SCOTLAND.
The Free Church Presbytery of Edinburgh recently addressed a me- morial to the East India Company praying that greater facilities might be given for the spread of Christianity in India. The Court of Directors in reply decline to discuss the question ; but they assure the me- morialists that they have "never failed to take such measures as have seemed to them requisite for securing the means and opportunities of reli- gious teaching for such of their servants as profess the Christian religion. As regards the efforts of missionaries for the conversion of the Natives to Christianity, free scope has been afforded to their labours, and the Court are not aware that any hinderances capable of removal by Govern- ment exist in the way of the reception of the gospel by those of the Na- tives who come under the teaching of the missionaries."
A fearful tragedy has occurred at Lerwick—a merchant has killed his wife, three of his children, and himself. Mr. Peter Williamson carried on a good business at Lerwick, where he was agent for the Peterhead whalers. Early on the morning of the 1st, Mr. Williamson arose, and while his wife was lying in bed asleep, beat her on the bead with a heavy iron hammer or cleaver ; she managed to get out of best; when her husband cut her throat with a razor. He next attacked his little girl, who had been sleeping with • the mother—crushed her head and cut her throat. The murderer then went up-stairs to the room where three more of his children slept—his fifth child was, happily, away from home. The eldest boy, a lad of sixteen, was much cut about the head, but he managed to escape alive to the room of the servant. Williamson then killed an infant. A 'boy of fourteen had wretched man lay down on the floor, steadied his neck by the chin against the leg of a table, and his arm on the rail of a chair, and fatally gashed his own throat. When the cries of the servant brought aid, Mrs. William- son was yet alive, but dying.
Mr. Williamson's motive is a mystery—probably he acted entirely from an insane impulse. An alteration in his manner had been observed of late. He had lost a very intimate friend. He had drunk a good deal, but was known to have become more abstemious recently. On the evening before the murder, he had conversed with two commercial travellers : he would persist in talking about Cakraft the hangman and several noted murderers. He was inquisi- tive as to the surest method of taking away life ; he himself thought "a sound stroke from a hammer on the skull" of the intended victim was the best way. His companions tried in vain to change the subject, which they felt to be unpleasant. Another circumstance points to considerable pre- meditation—the cleaver had twice been missed from the kitchen, the second time a day or two before the murders.
Adam Commelin, a boy of ten, while in prison at Dumfries a second time for theft, has hanged himself by a handkerchief to an iron bar in his cell. It is supposed that he merely intended to sham suicide in order that he might be removed from a solitary cell—the stool he stood on slipped, and he was found dead.
Donibristle House, Fifeshire, the ancient mansion of the Earl of Moray, situated on the Firth of Forth, on the bank opposite to Edinburgh, was burnt down on Tuesday. None of the family were residing in it at the time. An engine was sent by steamer from Edinburgh, but arrived too late to be of service. A large portion of the fine gallery of family and his- torical portraits was saved, and the contents of the library. There was an insurance for 18,000/. on the house and contents.
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