REFORM MEETINGS. — The meetings throughont the country have been so numerous,
that we cannot attempt giving even a list of them. The Hampshire county meeting, where Sir Thomas Baring, and indeed the whole of the family of Baring, with the exception of Alexander, declared their intention to support the Bill, was not without importance, even for that fact. The Berkshire county meeting was also highly im- portant, from the unanimity and respectability of the parties assembled. The Essex county meeting takes place to-day ; and before our next, we- have little doubt that most of the counties in England will have ex- pressed their feelings on the Bill. We need not say on what side they will be expressed,—there is mistake on that point.
There is one of the numerous town meetings which we desire to spe- cify—that of Birmingham ; and we do this for the sake of a single point in one of the speeches. Mr. Parke., the solicitor, in moving the third resolution, stated his intention to found a Purity Society, without re- ference to party, whose object should be to secure voters from corruptio. and members from expense. He would contribute his mite towards purity of election, by steadily refusing, as long as he lived in Birm- ingham, to take a fee for acting professionally in a town election. Law- yers were the nuisances of English elections. We need not say we wish well to Mr. Parkes's Society—that we honour his resolution, and hope sincerely that he will find many imitators among the practitioners of the law.
THE PETITION FROM Tint Rim—This petition bore the names of nearly four hundred barristers, including the names of many of the King's counsel, sergeants, and senior members of the profession of the western and home circuit.
LANCASHIRE LADS.—The Manchester people are not contenting them. selves with anticipations of good, or allowing their patriotism to evapo- rate in idle panegyrics on Ministers and the Bill : they are desirous to provide against possible failure, as well as to enjoy possible success. Cir. culars were on Tuesday issued in Manchester, calling a meeting of the leading inhabitants to consider of the best means of supporting the Go- vernment in case it were compelled to have recourse to a dissolution. This is not all—eleven of the gentlemen calling the meeting, deeming example more valuable than precept, immediately subscribed 1,550/. to begin with. We have much pleasure in placing before our readers the names of these honourable forerunners in a course as judicious as it is public-spirited. They are—
Mr. Thomas Potter ..... ...£200
Mr. Richard Potter 21.10 Mr. J. C. Dyer 200 Mr. It. H. Greg 200
Messrs. Fielden (of Todmorden) 200 Mr. Edward Baxter 100 .
Mr. John Brooks 100
Messrs. Coats and Co
Messrs. Barrett and Son Mr. George Heywood 150 M Mr. Richard Wilson 50
To those who have the means-and there are few that have not the means in a greater or less degree-we say, if you admire the principles of these honourable men, follow their example.
THE MaxcuusTart Fonerefts.-Sarah Martin and Martin Collings, two of the celebrated gang of forgers lately broken up at Manchester, were tried last week at the Lancaster Assizes. The principal witness was one -James Wilson, an accomplice. Kirkwood, Collyer, and Calvert, three others of the gang, were tried on Monday (Dade was included in the indictment). Kirkwood, it seems, engraved the plate for the forgery on Heywood's bank, and also cut a die for the stamp : Dade filled up the bills : the others were charged with abetting. The evidence of the ap- prover was more a history of his own roguery than of that of his corn- panions ; who seem to have been quite as willing, but by no means so capable of thieving as himself. A penny-a-line contributor to the Bolton Chronicle also gave evidence against the prisoners. In one case, a bill was wanted which they pretended was to be paid away in Ireland. Dade asked the Chronicle contributor for a name, and be gave him "John Doherty." The object in thus procuring real bank-hills, was that they might serve alleopies for Dade.by which to make the forged ones. The whole of the men were found guilty. EsCAPE ov PRISONSItS, Dade, one of the principals of the gang of forgers lately arrested, and Hollands, a. person deep in their secret, -escaped from Lancaster gaol on Sunday night. They took advantage Id* the preparations for the executions on Monday, which drowned the noise that would otherwise have created Instant notice, to wrench a bar rom the window of the cell. Having got upon the walls, they got down by means of a rope made of their bed-clothes ; it was, however, very short ; and Dade, it appears, must have been much hurt by the fall. He exchanged clothes with his wife, who waited for him below, and in that disguise was conveyed by the Manchester mail to Preston, where all traces of him have been lost. He was very lame and ill when helped into the mail. It is remarked as a curious coincidence, and it is one, that the scaffolding of the gallows erected below the cell where Dade and Holland dropped, saved their necks from being broken by the fall. A Wien.EsaLE Prxxocana.-A Mr. John Broach, an upholsterer, was charged the other day at Queen Square, with a series of very extensive robberies. Broach had, it appeared, got access to numerous houses of persons of distinction, in the way of his profession, and had carried on a system of wholesale plunder wherever he was admitted, and for a long time without the slightest suspicion of his villany. From Lord Am- herst's he had contrived to steal plate of the value of 500/. Three or four cases have been gone into, and several remain to be investigated. MURDER AT BETHNAL GREEN.-The Jury resumed the inquest on Mrs. Markham on Monday ; and on Tuesday, after a lengthened exa- mination of witnesses, returned a verdict of " wilful murder" against some person or persons unknown. Dexter, the son of the deceased, very clearly established an alibi.
TILE WoRRALLs.-These two miscreants, who were charged, some weeks ago, with abusing and murdering an old woman named M‘Chrinan, on the road leading from Manchester to Bolton, were tried and convicted at the Lancaster Assizes on Saturday. The evidence was partly direct, and partly circumstantial, and both of a very conclusive nature. They were condemned, and suffered on Monday. A man named Chadderton was also charged with the offence ; but the evidence against him was very incomplete, and he was acquitted. Expennuesrrai. HANGING.-On Sunday morning, a boy named Fitt, aged fifteen years, while amusing himself, as is supposed, in his bed- room in trying what sort of sensation strangulation occasioned, contrived to hang himself beyond recovery. The instrument of the unhappy boy's death was one of his shirt-sleeves, and it was tied in a single knot only ;
a looking-glass was placed on the table, that he might see himself while suspended. Every effort to restore animation was tried-, but without effect.
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