Artiscellantous.
Sir Jarnsetjee Jejeebhoy of Bombay has forwarded princely presents to Queen Victoria, in the shape of additions to the Royal stud and the Royal wardrobe. Four high-bred Arab horses, caparisoned in fine cashmere, brought home in the charge of Mr. Randall, Riding-master of the Bombay Horse Artillery, have lately been submitted to the personal inspection of the Queen and Prince Albert; and on Saturday last a massive gold box, containing some dresses the manufacture of the East and saved from the wreck of the Great Liverpool steamer, at the per- sonal risk of Lieutenant M'Leod, her unfortunate commander, were forwarded to Buckingham Palace.
The Duke of Beaufort has, it is stated, requested the whole of his regiment, the Royal Gloucestershire Yeomanry Cavalry, to let their mustachios grow for the permanent duty, which will commence the 16th May next.
Sir James Graham, in his speech on Ireland in the House of Commons on Mon- day, made a gratifying statement as to the advance which maize is making in the dietary scale. "The measure for the admission of maize free of duty is ope- rating most beneficially. It is cheaper than oatmeal; it is superseding .oatmea; and I am not without confident hopes that ultimately the effect of the introduc- tion of maize will be to supersede the potato as a principal article of food in that country. I look forward to gradually but surely elevating the scale of living in that country; and I think the introduction of maize will ultimately have that effect. The prejudice against it is rapidly disappearing."
Canadian butter is now selling at Sunderland for 8d. per, pound: a large cox signment has been made to merchants in that town.
At the present moment there is a rookery in Cheapside, and a cherry-tree- growing on London Bridge. The rookery consists of two crows' nests in the large tree at the corner of Wood Street. The cherry-tree is growing in a chink of the granite at the City end of the bridge: it appears to be three years old.
During this week four cargoes of ice have arrived for the use of the Berwick Shipping Company from different parts of Norway. The winter in that country is described as unusually mild, and the ice was beginning to disappear when the vessels left.—Berwick larder.
The new screw for the Great Britain steam-ship weighs seven tons.
It is said that the line-of-battle ships in England, and all steamers on the- home station that are not specially employed, will be assembled together in about a month as an experimental squadron—Times.
A suit of ancient British armour and bronze ornaments, supposed to belong to some British chieftain during the period of the occupation of the island by the Romans, was bought the other day for the British Museum, at a sale of antiqui- ties at Bridgewater; price, 150e.
The King of Hanover, having completed his legislative labours respect- ing the marriages of his military officers, has set himself to regulate their whiskers. An order of the day has been promulgated, which ordains that whiskers shall no longer be worn like a fringe round the face, meeting below the chin; but in the form of two scithes, with the points curving in towards the- corners of the mouth.
Some American newspapers speak of the departure from Newbury port of a number of families for Columbia river, as the best way to "give notice of intem- lion to close the joint occupancy" of Oregon. The party which embarked on board the brig Henry mustered twenty in all; including one marriageable lady, Miss Hannah Peabody. It is stated that from three to four hundred spectatore gathered at the wharf to witness the brig's departure; and that there were manj, moist eyes among those who took leave of their friends.
The railroad between Tours and Orleans was opened on Thursday week. The Dukes of Nemours and Montpensier were present. Salvoes of artillery—and something else, less noisy but more substantial, in the shape of a feast—formed part of the " inauguration " rejoicings.
The Russian Ambassador has not succeeded in quieting the controversy about the Bagidon nuns. A letter from Rome, of the 18th March, published in the Univers, mentions that Cardinal Castracani, who is deeply versed i
sed in the know- ledge of the Basilian rites, had subjected the Abbess of Minx to a searching in- terrogatory. The result is thus stated—" The Cardinal nowise doubted the sin- cerity of that heroic woman; but he wished to satisfy himself that she really was a Basilian nun. He obtained that proof so fully and completely, that he declared he had acquired the most profound conviction that the Abbess Idakrina really belonged to the order of St. Basil, and he was more than ever convinced of her perfect veracity."
It appears from the following, that the conversion of all England to Popery is by no means despaired of at Rome. "At the feast of St. Gregory, which sSas celebrated on the 12th March, in the church of Montecelio, in the convent of the Benedictines, a triduo had been ordered on the occasion, .to demand from the Al mighty the conversion of England. A number of English Catholics had joined in the pious ceremony, and the remainder of the month of March was to be de- voted to prayer for that intention." The Pope has armed Mr. Newman with a crucifix. The Brussels Opera company, whose performances gave so much satisfaction ix-- London last year are coming over again this season. They are, we hear, in treaty with Mr. Bunn for Drury Lane Theatre—Globe. There are hundreds of English girls, many of thein from Leeds, in the flax: mills of the North of France; and the cotton, flax, and woollen-mills of almost every foreign country, have either English overlookers or English workmen, to:, gether with English machinery.
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