8. Sir Samuel Baker gives an account of his expedition into Central Africa to the members of the Royal Geographical Society.

Fire at Yeddo, destroying buildings extending over two miles and a half of the city.

9. Mr. Mills, Conservative, elected M.P. for Exeter by 2,346 votes, against 2,055 given to Sir Edward Watkin, Liberal.

Dense fog in London, seriously interfering with traffic, and affecting to an appreciable extent the health of the prize cattle on show at Islington. As many as fourteen people were reported to have been drowned in the docks during its continuance. The death-rate for the week was sixty above the usual average.

Mr. Bright denies that he had ever applied the word "residuum" to the working classes. "I do not," he writes to a correspondent, "remember the time when, or the speech in which, I used the word 'residuum,' or I would refer you to the passage. You would at once see how utterly unjust and false is the construction which Mr. Read has put upon it. I do not know what Mr. Read is in his pulpit, but I would advise him to stay there, where he cannot be contradicted. On the platform, he is, what is not uncommon in the hot partisan priest, ignorant and scurrilous, and a guide whom no sensible man would wish to follow. His congregation should pray for him." The speech in which the objectionable phrase occurred was understood to be one delivered in the House during the discussion on the Reform Bill of 1867. "At this moment," said Mr. Bright, "in all or nearly all boroughs, as many of us know, sometimes to our sorrow, there is a small class which it would be much better for themselves if they were not enfranchised, because they have no independence whatever, and it would be much better for the constituency also that they should be excluded, and there is no class so much interested in having that small class excluded as the intelligent and honest working man. I call this class the residuum, which there is in almost every constituency, of almost hopeless poverty and dependence.'

10. Marshal Bazaine found guilty, and sentenced to death. At half-past four o'clock Maître Lachaud concluded his speech in defence. The Duc d'Aumale then rose and asked the Marshal if he had anything more to add. In the midst of profound silence, the Marshal rose. He said: "I bear on my breast two words, Honour' and 'Country." They have been my motto for the forty years during which I have served France, alike at Metz and elsewhere. I swear it before Christ." The Marshal was pale, and he appeared deeply moved. The Court having spent some hours in deliberation, the President, on returning, said:"In the name of the French people, the Council of War, &c., delivers the following judgment:-François Achille Bazaine, Marshal of France, is he guilty, firstly, of having capitu

lated before the enemy in the open field?— Unanimously, Yes. Secondly, had this capitulation the effect of making those under his command lay down their arms?-Unanimously, Yes. Thirdly, is he guilty of having negotiated with the enemy before having done everything prescribed by duty and honour?Unanimously, Yes. Fourthly, is he guilty of having surrendered a fortified place, the protection of which had been intrusted to him? -Unanimously, Yes. In consequence of this, Marshal Bazaine is condemned to the penalty of death, with military degradation, and ceases to belong to the Legion of Honour, and, besides, is condemned to pay the expense of the trial as regards the State. The Council orders that the sentence shall be read to the Marshal in the prison, in presence of the assembled guard under arms.' This sentence was in two days commuted by President MacMahon on the recommendation of the Court into twenty years of seclusion on the Isle St. Marguerite. Marshal Bazaine thereupon wrote to the President :-" You have remembered the days in which we served our country together, and I fear that the impulse of your heart overmastered State considerations. I should have died without regret, since the recommendation to mercy made to you by my judges vindicates my honour."

11. The Claimant's witness, Jean Luie, committed for trial on the charge of perjury. Pending further proceedings against him, the prisoner was sent back to undergo the remainder of his sentence as a convict.

Died, aged 57, William de Courcy O'Grady, known in Ireland as "The O'Grady,' head of an ancient Milesian family.

Charles Dawson sentenced to death at Durham Assizes for the murder of his wife by beating her with a champagne bottle, and then dancing upon the body of his unhappy victim.

Meeting in London to establish a National Federation of Employers of Labour.

13. Died, at Rome, aged 36, H. S. P. Winterbotham, M.P., Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department.

14.-Died, aged 73, the Queen Dowager Elizabeth of Prussia, widow of the late King Frederick William IV.

The Pope's last Encyclical on the present persecution of the Catholic Church read in the Roman Catholic Churches in London by order of Archbishop Manning. By desire of the Archbishop, the ""faithful' were at the same time formally warned, in their several congregations, that those who dispute or deny the definition of the Infallibility of the Roman Pontiff, or impugn the decrees and dogmatical constitutions of the late Vatican Council, incur the penalties attaching to the sin of heresy, and are in danger of being excommunicated from the unity of the Church and from the fold of Christ.

15.-Dr. Tristram, Chancellor of the Diocese of London, gives judgment against the erection of a baldacchino over the communion-table of St. Barnabas Church, Pimlico. After much consideration, he said he had come to the conclusion that the proposed ornament did not come within the rubrics, and that it was not necessary or subsidiary to the services of the Church. It was not in the province of this court to sanction the erection of an ornament that was not sanctioned, and as the law did not provide for such an ornament to the communion-table, it was not for this court to issue a faculty to give greater dignity and honour to the holy table than the simple dignity prescribed by the law. He should, therefore, refuse the application for a faculty, and grant Mr. Bowron his costs. As he had decided the question on the legal ground, it was not necessary to go into the question of discretion.

16.-The surrender of the Virginius and the surviving prisoners to American officers at Bahia Honda.

A Committee of Ministers of the Church of Scotland, concerned at the insufficient number of qualified probationers presently available, issue a circular announcing an intention to adopt energetic means for maintaining her efficiency. "They contemplate aiding and encouraging, by pecuniary grants, young men of ability and character, who desire to study for the ministry. They consider it of vital importance that every such student should, throughout his university curriculum, be a regular worshipper in some particular congregation, from the minister, elders, and members of which he should experience friendship and attention. With a view to all this (writes the Secretary), I have to beg that you will kindly inform me, on or before the 8th proximo, whether you know of any youth in your parish or congregation who is inclined to become a minister, and whom you believe to be fitted for the office by his talents and dispositions."

18. The Tichborne case adjourned on this the 145th day of trial until after Christmas.

A paper in London Society forming one of a series known as "The Chesterfield Letters of 1873," being considered injurious to the

Eight men drowned in the Thames at West Moulsey, by the sinking of a boat engaged to convey them across the river from the works of the Lambeth Water Company.

21.-Died, at Lambeth, aged 89, Major George Rawlinson, who had obtained an ensign's commission in 1805, and been on the half-pay list since 1816.

22.-Announcement made of the creation of four new peers-Mr. Monsell, Lord Emly, of Tervoe, in the county of Limerick; Sir James Welwood Moncreiff, Lord Moncreiff, of Tulliebole, Kinross-shire; Admiral the Hon. Edward George Granville Howard, heir presumptive to the Earl of Carlisle, Lord Lamerton, of Lamerton, in the county of Cumberland; and Sir John Duke Coleridge, Baron Coleridge, of Ottery St. Mary.

Died, at Dublin, aged 77, Lord Chief Baron Pigott.

The Pope holds a Consistory, at which he creates twelve new Cardinals.

A jury in the Court of Exchequer gives a verdict carrying 350%. damages against the proprietor of the Gloucester Mercury, for publishing a libel against Mr. Edmunds, solicitor, Newent, charged last year with the murder of his wife, and, as appeared to the Lord Chief Baron, the victim of a species of persecution under circumstances which, but that they appeared in evidence, he should have thought impossible to have existed in this country.

23.-Archbishop Manning reads a paper before a Society known as the "Academia of the Catholic Religion," on Cæsarism and Ultramontanism, to prove that the antagonist of the Church has always been Cæsarism, or the supremacy of the civil over the spiritual. "If the Church," said the Archbishop, “be Antichrist, every Cæsar from Nero to this day is

justified. If it be Christ, it is the Supreme Power among men; that is to say: (1) it holds its commission and authority from God; (2) it holds in custody the faith and the law of Jesus Christ; (3) it is the sole interpreter of that faith and the sole expositor of that law. It has within the sphere of that commission a power to legislate with authority; to bind the consciences of all men born again in the baptism of Jesus Christ; it alone can fix the limits of the faith and law entrusted to it, and therefore the sphere of its own jurisdiction; it alone can decide in questions where its power is in contact with the civil power-that is, in mixed questions; for it alone can determine how far its own Divine office, or its own Divine trust, enter into and are implicated in such questions; and it is precisely that element in any mixed question of disputed jurisdiction which belongs to a higher order and to a higher tribunal."

24. The Supreme Court of the Brazilian -Empire finds the Bishop of Pernambuco guilty of attempting to set aside an Article of the Constitution, an offence punishable by imprisonment, and orders him to surrender to the court to receive judgment.

Mr. Caleb Cushing appointed American Minister to Spain in succession to General Sickles.

28.-Popular demonstration in Paris, at the funeral of M. François Victor Hugo, son of Victor Hugo.

New Bourse at Brussels opened with a ball attended by the royal household and memhers of the diplomatic circle.

30.-A Berlin telegram to the Times reports that the Chapter of the Civil Class of the Prussian Royal Order "For Merit" has been presented to Mr. Thomas Carlyle, the vacancy having been created by the death of Alesandro Manzoni.

The Duke of Edinburgh leaves London or St. Petersburg.

31.-Treaty between Russia and Bokhara published at St. Petersburg. One Article provided for Russian merchants having the right to construct harbours on the banks of the Amou Daria, in the territory of Bokhara, the Government of Bokhara to be responsible for the security of such harbours, and the sites chosen for them to be approved by the Russian authorities; another that Russian merchants shall be permitted to establish factories and commercial agencies in any part of Bokhara, and the merchants of the latter shall be entitled to possess such establishments in Turkestan territory. Both Governments engaged to consider all commercial treaties as sacred, and faithfully to fulfil them.

The Spanish Cortes opened with a message from Señor Castelar, describing the insurgents at Carthagena as engaged in a criminal insurrection tending to break up the unity of the Fatherland, the marvellous work of so many centuries, "seizing upon one of our strongest places, the best provided of our arsenals, and our most formidable war vessels, maintaining its accursed flag under the protection of impregnable fortresses, and thereby encouraging the revival of demagogic passions. The want of troops and resources delays the capture of the place, but, considering the energy and activity of the besiegers and the prostration and penury of the besieged, it must soon fall at the feet of the Assembly." Papers were promised relating to the Virginius difficulty, settled, it was said, according to the first principles of international law.

3. Died, aged 61, William Telbin, scene painter.

A new Revolution in Spain, Señor Castelar, twice defeated in the Cortes, being succeeded by a military Dictatorship. Castelar thereupon wrote:-"I protest with all the energy of my soul against the brutal act of violence committed against the Constitutional Cortes by the Captain-General of Madrid. My conscience will not permit me to associate my

self with demagogues; but, on the other hand, my conscience and my honour keep me aloof from the state of things which has just been created by the force of bayonets."

5.-Dawson, Gough, and Thompson executed at Durham.

6. The Conservatives gain a seat at Stroud, the poll showing 2,817 for Dorrington, against 2,426 for Havelock, Liberal.

The Duke of Cambridge assaulted in Pall Mall by a retired captain named Maunsell, whose mind had become affected through what he considered a denial of justice by officials at the Horse Guards.

7.-Addressing his constituents at Elgin, Mr. Grant Duff expresses an opinion that for a Conservative Cabinet to be possible not as a mere stop-gap, but to live with its own life, he held "that not one or two men like Lord Derby are necessary, but half a dozen, and I do not see the men, nor any of them, an assertion which I make without forgetting the merits of politicians like Mr. Cave or Sir Charles Adderley." After some remarks on Mr. Disraeli's speech at Glasgow, Mr. Grant Duff discussed the possibility of a middle party in English politics, and contended that there were not men enough to form such a party. Just at present he did not think the country wanted a coalition, much less a Conservative Government.

Died, aged 69, Henry Glassford Bell, Sheriff of Lanarkshire, and author of a volume of graceful verses. Sheriff Bell's illness gave rise to a disagreeable controversy regarding a somewhat brusque request made to him by the Home Secretary to resign, which was thought to have even damaged the closing days of the Liberal Ministry.

The Glasgow Presbytery appoint a committee to inquire into the relations in which that body stood to Principal Caird, preparatory to dealing with him on a charge of heresy on the subject of responsibility for belief.

The Prussian Judicial Tribunal for the trial of ecclesiastical causes sit for the first time, the case for decision being the complaint of a chaplain who had been removed from his office by the Bishop of Paderborn. The court decided that the act of the bishop was null and void.

Explosion in Carthagena of a powder magazine, fired by the besieging batteries.

8.-President MacMahon delivers the Cardinals' hats to the new Cardinals in the chapel of the Palace of Versailles. The recipients were Monsignor Chigi, Papal Nuncio, and the Archbishops of Paris and Cambrai. "The Pope," said the Marshal, "knows our filial attachment and our admiration at the manner in which he supports his trials. His sympathy did not fail us in our misfortunes, and his good wishes are with us now in the work of pacific regeneration which my Government pursues."

The Bishop of Troyes having forbidden the clergy of his diocese to celebrate masses for the soul of the EmperorNapoleon, the Empress writes that she can hardly believe it, "because the Church has never refused a prayer for the dead. The spirit of charity and brotherly love form one long chain which binds us the one to the other-the rich or the poor, those in prosperity or those in adversity, the living and the dead! No, it is impossible that you can have refused a prayer for him who founded the institution of almoners for saying the prayers after death. No, it is impossible, when you protest against those civil burials which deprive a Christian of the prayers of the Church, that you can have refused those same prayers when asked for. Moreover, it is impossible that you can have forgotten the oath which you took in the presence of him who is no more.'

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11. Carthagena surrenders to the troops of the Madrid Government. The town had suffered severely, though not so much as was supposed, except near the Madrid Gate, where the damage was very great. There scarcely one house escaped untouched, and some were riddled with shell; two houses had been thrown down, and the street pavement ploughed up. Immense damage was found to have been done by the recent explosion of the powder magazine, where over 200 persons were said to have been killed. The walls near the Madrid Gate suffered much, but there was nothing approaching to a breach. The Numencia, with the insurgent Junta on board, escaped to Oran, and surrendered to French authorities.

his reply next day, and in the afternoon, when proceeding homeward, narrowly escaped from the attentions of an excited mob pretending sympathy with the Claimant.

14. -The French Assembly express approval of the Government bill relative to the nomination of mayors.

The Rev. George Richardson Mackarness elected Bishop of Argyll by an absolute majority in both Chambers. The candidature

of Provost Cazenove was withdrawn.

15.-The Baroness Burdett-Coutts presented with the freedom of the city of Edinburgh, "in recognition of her ladyship's devoted zeal and patriotism in the promotion and munificent support of useful and charitable institutions, and also in consideration of her ladyship's association with Edinburgh as the honoured descendant of one of its chief magistrates.'

16.-The allegations against Prince Bismarck in a book recently issued by General Della Marmora, lead to a scene in the Prussian Lower House. In the course of a debate on education, Herr von Malinckrodt declared that the Ultramontanes were as faithful patriots as Prince Bismarck, and he asked, amid considerable uproar, "Were they present at the

conference between Prince Bismarck and M. Govone when a cession of territory on the left bank of the Rhine was discussed?" adding, "I myself was not present, but I met with this statement of the interview in a reliable quarter." After a reply from Herr Kleoppel, the motion was allowed to drop, and the debate on the Civil Marriage Bill resumed. Prince Bismarck shortly afterwards entered the House, and obtained leave to speak on a matter of privilege. He characterized the statement of Herr von Malinckrodt as an audacious and lying invention, made in a malignant and calumniatory manner. The Imperial Chancellor added:-"I never uttered a syllable of the sort. I have never spoken of ceding a village or a meadow of German territory. The whole accusation is through out an audaciously invented falsehood concocted to blacken my character. (Loud cheers.) I ask for no special consideration from my opponents, but I am entitled to ask that they shall behave more decently in the sight of fo eign countries and our own Sovereign." Later in the discussion Frince Bismarck said:-"It is remarkable that Herr Malinckrodt attaches greater value to the testimony of a foreigner than to mine. It would require a man's lifetime to contradict all that my enemies write against me. safely say, and I am proud to be able to say it, that I am the most strongly and the best hated man of any country in Europe. Has not Herr Malinckrodt sought to keep you and the country in the belief that Della Marmora's book tells the truth? I do not wish to convince him, but I ask you, could I not have obtained the most immense results if I had been willing to cede a portion of German territory to France?

I may

Did I do so? You have no right to ask the leader of the Government to justify himself against calumny in the open tribune. That is a proceeding to characterize which no parlia mentary expression can be found. The public press will, no doubt, find one to supply the deficiency."

16.--Died, at Bonn, Dr. Max Schultze, anatomist.

17. Narrow escape of the De Broglie Government on the Nomination of Mayors Bill. An amendment by M. Ducarre, of the Left, enacting that the mayors should not be selected except from the members of the municipal councils, was lost by only fourteen votes, the numbers being 343 and 329. A subsequent amendment, proposed by M. Feray, of the Left Centre, that the mayors should be selected from the municipal councils in communes having a population of less than 3,000, was rejected by 341 against 336, showing a majority for the Government of five only.

The German Emperor writes to the Old Catholic Bishop, Dr. Reinkens:-"I thank you for the hearty congratulations which you have offered to me on the occasion of the renewing of the year. May God's blessing advance the work begun by you in His name, also in the new year. May continually widening circles be penetrated by the unquestionably right conviction, shared by you, that in my States respect for the law is reconcilable with the exercise of the religion of every community which pursues no worldly purposes, but only the one purpose-to seek man's peace with God."

18.-Died, aged 78, James Matthew Cope, for over fifty years connected with the London press.

Died, in North Carolina, aged 63, the Siamese twins, Chang and Eng. 19. The Swedish Parliament opened by the King in person.

The Corporation of Brighton entertain Sir Samuel Baker at a banquet in the hall of the Royal Pavilion. Addressing the assembly after dinner, Sir Samuel said there was now a fair prospect for the development of the country of the White Nile, but the future would of course depend upon the energy and intelligence of the Governor, who should be perfectly unfettered by Egypt, and should be furnished with supreme power. He much feared that the Viceroy was rather too impatient for quick returns from his new territories; but as he had now intrusted his (Sir Samuel's) late command to an English officer of high reputationColonel Gordon-he felt sure all would be done that was possible with the means furnished by the Viceroy. The good work had been begun and must be continued by English