Rim SAILING.—On Monday, six persons were drowned in the Thames,
by an accident of no unfrequent occurrence with the ignorant
and incautious. It seems that a person who had charge of Lord Chol- mondeley's sailing vessel, the Brilliant, had asked permission of his Lordship to take a few of his friends for a sailing excursion down to Gravesend. The man, Whose name was Biddle, started in the morn- ing, in company with seven other persons, all males, his friends. They had a boisterous passage down the River, but reached Gravesend in safety; and after remaining there some time, during which the gale in- creased, they bore up With the intention of returning home. When they reached Purtleet, a sadden squall of wind took the vessel by the lee, and she filled, and went down stern foremost. Immediate assist- ance was rendered from the shore, but only two of the party were saved. 'The crew had not time to cast off the sheets, or she might have righted. Among those drowned, were two brothers, named Seeley, and the waterman, named Simpson, who was at the helm at the time of the accident.
[It is plain that Mr. Biddle, who has been so fearfully punished for his ignorance, was a most improper person to intrust with the charge of a sailing vessel on a river, or anywhere else. The accident which swamped his boat at Purfleet, is the same which foundered the Ville de Paris and many other vessels in the midst of the Atlantic, after Bodney's celebrated action. When a boat or ship is sailing large, and the wind, from a sudden shift of her course or any other cause, takes her sails aback, the almost inevitable consequence of the change of direction in the power that acts on them, is the swamping of the vessel. In a boat, the only plan of avoiding the danger is to let the sheets fly, and thus relieve the sails from the pressure Of the wind until they can be again trimmed to it. None but the • most reckless or stupid of man- kind would, in blowing weather, belay a boat's sheets. They ought always to be held by hand, and to be perfectly Clear. If any of our friends happen to be lured into a sailing-party in such weather —or in- deed in any weather, for it is impossible to calculate on a steady breeze on the Thames,—let them always attend to-this point, if they wish to avoid accidents.]
About the same time that the accident 'happened to Lord Chol- rnondeley's boat, and within a short distance of the same place, a gen- tleman, the superintendent of a boat-builder's yard, near Blackwell, happened to be amusing himself with a fowling-piece ; when a steam- boat passing by, he placed the gun between his legs, to assist a friend who accompanied him to manage the boat, -when the gun went off, and the contents lodged in his abdomen. -A lady, nearly related to the un- fortunate gentleman, was in the boat at the time. [We have repeatedly called on the public to use Soinerville's guns, and only Somerville's guns—no such accidents can possibly occur with them. The wretched infatuation which in these cases shuts men's ears to the dictates of common sense is hardly a matter' for pity. If people will set their lives on a trigger, they must even take the chance of the hazard.] Mr. Thomas Tornkyns, barrister, was drowned on Thursday sen- night, in consequence of accidentally pitching overboard from a wherry in which he and a friend had been pleasuring up the River. The body was not found until Monday.
The other day, a young man, named Smidkurst, undertook, for a trifling wager,' to swim from the Fox under-the Hill, .Adelphi' across the Thames and back again. When he got half way across, he was seen to sink ; boats instantly put out to his assistance, but too late to save him. It is supposed he was suddenly-seized with the cramp.
An aged man, dressed as a mechanic, threw 'himself over London Bridge on Tuesday night. He was never seen to rise. The tide was running rapidly down.
As a butcher, named Bennet, residing in St. George's Market, was riding home on Tuesday night with his wife in a chaise-cart, just as they turned the corner of the London Road, near the Obelisk, a gen- tleman in a chaise drove up, and running foul of Mr. Bennet's vehicle, the shaft penetrated the neck of his horse, which immediately fell in an expiring state. While it was lying in this state, a knacker came up, and the horse was immediately sOld to him ; when he released it from its sufferings by stabbing it in the chest. None of the persons in the vehicles were injured.
On Friday, an unfortunate boy, son of a Mr. Ohlson, a broker in St. Helen's, was killed by falling from one of the trees in Alderman's Walk, Bishopsgate, which he had climbed for the sake of a bird's nest. The learned gentleman who reports the fatal accident says that the boy was precipitated with great velocity: a leisurely fall from a high tree would be something new.
On Tuesday a woman, named Margaret Shields, the wife of an Irish labourer, residing in Great St. -Andrew Street, Holborn, was beaten and kicked, by another, female, so brutally; that she expired in an hour after. The offender was sister to the deceased, and many years older. The Coroner's inquest have returned verdict of "Man- slaughter" against her. The deceased was in an advanced state of pregnancy.
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