6 MARCH 1858, Page 10

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A great eclipse of the sun is announced by the astronomers for Monday the 15th March. It will happen in England about one o'clock, and over a large belt of country there will be total obscuration. No other eclipse to the same degree will be visible in England during the present century. Mr. Hind the astronomer has furnished the Times with a description of the line of central eclipse, and much useful information on the subject, The eclipse will commence on the Southern part of the Carribean Sea, touch the island of Tobago' cross the Atlantic, pass within a few miles of the French coast, enter England near Lyme Regis, and quit it by Lincoln Wash, for Sweden and Finland. A partial eclipse will be visible in North America, Western Africa, Asia Minor Asiatic Russia, and Persia. The track of the central line across England is thus described by Mr. Hind- " It will approach very near Start Point on the coast of Devon, but will not fairly land on British ground after its long sweep over the Atlandc until it reaches Lyme Regis in Dorsetshire, about a mile West of which place it should first strike our shores, according to the prediction. Start Point will not be more than two miles from the central eclipse. From Lyme Regis the central line passes over Bettiscombe and Burstock, and about midway be- tween South Perrott and Crewkerne into the county of Somerset In Se- mersetshire it will pass by Misterton and East Chinnock, near Yeovil, Marston Magna, and Castle Cary, to Bruton, whence it runs up the line of railway to Witham. Friary, and crosses it into Wiltshire about two miles East of Frome. The railway from Yeovil to Frome is throughout less than a mile and a half distant from the calculated path of the eclipse. In Wiltshire the central line runs midway between Trowbridge and West- bury to Caine, and thence by the Swindon Junction station on the Great Western Railway to Highworth, and over a corner of Berkshire, about midway between Lechlade and Farringdon, into the county of Oxford. In Oxfordshire its course is through Bampton, Witney, Blenheim Park, and Woodstock, and thence by Heyford Purcell, on the Birmingham and Oxford Railway, towards Brackley. In Northamptonshire, passing over Croughton and Brackley, and very near to Towcester and the Blisworth station of the London and North-Western line, it will take Northampton in its track, and sunning midway between Kettering and Thrapston to Oundle, will skirt the fens adioming Peterborough to the borders of Lincohishire near Crowland. Brackley, Northampton, and Oundle, appear to be situate very exactly on the central line. In lancohishire it traverses Holbeach, and then enters the Wash, passing midway between its shores towards the North Sea. For about five mike on each side of the line thus indicated the eclipse will present the annular form. This is the calculated limit, but owing to the slight degree of uncertainty existing with regard to the precise values of diameters of the sun and moon proper to be used in the prediction of eclipses, the true breadth may, and most likely will, be somewhat in excess of the above range. * • * When two-thirds or rather more of the sun's diameter are covered by the moon, or when the sun has assumed the figure presented i by the moon three or four days before the change, a decided alteration n the co- lour of the landscape will be remarked ; a gradually deepening yellow tinge will creep over it ; and about the same time has generally commenced that period of unusual stillness of nature which is frequently a marked cha- racteristic of the absence of sunlight. Ten minutes or thereabouts previous to the greatest eclipse, the pale or azure blue of the sky will change to violet or purple, the horizon will begin to close in on. every side of the spectator, and shortly after the heavens will appear to descend upon him. This appa- rent descent of the sky struck me as one of the most astonishing and im- posing effects of the totality in 1851; indeed on that occasion it was truly appalling. For two or three minutes at the time of greatest obscuration, the planet Venus and several of the brightest stars will probably come into view ; while everything around the observer will have assumed that unnatural gloomy appearance which has never failed to induce feelings of awe. Ob- jects will then appear tinged with dull olive or purple; the clouds, if favour- ably, placed for the effect, will seem to be almost in contact with him ; and the black moon projected on the face of the sun, and surrounded by a bril- liant halo, will appear to be hardly more than'a hundred yards distant. How- ever a person may have prepared himself for the phenomena of a great eclipse, it is not unlikely that his self-possession may desert him when the grandeur of the scene is before him."'

Mr. Hind recommends unprofessional observers to leave their tele- scopes at home and content themselves with a few coloured glasses vary- ing in depth of shade. The most striking effects will be visible only near the central line. For Londoners, Swindon station on the Great Western will be the best position.

We understand that a London Committee has been, formed for the purpose of organizing a constitutional opposition throughout the country to any attempt which may be made to alter the laws affecting conspi- racy. The efforts of the Committee will also be directed against any step on the part of the Govemment tending to encroach upon our con- stitutional liberties, or to invalidate the security of the asylum afforded by this country to political exiles of all classes and opinions. The vigi- lance of this Committee has been aroused by the very unsatisfactory state- ment made by Lord Derby in the House of Lords on Monday last.— Daily News.

The system of direct admission to the Artillery and Engineers by open competition has been put an end to under regulations issued from the Horse Guards. In future, all candidates for admission to the scientific cups muskpass through Sandhurst.

The Council of the Society of Arts are about to determine whether the Society shall at once announce its resolution to direct and superintend an Fsrhibition for 1861, or any other year.

Lord Stratford de Radcliffe has resigned his office -as Ambassador at the Ottoman Porte. He will go to Constantinople to take leave of the Sultan. Lord Cowley is to retain his post at Paris.

Mr. Lyons, her Majesty's Secretary of Legation at Florence, residing at Rome, is to proceed to Naples to watch the trials, and to support the interests of the two engineers, unofficially, our diplomatic relations being suspended.

Difficulties have been experienced in fixing a site for the British Memo- rial Church at Constantinople : it was expected that it would be erected in the cemetery at Scutari, amid the graves of our soldiers ; but the Sultan has presented a piece of ground on the hill of Tophane. The church will be next to a mosque.

A newspaper is now printed at the Kurdman Missionary station at the Cape in the Bechuana language. "It is issued monthly," says the (Jape Town Advertiser, "ingot-up and printed by Mr. Ashton at the mission press at the station in the first style of typographic art, and, if not very intelligible to the English reader, promises in its large type to be both legible enough and intelligible enough to its Bechuana subscribers. The motto under which it appears is Kico Kinonoco ' ; and the title of the publication is Mokaeri oa Bechuana, Le Ruled oa Mahuku,'—the mean- ing of which is, of course, obvious to the educated reader, and therefore needs no translation here."

The Police Committee of the City of London have resolved, as a preli- minary arrangement, to unite a few of its stations by an electric telegraph, according to the plan submitted by Mr. Waterlow, and upon the over- house system, as constructed by Mr. 0. Rowland between Messrs. Waterlow and Son's establishments in Birchin Lane and London Wall. Contrary to the opinions expressed at the time, some seven months since, the wire then raised has not been in the least affected by its exposure to the smoke, or by any of those atmospheric influences which it was supposed would have im- paired wires suspended over large towns. The great advantages of this system are its economy, its certainty, and the facility with which it can be repaired in case of accident or damage.

A handsome mausoleum is to be erected in the Musadman cemetery at Pere la Chaise over the remains of the Queen of Oude, by command of Mirza //Ahmed Hamid.

Despotism cannot always endure the organs even of despotism : within one week five numbers of the Nord have been confiscated at Vienna.

The Senators, Representatives, and officers of the Legislature of Cali- fornia, cost the country 1400 dollars a day ; they draw their pay in gold Weekly. The expected Mormon war is very popular in California. Volunteer companies are drilling all over the country, panting for glory and spoil. Other patriots are eager for making money by supplying the wants of the

finny.

As in England, the revival of credit has brought with it no renewal of Commercial and speculative ardour in America ; indeed, it is thought that in trade "the coming season will be one of great stagnation." The Russian Government has sanctioned the formation of two new railway companies—the Vienna-Warsaw, and the Warsaw-Bromberg.

According to the Official Journal of the Two Sicilies, the victims of the earthquake in Naples were 93.50 killed and 1359 wounded. At Monte- murro, out of 7000 inhabitants 5000 were crushed to death.

During 1857, there arrived in the United States 271,558 immigrants, 162,538 males and 109,020 females. Germany supplied 83,798.

The storm of snow, accompanied with much wind, which prevailed during Tuesday and Wednesday, blocked up portions of the railways in the more Northerly parts of England. South of London hardly any delay was caused in the railway-traffic, though the communication with the Continent was stopped for a time by the boisterous weather. The Great Northern Railway was stopped up by drifts near Grantham, and traffic had to be carried on by the loop-line. Near Norwich, and on the Eastern Union Railway, trains were stopped : at Buckenluim a train left the clogged rails, and ran into some trucks on the other line : a railway official sustained a fracture of the t arm, but the passengers were not hurt. The Holyhead and Dublin mail- boats could not leave their harbours.

Iii the voyage of the Shannon frigate to China, about ninety miles to the South-west of Java she became enveloped in a terrific thunderstorm : the lightning streamed over the ship, yet no damage was done and not a man was hurt. In 1796, the frigate Lowestoffe was caught in rAhunderatorm in the Mediterranean : much damage was done, two men were killed and several badly hurt, and the ship was set on fire : the crippled ship got to Minorca. How came the Shannon to escape disasters like those of the Lowestoffe 1—She was fitted with Sir Snow Harris's lightning-conductors, which carried the electric currents into the sea.

The other evening,. the attention of scone persons was attracted to an ob- ject in a pond in a brick-yard near Barnsley. On proceeding to examine it, they found a man up to the neck in water, with a collar of ice round his neck, which kept him fixed as in a vice He was taken out quite insensible, and efforts were made to restore him, but four hours elapsed before he re- covered. He turned out to be a blacksmith from Silkstone, and he had fallen into the pond in a state of intoxication.

The fishermen on the North-east coast of Scotland are in alarm from the appearance of immense shoals of dog-fish ; if they remain till the com- mencement of the fishing-season, "the effect upon the catch of herrings cannot but be very serious." . -

Dr.- Macgowan of Jerusalem has forwarded to the Tome a shocking nar- rative of an outrage committed upon sonic American missionaries living near Jaffa. Several men, well armed, and disguised, broke into the house of the missionaries, shot one dead, nearly killed another, and violated their wives. The ruffians staid some time, and compelled the women to wait upon them. Before they fled they ransacked the place, but found little plunder. All the Consuls took up the matter warmly, but the Pasha seemed slow to act.

CRYSTAL PALACE.—Return of admissions for six days ending Friday March 5th, including season-ticket-holders, 4382.