be Vrobintts.

The seat for South Nottingham, vacant by the resignation of Colonel Rolleston, has been filled by the election, without opposition, of Mr. Robert Bromley of Stoke; a Protectionist, who concedes that he 18 in a mi- nority—the country will not " return to protective duties," and who there- fore would administer relief to suffering agriculture by a readjustment of local taxation. The election proceedings passed off at Newark, on Tues- day, without any incident worth noting.

" Protection for agriculture " still supplies a topic for meetings in the provinces, hut not one that has provoked much earnest or original oratory.

At Exeter, on Friday, Sir Thomas Dyke Adana sketched the contest waged between protection and free trade since the war, and admitted that the tide of free trade has at last:overwhelmed its opponents: he saw no hope of rolling back the tide till experience should have created a revulsion in the mind of the whole country.

At Colchester, on Saturday, Major Beresford and Sir John Tyrell ex- horted the farmers to follow the leading of Lord Stanley, and the "talented and able Member for Bucks"; who were but at the commencement of is movement that would yet place the farmers in their proper position.

Some months since, Prince Albert accepted an invitation from the Man- chester, Sheffield, and Lincolnshire Railway Company, to lay the founda- tion-stone of a grand system of docks which they have projected at Great Grimsby, on the mouth of the Humber, as a Lincolnshire port to compete for the European traffic engrossed by Hull. The Prince left Windsor on Tuesday, and proceeded by the North-western Railway from Watford to Lincoln; where he halted, and paid a visit to the Town-hall and Cathedral. The Corporation came to him at the station, in violet-coloured robes of office, and escorted him to their hall. There they presented to him an address, in the name of their ancient and once royal city. Prince Albert replied affably to their courtesies.— " You do me no more than justice in believing that I am sincerely anxious to give every encouragement in mypower to those excellent institutions of which you may feel justly proud ; some of which provide for the wants and sickness of your poorer brethren, and others that tend, by the encouragement of art and the wider diffusion of knowledge, to enlarge the minds and elevate the condition of the Bri- tish people."

The Cathedral was visited under the guidance of the Canons and other reverend dignitaries. The journey was resumed to the Earl of Yarborough's seat of Brocklesby Hall; where the Prince remained a guest for the night. Wednesday morning saw the Prince and the Earl out at early dawn, in spite of snow-storms and biting winds, on a round of inspection into farm- ing improvements; and in the forenoon 600 of the tenantry assembled near the mansion, and excited the Prince's admiration under "review" as a. quasi-yeoman regiment. The Corporation of Boston came in state, and presented an address; which the Prince acknowledged with a special compliment—

"The transformation of the district which formerly was called the Lincolnshire Fens from unhealthy sterility to their present high state of cultivation is a proud testimony to the enterprise and skill of your country." The station of Great Grimsby was reached, with a large party from Brocklesby Hall, soon after noon; and another Corporation address having been there received and suitably acknowledged, the Prince set forth to the site of the new docks.

A few years since, Great Grimsby was an obscure fishing village, equally without produce of its own or traffic in any imports. Hull had secured the commerce of the East coast, as Chester had that of the West; but the inconvenience of the Humber navigation has long been felt, and Hull, like Chester and Bristol, has not increased its commerce with anything like the rapidity of Liverpool, Southampton, and other places where railways and docks have opened new courses of inland communication or established new ports. The extraordinary development of agricultural industry in Lincoln- shire, its increased agricultural exports, and concurrent imports of bulky articles from the Continent, of bones, rape-seed, and oil-cake, have de- manded the formation of lines of inland communication with the manufac- turing and trading centres of the West and Midland counties. The Man- chester, Sheffield, and Lincolnshire Railway Company, have projected a continuation of the railway to the sea-coast at Grimsby, and the formation of sea-docks as its terminus, to supply this exigency; and their engineer, Mr. Rendell, has projected works on an adequately grand and comprehensive scale. The general plan of constructing docks is, to excavate the work at the bank or coast, and then cut a communication with the channel or open sea; but in this case the bold scheme has been carried out of enclosing by vast embankments 135 acres of the estuary of the Humber, over most of the area of which a depth of water already flowed enough to float vessels of considerable burden. The works will embrace when complete, first, an entrance-basin, the area of which is sixteen acres, and which will be acces- sible to the largest vessels at all times; secondly, piers suitable for all ves- sels not requiring to enter the docks; thirdly, the great dock, 300 feet in length and 65 in width; fourthly, the small dock, 200 feet in length and 45 in width; fifthly, the dock with an area of 29 acres, accessible for all vessels for twenty hours out of the twenty-four; sixthly, the West wharf, 200 feet in length, with railways, &c. upon it, and comprising an area of twelve acres; seventhly, the East wharf, 2,000 feet in length and 670 in width, to be appropriated to warehouses; and lastly, a goods-station, with railways laid to every part, and embracing an area of 42 acres.

The day was inclement, but the town of Grimsby and a vast multitude of the population of the East coast had resolved to make holyday and "see the Prince ": the Railway Company had strained themselves to secure a worthy inauguration; and the Government itself had so far acknowledged the national character of the undertaking, as to honour it by the presence of the Sheerness squadron of evolution under the command of Admiral Elliott.

Prince Albert and his party, entering a long train of carriages, were drawn by a shouting host of brawny-armed "navies," towards the site of the foundation-stone—a large block weighing eleven tons. Passing under arches of evergreens, they entered an immense enclosure stored with vast piles of stone and timber, in preparation for the works: the spectators were nineteen feet below high-water mark; but over the edge of the sur- rounding embankment the ships of the Royal squadron showed their rigging decked with flags. Prince Albert and his suite descended from their carriages; the officers of the company approached with the insignia of the ceremony; and, amidst the roar of a royal salute, the foundratian-

stone was laid. Tim Bishop of Lincoln briefly prayed God's blessing on the work.

In a grand pavilion hard by, a luncheon was prepared for 1,000 persons; and thither the Prince and his party repaired for refreshment and speech- making, under the chairmanship of the Earl of Yarborough. Prince Albert was toasted with great enthusiasm; and reference was made to a possible visit even more august than his—

"I am quite certain," said the Chairman, "that if we should at any time find that her Majesty wished, in prosecuting a voyage from London to Scotland, from stress of weather, to remain quiet at anchor instead of knocking about in the roads, she will find in a few years a most quiet retreat in the Grimsby Docks." In reply, Prince Albert said-

" This work has hem undertaken, like almost all great enterprises in this great sstmtg, by private enterprise, private capital, and at private risk ; and it shares also in that other feature so peculiar to the enterprises of Englishmen, that, strongly attached as they are to the institutions of their country, and gratefully acknowledging the protection of the laws under which those enterprises are under- taken and prosper, they love to connect them in some manner with the authority of the Crown and the person of the Sovereign. (Loud cheers.) It is the per- suasion of this circumstance which has impelled me to respond to your call, and come amongst you as the readiest mode of testifying to you how strongly her Ma- jesty the Queen appreciates and reciprocates those feelings." (Continued cheering.)

Prince Albert returned to Windsor the same evening.

The shareholders of the Midland Railway Company assembled on Thursday, at the Derby station, in extraordinary special general meeting, to consider the appointment of a Committee of inquiry into the general management of the Company. Mr. John Ellis, M.P., who presided, opened the business of the day by reading a communication from Mr. Hudson re- signing his office of Chairman of the Company: he did so on the ground that after the opening of the traffic on the Great Northern Railway, shortly, the interests of the three companies over which he has presided, the Mid- land, the York and North Midland, and the York, Newcastle, and Ber- wick lines, "may not be found to be identical." This announcement was received with manifestations of satisfaction, and by anticipation prevented a very stormy meeting. The committee of investigation, however, was ap- pointed.

A violent assault was committed last week on Mr. Qainlevan, a Roman Catholic priest of Cambridge by one of his flock, Benjamin Smithson. On Monday after- noon, Smithson went to the priest's house, had an interview, and shortly after left the place. A servant found Mr. Quinlevan on the floor, bleeding from a wound ea the head, inflicted with the poker. When Smithson was arrested he admitted his guilt. Up to Friday, the sufferer was too ill to attend at the Police Court to give evidence. On that evening, an inquest was held on the body of Miss Alice Bowtell, who died suddenly the day before. A surgeon stated that he had found considerable disease in the stomach, but the immediate cause of death was an inflammation of that organ: on the coats of it there was a white shining deposit. The witness was directed to analyze this; and the Jury adjourned. Miss Bowtell had recently become a Roman Catholic ; she was engaged to marry Smithson; it was rumoured that the priest had interfered to prevent the union, and hence the attack upon him by Smithson; wild it was at once suspected that Miss Bowtell bad poisoned herself. These occurrences and rumours caused a good deal of excitement at Cambridge.

At the end of last December, the body of Job Doxey, an old pensioner, was found in a brook close to the Victoria bridge, Glossop. There were rumours that some of Doxey's family probably had a hand in his death, as they were known to quarrel with him and ill-use him; but there was no evidence against any one. On Good Friday, John Clough disclosed that he had seen the old man mur- dered: he said that Thomas Doxey, the deceased's son, and Dawson, his son-in- law, were the murderers. These men were apprehended. Before the Magis- trates, Clough stated that he was out with his wife on the night of the 30th De- cember; they saw two men beating and kicking Job Doxey; the couple interfered, but the assailants of the old man threatened to serve them the same if they did not go away. As he was retreating, Clough saw the men throw Doxey over the bridge: one of the men was Thomas Doxey ; Clough had at first thought Daw- son was the other, but he now admitted that he was mistaken. The witness had refrained from telling his story before from terror: Thomas Doxey had threat- ened him since the murder. Dawson's family proved that he was at home at the time of the outrage; and the Magistrates liberated him. Doxey was committed for trial.

The embankment of a reservoir at Cowling, near Keigbley, suddenly gave way on the night of Sunday week, and a vast body of water rushed down to a lower

level; sweeping before it large stones, trees, gravel, earth, and a bridge. i Fortu- nately, no life was lost- At the village of Ickornshaw, a widow and two children were n peril: the water filled the basement of a cottage to the depth of five feet, and the people were struggling in it for some time, till they could be drawn into an upper room by a hole broken in the floor. Acres of land have been covered with silt.

A cotton-warehouse at Liverpool, belonging to Mr. Maxwell, with 800 bales of cotton that were within it, was burnt down on Saturday morning. Several per- sons were at work on the premises at the time; their attention was excited by a strong sulphurous smell, and directly after the whole place was in flames. The fire raged furiously, and the pile of building was soon in ruins. A stone window- sill of an opposite home cracked with the heat; and a portion fell on a man's head, fracturing the skull, and causing death in a few hours.