the gold coinage is falsi-
fied by being bored through ; in France the coinage of 40f
pieces has been obliged to be given up for several years from
the same cause."

THE KING OF PAITSSIA.—During his majesty's brief
visit to this country Mr. Owen, the chief constable of West-
minster, was appointed to attend the King on all his visits to
public places. In reward for those services his majesty has
ordered a splendid silver tea service, bearing a suitable in-
scription, to be presented to Mr. Owen, which is now in a
state of preparation.

The price of corn has risen considerably in Poland.—This
rise is attributed to the unfavourable state of the harvest this
year in the neighbouring Russian provinces. The price of
wool has fallen, very much to the dissatisfaction of the fund-
holders.

We are informed, on good authority, that a marriage be-
tween the Princess Imperial of Russia and the Duke de
Bordeaux has been finally determined on by the ex-royal
family of France and the Emperor Nicholas. This alliance
is said to be the main cause of the bad understanding which
at present subsists between the courts of the Tuilleries and
of St. Petersburg.—Morniny Herald.
EMIGRATION.—Extract of a letter from the Cape of
Good Hope, dated December 17, 1841:—" The emigrant
ship Lloyd's, bound from London for New Zealand, has ar-
rived at Table Bay. During the passage from England no
fewer than 57 infants and children, all under six years of
age, died from diarrhma."—Observer.

In the shop-window of a tailor, in Castle-street. South-
wark, a paper with he following inscription has been dis-
played for several days:—" A Petition to Parliament for a
tottle abalition of the Corn Laws lieth here for Signature.
N.B. Ladys as well as Gentlemin may sign." Perhaps Mr.
Joseph Hume, who is so anxious for a "tottle" repeal of
the corn laws, had some hand in preparing the above notifi-
cation.

CHURCH EXTENSION.—A large Roman Catholic chapel
at Bath, known as Portland Chapel, has been purchased by
some members of the Church of England, and opened under
episcopal sanction. The Rev. Sydney H. Widdrington,
M.A., rector of Walcot, preached to an immense congrega-
tion on the day of opening.
Mr. SHARMAN CRAWFORD.—Mr. Crawford has given
great dissatisfaction to many of his constituents, by walking
out •,f the house on the division of Lord John Russell's
motion. His explanation, given in the Times of last Satur-
day, for refusing to vote, has rather aggravated than palliated
his conduct on that occasion. Many of his supporters say,
that he was not called upon to vote for Lord John's speech ;
but his motion, which was merely to negative the sliding
scale, and thereby compel the ministry to adopt some more
feasible plan. Several of the liberal electors declined to
vote at the last election, through fear of his crotchety
notions ; and that he would attempt singularity by walking
in the footsteps of the honourable member for Oldham.—
Manchester paper.

- :
We learn, with great satisfaction, that there has been a
visible improvement in the health of the Princess Royal
during the short residence of the court at Brighton, and, we
may add, that the infant Prince is also remarkably well.
Prince Albert is, we hear, greatly pleased both with the
palace and the town. His royal highness has endeared him-
self to the inhahitants by his open and affable demeanour.—
Brighton Gazette.
MEMORIAL TO MR. BUSFEILD FERRAND.—A correspon-
dent informs us that some of the respectable farmers and
others who attend the market at Knaresbro', contemplate
originating a subscription for a service of plate, to be pre-
sented to Mr. Busfeild Ferrand, the member for that bo-
rough, in token of their approbation of his manful exposure
of the tricks of the corn law repealers, and of his zealous de-
fence of the agricultural interest in the House of Commons.
The receipts of railways for the past week—that is to:say,
up to the date to which the respective returns are made—are
as follow :—York and North Midland, £1,432 ; Midland
Counties, £2,248 ; Great North of England, £1,105; North
Midland, £3,688; Manchester and Leeds, £3,959 ; Birming-
ham and Derby, £874; Great Western, £9,578; Greenwich,
£BO5 ; Northern and Eastern, £789 ; Birmingham, £12,740 ;
South Western, £4,107; Manchester and Birmingham,
£336; Eastern Counties, £735 ; and Blackwall, £595.

BREACH OF PROMISE OF M ARAI AGE.—DARBON V.
ROSSER.—It will be recollected that an application was made
by Mr. Thesiger, on the part of the defendant, last term, to
reduce the damages (£1600) assessed by a special jury, who
tried the cause, or that the court of Queen's Bench would be
pleased to grant a new trial, when the court suggested that
the parties should agree amongst themselves and granted time
for that purpose, which led to an arrangement between Mr.
Platt and Mr. White, and Mr. Pearson, counsel for the plain-
tiff ; and Mr. Thesiger, counsel for the defendant, who at
last agreed that the verdict should be entered for the plain-
tiff, damages £B5O. The costs in the cause have been subse-
quently taxed at £5BB, making together the sum of £1,438.
The directors of the Bank of England, at their
-weekly

meeting, on Thursday last, came to the resolution of lovver-
ing the rate of interest for discounts to Four per Cent., and
immediately issued a notice accordingly. A copy of the
notification will be found in another part of our paper. The
measure was received with marked satisfaction by the com-
mercial classes in the city, as indicating the easy position of
the bank in respect to its stock of bullion, and as affording
evidence that the directors are disposed to apply an effectual
remedy to the pressure which has so long and so injuriously
prevailed in the mosey market. It Mar be hoped that the
relaxation will exercise a beneficial inflnerlbe throughout the
country, and that a speedy impulse will be given to our trad-
ing and manufacturing interests.
AFFAIR OF HONOUR.—A. complicated correspondence of
" a hostile character," between Mr. Peter Borthwick, Mr.
J. Peard Lee, and Mr. J. Robertson, has been published.
The origin of the " affair " was a letter published by Mr. Lee,
accusing Sir W. Wraxall of ungentlemanly conduct. Mr.
Peter Borthwich, who at first appeared as Sir W. Wraxall's
friend, in the course of the correspondence became one of
the principals in the matter' But notwithstanding his hav-
ing expressed an opinion that the affair " could only be settled
at the pistol's mouth," after a multiplicity of notes, the
matter terminated without the introduction of powder and
shot, or even a " hostile meeting." We are sorry to see a
man, of the capacity for public service that Mr. Borthwick
undoubtedly possesses, countenance such a Gothicism as the
" settling" of affairs of any kind " at the pistol's mouth."

BERLIN, FEB. 17.—His majesty arrived here yesterday
about one o'clock in the afternoon, on his return from
England, in perfect health. On the latter part of the jour-
ney his majesty travelled by the Anhalt Railway, where
every preparation was made to receive him. Yesterday
morning their Royal Highnesses Prince Charles and Albert
went to Zuckenwald, where they met their royal brother.
His Royal Highness the Prince of Prussia received his ma-
jesty at the station in Berlin, and the public, who were
assembled in great numbers, welcomed their august sovereign
with loud acclamations. His majesty soon got into his car-
riage, which was standing ready for him, followed by those
of the princes and the other suite. Crowds of his majesty's
loyal subjects were waiting about the palace, ,who saluted
him with cries of joy as he drove up. Her majesty the
queen was anxiously waiting for her august consort. His
majesty came up by a special train from Coethen to Berlin,
a distance of 20 German (90 English) miles in three hours
474 minutes, from which a stoppage of 37 minutes at the
station must be deducted.
ATTEMPTED ESCAPE FROM SALOP GAOL.—A rumour
has been abroad in Shrewsbury, Oswestry, and other places,
to the effect that John Williams (one of the persons in cus-
tody charged with the murder of Emma Evans, at Brony-
garth, near Chirk,) had made an attempt, during the last
few days, to escape from Salop prison. We have not been
able to procure any account of the particulars from the gaol-
er, or any other party connected with the gaol, but believe
there is no doubt that an attempt to escape has been made.
The generally accredited report is that Williams had con-
trived to draw the staple from which his hammock was sus-
pended,—had worked with this so as to remove some of the
bricks from the wall of his cell,—but being overheard by the
watchman, was promptly placed in a cell of greater se•
curity than the one he had previously occupied.—Salopian
Journal.

EASTERN COUNTIES RAILWAY.—On Tuesday a specia
general meeting of the shareholders of this company was held
at the station in High-street, Shoreditch, for the purpose of
raising a further sum of money by the issue of new shares,
and for declaring the forfeiture of certain shares on which the
calls were unpaid. The chair was taken by Mr. Bosanquet,
who submitted to the meeting the plan of the directors,
which was embodied in a string of resolutions, and suggesting
the creation of 36,000 new shares of £25 each, upon which
the sum of £8 6s. Bd. only was to be payable in the following
manner :—£2 6s. Bd. on the sth April, £2 on the 4th June,
£2 on the sth August, and £2 on the sth October next ; one
of such new shares (as nearly as practicable) to be given for
every three of the original shares, and for every three of the
convertible debentures, or as the case may be, for every three
of such shares and debentures jointly, the new shares to be
entitled on the 4th January next to rank with the now exist-
ing shares in respect to the traffic of the previous half-year,
and from and after that date, in regard to dividends and all
other purposes, to be considered as if £25 had been paid
thereon. Mr. Haseltyne moved the adoption of the resolu-
tion, which was seconded by Mr. Esdaile, and carried unani-
mously. The chairman, in reply to to a proprietor, said the
question of a reduction of their 4d. toll to 21. on the passen-
gers of the Northern and Eastern Railway, was at present
broken off, through that company not agreeing to their con-
ditions. Two hundred and fifty-seven shares were then de-
clared to be forfeited, after which the meeting adjourned.
THE GREAT WESTERN RAILWAY.—On Thursday the
half-yearly general meeting of the proprietors of the Great
Western Railway Company took place, at the offices of the
company, Princess-street, Bank, Manchester ; Mr. C. Rus-
sell, M.P., chairman of the board of directors, presiding.
Mr. Saunders, the secretary, read the report. It expressed
the pleasure of the directors in laying before the proprietors
the result of the first six months' business on the entire line
of the Great Western Railway, together with that on por-
tions of the Bristol and Exeter, and of the Cheltenham Rail-
way, between Swindon and Cirencester. The gross receipts
for six months, up to the 31st December, 1841, were £337,352
4s. 2d. ; of which sum, £295,010 18s. was earned exclusively
on the Great Western Railway. The number of passengers
conveyed on the line, between the Ist of July and 31st of De-
cember, 1841, was £882,119, travelling an aggregate number
of 27,538,764 miles. The expenses on the traffic amounted
to £125,910 6s. being in the ratio of 37,323 per cent on the
receipts. The locomotive expenditure was £40,110 19s. 6d.,
of which £22,144 3s. was paid for coke, but which would be-
come much reduced; arrangements having been made for
procuring it at Bristol. The number of miles run by the
engines, during the half-year, was 673,398, of which 613,616
miles were travelled by regular engines with trains of pas-
sengers and goods, and 20,654 miles by the assistant engine
upon the incline ; and the sum of £15,940 14s. Ild. had been
paid for government duty. The first charge upon the profit
of the half-year was the interest on the company's debt, and
the rent payable, under lease, to the Bristol and Exeter Rail-
way and the Cheltenham Great Western Union Railway
Companies, to the amount of £93,259 10s. lid., which, de-
ducted from £212,446 165., would leave a balance available
to the company of £119,187 ss. Id. The report, after re-
commending thatlthe sum of £20,000 per annum should be
appropriated for ten years, to meet the first cost and probable
depreciation of stock, concluded by recommending that a
dividend of £6 per cent on the amount called up should be
declared for the last half-year. (Cheers.) The engineer's
report, after referring to the satisfactory state of the works
throughout the line, alluded to the late dreadful accident at
Sunning Hill, which was attributed to a large basin of gravel,
existing
overcharged with water, pushed the top of the slope into the
within the clay near the cutting, which, becoming
cutting, and with it a thin bed of sandstone, which caused
the engine to go off the rail. Against such contingencies it
was impossible, either on a railway or any other work, to
provide.---The report having been adopted, four directors
were elected, in the room of that number of gentlemen who
went out by rotation.

THE CONFESSIONAL.—Wbat a power over the consciences
of their votaries does the confessional confer on the Roman
priesthood ! It is recorded of Ximenes, confessor to the
Queen of Spain in the 15th century, that on an insult being
offered to him by a nobleman of the court, he with equal
blasphemy and pride demanded respect for the man who
each day had the offender's God in his hand and his queen at
his feet !
RAILWAY TRAFFIC.—The following calculation of the
last weekly returns of 34 railways, 1215 miles in length,
given in our present number, will, we believe, be of interest :
Number of passengers on 22 railways. 166,813, consequently
the total for the week must be above £400,000. The receipts
for passengers on 34 railways, £45,229 18s. 9d., ditto for
goods on 25 railways, £17,478 185..4d., total, £62,708 17s. Id.
This is an average of £52 per mile per week. The traffic,
therefore, is certainly at the rate of more than three millions
a year, and carrying fifteen millions of passengers.—Raitway
Magazine.
- - - -

THE CORN-LAws.—At a recent agricultural meetin,g, the
Earl of Hardwicke thus expressed himself on Sir Robert
Peel's proposal for the modification of the corn-laws :
" When first I saw the proposed scale the other day I was
not only astonished, but greatly alarmed. (Cheers.) I did
think the reduction appeared so great that its proposers must
have forgotten altogether the interests they professed to pro-
tect, and had put forward a document which could never
stand the test of public opinion. (Hear.) But on a careful
review of the document I confess my opinion is totally changed.
I consider the scale to be a safe and a protective one."
" ALL HAIL !"--Some say there is nothing new under the
sun, while others proclaim that there is no end to man's in-
genuity ; and really this seems to be the case in this scheming
age. One would have supposed that there was 'hardly an
opportunity to squeeze in another company ; but instead of
that being the fact, among the bills now before parliament a
measure has just been presented " to incorporate a company
to insure farmers and gardeners against loss from the effects
of hailstorms, under the title of ' The Farmers' and
Gardeners' Hailstorm Insurance Company l' " [To insure
hailstorms, however, if the parties have the power, may be
no great public benefit.]

INCURABLE PROTESTANTISM OF THE WELSH.—A cor-
respondent of the Dublin Freeman's Journal, who writes in
Friday's paper, thus laments the condition of the people of
Wales :—" As to the conversion of the Welsh, there is,
humanly speaking, no chance of it, under present circum-
stances. There is no priest to address them in their own
language, except, perhaps, two in the whole principality, and
there is an innumerable swarm of preachers of various sects,
who poison their minds with all sorts of misrepresentations
of the catholic religion. For this, the only and the obvious
remedy is to educate Welsh boys for the church. But, alas !
we have no seminary wherein to educate them. There are
youths enough in our congregations, blessed be heaven, with
the talents and dispositions suitable to the ministry, but we
have not the means of educating them."
RAILWAYS.—One of the regulations in the measure in-
troduced by Mr. Gladstone, the Vice-President of the Board
of Trade, for the better regulation of railways will authorise
the Companies to close the gates, which a general highway
act of the 2nd Victoria directs shall be put up wherever the
railways may happen to cross the turnpike roads or high-
ways on the level, but which act leaves it entirely in doubt
whether the Companies may keep such gates across such
turnpike road or highways. We know instances where not
only persons of inferior condition have taken advantage of
this doubt, and have attempted to pull the gates down when
so closed, by force, but where gentlemen (even of the quorum)
have threatened to do the same thing. The provisions of
Mr. Gladstone's new Railway Act will cure this defect, and
Imake it legal, as well as salutary, to keep the gates shut in
such cases.

BLOWING-UP OF A HOUSE.—It will be in the recollection
of many of our readers that a most diabolical act was com-
mitted at Kirkham some time ago, by the blowing-up of a
house when the inmates were in bed. This happened on the
19th April, 1836. and suspicion attaching to an individual of
the name of Richard Bennett, he was apprehended and tried,
but the evidence was not of a nature sufficiently conclusive
to warrant his conviction, and he was therefore acquitted,
though it was generally supposed that he had committed the
frightful deed. Six years have since elapsed, and whether
from the stings of conscience, or as it is thought by some, for
the purpose of annoying his family, on Monday last he pre-
sented himself before the police-officer, at Kirkham, as his
own accuser, and stated that he was the person who had
committed the act. On the officer asking him some ques-
tions, Bennett requested him to hold his tongue and he
(Bennett) would tell his own tale, when he stated that on
the night in question he placed a barrel containing gunpowder
in the cellar of Parkinson's house, but that this being done,
he had not the heart to apply the light, and he went home,
but that about four ih the morning, the diabolical idea again
came across his mind, that he got out of bed, threw a cloak
over himself, and proceeded to the spot, when he set fire to
the train, and immediately ran hotne. The explosion took
place, andi was most frightful in its consequences. Bennett
was taken before a magistrate, and this statement again made,
when he was committed to the House of Correction for trial
at the sessions.—PrAton Pilot.

COBBETT ON FREE TRADE.—" Of all the stupid things
that ever engaged the minds of shallow and purblind politi-
cians, the free trade project is the most stupid."—Register,
Jan. 13, 1837. "Of the free trade project I have always
been an enemy ; it is an absurdity in itself. Other nations
have taken advantage of our folly, and all are gaining by our
loss." (Aug. 8, 1829.) " A free trade in corn, if it had
been adopted, would at this hour, have made the land deso-
late." (Sept. 12, 1829.) "If there were no corn-laws, the
landowners and farmers of England would be totally ruined,
and the land would be covered with docks and thistles in-
stead of corn." (Aug. 8, 1829.) Snch were Cobbett's
opinions, and such must be the opinions of every sensible
and honest man, unbiassed by any sinister influence or in-
terest. _ _

"--f-HP. CHILTERN HUNDREDS.—By an express Act of Par-
liament, the conferring of any office of emolument by the
Crown on a Member of the House of Commons vacates his
seat. The Chiltern Hundreds are ancient divisions of the
counties of Buckinghamshire and Berkshire, in which peculiar
courts exist, originally constituted as far back as the time of
Alfred ; most courts of the same nature have been merged in
County Courts, but the courts of tha Chiltern Hundreds
remain distinct and the appointment of their officers is vested
in the Crown. The courts and offices attached to them are
now scarcely anything more than a name, but the Chancellor
of the Exchequer appoints a steward with a salary of 20s.
and
all fees and perquisites ; and this appointment, trifling
as it is, vacates a seat in the House of Commons. It has
long been the custom for the Crown to confer this appo'nt.
went on any member of the House of Commons who whiles
to resign his seat— there being no other way by which he can
legally free himself from representative duties ; and as soon
as the holding of the stewardship has answered its purpose,
the steward immediately resigns his office into the hands of
the Crown. There is no obligation on the crown to confer
this appointment, but it is a convenient usage, and on that
account maintained.