12 FEBRUARY 1848, Page 8

Artiscellantous.

The death of the venerable Archbishop of Canterbury, expected for some days past, took place at a quarter past two o'clock resterity wail; I The Archbishop had been attacked by influenza about eight ' and had never quite rallied. He wise to NB pi.iascaR' nearly to his last hour. His wife, and his daughter, Mrs. W. Kingsm4 were with him through his sickness, and were present at his death. William Howley, the only son of the Reverend William Howley, D.D., Vicar of Bishop's Tatton and Ropley, Rants, was born on the 12th February 1765. Re was educated at Winchester School, and at Oxford; and became tutor at the Uni- versity to the Prince of Orange, now King of Holland. He was appointed Re- gius Professor of Divinity at his University in 1809; Bishop of London in 1813 in succession to Dr. John Randolph; and in 1828 the Duke of Wellington elevateij him to the Primacy of all England, in succession to Dr. Manners Sutton. Ile had been a Member of Privy Council since 1813. Dr. Howley was much beloved for his amiable nature and respected for his piety; he never rendered himself remarkable by great attainments; interfered in political affairs least of all the Bishops; and seldom addressed the House of Lords at any length. He opposed Catholic Emancipation, the Reform Bill, and the Go- vernment Education measure introduced by Lord Melbourne in 1839.

At Lambeth he has rebuilt the greater portion of the ancient palace, restored the beautiful chapel, and enriched the valuable library. Be was a munificent benefactor to the various religions and charitable institutions.

A meeting of "the Country party "took place at Lord Stanley's on Mon- day, to receive the resignation of Lord George Bentinck as leader of that party in the House of Commons. Lord Stanley stated, that Lord George, differing as he did from so large a proportion of his party on such vital questions as those which had recently occupied Parliament—namely, the questions of removing Jewish disabilities, and of making still farther con- cessions to the Roman Catholics—felt that the efficiency of the party would be materially increased by his retirement. Lord George, however, had promised still to give his most active and vigorous support to the future leader of the party in the House of Commons, whoever might be appointed to the post. Lord Stanley alluded in flattering terms to the past exertions of Lord George; and in receiving his resignation the meeting expressed gratitude for those exertions. A second meeting of the Country party was held on Wednesday, at the house of Mr. Bankes; when the Marquis of Granby (Lord John Manners's brother) was elected to the post vacated by Lord George Bentinck.

The following letter of Sir John Burgoyne has appeared in the Oxford Chronicle— "54, Pall Mall, London, Feb. 2,5845..

" Sir—I beg to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of 22d January, re- specting our state of national defence. I regret to read the tone of censure you adopt with regard to the opinion of the Duke of Wellington; who, to say the least of it, is as likely to be correct in his judgment as most men. It is manifestly out of the question to think of providing for the security of the country by the con- stant maintenance of an adequate army; and the desideratum is, what would be the least expensive and least inconvenient manner of rendering a sufficient number of our population competent to the object, whenever the emergency shall arise to render their services necessary. Whether your proposition is the best for the purpose, I am not prepared to investigate. The first consideration, however, with regard to any system, must be, that it should be thoroughly effective; and the second, to carry it out at the least possible cost. "Sir, your obedient servant, J. F. BURGOYNE. "Joe. Caudwell, Esq."

Mr. Aglionby on Monday obtained, in the House of Commons, an order on his notice of motion for a return of the salariee of the several Masters in Chancery, and their title to "any and what retiring pensions." The return when made, it is understood, will be the fulcrum for a further notice of motion respecting the disabilities of certain of the Masters disqualified by age and infirmities. Mr. Aglionby also obtained, the same evening, an important order for reference to the Commons Committee on the Fees of Courts of Law and Equity of all petitions which have been presented praying for inquiry into the scandalous compensations of the late Six Clerks and their staff. It is understood that this Committee is now resolved to probe and expose the fraud of these iniquitous oompensations, and to require all the documents on the false data of which the compensated gentlemen obtained the enormous allowances which now encumber the suitors' fund. It is impossible that the Masters' Offices can much longer remain in their present state of inefficiency and non-reform; and the compensations awarded to the old - Masters and the Six Clerks must undergo inquiry and revision.—Mornina Chronicle.

A Cabinet Council was held at the Foreign Office on Wednesday.

We understand, that Vice-Admiral the Earl of Dandonald, G.C.B., the newly- appointed Commander-in-chief to the West India station, has applied to the Lords of the Treasury for his arrears of half-pay, which were impounded during the period his Lordship's name was not on the Navy List—United Service Gazette.

The Marquis of Donegal succeeds Lord Falkland as Captain of the Yeomen of the Guard.

Major-General W. Napier, the historian of the Peninsular war, is to succeed to the Colonelcy of the Twenty-seventh Regiment, vice Sir John Maclean, de- ceased.

Mr. R. Dillon Browne, M.P., is appointed to succeed Sir Emerson Tennent as Colonial Secretary at Ceylon.—Limemck Chronicle.

Mr. C. W. Cope, A.R.A., and Mr. William Dyce, A.R.A., were elected members of the Royal Academy of Arts, on Thursday.

Sir Henry Rowley Bishop, Mu. Bar., has been appointed to succeed the late Dr. Crotch in the Professorship of Music in Oxford University.

General Flores, who came before the public last year in connexion with the Spanish expedition to the Ecuador, has arrived in England from Cuba.

It is reported that the actual subscriptions for Mr. Cobden's services as Anti- Corn-law agitator, nominally between 70,0001- and 80,0001., do not exceed 40,0001. Several of the roaring patriots at Manchester find it convenient to repudiate their promises to pay; and it is stated that, during the panic, nearly 20,0001. of the tend was advanced, after much earnest entreaty, to support the mercantile CS,- tablishment of Messrs. Cobden, calico-printers.—Berioick and Kelso Warder.

Our Paris correspondent informs us that the Dutchess of Montpensier is en- ceinte. The announcement has not been made officially, but the information comes from quarters which leave no room for doubt as to the fact.—Morning Chronicle.

M. Museums, the late Turkish Ambassador at Athens, has fallen from horseback and broken two of his ribs. As the Porte declines to make any. atm/Gad, in.aaa- tiovernment, of the "new Christian M. Greece till M Mumtaz has been formally received at....thlent. ,are...aearetareilnigiedous sect, was received by the heads of the new relations of the count.ry .7calgleburg, on the 25th of January. The Government had made The official Comiz;in the statutes submitted to it for its approbation. On the 6th eKet'; instant, this new Congregation, which counts 11,000 members, will hold a general meeting for the election of twelve Pastors.

A statistical account of the population of Italy, up to the end of last year,

ves the following numbers-the Two Sicilies, 8,566,900; Piedmont and Sa 4.,879,000; Roman States, 2,877,000; Tuscany and Lucca, 1,701,700; Monaco, 7,580; San Marino, 7,950; Modena, 483,000; Parma and Placentia, 477,000; venetian Lombardy, 4,759,000; Italian Tyrol, 522,608; Istria, 485,000; total, 24,567,238- frk 1839 the price of steam- engines in France was from 1,000 francs to 1,800 francs (461. to 701.) per horse power, for stationary engines; and from 2,000 to 2,400 francs for engines for steam-vessels. In 1847, the price of the former was from 700 to 1,200 francs, and of the latter from 1,300 to 1,400. In 1839, the .orme of locomotives was 300 francs the 2 hundredweight; the price in 1847 is 55 franca. In 1839, the French workshops produced only 20 to 25 locomotives per annum; in 1847, the:railways can obtain 300 to 400 locomotives from the workshops of Paris, Rouen, Creuzot, Mulhausen, and Arras.-Patent Journal.

The Count Mortier has been declared, by the physicians appointed to report on his case, a dangerous lunatic. One of his delusions is, that M. Gaizot wishes to deprive him of his skin, and of air; and he recognizes amongst his physicians an emissary of the Minister.

An alarming case of hallucination came to light at Stuttgardt on the let in- stant. "A young man, about twenty-two years of age, named Augustus Kest, who is a clerk in a register office for mortgages at Ruchenberg, went to the officer on duty at the Palace, and, with tears in Ins eyes' informed him that he had an irresistible impulse to assassinate the Prince Royal. He was of coarse at once secured and searched. Upon him was found a pair of double-barrelled pistols, each barrel having a heavy charge of small shot of different sizes. On being afterwards interrogated, he gave as the principal source of his murderous idea a long residence he had made in a small town near the frontier of Baden, in which, to use his own words, there were a great many revolutionary heads. A com- mittee of physicians has been appointed to ascertain the real state of the mind of Kest."

Mr. Barry reports, that there are at present 1,399 men engaged upon the works of the New Palace.' of which number 776 are employed at the building, 120 at the quarries, 335 at the Government works at Thames Bank, upon the joiners' works and wood-carvings, and 168 upon miqm-llaneous works both at the build- ing and elsewhere.

In the Established Presbytery, the other day, it was stated that a legacy of 50,0001. had been left to the town of Dundee for educational purposes.-Glasgow Courier.

A Parliamentary return, just issued, shows the number of registered electors in Great Britain for 1846, and their various qualifications. In England, the total for counties was 475,036; cities and boroughs, 342,342: in Wales, for counties, 37,340; cities and boroughs, 11,205: in Scotland, counties, 48,953; cities and boroughs, 29,597. The gross total in the return is 944,473: but the actual number of electors is somewhat greater, as there was no return of the state of the register from several places.

About eleven °Week on Saturday sennight, the public clocks of Edinburgh, according to previous arrangement, were advanced from local to Greenwich time -a difference of twelve minutes and a half. - The change to Greenwich time has been also adopted in Glasgow, Greenock, Stirling, Perth' &c.; and we have no doubt will be so in all the principal towns in the United Kingdom.-Edinburgh Advertiser. The Americans have invented a "railroad sprinkler" for laying the dust on the passage of a train. It has been tried on the Stonington Railway, with com- plete success, being considered useful inesveral ways. For about foaty-eight miles of rail two thousand gallons of water afe required; which is carried behind the tank that supplies the envie, and the driver has the control of the valve through which the water flows. This plan produces great comfort to the passengers, as the windows can be left open in warm dry weather without the annoyance of dust.

Li the Perth Court of Justiciary, six persons of respectable station in life have been tried for destroying a testamentary deed. Four sisters-two of them single, named Duffus, of Enchtbank, the other two married to Rattray of Coralbank and Pringle of Grapnel:int-had life interests under a deed of trust-disposition and settlement executed by their uncle, William Hutchinson, writer in Forfar, in pro- perty worth 1,0001. a year. The children of the sisters were named to succeed their mothers after their death. On the death of Mr. Hutchinson, the nieces and their husbands, in concert, burned the deed, with the object of defeating the in- terests of the children; and they informed the trustees under the deed of the act. The accused, who had been out on bail, pleaded "guilty" at the trial; al- leged ignorance of wrong in what they had done; and gave proofs of their moral- ity and respectability of charaeter. The Court sentenced the whole six to im- prisonment for four months.

Mr. Dubois lately determined, in his Court at Bloomsbury, that newspapers cannot be lent on hire. The Daily News objects-" This decision, we learn, from a competent legal authority, is erroneous. There is no law against lending newspapers for hire. There was formerly an act (29 Geo. III. c. 50, 1798) which prohibited it under a penalty of Si.; but that act was repealed by the _present Newspaper Act, 5 and 6 WiL IV. c. 76, and the provision has not been reenacted. Indeed, for many years previously to the repeal, the enactment bad, so far as the Stamp-office was concerned, become a dead letter; it having been ascertained that the practice of letting out newspapers tended to promote the sale of them."

Many complaints have been made in the country, of late, respecting the non- delivery of newspapers which have been posted in London; some people are con- stantly defrauded of their property in this way. The Times recommends that the Post-office employes should be searched on leaving the office.

A large extent of the Customhouse Quay at Glasgow has been forced down by the pressure of a vast quantity of ice which had descended the Clyde on the breaking up of frost. The damage is estimated at several thousands.

The cargo of coals of the barque Henry took fire spontaneously on the voyage to Bombay. The ship was driven by winds out of her course, and the crew con- tended with the hidden fire night and day for thirty-one days -throwing in and pumping out several hundred tons of water. At last, on milking the Cape of Good Hope, it Was found that half the cargo was consumed, and the bottom of the ship all but burnt through.

A man in his hundred-and-fourth year has been fined at Salford for having been found drunk: the hoary toper is said to be an oat-pensioner of Chelsea Hospital.

A servant girl at Birmingham was suffocated, a few days since, by a piece of tripe an inch and three quarters square, which she endeavoured to swallow while carrying down stairs the remains of a lodger's supper.

A young lady of Manchester has "taken the bull by the horns" in good ear- nest. A number of oxen strayed without a driver; one of them ran at a lady who was passing along by a dead wall; the lady caught hold of the animal's horns, i

and was lifted high n the air, but set down again unharmed. The bull then prepared to pin her against the wall; but, with great presence of mind, she threw herself on the ground close to the wall; which saved her from being gored: and she was soon observed and rescued.

Mr. John Bull, who was clerk to Messrs. Spurling, City stockbrokers, till he had nearly attained his rindredth year, died recently, from influenza, at the great age of a hundred year and seven months. A correspondent of the Morning Post says that Mr. Ball was one of the mutineers of the Nom, having been a Privy Councillor' and filled many offices both of duty and honorary distinction. sentry on board Admiral Parker's ship.

The Quarterly Report on Mortality, just issued by the Registrar-General, is a very interesting document; giving many important statistical facts in a compendious form, and presenting some theoretical opinions on the sub- ject of infection in their newest aspect. We extract some of the more interesting parts of the report. "57,925 deaths were registered in the last quarter. The average number of deaths deduced from the returns of the corresponding quarter of nine preceding years, and corrected for increase of population, is 46,549. There is consequently an excess of 11,376 deaths in the quarter. The deaths registered in the Decem- ber quarters of 1845, 1846, and 1847, are 39,291, 53,093, 57,925; the mortality in the first is to that of the last quarter nearly as two to three. The mortality was below the average in the autumn quarters of the five years 1841-5, and above the average in the five years 1838-40, 1846-7. "Scurvy prevailed in the beginning of the year; but in the summer the public health appeared to be slightly improved. Epidemics of typhus and influenza, how- ever, set in, and made the mortality in the last quarter of 1847 higher than in any quarter of any year since the new system of registration commenced.

" 'The deaths in the year 1845 were 166,000; in 1847, 215,000. The excess in 1847 is 49,000, or not less than 35,000 over the corrected average of 1889-45. The districts from which the quarterly table is made up have hitherto returned less than half the deaths in England; but it is not .probable that the country dis- tricts have suffered to the same extent as most of those in the return.

'In London, the deaths registered in the quarters ending December 1845- 6-7, were 11,838, 13,221, and 18,533 (thirteen weeks). The greatest number registered in any quarterof the nine previous years was 14,686, in the severe winter of 1845."

The approach of the influenza is described. "The wind had generally been blowing S.S.W. and S.W., since the first week of October; the weather was unusually warm; a brilliant aurora was observed, and shook the magnets on Oc- tober 24; it appeared eight times during the quarter; on Tuesday, November 16, there was a remarkable darkness; the wind changed to NW., and amidst the various changes still blew from the North over Greenwich at the rate of 160 and 250 miles a day. The mean temperature of the air suddenly fell from 11° above to 100 below the average; on Monday it was 54°, Friday 32°; the air on Friday night was 27°; the earth was frozen; the wind was calm three days, and on Sa- turday evening a dense fog lay over the Thames and London for the space of five hours. No electricity stirred in the air during the week. All was still, as if Nature held her breath at the sight of the destroyer come forth to sacrifice her children. On Sunday the sky was overcast, the air damp, the wind changed in night to S. by E., and passed for four days over Greenwich at the rate of 200 and 300 miles daily; the temperature suddenly rose, and remained from 2° to 9° above the average through the week ending November 27." Influenza was now epidemic: "11,339 persons died in six weeks, and altogether the epidemic car- ried off more than 5,000 souls over and above the mortality of the season. The epidemic attained the greatest intensity in the second week of its course; raged with nearly equal violence throughout the third week; declined in the fourth, and then partly subsided; but the temperature falling, the mortality remained high, not only through December, but through the month of January. The epi- demic was most fatal to adults and to the aged." "The epidemic of influenza killed twice as many people in the insalubrious Rafts of London as it did in those less unhealthy; its fatality in Lewisham and St. George-in-the-East was, as we have seen, one to four. . " Our knowledge of the progress of the epidemic in other countries is necessarily imperfect, as no weekly tables are yet published in any of the great Continental cities. We learn, however, from the medical and other journals, that the grippe, which had prevailed for a week, was at its height in Paris about December 4, when one- fourth or one-half of the population was laid up. ('Un quart si non la moitie de la population eat couchee.'-Gazette Medico:6.) It is stated that 50,000 of the in of Madrid were in bed, suffering from influenza, on January 11. The epidemic still prevailed on the 19th, and was exceedingly fatal. London was pro- bably attacked a few days before Paris; Madrid a month later. In the former epidemic (1782) influenza attacked London at the end of May, France in Jane, Italy in July, and Spain in August. It travels faster now."

"Dr. Laval, a member of the Council of Health at Constantinople, states that influenza broke out in that city towards the end of August 1847, and prevailed, though not to a very great extent, for a month or six weeks. A slight epidemic of cholera broke oat in October, and still reigns in Constantinople. Respecting the influenza epidemic in Germany, Russia, and Italy, no authentic information has come to hand. "The English physicians of the eighteenth century agreed in pronouncing in- fluenza contagious. By this they did not mean that it was propagated by con- tact, but that it was introduced into cities, institutions, and houses in England, by persons actually affected by the disease. This notion is, however, too exclu- awe; the word contagion' applied to influenza or cholera is apt to mislead, and to have practically a bad effect." The matter of infection appears to be material; but it is more or less diffusible, in some instances highly so.

Number of Winter

dentin. average.

Zymotle Diseases 394 .. . 184 Dropsy Cancer and other diseases of uncertain or variable seat 4$ .... 59

Tubercular Diseases 219 .... 199

Mamma of the Brain, Spinal Marrow, Nerves, and Senses 156 ... 135 Diseases of the Heart and Blood-vessels . 60 .... 39 Diseases of the Lungs, and of the other Organs of Respiration 362 .... 225 Diseases of the Stomach, Liver, and other Organs of Digestion 72 .... 62

Diseases of the Kidneys, &c •

Childbirth, diseases of the Uterus, &c. 10 .... 13

Rheumatism, diseases of the Bones, Joints, 84c. 8

Diseases of the Skin, Cellular Tissue, Sc. 1 Malformations 4 .... 15 Premature Birth Si . .. 28 Atrophy 3

Old Age n .... 79

Sudden Violence, Privation, Cold, and Intemperance 29 .... 31 -

Total (including unspecified causes) 1479 1107 The temperature of the thermometer ranged from 56.70 in the sun to 28.0° in the shade; the mean temperature by day being warmer than the average mean temperature by 3.4°. The general direction of the wind for the week IVES South- Results of the Registrar-General's return of mortality in the Metropolis for the week ending on Saturday last-