18 APRIL 1835, Page 6

Sir Michael Shaw Stewart WKS the only professed Liberal at

a grand dinner given by Sir Robert Peel on Saturday last.

The Jupiter frigate now fitting out at Sheerness for the conveyance of the new Governor- to Calcutta, will be ready for the recep- tion of his Lordship and suite by Tuesday next. Lord Heytesbury has appointed Lieutenant-Colonel Bowles to be his military secretary ; which officer, with General Sir Henry Fane and Captain Fame, will take his passage in the Jupiter.— Times. Will Lord Heytesbury think it pru- dent to go to India? It is not impossible that he may be met on his arrival at Calcutta by a despatch cancelling his appointment.]

Our new Special Envoy to Persia, Sir Henry Ellis, will leave Eng- land about the end of this month for Trebisond, a port on the Black Sea ; from thence the embassy will proceed by land to Ispahan.

Lord Lowther, the Marquis of Bute, Sir Thomas Hardy, Mr. G. Robinson, Mr. Aaron Chapman, Mr. Octavius Wigram, and Captain Beaufort, have been appointed Commissioners to inquire into the laws and regulations relative to Pilotage.

The King has been pleased to grant to the Reverend Henry Hart Mlltuan, M.A. the place and dignity of a Prebendary of the Colle. gate Church Of St. Peter, Westminster, void by the death of the .Reverend Evelyn Levett Sutton.—London Gazette. [How is this ? It was stated that the Westminster Prebendal Stall was given up to the Eceesiastical Commission, the income to be devoted to the increase of poor livings.] The Standard says that the only pensions granted by Sir Robert Peel during his Administration, excepting one of 100/. per annum to the widow of Mr. Temple, late Governor of Sierra Leone, are the following— Professor Airey

.f.:100

James Montgomery ..... £150 Mr. Southey

300 Sharon Turner 200 Mrs. Somerville 200

The Duke and Dutchess of Bedford intended to have left town on Wednesday for Devonshire ; but a sudden attack of illness having seized his Grace,alic journey:is given up. The disease is a rheumatic affection in the head.

Sir Robert Peel was on a visit to Lord Francis Egerton at Oatlands on Wednesday, when he received a private communication from the King. Sir Robert returned to town the next morning.

Earl Grey was stated in the Tory papers to have left town on Wed- nesday; but he only went as far as Kensington Palace, to dine with the Duke of Sussex, and returned to his residence in Berkeley Square. It is probable that he will spend the Easter holydays with the Duke of Bedford, at Woburn Abbey.

The Marquis of Hertford is arrived at his town residence, accom-

c=d by his ward, Miss Louisa Straehan. It is anticipated that his Lordship will, after Easter, enliven the town by a brilliant fete at his villa in the Regent's Park. The Marquis gave his first grand dinner on Thursday at Dorchester House.

The answer which Mr. O'Connell gave, in St. James's Street, to a gentleman well-known in the fashionable world, is much talked of in certain circles. " Praywhat office are you to have, Mr. O'Connell, in the new Administration ? " "The privilege, Sir, I hope, of walk- ing the streets without being asked such impertinent questions. You will see me cross over to the Treasury side of the House, with sixty Irish Members ; and we shall take our places behind the Ministers without having made any stipulation whatever, solely because we believe them disposed to do justice to our country."— Courier.

At St. George's Church, Bloomsbury, on Sunday last, Bishop Maltby preached a sermon in favour of the Radical University in the presence of the Ex. Chancellor (Brougham). This eccentric gentleman attracted great notice on account of the singularity of his attire—a frock coat of the fashionable colour, a light Adelaide brown, a brilliant em- broidered velvet vest, and trousers of Scotch plaid, very broad pattern ; a black silk stock, too small for his neck; a massive gold chain, crossing from one pocket to the other. —Morning Post.

Lord Brougham is freally a liberal man. Out of all the tartan he bought at Inverness, he is not satisfied with having trousers made for himself, but has, it is said, made presents of it to several of his political

friends. On the first day of Easter Term, Mr. Baron Williams made his appearance in a remarkably smart green and black tartan waistcoat, sobered down, for the sake of judicial gravity, we suppose, by a frock coat of bright blue. This beats Lord Brougham's own costume, on Sunday last, when he went to hear a sermon by his friend Bishop Maltby, and we suppose this style is to become official under the new regime.—Albion. The present Lord Ribblesdale, eldest son of the noble bride of Lord John Russell, is in his eighth year only, and is the youngest Peer of the realm.

Count Matuszevic, the late Russian special Minister here, will not return again to this country, as he contemplated when he departed ; he having been appointed by the Emperor to the Diplomacy at Naples, in the place of Count de Stackelberg.—Herald. The Worcester Election Committee have declared Ms. Bailey duty elected, and that Colonel Davies's petition was neither frivolous ncgr vexatious. The question which turned the scale against Colonel Davies,, was the decision of the Committee in favour of nou-resident freemen; which was similar to the decision come to by the Rochester Committee on the same subject—the grounds being the same—namely, their names being on the registry and not objected to.

The expenses attending the trying the merits of this petition amounted, it is said, to not less than 4001. a dayduring the sitting of the Committee. Nearly one hundred witnesses attended horn the country, whose maintenance and lodging, together with the fees to banisters and other expenses, were very considerable.

An address from eleven hundred solicitors in London was presented to Sir Robert Peel on Monday. The subscribers to it expressed their admiration of the late Premier's political conduct, and their hopes that he would soon be again in office.

The Bishop of London, at the last audit dinner of the Dean and Chapter of St. Paul's, expressed to one of the Canons present that he was "considering whether he should not order his Secretary to send a letter of interdiction to one of the Prebendaries (with whom he has had a very pretty quarrel,' but out of which his Lordship has come with as much success us when he entered on his Watford campaign) front preaching in his own cathedral." Now, as the Prebendary against whom his Lordship's fulminations are about to be directed, holds his appoint- ment from the same source that Bishop Blomfield holds his (from the Crown), the report is much strengthened, which has some time been prevalent, that his Lordship is about, with or without the sanction of Parliament, to institpte a new office in the Church, which will super- sede the rights under appointments from the Crown—that of Grand Inhibitor in these Protestant realms, similar to that of Grand Inqui- sitor in Catholic countries. The Prebendary menaced has, we under- stand (when his diocesan has quite made up his mind to instruct his Secretary to write the awful prohibition), given directions that the letter may be addressed to his Proctor—Morning Chronicle.

In one of his letters Swift has the following passage—I use the Ministry like dogs, because I expect they will use me so. I never knew a Ministry do any thing for those whom they made companions of their pleasures.

It is understood that Sir Robert Peel very reluctantly yielded to the solicitations of Mr. Baring to recommend his elevation to the Peerage. On this being mentioned to a gentleman well-known for his punning propensities, be answered, "Ay, this is not the first.time that the title of Ashburton has been got by Dunning."

A well-known Member of Parliament, who represents the largest agricultural constituency in the Emerald Isle, has backed himself for a considerable sum to hop on the same foot two hundred and fity feet in thirty successive hops, being equal to 84 feet each hop. The feat is to be attempted in the course of next week, and is considered an extra- ordinary sporting undertaking.—Post. Sir George Smart has left town for Cambridge, to make arrange- ments for a grand musical festival to he held there next month, on the occasion of the installation of the Marquis Camden as Chancellor.

The number of persons charged at the London Police-offices with drunkenness in 1834, is one-third less than in 1833; the total in 1833 being 29,880, in 1834 19,779. Among the points to which the inquiries of the Committee of Lords on Prison Discipline have been prominently directed in examining the witnesses from the Middlesex House of Correction and the West- minster Bridewell, has been the practical working of the "silent system" recently introduced. This system consists in compelling the prisoners to maintain a profound silence while performing their labours on the rotary wheel of the mill. Neither laugh nor joke may pass, on pain of solitary imprisonment and partial stoppage of provisions. With a view to improving the discipline of the gaol, the Visiting Magistrates sent Mr. Chesterton, its Governor, a short while back, to visit and to make inquiries at various prisons as far north as Glasgow; and much of the information gleaned has since been adopted, this being part. It has been found to work powerfully in producing a salutary dread of imprisonment. Persons whose faces had been constantly familiar for years to the turnkeys,—they seldom passing more than one or two days at large at a time —have, on their discharge,:declared they would take care not to come there again, and have kept their word. Many known Me- tropolitan thieves are now making the circuit of the provinces. A large proportion have emigrated into Surry; and it appears others have confined their operations to the City of London. On Thursday last, Sir Peter Laurie declared that the gaols of London had become com- pletely crowded since the change.

The London pickpockets are considered to make the best shepherds in New South Wades, as it suits their idle habits ; the industrious la- bourer cannot endure the very wearisome and lazy employment of look- ing after sheep.

At an assembly of the States of the Island of Jersey, on the 27th March, especially convoked to take into consideration the bill recently brought into the House of Commons by Mr. Alexander Baring, to prevent the introduction of Channel Islands corn free of duty, a formal remonstrance was agreed to, and deputies were appointed to go to London to give every opposition to the measure.—Hampshire Inde- pendent.

The condition of the Ionian Islands appears to have been materially improved under the government of Lord Nugent. In his farewell speech to the Senate, his Lordship stated the following facts in refer- ence to the revenue-

" The revenue, I am enabled to show you, has reached an amount beyond that of any productive year which these States have ever known. The account of the balance is also equally favourable. It is shortly this-

" The amount of gross revenue in the years in which it has approached the nearest to that of the last year has been as follows. XMAS') 187.182 171,616 182,487 189.939 200,846 1832

In the ins; year, 1834 " The amodut of surplus revenue, !mod the expenditure fur the service-lot the year, is also larger than that of any preceding year since the establishment of the constitutional government, excepting the year l818; in which year, it may be observed, the great surplus was occasioned by an additional duty of five per oent. paid for that year only on currants, in consequence of the extraordi- nary rise in the prim of that article of staple produce.

" The account of the years giving surplus revenue is as follows. In the year 1818, 98,0341. (including 5671/. which was the amount of an extra duty laid, for that year only, on currants) ; 1819, 6541/. ; 1920, 19,514/. ; 1821, 21,824/.; 1822, 25,4271. ; 1829, 979W.; 1824, 32,2541.; 1828, 87001.; 1830, 1671.; 1832, 12,83W.; 1834, 34,273/."

Lord Nu§ent also referred to the improvement of the criminal code of the Islands.

You have abolished the Venetian statute—the worst, the most tyrannical ee certainly that has ever lasted down in aa civilized times; a book of laws ill now a living symbol, now only a curious monument of bygone iniquity, absurdity, and cruelty,—powerless, it is true, of late years, and unapplied, thanks to the genius of the times and the genius of your government, but mon- strolia in its principles, monstrous in its barbarity, and monstrous in its folly ; a code by which the crimes of petty offenders were made punishable with ex- ecrable torture, while the worst violences of the powerful were not only un- checked, but encouraged and invited into action; a code which, after denoun- cing the most unequal and unjust punishment against the offences it defined, left all that was undefined to the'caprice and the passions of judges. I need scarcely remind you of the 29th chapter of that statute—the chapter, as it was called, ' De Maleficiis,' which left it to the judge to determine upon the cri- minality of any act which haul not been declared by law a crime, and then to punish it according to whatever measure might seem fit to his ' conscience and -discretion.' Under such a code, weak where it shculd have been severe, and arbitrary where it should have been precise, I can (oily say that it was owing to the wisdom and humanity of the judges, and to the good dispositions of the people, that the people have been generally an innocent people, and the judges have given judgment with justice.'