larobincts.

Mr. George Tomline, M.P. for Shrewsbury, has presented 1,0001. to the Provost and Fellows of Eton College, as the foundation of an annual ma- thematical prize.

At a numerous meeting of the hop-growers of Kent and Sussex, held at Maidstone on Thursday, two resolutions were submitted for choice; one making offer to give up the present protective duty [41. 108. the hundred- weight] on foreign hops, on condition that the excise-duty [188. the hun- dredweight] on home-grown hops be repealed; the other pledging the meeting to use its utmost endeavours to maintain the present amount of protection. The protective resolution was carried by a large majority.

From a statement made to a meeting of the creditors of Latham's bank at Dover, it appears that the liabilities are about 100,0001.•' while the assets are roughly estimated at from 50,0001. to 65,0001. The Dover. Chronicle remarks—" This failure will be felt very severely in all the ramifications of our trading and mercantile pursuits, not only as regards present losses to individuals, but also on account of the closing of a bank- ing establishment that was ever ready to aid and assist the honest and industrious tradesman in his laudable endeavours to raise himself in the scale of credit and respectability. For nearly a century the house of La- tham and Company has been the fostering parent of that enterprise which has raised Dover to its present prosperity and surpassing eminence among the towns in East Kent."

We are sorry to hear that the linen-mill of Mr. John Brooks, Bolton, in which a great number of hands are employed, is about to cease working.— Manchester .Examiner.

The Mayor of Basingstoke denies that the town has been so much in- jured by the Railway as was recently represented: there are very few shops and houses untenanted, and even the vacancy of these cannot be at- tributed to the loss of the coach traffic.

The sailors' strike is now at an end in Hull. Unfortunately for its pro- moters, it has remained long enough to bring to the town a great number of sailors from other ports, who gladly accept the wages offered to but re- fused by our own sailors; and the end of the matter is, that the men having spent their small resources, and drawn in many instances their odd pounds from the Bank of Savings, must now accept the average wages of the day., —Halifax Guardian. Another " strike " of workpeople has been added to those already existing: in the North—that of the coopers of Liverpool.

The Reverend Mr. Sibtherp is now at Oxford on a visit to some of his old Col- lege friends. It is said that he has imposed on himself a silence of three years from his usual pulpit ministrations, as a mark of penitential regret for having in IL moment of ill-judged excitement joined the Flemish communion.—Times.

The Reverend Mr. Williams, the young clergyman who was subjected to 1001." damages at last Carmarthen Assises for the seduction of a young woman, whom he had promised to marry, has since satisfactorily fulfilled his engagement to her, and they were married on St. David's Day.—Globe.

Three fatal accidents are reported on the Eastern Counties Railway. An engineer has been killed, near Broxbonrne, by falling from an engine while leaning over attempting to count the number of carriages in the train. A pointsinan at Chelmsford has been crushed between the buffers of two cattle-vans, the conse- quence of his own incautiousness. A poor old woman, returning from the work- house, where she had been obtaining relief; got upon the line near William as a train was coming up: the whistle was sounded, but the woman did not hear it, and in a moment she was struck dead by the buffer of the engine.

A very serious accident happened on the Aylesbury Railway last week. A train, consisting of two first-class carriages, two second-class carriages, a luggage- van and two trucks, was progressing during the afternoon at a rapid rate towards Aylesbury, when the axle of one of the trucks broke: "before the steam could be shut off and the engine stopped, the carriages were thrown off the line with great violence; two of the carriages and the trucks completely turned round, and the connecting shackle of the engine snapped asunder. One first-class carriage, one second-class carriage, the two trucks, and the luggage-van, were broken into' many hundred pieces; the wheel of one truck, although of great substance, pre- senting the appearance of a hoop, not a single vestige of a spoke remaining." There were but few passengers in the train, and nearly all these were in a se- cond-class carriage which escaped with little injury. One of the guards, who was thrown from his seat, was se much hurt that at first his life was feared for; and a passenger, Mrs. Russell, was very severely cut and disfigured, but she does not appear to be in any danger; the rest of-the passengers and the railway people escaped with bruises.

Molineaux master of the Middleton station of the Manchester and Leeds Rail- way, has been killed on the line, at night, by twofold misconduct on his part. He got drunk, and in that state walked on the rails; he was knocked down -by a pilot-engine, which was returning to Manchester on the same line on which it

had been assisting a luggage-train from Manchester: this was contrary to the rules of the company, but the deceased had sanctioned the practice on former occasions. A Coroner's Jury has returned a verdict of "Accidental Death," with a deodand of 251. on the tender and 25/. on the engine.

A goods-train on the Leeds and Selby Railway caught fire last week, and a great quantity of cotton-wool was destroyed; the damage estimated at 1,000/. 'The disaster is ascribed to the friction of an axle.

Another explosion has happened in the coal-mine at Bilston where five people were recently killed. On this occasion, two colliers went into a part of the pit to prepare for ventilating it, in order that the men might commence work: they car- ried unprotected candles! Both were hurt, one dangerously.

We observe that the lady travellers on the London and Birmingham and Grand Junction Railways are now accommodated with their own separate carriages.— Railway Chronicle. Mr. Philip Weld, a strident of St. Edmund's Catholic College, and nephew of the late Cardinal Weld, unhappily met his death by drowning, on Thuriday week, while engaged with a party of his fellow collegians in the amusement of boating, at the Rye House, near Broxbounie.—Mornuig Chronicle. A boy, twelve years old, has been killed in a strange manner at Great Beal- ings. He was sent to drive some cows home from pasture, and he tied the tail of one of them round his body; the cow took fright, starting off at a great pace, kicking and dragging the boy along a hard road and through a river: at length he became disengaged, and was picked up, dying, from a fracture of the skull.

A Nova Scotian vessel from New York, with a cargo of logwood, was run down off Beachy Head, on Saturday night, by the schooner Martha, of Guernsey. For- tunately, the vessel did not sink for some little time' and the crew and passengers escaped in a boat to the ship which had caused the disaster.

A most extraordinary storm of black rain has fallen in the Northern part of Worcestershire, exciting the greatest alarm. The shower lasted two hours; and the pools, water-courses, and even the Severn itself, were turned completely black. The storm extended over Abberley, Dunley, Stour.port, and Bewdley; to the great alarm of the inhabitants of those places, the air being during the time corn pletely black. "Our informant," says the Worcestershire Guardian, "who de- scribes this singular phamomenon, states that the rain had a smell as of soot and paint mixed, and that any article dipped into it was blackened. We give this information as we have received it: it is possible that the rain was charged with the sooty impurities of the Dudley coal-field, which surrounds the district where the rain fell."

At Redmarley, in Worcestershire, the other day, a wolf entered a cottage where three or four children were by themselves; the youngsters thought it was a dog, and the creature quietly laid itself down under a table. Presently, the youngest child, an infant two months old, which was lying on a low bedstead, began to cry: the savage animal rushed towards it; a cat belonging to the family courage- ously attacked the intruder; poor puss was quickly torn limb from limb; and the wolf, carrying her remains to the outside of the house, proceeded to devour them. The eldest child had now the presence of mind to shut the door: having eaten the whole of the cat except the hind-legs, the wolf strove to reinter the house; but two men, who came up at the moment, killed it with a pike and a pitchfork. The wolf is supposed to have escaped from some travelling menagerie.

An "infernal machine" has been exploded in Messrs. Marshall's edge-tool ma- nufactory at Sheffield. It consisted of an iron tube filled with powder; a fusee being attached, by which the villanous contrivers fired it. This was the second attempt within a fortnight.

An alarming fire broke out on Saturday night in the Castle or Palace of Dur- ham, one of the Bishop's residences. It occurred in some out-buildings, of no great importance; but they were contiguous on the one hand to the Registrar's Office, where the wills of the Palatinate are deposited, and on the other, to the University library. After some hours, however' the flames were got under, with- out having extended from the building in which they began.

A family at Pillgwenlly had a narrow escape the other day. An arrow-root pudding was made and they partook of it; but, fortunately, their stomachs re- jected what they had eaten, for it was found that dry white-lead had been sold in mistake for arrow-root !

A few days ago an elderly female of the name of Nancy Brear, of Cragg House, in the parish of Siliden, having been afflicted for some time with a dangerous ill- ness, was supposed to have departed this life: her mourning relations, therefore, proceeded to perform the last office for the deceased, by "laying her out"; which was accordingly done, and she remained in this state for upwards of four hours. Shortly afterwards, however, signs of life became apparent in the supposed de- ceased; and she got up and partook of breakfast with her greatly astonished rela- tives, and is now much recovered from her recent affliction.—Leeda Mercury.

On the subsidence of the late flood, a great number of pheasants, partridges, hares and rabbits, were found drowned in an osier bed between the villages of Stoke Bardolph and Ganthorpe, Nottinghamshire, the property of Lord Chester- field.