NEWS OF THE WEEK.

Aterrible catastrophe has saddened the week. The steamer Anglo-Saxon, from Liverpool to Quebec, fell, on 27th April, while near Cape Race, into a dense fog. The captain, anxious to make a quick voyage, stood on at half-speed, when breakers were reported ahead, and despite the immediate stoppage of the engines the vessel struck on the rocks of Clam Cove. The boats were lowered successfully, and a hawser was fastened to the rocks, along which a basket was slipped with women and children. The vessel, however, thumped very heavily, and at last went to pieces while the captain and some two hundred -of the passengers were still on deck. They were all drowned or smashed against the rocks. It adds to the horror of the -affair that the Associated Press of New York offered to place a fog trumpet on Cape Race, and permission was refused by the British Government. The blame of the catastrophe is attributed to the captain, whose desire for a quick passage induced him to run his steamer in a fog at six miles an hour. After the wreck all hands behaved well, and the captain was -among those swept away when the steamer broke up.

A singularly pertinent question was asked last night by Mr. Liddell in the House of Commons, "Does the Govern- ment intend to found an Anglo-Chinese empire ? " The -debate, extending over several hours, and very good through- out, was listened to by about twenty members—the noble Lord at the head of the Government asleep, apparently, on his seat. In vain Mr. Cobden and Mr. Denby Seymour stormed at this "contempt of public opinion on the part of Her Majesty's Ministers;" there was no echo from the Treasury "bench. So, it seems, China may be quietly conquered, or annexed to India, with the tacit consent of our House of Commons.

General Hooker has once more assumed the offensive with 100,000 men. He crossed the Rappahannock on the 28th of April, at two points, below and above Fredericksburg. The resistance to the passage appears to have been feeble, and the Federals drove the riflemen from their pits with comparatively little loss. The plan of operations is carefully concealed, but it would seem that General Hooker must intend to surround General Lee's position at Fredericksburg, attacking him from the South with one wing, while the other prevents his escape. The next mail will probably bring us an account of a great battle unless General Lee should discover a line of retreat, and battle, up a new position nearer Richmond. He cannot retreat further than Junction, as that important post would give the Federals command of the Central Virginia Railroad. The rumours of a great battle, in which General Hooker has been victorious, are not confirmed, though news from New York extends to the 2nd inst.

Dr. Phillimore an4, Mr. Coleridge have soundly advised Messrs. Pusey, Ogilvie, and Heurtley that the Court of Queen's Bench would probably refuse a mandamus to the Assessor in the Vice-Chancellor's Court to entertain the charge of heresy against Mr. Jewett which he declined to hear. It would probably regard the case, say the advising counsel, as "one of academical discipline," and therefore leave the parties to the suit "to their remedy in that course of appeal pointed out by the University statutes." Now, Dr. Piney and his colleagues were not aware that there was any course of appeal to Courts within the University on the ques- tion of jurisdiction, and had allowed the time given by the statutes to expire. Hence, discouraged as they are from applying to the Queen's Bench, they are compelled at last to abandon their suit and acquiesce in the unpleasant proximity of an accomplished and profound thinker.

The news from Poland received this week is, on the whole, doubtful. Four or five defeats of the insurgents have been reported, one near Cracow, in which an expedition organized by Mieroslawski was defeated ; another, near Olkusz, in which Colonel Rochebrune's Zouaves were dispersed, and the Italians of his command slain round the body of their leader, Colonel Nullo. General Jezioranski, also, in Lublin, is reported to have suffered a severe defeat, but this is not confirmed by the English correspondents, who report him as up to the 10th of May still victorious. The most serious incident is, however, the determination of the Government, after the 13th of May, to make military rule supreme in Poland, and destroy until the country is quieted. Externally, affairs do not advance, the French Emperor postponing his decision till the elections are over, though he is accumulating stores at Cherbourg, and Sweden remaining still irresolute. It is affirmed, however, most positively, that the Polish Committee have been directed from Paris to hold out to the last, and it is certain that the Poles in Paris believe that the Emperor will, the moment the elections are over, openly adopt their cause. The dlionaeur continues to publish anecdotes unfavourable to the Rus- sians.

The Pope is once more reported ill with erysipelas in his leg.

Town talk has this week been pretty well divided between General Hooker's advance and Mr. Boucicault's escapades. That gentleman has in his company a lady named Jordan, whose husband suspecting her intimacy with the manager, separated from his wife. He was still, however, doubtful, for on the 3rd of September he traced his wife to lodgings in Pall Mall, and on her opening the door asked "if that fellow Boucicault was there ?" She admitted the charge, but begged him not to expose her, and he rushed through the house seeking his enemy. The landlady remonstrated, and Colonel Gibbon, a lodger in the same house, sent for a policeman and turned him out. Mr. Jordan thereupon brought an action against Colonel Gibbon, and the jury granted 25/. damages, the oddest verdict given for some time. Mr. Jordan had been deeply injured by Mr. Bouci- cault, and had ground for seeking him, consequently, the jury held that he had a right to force open doors in a lodging- house not inhabited by Mr. Boucicault, and even to intrude into the room of Colonel Gibbon, a perfect stranger to the quarrel. The Chief Justice at once granted a new trial, and the only effect of the case will probably be most seriously to damage Mr. Baucicault, whose new theatre will probably remain unvisited by the Court.

The night of the 8th of May was marked by the best debate of the session, unfortunately too late for our last issue. It was raised by Mr. Hennessy, apropos of Neapolitan trade, but soon wandered into the general question of Italy. The most important speeches were those of Mr. Layard, Lord Henry Lennox, Mr. Butler-Johnstone the new member for Canterbury, and Mr. Gladstone. Mr. Layard answered Mr. Hennessy's statistics forcibly, but spoke with an acrimony which laid him fairly open to the taunt that he denounced in Italy the oppression which he justified in Constantinople. Lord Henry Lennox affirmed that "every morning every Italian newspaper must be sent, before publication, to an official gentleman called the QuEestor," who confiscated papers at will. He gave numerous examples of such confiscations, and of persons carried to prison without warrant, and related his own experience of Neapolitan prisons, which were, he affirmed, as bad as they had been under the Bourbons. Mr. Butler-Johnstone, who was complimented from all sides, replied that the Italian Government had replaced corrupt judges by trustworthy men, invited inspection of their prisons, introduced publicity, and, though heirs of a demoralized system, were striving diligently to restore order. That the prisons were crowded was true, but they were crowded with the Camorra—the secret society which had for centuries dis- graced Naples. Mr. Disraeli followed with a virulent attack on British policy in Italy, which called up Mr. Gladstone, who, in an impromptu speech, perhaps the ablest he ever spoke, satirized the gradual development of Mr. Disraeli's knowledge, pointed to Italian cordiality as the justification of Ministerial policy, and, after a peroration of unusual power on the "enthusiastic convictions of the English people" in behalf of Italy, sat down amid "enthusiastic cheers." The debate was a triumph for the Liberal leaders, as well as for the Liberal cause.

The reports from Vicksburg are conflicting, though it would seem that of five transports which endeavoured to pass the batteries, two were disabled and one sunk ; but in South- Western Louisiana General Banks has gained an important victory. He left Baton Rouge in charge of three coloured regiments, and, with all the white soldiers disposable, marched towards Opelousas. The details of his movement have not reached England, but he appears to have attacked the enemy, twice defeating them, each time with heavy loss, and captur- ing from one to two thousand prisoners. The Confederate foundries at Franklin and Iberia were also captured, with several guns, and the whole of their fleet on Grand Lake. His own losses were about 700, and he has opened the com- munication with Admiral Farragut above Port Hudson, and so shattered the Confederate arrangements that New Orleans cannot be attacked for weeks, perhaps months, to come.

A resolution was offered to the Convocation of the Univer- sity of London on Tuesday evening, requesting the Senate to inquire what steps they could take to elevate the standard of female education in this country by drawing up a curri- culum for the examination and certification of their attain- ments. It was rejected by a very large majority, composed, however, of very different elements. Not a few of the speakers all but distinctly contended that women should be refined intellectual toys, with which fathers, husbands, and brothers may amuse their hardly earned leisure, and were taxed, not unjustly, with holding much more Mahometan than Christian views, and, in effect, denying women an independent soul. Others, disclaiming this view, pointed out, justly enough we think, that to admit women to men's academical degrees would be holding up a false and futile standard of female education, of which at best only a few in a cen- tury would avail themselves, while to form a new curricu- lum for women would be a work of time and difficulty, for which the Senate of the University of London have no qualifi- cations. Finally, many were contented with the legal opinion which bas been delivered, that the University has no power under its present charter to confer such diplomas, or hold such examinations at all. For ourselves, we feel no doubt that a Woman's University is much wanted, and might exercise a very large and beneficial influence on. the general course of female education, but that its work would certainly be very in- efficiently done by the lawyers and medical men who con- stitute the majority of the London University Senate.

There is a dead-lock at last in Prussia between the Ministry and the Assembly, but whether the people will bestir them- selves in the matter is as doubtful as ever. In the debate on the Army last Monday the Minister of War (Von Roon) charged a previous speaker with improper language, and was Interrupted by the Vice-President (Bocitum Dolffs), who • wished to make an explanation. The Minister would not give way, the Vice-President rang his bell, the Minister screamed in competition with the bell, and reiterated Von Bismark's old assertion, that the authority of the House and its officers ended at the Ministerial table. The Vice-President, suspending the sitting for an hour, put on his hat, and the members rose without regard to M. Von Boon, who tried to go on speaking. When the sitting was resumed the Ministry absented themselves, and communicated next day to the Assembly their resolve not to attend again till they- received a formal acknowledgment that they are not amenable to the discipline of the Assembly. It is a curious claim that the Ministers make under Article 68 of the Con- stitution, of an absolute right to be heard without inter- ruption, whatever they may choose to say. On the Ministerial showing, if they claimed an attentive hearing for the multi- plication table, or the Lord's Prayer said backwards, or an imprecation on each individual deputy by name, it would be- strictly unconstitutional in M. Grabow or M. Bockum-Dolffs. to ring the bell or put on their hat. Neither party can yield, but whether anything will come of it, is more difficult to say.. After all, is not a dead-lock in Prussia now the normal form of her political institutions ? If the Assembly would " invite " the attendance of Ministers at each sitting under- one of the articles of the Constitution, and the Ministers would refuse under another, the political condition of things would be simpler, and practically quite as useful as it has- been for the last two sessions.

The Hampshire Advertiser of November 29, 1862, published an article stating that Captain Mangles, candidate for South- ampton, had hired Mr. G. Thompson, the well-known lecturer,. to advocate his cause. Mr. Thompson brought an action for libel, and the defendant pleaded justification. It was proved that Mr. Thompson went to Southampton as the candidate- of the Alliance Association, the friends of the permissive bill for prohibiting the sale of liquor, and found he had no- chance. The Association, therefore, agreed to withdraw him on condition that Captain Mangles would vote for the first reading of the "permissive bill," and pay ex- penses. These terms were accepted. Captain Mangles. paid 100 guineas, and Mr. Thompson addressed the electors twice in his favour. The money was not, however, paid to. him, nor did he give the addresses in consequence of its receipt. The jury found a verdict against the paper, with damages of 150/., which, with costs, will amount to a heavy fine. A quiet statement of facts would, we think, have served Mr. Thompson as well as an action, which, considering the license usual at elections, was a little vindictive. Serjeant Shee was attacked in just the same way by Mr. Grenfell, but did not resort to law.

General Forey stormed Puebla on 31st March and the fol- lowing day. The city was defended street by street, and house by house, many Americans and other foreigners joining in the defence ; but it was carried at last, with a loss of 5, officers killed, and 56 soldiers ; 30 offieers wounded, and 443, privates. The assault lasted six days, and it was frequently necessary to blow up the houses, burying the defenders in their ruins. The whole town is considered to be in French hands, and La Patric, with calm impudence, quotes the de- fence as proof that the Mexicans are friendly to French occu- pation. The Mexicans, then, must be good, for they lay down their lives for their friends.

The Directors of the Dover and Chatham Railway have done the public a service. Their impudent determination to carry a viaduct over Ludgate Hill, and so shut out the view of St.. Paul's, has roused all London to resistance. The City has petitioned against the bridge, and the petition has been signed by all the great bankers, including names like Rothschilds, Baring Brothers, Jones Lloyd and Co., Masterman and Co., and every one interested in, or connected with, Ludgate Hill. The Chatham and Dover Company are bound to finish their viaduct by August, but have neglected to do so, and are applying for an extension of time, which Parliament is re- quested to refuse. An active committee has been organized to resist the work, and they produce high professional opinions, showing thdt Ludgate Hill can be tunnelled at less cost than that of the proposed bridge. In any other country than this, Directors would not have made the proposal, but an English corporation, once possessed of a monopoly, loses all sense of decency. We dare say the majority of the Directors think the viaduct would improve the view.

The cruel judicial habit, of which we gave so flagrant and pathetic an instance last week, of browbeating the accused in French Courts of Justice, has been carried almost as far in the case of Suzanne Bosquet, tried in the Assize Court of the Cates du Nord, for strangling her husband in bed. The indictment alleged that he was of weak intellect, and was married by the accused for his money ; that after his marriage he had made over his personal property to her, and left her by will a life interest in his real property, and that she murdered him in the fear that he might revoke his will in consequence of her dissolute conduct. The direct examination of the prisoner was brutally conducted. "For your own sake," said the Judge, don't go beyond reasonable limits. I cannot force you to say that you abhorred your husband, but do not say that you married him out of friend- ship." When she denied an illicit connection with one of her cousins, the Judge replied, "Take care, you are in a grave position. Do not allow a false shame to hinder you from avowing a fault, when you have to justify yourself for a crime; this cousin was constantly at your house, and the moment he came, there was grog and coffee drinking--in a word, there was going on a debauch so scandalous that in the commune it was said that when your cousin arrived good cheer would be sure to follow ;" and thus he continued nagglin„, at the prisoner with no clear drift, except to inflict shame and torture, till her acquittal brought down applause from the court. Then the Judge fixed on a poor woman employed as a lamplighter, cross-examined her with fury as to whether she had clapped her hands, and committed her to prison for twenty- four hours. The French Judges appear to think that their value to the country is measured, not by the justice they dispense, but by the number of penalties they inflict and convictions they secure.

The French Chambers have been. dissolved, and the new elections fixed for the 31st of May and 1st of June. In view of their approach the Minister of the Interior has issued a cir- cular to the prefects stating that a coalition has been formed of old parties, the dibris of ancient Governments, who "aim at penetrating the heart of our institutions only to vitiate the principle of them, and invoke the name of Liberty only to turn it against the State." The prefects must, therefore, "desig- nate loudly the candidates who inspire the Government with most confidence," and "let the populations know who are the friends or adversaries, more or less disguised, of the Em- pire." The prefects are accordingly employing every form of offi- cial influence, warning the local papers, ordering printers not to print the candidates' cards, and compelling the village mayors to canvass the peasantry for the Government candidate. The opposition candidates, in their addresses, which find publica- tion in Paris, rely, we perceive, greatly upon their desire for economy. It is calculated that not more than ten will be returned, but this may prove an exaggeration.

A correspondent of the Times relates the circumstances of a case, known in India as the Lilley case, the death of a Ser- jeant-Major of the 6th Dragoons from oppression. John Lilley had been Seijeant-Major of the Inniskillens for seven years, and had under a very strict Colonel borne the highest character, when he was subpcenaed as a witnesss in the trial of the paymaster. Colonel Crawley, then in command, in order, it is supposed, to intimidate him, placed him under close arrest. His two children had died a few weeks before, and his wife was dying, but the Colonel ordered the sentry not to lose sight of him day or night. "This order, Colonel Crawley well knew, implied that the sentry must also keep under his eyes, day and night, the Sedeant-Major's dying wife ; and this order was actually carried out to the letter." This con- finement at Mhow, one of the hottest stations in India, and in May, the hottest month, lasted a fortnight, when Lilley was allowed to walk out for an hour a day. It was, however, too late, for broken by the strict confinement, his children's death, the state of his wife, and the surveillance under which he lived, the Setjeant-Major, against whom no charge had ever been breathed, died of apoplexy. Colonel Crawley remains in command of EL M.'s 6th Dragoons.

A Conversazione on the subject of Working Men's Clubs took place on Monday, in connection with the Working Men's Club and Institute Union, at the Hanover Square Rooms, Lord Lyttleten in the chair. The .usefulness of the society was illustrated by its recent achieve- ments in Soho, where, having guaranteed the rent of premises, afforded counsel, and other assistance, a body of men had voluntarily cleaned, repaired, and fitted up the house, and made the furniture for a Club, which in a fortnight attracted nearly two hundred, working men.

The Sultan, in a despatch to the maritime powers, has prohibited the Suez Canal, unless the shareholders agree to give up their territorial rights over a mile of land on each side, and abandon the system of forced labour. As these demands are incompatible with the execution of the work, and the Sultan is within his legal right, the undertaking is at an end. The shareholders are to be repaid.

-The House of Commons was emptied on Tuesday night by a motion of Mr. II. Seymour on Indian Land Tenure. Ile wished the House to resolve that the occupation of waste lands in India by settlers, and the redemption of a portion of the land-tax of India, were desirable objects. The debate was very unreal, the House being very thin, and the few present not understanding the subject, but Lord Stanley made a fair speech, and Sir Charles Wood uttered a series of flagrant quibbles. He said that the land-tax ought not to be redeemed, because Government, in suffering its redemption, gave up the right of future increase, quite forgetting that he has himself sanctioned a permanent settlement for all India. If that sanction is honest, time will not increase his revenue ; if it is not, which is absurd, he is simply cheating the natives of India. The redemption of a permanently settled estate is to the State a mere matter of account, for it pays off perpetual debt with perpetual revenue exactly equi- valent to the interest. The only difference is, that the landowner, no longer afraid of the sunset law, can im- prove his property. So, too, with the waste-land question. Sir Charles Wood says his variations on Lord Canning's order are infinitesimal. Then, why does he stick to them so obsti- nately, at the riskof having the Northernmembers make his dic- missal a sine qud non of support? We suppose he will admit Mr. H. Ricketts to be an authority on the point. Yet that gentle- man, while defending Sir C. Wood in our columns, admitted that under his rules A would have to pay for surveying land which B would then buy at auction!

On Tuesday Lord Normanby brought forward again the case of Mr. James Bishop, of Martyr Worthy, the English- man who was convicted last September of carrying letters between the conspiring Government of Francis II. and his friends in Naples. His father, the Rev. Alfred Bishop, has,. Lord Russell remarked, been a very unfortunate man, unfor- tunate in his son's health, for he has been an invalid from child- hood ; unfortunate in his son's tastes, for, instead of caring to see what is worth seeing in Italy, he chose to mix himself up in disreputable conspiracies, and get convicted of a capital crime ; unfortunate in his son's obstinacy, for when his father engaged that if released he should immediately leave Italy, the son declined to ratify that agreement ; and not, perhaps, kast unfortunate, said Lord Russell, in the advocacy of Lord Normanby. Nor was this reply all that the noble mar- quis took by the debate. The Duke of Sutherland had occasion to explain that fiuding Mr. Bishop provided in the fortress of Aleisandria with books and a sofa, and almost every luxury, he inquired why Mr. Bishop had books allowed him, and was told "because the poor gentleman was considered weak in the head, and a friend of Lord Normanby's."

Yesterday week Lord Russell made a temperate statement, in answer to an able speech of Lord Shaftesbury's, of the Eng- lish view of the Polish question. He was exceedingly anxious, he said, to avoid giving any impression that England would in any case interfere forcibly on behalf of the Poles. He sees no hope for Poland that the Poles or their friends would regard as a hope, but has much vague reliance on uncertain and shadowy godsends of aid,—on, the power of public opinion in Europe—(what political iniquity did that ever sweep away ?) —on the remonstrances of England, which he admits can only mitigate the anguish of failure,—on the general Euro- pean sense of justice,—which is but an element, and a very homceopathic element, in his previous stay, European public opinion,—and on "that Heaven which will not allow op- pression to pass unpunished,"—but which also takes its own time (and often how weary a time !) in punishing it.. Lord Russell, like all statesmen who have made up their minds that they ought to furnish no more than a corps of observation, and to leave the actual recruiting for the good cause to Pro- vidence,—is apt to see a little couleur de rose.

Consols are 93/ 93i for money, and 92 92/ ex div. for the account. Tha New Threes and Reduced are 911 91. Exchequer Bills have been dealt in at 3s. to 2s. discount. Indian Five per Cents. at 110 110*: and the 5i per Cents. at 116. At the annual meeting of the Universal Life Assurance Society, held on the 13th inst., the report showed that the number of new policies issm.t during the past year was 237, the premiums on which amounted to 6,720/. 17s. 3d.; the total number of policies issued from the com- mencement of the society were 7,842, insuring the sum of 6,848,1811.; while the total amount of premiums received was 1,878,324/. A reduction of 471 per cent. on all premiums entitled to participate (being an increase of 2/. 10s. per cent. beyond the reduction of last year) was declared, and a dividend of 1/. 19s. per share in addition to the 10s. per share due on 31st December next. A company called the Mediterranean Hotel Company has been started to supply Nice with more hotel accommodation,