partake in some measure of that representation, and to be free."

27.-Alliance offensive and defensive between Prussia and Italy. Italy engages to declare war against Austria as soon as Prussia shall have either declared war or committed an act of hostility. Prussia engages to carry on the war until the mainland of Venetia, with the exception of the fortresses, and the city of Venice, is in the hands of the Italians, or until Austria declares herself ready to cede it voluntarily. The Prussian Government further engages to obtain for Italy the possession of the mainland of Venetia, always excepting the fortresses, and will guarantee to Italy the maintenance of her present possessions. King Victor Emmanuel, upon his part, declares that he will attack Austria upon the Mincio with 80,000 men, and will throw 40,000 across the Po; at the same time the Italian fleet will cruise in the Mediterranean, engage the Austrian men-of-war, and make an attack upon Venice. King Victor Emmanuel further promises not to lay down his arms until the Prussians shall be in legal possession of the Elbe Duchies.

It is

28. The eminent American merchant, Mr. Peabody, having added another donation to his munificent gift of last year for the improvement of the dwellings of the poor of London, her Majesty addressed to him the following autograph letter:-"The Queen hears that Mr. Peabody intends shortly to return to America, and she would be sorry that he should leave England without being assured by herself how deeply she appreciates the noble act of more than princely munificence by which he has sought to relieve the wants of the poorer class of her subjects residing in London. an act, as the Queen believes, wholly without parallel, and which will carry its best reward in the consciousness of having contributed so largely to the assistance of those who can little help themselves. The Queen would not, however, have been satisfied without giving Mr. Peabody some public mark of her sense of his munificence, and she would gladly have conferred upon him either a baronetcy or the Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath, but that she understands Mr. Peabody to feel himself debarred from accepting such distinctions. It only remains, therefore, for the Queen to give Mr. Peabody the assurance of her personal feelings, which she would further wish to mark, by asking him to accept a miniature portrait of herself, which she will desire to have painted for him, and which, when finished, can either be sent to America, or given to him on his return, which, she rejoices to hear, he meditates, to the country that owes him so much." Mr. Peabody replied on the 3d April, from the Palace Hotel, Buckingham Gate :'Madam,-I feel seriously my inability to express in adequate terms the gratification with which I have read the letter which your Majesty has done me the high honour of transmitting by the hands of Earl Russell. On the occasion

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which has attracted your Majesty's attention of setting apart a portion of my property to ameliorate the condition and augment the comforts of the poor of London, have been actuated by a deep sense of gratitude to God who has blessed me with prosperity, and of attachment to this great country, where, under your Majesty's benign rule, I have received so much personal kindness, and enjoyed so many years of happiness. Next to the approval of my own conscience, I shall always prize the assurance which your Majesty's letter conveys to me of the approbation of the Queen of England, whose whole life has attested that her exalted station has in no degree diminished her sympathy with the humblest of her subjects. The portrait which your Majesty is graciously pleased to bestow on me I shall value as the most precious heirloom that I can leave in the land of my birth, where, together with the letter which your Majesty has addressed to me, it will ever be regarded as an evidence of the kindly feeling of the Queen of the United Kingdom to a citizen of the United States."

29.- Died

at Bournemouth, aged 74, the Rev. John Keble, vicar of Hursley, the amiable and accomplished author of "The Christian Year."

April 1.-Sunday riot at Northmoor-green, Bridgewater, caused by the incumbent attempting to celebrate Easter service with great ritualistic pomp.

2.-Thomas Carlyle installed as Lord Rector of Edinburgh University. He was received with extraordinary enthusiasm, and delivered an extemporaneous address, full of all his old fire and originality, to a crowded company of students and admiring friends. He began by referring to his connexion with the University fifty-six years since, counselled the students to learn, not to cram-to find out the work they were fitted for, and to regard all honest labour as the best cure for the miseries of life. He recommended the study of history-particularly the history of our own country-advised them to avoid literature as a profession-eulogized Cromwell and Knox, and spoke regretfully of the "vocality" of the present age. "It seems to me," he said, "that the finest nations in the world-England and America-are all going to wind and tongue. This will appear sufficiently tragical by and by, long after I am away out of it. Silence is the eternal duty of a man. He won't get to any real understanding of what is complex, and what is more than any other pertinent to his interests, without maintaining silence." Again, "We have got into the age of revolution. All kinds of things are coming to be subjected to fire, as it were hotter and hotter the wind rises around everything. Curious to say, now, in Oxford and other places that used to seem to lie at anchor in the stream of time, regardless of all changes, they are getting into the highest humour of mutation, and all sorts of

new ideas are getting afloat. It is evident that whatever is not made of asbestos will have to perish in this world. It will not stand the heat it is getting exposed to. And in saying that, it is but saying in other words that we are in an epoch of anarchy-anarchy plus the constable. There is nobody that picks one's pocket without some policeman being ready to take him up. But in every other thing he is the son, not of Cosmos, but of Chaos. He is a disobedient, and reckless, and altogether a waste kind of object. A commonplace man in these epochs, and the wiser kind of man-the select, of whom I hope you will be part has more and more to see to it, to look forward, and will require to move with double wisdom; and will find, in short, that the crooked things that he has to pull straight in his own life or round about, wherever he may be, are manifold, and will task his strength, wherever he may go." Reminding his young hearers that there was a nobler ambition than the gaining of all the gold in California or the votes on the whole planet, he urged them to attend to their health as the greatest of all temporal blessings, and to stand up to their work whatever it might be-not in sorrows or contradictions to yield-but to push on towards the goal. Delivering with tender earnestness, "a small bit of verse from Goethe-a kind of marching music of mankind," he added, one last word, Wir heissen euch hoffen" (we bid you be of good hope).

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5.-The Emperor Napoleon announces his intention to withdraw the French troops from Mexico.

6.-Among the numerous meetings held during Easter-week, in England, on the subject of Parliamentary Reform, the greatest interest was excited by the gathering in Liverpool, attended as it was by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and several other Cabinet Ministers, and where the pledge was renewed that the Government would stand or fall by their bill. "Having produced this measure, said Mr. Gladstone, "founded in a spirit of moderation, we hope to support it with decision. It is not in our power to secure the passing of the measure; that rests more with you, and more with those whom you represent, and of whom you are a sample, than it does with us. Still we have a great responsibility, and are conscious of it; and we do not intend to flinch from it. (Here the whole audience rose in a body, and cheered for several minutes.) We stake ourselves-we stake our existence as a Government--and we also stake our political character on the adoption of the bill in its main provisions. You have a right to expect from us that we should tell you what we mean, and that the trumpet which it is our business to blow should give forth no uncertain sound. Its sound has not been, and, I trust, will not be, uncertain. We have passed the Rubicon-we have broken the bridge, and

burned the boats behind us. We have advisedly cut off the means of retreat, and having done this, we hope that, as far as time is yet permitted, we have done our duty to the Crown and to the nation."

9.-The Commissioners appointed to inquire on the spot into the origin, nature, and circumstances of the disturbances in Jamaica conclude their report,-finding, "1. That the disturbances in St. Thomas-in-the-East had their immediate origin in a planned resistance to lawful authority. 2. That the causes leading to the determination to offer that resistance were manifold: (a) That a principal object of the disturbers of order was the obtaining of land free from the payment of rent; (b) that an additional incentive to the violation of the law arose from the want of confidence generally felt by the labouring classes in the tribunals before which most of the disputes affecting their interests were carried for adjudication; (c) that some, moreover, were animated by feelings of hostility towards political and personal opponents, while not a few contemplated the attainment of their ends by the death or expulsion of the white inhabitants of the island. 3. That though the original design for the overthrow of constituted authority was confined to a small portion of the parish of St. Thomas-in-the-East, yet that the disorder in fact spread with singular rapidity over an extensive tract of country, and that such was the state of excitement prevailing in other parts of the island that, had more than a momentary success been obtained by the insurgents, their ultimate overthrow would have been attended with a still more fearful loss of life and property. 4. That praise is due to Governor Eyre for the skill, promptitude, and vigour which he manifested during the early stages of the insurrection; to the exercise of which qualities its speedy termination is in a great degree to be attributed. 5. That the military and naval operations appear to us to have been prompt and judicious. 6. That by the continuance of martial law in its full force to the extreme limit of its statutory operaration, the people were deprived for a longer than the necessary period of the great consti. tutional privileges by which the security of life and property is provided for. Lastly, that the punishments inflicted were excessive: (a) that the punishment of death was unnecessarily frequent; (b) that the floggings were reckless, and at Bath positively barbarous; (c) that the burning of 1,000 houses was wanton and cruel. All which we humbly submit to your Majesty's consideration."

11.-Mysterious murder in Cannon-street. The victim, a widow, named Sarah Millson, was housekeeper to, and lived on the premises About of Messrs. Bevington, leather-sellers. nine o'clock at night, when sitting by the fire in company with another servant, the street-bell was heard to ring, and Millson went down to the front, remarking to her neighbour that

she knew who it was. She did not return, although for an hour this did not excite any suspicion, as she was in the habit of holding conversations at the street-door. A little after ten o'clock the other woman-Elizabeth Lowes -went down and found Millson dead at the bottom of the stairs, the blood then flowing profusely from a number of deep wounds in the head. Her shoes had been taken off, and were lying on a table in the hall, and as there was no blood on them it was presumed this was done before the murder. The housekeeper's keys were also found on the stairs. Opening the door to procure assistance, Lowes observed a woman on the doorstep, screening herself apparently from the rain which was falling heavily at the time. She moved off as soon as the door was opened, saying in answer to the request for assistance,--"Oh dear, no; I can't come in!" The gas over the door had been lighted as usual, at eight o'clock, but was now out, although not turned off at the meter. A policeman and surgeon were soon on the premises, and removed the body. The evidence taken by the coroner showed that the instrument of murder had probably been a small crowbar used to wrench open packingcases; one was found near the body unstained with blood, and another was missing from the premises. From documents found in possession of the murdered woman, suspicion was directed towards William Smith, living with his sister at Eton, and who was known to have been employed to recover money said to be due by Millson to an inmate of one of the workhouses. With this clue to begin the inquiry the police succeeded in weaving round Smith a web of circumstantial testimony which led to his being committed for trial.

12.-Debate commenced on the second reading of the Reform Bill. The Chancellor of the Exchequer spoke at some length on the necessity for legislating on the subject, the propriety of proceeding by stages, and defended the working classes from the charges which he said had been brought against them of ignorance, drunkenness, venality, and violence. Mr. Lowe protested against the gross systematic and wilful perversion of his words. He had spoken, he said, entirely of the venality and violence which election committees had shown to prevail in existing constituencies :"No man in the world has been subjected to more abuse than I have been during the last month, and that abuse has been procured by the deliberate misrepresentation of my language. I make my protest in the face of the House against this species of political warfare." Earl Grosvenor moved his amendment, which was seconded by Lord Stanley. Mr. Kinglake, Mr. J. S. Mill, and Sir George Grey were among those who spoke in favour of the Government; and Sir E. B. Lytton, Lord Robert Montague, and General Peel against. 16.-The Emperor of Russia fired at while entering his carriage at St. Petersburg.

The

pistol was turned aside by a workman, who was ennobled for the act.

17. After many stupendous and ingenious efforts to complete the launch of H. M. ironclad vessel the Northumberland, a sufficiency of propelling power was this day put forth, and the huge mass glided safely into the Thames amid the cheers of a great company whom the novelty of the scientific appliances had drawn together.

At the Guildhall Mr. George Peabody distributed the prizes gained by the successful competitors at the Working Classes Industrial Exhibition.

20. Letters from Aden of this date make mention that news had been received from Captain Cameron, dated Magdala, February 26, stating that he and his fellow prisoners had been released from their chains on the previous day, and were about to proceed to Gaffat, to be given up to Mr. Rassam. The letter further reported everything as being friendly, and stated that Messrs. Stern and Rosenthal were not to be subjected to any further trial.

21. In reply to an Austrian proposal to disarm, Prussia replies that she would do so when Austria herself set the example.

Considerable excitement was created today (Saturday), by the Times announcing, in a prominent manner, that the Austrian Ambassador had been withdrawn from Berlin. In the next publication it was intimated that the document on which the statement was based was a forgery, though purporting to have emanated from the Foreign Office with the authority of Lord Clarendon.

25. The Fellowship of Colleges Declaration Bill, brought in by Mr. Bouverie, carried through committee in the Commons by 208 to 186 votes.

26. On this the seventh evening of the debate on the Reform Bill, Mr. Lowe spoke with extraordinary vigour for two hours and a half against the measure, endeavouring to show the false principles upon which it was founded, the avowed coercion which was being brought to bear on the House of Commons, the extensive and powerful tyranny which would be exercised through the bill by trades unions, and the fatal injuries which democracy would inflict upon the English Constitution. Amid the triumphant cheers of a large portion of the House, he devoted considerable time to proving that the principle of Mr. Gladstone's measure, and the idea that, however covertly, lay at the root of all his reasoning, was the fitness of the poorer classes for the franchise, and their indefeasible claim to it as soon as they were fit-and not any conviction that the objects of good government would be materially aided by their admission. He pointed out that every one of Mr. Gladstone's plans went, not towards enfranchising 200,000 men, but towards enfranchising all,

"It

since all were "flesh and blood-fellow-citizens and Christians-and fathers of families." seems to me," he said, "that we have more reason every day we live to regret the loss of Lord Palmerston. By way of a mortuary contribution, it seems to me that the remaining members of his Cabinet laid in his grave all their moderation, all their prudence, and all their statesmanship. The Government have performed an immense exploit. They have carried the great mass of their party-men of moderate opinions and views-they have carried them over from their own views and laid them at the feet of the member for Birmingham. They are brought into contact now with men and principles from which six months ago they would have recoiled. (No, and Opposition cheers.) That is what has happened to part of them. The rest of us are left like sheep in the wilderness. And after the success of this extraordinary combinationfor I can give it no other name-we, who remain where we were, are charged with being conspirators and traitors. We are told that we are bound by every tie to support Lord Russell. I dispute that. I never served under him. I have served, unfortunately, for a little less than ten years under two Prime Ministers, one being Lord Aberdeen, and the other, Lord Palmerston. Both these Governments Lord Russell joined; both these Governments he abandoned; and both these Governments he assisted to destroy. I owe him no allegiance. I am not afraid of the people of this country; they have shown remarkable good sense, remarkable indeed in contrast with the harangues that have been addressed to them. Nor am I afraid of those who lead them; and here I differ from my right honourable and gallant friend the member for Huntingdon. Demagogues are the commonplaces of history; they are found everywhere where there is popular commotion. They have all a family likeness. Their names float lightly on the stream of time; they finally contrive to be handed down somehow, but they are as little to be regarded for themselves as the foam which rides on the top of the stormy wave, and bespatters the rock it cannot shake; but what I do fear, what fills me with the gloomiest misgivings, is when I see a number of gentlemen of rank, property and intelligence, carried away without even being convinced, or even over-persuaded, to support a policy which many of them in their hearts detest and abhor. Monarchies exist by loyalty, aristocracies by honour, popular assemblies by political virtue. When these things begin to fail, it is in their loss, and not in comets, eclipses, and earthquakes, that we are to look for the portents that herald the fall of states." Though he could not agree with the Chancellor of the Exchequer, there was, happily, one common ground left them— the Second Æneid. "My right honourable friend returned again to the poor old Trojan horse. I will add one more to the excerpt from the story of that noble animal, after which

'Arduus armatos mediis in manibus adstans Fundit equus, victorque Sinon incendia miscet Insultans, portis alii bipatentibus adsunt, Millia quot magnis nunquam venère Mycenis.' (The fatal horse pours forth the human tide, Insulting Sinon flings his firebrands wide: The gates are burnt; the ancient rampart falls; And swarming myriads climb its crumbling walls.") I have now, Sir, traced as well as I could what I believe would be the natural result of a measure which seems to my poor imagination destined to absorb and destroy one after the other those institutions which have made England what she has hitherto been, and what I believe no other country ever was, or ever will be. Surely the heroic work of so many centuries, the matchless achievements of so many wise heads and strong hands, deserve a nobler consummation than to be sacrificed to revolutionary passion, or to the maudlin enthusiasm of humanity. But if we do fall, we shall fall deservedly. Unconstrained by any external force, not beaten down by any intestine calamity: in the plethora of wealth and the surfeit of our too exuberant prosperity, we are about, with our own rash and unconstrained hands, to pluck down on our own heads the venerable temple of our own liberty and our law. History may record other catastrophes as signal and as disastrous, but none more wanton and more disgraceful."

27.-Fire at the West India Docks, Poplar, destroying one of the new warehouses and about 14,000 bales of jute stored therein.

Conclusion of the debate on the second reading of the Reform Bill. Besides the division itself, the main feature of this the eighth and last night's discussion of the measure were the speeches of Viscount Cranborne and Mr. Disraeli, and the closing reply of the Chancellor of the Exchequer. The leader of the Opposition spoke for nearly three hours, insisting that it was impossible to fathom the effects of this Franchise Bill till the complete scheme was before them; defending Conservatives from the charges now brought against them of dealing unfairly with this and other questions; and laying down such principles as he thought ought to be kept in view in framing a Reform Bill. "These principles," he said, "are English and not American principles. It ought to proceed upon the principle that we are the House of Commons, and not the House of the people; and that we represent a great political order of the State, and not an indiscriminate multitude. And in estimating what share the working classes should possess in the power of the State-a share which I do not at all begrudge them - we ought to act and to form that estimate according to the spirit of the English Constitution."-Mr. Gladstone spoke in his

mons, he asked, Does my right honourable friend not recollect that, in one of his plays, Aristophanes conveys, through the medium of some character or other, a rebuke to some prevailing tendency or sentiment of the time -I cannot recollect now what it was-it is. too long ago since I read it--but that character, addressing the audience, says-‘But now, my good Athenians, pray recollect I am not speaking of the city; I am not speaking of the public, I am only speaking of certain depraved and crooked little men.' (Laughter.) And if I may be permitted to make a metaphorical application of these epithets--doing so only metaphorically, purely in a political sense, and solely with reference to this question of Reform, I would say it was not of the House of Commons, but of certain depraved and crooked little men,' that I used these words; and I frankly own now in candour my right hon. friend is first and foremost among them. Had I been Earl Russell-(cheers)— there might have been some temptation to go to excess in the exercise of authority, and to apply a pressure to this House in itself unjustifiable. But I am not Earl Russell. The right hon. gentleman, secure in the recollection of his own consistency, has taunted me with the errors of my boyhood. The right hon. gentleman, when he addressed the hon. member for Westminster, showed his magnanimity by declaring that he would not take the philosopher to task for what he wrote twenty-five years ago; but when he caught one who thirty-six years ago, just emerged from boyhood, and still an undergraduate at Oxford, had expressed an opinion adverse to the Reform Bill of 1832, of which he had so long and bitterly repented, then the right hon. gentleman could not resist the temptation. He, a parliamentary leader of twenty years' standing, is so ignorant of the House of Commons that he positively thought that he got a parliamentary advantage in exhibiting me to the public as an opponent of the Reform Bill of 1832. (Cheers.) As the right hon. gentleman has exhibited me, let me exhibit myself. It is true, I deeply regret it, but I was bred under the shadow of the great name of Canning; every influence connected with that name governed the politics of my childhood and my youth; with Canning I rejoiced in the removal of religious disabilities, and in the character which he gave to our policy abroad; with Canning I rejoiced in the opening he made towards the establishment of free commercial interchanges between nations; with Canning, and under the shadow of that great name, and under the shadow of that yet more venerable name of Burke, I grant, my youthful mind and imagination were impressed just the same as the mature mind of the right hon. gentleman is now impressed. I had conceived that fear and alarm of the first Reform Bill in the days of my undergraduate career at Oxford

which the right hon. gentleman now feels; and the only difference between us is this-I thank him for bringing it out-that, having those views, I moved the Oxford Union Debating Society to express them clearly, plainly, forcibly, in downright English, and that the right hon. gentleman is still obliged to skulk under the cover of the amendment of the noble Lord. I envy him not one particle of the polemical advantage which he has gained by his discreet reference to the proceedings of the Oxford Union Debating Society. My position in regard to the Liberal party is in all points the opposite of Earl Russell's. Earl Russell might have been misled possibly, had he been in this place, into using language which would have been unfit coming from another person. But it could not be the same with me-I am too well aware of the relations which subsist between us. I have none of the claims he possesses. I came among you an outcast from those with whom I associated, driven from them by the slow and resistless force of conviction. I came among you, to make use of the legal phraseology, in formâ pauperis. I had nothing to offer you but faithful and honourable service. You received me with kindness, indulgence, generosity, and I may even say with some measure of confidence-and the relation between us is this that you never can be my debtors, but that I must for ever be in your debt. It is not from me, under such circumstances, that any word will proceed that can savour of the character which the right hon. gentleman imputes to me." Mr. Gladstone closed the debate with the renewed assurance that the Government would stand or fall by the bill. "We stand with it now," he said, 66 we may

fall with it a short time hence, and if we do we shall rise with it hereafter. I shall not attempt to measure with precision the forces that are to be arrayed in the coming struggle. Perhaps the great division of to-night is not the last that must take place in the struggle. You may possibly succeed at some point of the contest. You may drive us from our seats. You may bury the bill that we have introduced, but for its epitaph we will write upon its gravestone this line, with certain confidence in its fulfil

ment

'Exoriare aliquis nostris ex ossibus ultor.'

You cannot fight against the future. Time is on our side. The great social forces which move on in their might and majesty, and which the tumult of our debates does not for a moment impede or disturb — those great social forces are against you; they are marshalled on our side, and the banner which we now carry, though perhaps at this moment it may droop over our sinking heads, yet it soon again will float in the eye of heaven, and it will be borne by the firm hands of the united people of the three kingdoms, perhaps not to an easy, but to a certain and to a not distant victory." (The right hon. gentleman resumed