31iintl1autous.

A Privy Council was held at Osborne House on Wednesday. The Queen presided. There were likewise present Prince Albert, the Lord Chancellor, the Marquis of Salisbury, the Earl of Derby, Mr. Walpole, the Earl of Malmesbury, Sir John Pakington, the Chancellor of the Ex- chequer, the Duke of Northumberland, the Earl of Hardwicke, Mr. Herries, and the Marquis of Exeter. It was ordered by the Queen in Council, "That the Right Honourable the Lord High Chancellor of that part of the United Kingdom called Great Britain do issue write for pro- roguing the Parliament, which was appointed to meet on Friday the 20th day of August instant, to Thursday the 21st day of October next ; and also for proroguing the Convocations of the Provinces of Canterbury and York, from Saturday the 21st day of August instant, to Friday the 22d day of October next."

At the Roman Catholic College of St. Mary Oscott, a Synod was held last month ; and one of its fruits has appeared this week in the journals. It is a letter commencing, as if in defiance of the Ecclesiastical Titles Act, "We, the Archbishop and Bishops of the Province of Westmin- ster " ; and proceeding to state that certain decrees and canons have been made and submitted to the Pope, which will be published as soon as he has confirmed them. The discussion of the education of the poor is "the paramount subject" which appears to have occupied the Synod ; and on this the letter dilates at great length. The purpose is to inculcate the necessity of keeping Catholic children away from all schools not Catholic, in order to have the next generation Catholic. For this purpose, "we must take advantage of the means afforded us to render the secular part of our education as effective as that which others offer " ; in fact, "our education must be up to the mark of modern demand, yet solid in faith and piety"—purely Catholic. "Make your schools equal in every re- spect to those which are opened to allure away our children. Avail your- selves of every encouragement and every improvement which tends to raise the standard of your education, and let there be no pretence tenable for sending Catholic children elsewhere." They have established a sys- tem of school inspection, by ecclesiastics, especially with a view to keep- ing up their faith; and the letter speaks of day-schools in towns for the middle classes. Peace and reliance on the law in cases of insult or op- pression are inculcated towards the end of the letter. It is not signed by any Bishop or man of note.

Alexander, tenth Duke of Hamilton, died on Wednesday, at his house in Portman Square. He was born in 1767, and was one of the oldest members of the Peerage. His English titles were Duke of Brandon and Baron Dutton. In 1810 he married the second daughter of Mr. William Beckford of Fonthill Abbey. He is succeeded by his son, known hitherto as the Marquis of Douglas ; who was born in 1810; and married, in 1843, the Princess Mary Amelia Elizabeth Caroline, daughter of the late Grand Duke of Baden, and first cousin of President Bonaparte.

A vacancy on the Chancery bench has been created by the death of "Vice-Chancellor Sir James Parker. Sir James died suddenly, of angina pectoris, on the 13th instant, at his country residence, Rothley Temple, near Loughborough in Leicestershire. He was born at Glasgow, in 1803, and attended the schools and College of that city ; but afterwards entered at Trinity College, Cambridge, and took the degree of Master of Ans. Ile was called to the bar in 1829, and made a Queen's counsel in 1844. His appointment to the Vice-Chancellorahip took place, as our readers may remember, in October 1851. In politic* he was a consistent Tory; and he was selected for the Vice-Chancellorship by the Whig Govern- ment solely on account of his great legal knowledge.

Sir John Pelly died on Friday week, at Upton House, Essex, in his seventy-fifth year. He was known as the Governor of the Hudson's Bay Company and Deputy-Master of the Trinity House ; and had been Deputy-Governor and Governor of the Bank of England in 1840 and 1841.

The public have lost a valuable public servant by the death of Mr. Joseph Fletcher, her Majesty's Inspector of Schools.

"Mr. Fletcher had established for himself a high reputation by his labours in the cause of humanity, as secretary to the Handloom Inquiry in the first in- stance, and afterwards to the Children's Employment Commission. The several reports of these Commissions will remain an unfailing monument to Mr. Fletcher's earnest and indefatigable endeavours to ameliorate the condition of women and children employed in manufactures. On the termination of the Children's Employment Commission, whose startling disclosures ex- cited so painfully the attention of the public, and forced upon our Legislature the absolute and imperative necessity for Parliamentary control, Mr. Fletcher was appointed to the post of Inspector of Schools receiving grants under the Privy Council. His voluminous reports on the schools in his inspection are among the most valuable contributions to our educational statistics. Mr. Fletcher was for many years one of the honorary secretaries of the Statistical Society of London; in which post he had earned for himself a widespread reputation among foreign as well as British statists, for the zeal, industry, and assiduity with which he discharged the laborious duties of that office. He was also during the same period editor of the Statistical Journal; and to his talents and patient labour are due the collation and arrangement of the vast collection of valuable documents to be found in those volumes. Mr. Fletcher for several years acted as secretary to the Statistical Section of the British Association, of which he was also a member of the Council. He con- tributed several valuable memoirs to the series of the Association reports. Our brief enumeration of Mr. Fletcher's labours will have given cause to our readers to imagine him a man advanced in years : he expired, however, at the comparatively early age of thirty-nine. Ever since he was nineteen Isis pen had been engaged upon literary occupations. Mr. Fletcher had been ill but a short time, and was at the time of his death on leave of absence at Chfrk, in North Wales."— Times.

Mrs. Lalor Shell, widow of Richard Lalor Shell, died on the 4th in- stant, at Leghorn. Her remains are to be brought to Ireland for burial, at Long Orchard, near Templemore.

The Honourable Jeffrey Hart Bent, Chief Justice of British Guiana, died on the 29th June, in the seventy-second year of his age.

After the Privy Council on Wednesday, the Earl of Derby and the Marquis of Salisbury went to St. Leonard's ; the Lord Chancellor to Kingston.

Sir John Pakington returned to town on Tuesday, from Westwood Park ; and went back on Wednesday.

Mr. Disraeli arrived in town, from Hughendon Manor, Buckingham- shire, on Tuesday ; and returned thither on Wednesday.

A report which stated that the Earl of Derby would preside over the annual dinner of the Lancashire Agricultural Society at Preston, has been this week contradicted.

Mr. Samuel Warren, Q.C., author of numerous works, popular and professional, has been appointed to the Recordership of Hull. He suc- ceeds the late Mr. T. C. Granger M.P.

It is stated that Mr. Fearon, the Attorney-General's solicitor for chari- ties, was last week on a visit to William of Wykeham's foundation, St. May's College, Winchester, with a view to the better administration of the noble endowments.

The Queen of Holland was at Prague on the 13th, and was expected to reach Ischl on the 18th.

The Duchess of Orleans and her children arrived at Geneva on the 13th. Several German papers say that the rumoured marriage between Presi- dent Bonaparte and the Princess Vasa will not take place.

General d'Ornano has been appointed Grand Chancellor of the Legion of-Honour. He was born in 1784, and made his first campaign at Ma- rengo. He is a Corsican.

The Harvard University, United States, has lately conferred the honom- ry degree of Doctor of Laws upon Francis Guizot and Alexis de Tooque- ville.

Mr. Ward, recently elevated to the Regency of Parma, was originally a Yorkshire groom. When a smart lad, he was noticed by the Duke, and taken into his service. He appears to have risen to his present emi- nence very gradually ; his success in the stables leading to his appoint- ment in the household; and his good judgment in that capacity winning for hirn an ascendancy over the mind of his master, which placed him in the second post in the little Dukedom.

The Standard of Monday contained the following paragraph on the American fishery dispute-

" We believe that we may with perfect confidence assure our readers of the satisfactory termination of the dispute on the subject of the North American fisheries ; a dispute, we may observe, that has been treated much more seriously in newspaper controversy and hustings speeches than in the com- munications of the British and American Governments. The terms on which the matter is likely, we may say, certain, to be adjusted, are extremely sim- ple, and as it will be seen perfectly esuitable. They are terms of absolute reciprocity, as far as the right of fishing is concerned. The Americans are to be at hberty to fish in all British waters, the British to fish in all Ameri- can waters ; subject on both sides to the general law which prohibits the vessels of foreigners to fish within less than three miles of the shore of any country to which they do not belong ; the three miles to be measured from the nearest land, without distinction of bay or open sea. This general law is absolutely necessary for fiscal and police purposes ; and, therefore, there can be nothing offensive or invidious in its enforcement, whether by British or American authorities. We may add, that upon a careful review of all that has occurred, the American Government acknowledges that no offence has yet been offered to it ; though it slightly complains that a notice had not been given by the British Government of its purse of protecting the three-miles border of the sea with more vigilance than before. Such a notice, however, upon a further consideration, it has been admitted, would have been equivocal, if not positively insulting, as implying a suspicion that the Government of the "United States had connived at a contraband fishery."

The main despatches upon this question, just reproduced in the United States Senate, consist of one from Lord Aberdeen to Mr. Everett, dated "Foreign Office, March 10, 1846," and one from Mr. Everett to Lord Aberdeen, dated "Grosvenor Place, March 25, 1845." Their most im- portant parts will be found in the following extracts.

LORD ABERDEEN TO MR. EVERETT.

"The undersigned will not think it necessary to enter into a lengthened argument in reply to the observations which have at different times been submitted to her Majesty's Government by Mr. Stevenson and Mr. Everett on the subject of the right of fishing in the Bay of Fundy, as claimed in be- half of the United States citizens. The undersigned will confine himself to stating, that, after the most deliberate reconsideration of the subject, and with every desire to do full justice to the United States, and to view the claims put forward on behalf of American citizens in the most favourable light, her Majesty's Government are nevertheless still constrained to deny the nght of the United States citizens, under the treaty of 1818, to fish in that part of the Bay of Fundy which, from its geographical position, may properly be considered as included within the British possessions. "Her Majesty's Government must still maintain, and in this view they are fortified by high legal authority, that the Bay of Fundy is rightfully claimed by Great Britain as a bay within the meaning of the treaty of 1818. And they equally maintain the position which was laid down in the note of the undersigned dated the 13th of April last, that with regard to the other bays on the British American coasts, no United States fisherman has, under that convention' the right to fish within three miles of the entrance of such bays, as designated by a line drawn from headland to headland at that entrance. "But while her Majesty's Government still feel themselves bound to maintain those positions as a matter of right, they are nevertheless not insensible to the advantages which would accrue to both countries from a re- laxation of the exercise of that right : to the United States as conferring a material benefit on their fishing-trade ; and to Great Britain and the United States conjointly and equally, by the removal of a fertile source of disagreement between them.

"Her Majesty's Government are also anxious, at the same time that they uphold the just claims of the British Crown, to evince, by every reasonable concession, their desire to act liberally and amicably towards the United States. "The undersigned has, accordingly, much pleasure in announcing to Mr. Everett the determination to which her Majesty's Government have come, to relax in favour of the United States fishermen that right which Great Britain has hitherto exercised, of excluding those fishermen from the British portion of the Bay of Fundy; and they are prepared to direct the Colonial authorities to allow henceforth the United States fishermen to pursue their avocations in any part of the Bay of Fundy, provided they do not approach, except in the eases specified in the treaty of 1818, within three miles of the entrance of any bay on the coast of Nova Scotia or New Brunswick.

"In thus communicating to Mr. Everett the liberal intentions of her Ma- jesty's Government, the undersigned desires to call Mr. Everett's atten. tion to the fact, that the produce of the labour of the British Colonial fisher- men is at the present moment excluded by prohibitory duties on the part of

the United States from the markets of that country ; and the undersigned 'would submit to Mr. Everett, that the moment at which the British Govern- ment are making a liberal concession to United States trade, might well be deemed favourable for a counter-concession, on the part of the United States, to British trade, by the reduction of the duties which operate so prejudicially to the interests of the British Colonial fishermen."

MR. EVERETT TO LORD ABERDEEN.

"While he desires, however, without reserve, to express his sense of the amicable disposition evinced by her Majesty's Government on this occasion, in relaxing in favour of the United States the exercise of what, after deli- berate consideration, fortified by high legal authority, is deemed an unques- tioned right of her Majesty's Government, the undersigned would be un- faithful to his duty did he omit to remark to Lord Aberdeen, that no argu- ments have at any time been adduced to shake the confidence of the Government of the United States in their own construction of the treaty. While they have ever been prepared to admit that in the letter of one ex- pression of that instrument there is some reason for claiming a right to exclude the United States fishermen from the Bay of Fundy, (it being diffi- cult to deny to that arm of the sea the name of bay,' which long geogra- phical usage has assigned to it,) they have ever strenuously maintained that it is only on their own construction of the entire article that its known design, in reference to the regulation of the fisheries, admits of being carried into effect.

"The undersigned does not make this observation for the sake of detract- ing from the liberality evinced by her Majesty's Government in relaxing from what they regard as their right ; but it would be placing his own Go- vernment in a false position to accept as mere favour that for which they have so long and strenuously contended as due to them under the convention." [With reference to the meaning of the words "entrance of any bay," de- fined to be a line drawn from headland to headland, Mr. Everett cites two cases of seizures to illustrate the working of that definition.] "In the case of the Washington, which formed the subject of the note of the undersigned of the 25th of May 1844, to which the present communica- tion of Lord Aberdeen is a reply, the capture complained of was in the waters of the Bay of Fundy. The principal portion of the argument of the under- signed was addressed to that part of the subject; and he is certainly under i the impression that it the point of greatest interest in the discussions which have been hitherto carried on between the two Governments in refer- ence to the United States right of fishery on the Anglo-American coasts.

"In the case, however, of the Argus, which was treated in the note of the undersigned of the 9th of October, the capture was in the waters which wash. the North-eastern coast of Cape Breton - a portion of the Atlantic ocean in- tercepted, indeed, between a straight 'line drawn from Cape North to the Northern head of Cow Bay, but possessing nqne of the characters of a bay, (far less so than the Bay of Fundy,) andnot called a 'bay' on any map which the undersigned has seen. The aforesaid line is a degree of latitude in length ; and as far as reliance can be placed on the only maps (English ones) in the possession of the undersigned on which this coast is distinctly laid down it. would exclude vessels from filing-grounds which might be thirty miles from the shore."

rl'o the remarks of Lord Aberdeen respecting reciprocity, Mr. Everett re- plies hypothetically, in the absence of instruction.s.1 "The undersigned is, of course, without instructions which enable him to make any definite reply to this suggestion. It is no doubt true that the British Colonial fish, as far as duties are concerned, enter the United States market, if at all, to some disadvantage. The Government of the United States, he is personally persuaded, would gladly make any reduction in these duties which would not seriously injure the native fishermen ; but Lord Aberdeen 113 aware that the encouragement of this class of the seafaring com- munity has ever been considered, as well in the United States as Great Britain, as resting on peculiar grounds of expediency. It is the great school not only of the commercial but of the public marine, and the highest consi- derations of national policy require it to be fostered. "The British Coloinal fishermen possess considerable advantages over those of the United States. The remoter fisheries of Newfoundland and Labrador are considerably more accessible to the Colonial than to the United States fishermen. The fishing-grounds on the coast of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, abounding in cod, mackerel, and herring, lie at the doors of the former. He is therefore able to pursue his avocation in a smaller class of vessels, and requires a smaller outfit. He is able to use the net and the seine to great advantage in the small bays and inlets along the coast, from which the fishermen of the United States, under any construction of the treaty, are excluded. All or nearly all the materials; of shipbuilding—timber, iron, cord- age, and canvas—are cheaper in the Colonies than in the United States ; as are salt, hooks, and lines. There is also great advantage enjoyed in the former in reference to the supply of bait and curing the fish. These and other causes have enabled the Colonial fishermen to drive those of the United States out of many foreign markets, and might do so at home but for the protection afforded by the duties.

"It may be added, that the highest duty on the kinds of fish that would be sent to the American market is less than fd. per pound ; which cannot do more than counterbalance the numerous advantages possessed by the Colo- nial fishermen. The undersigned supposes, though he has no particular in- formation to that effect, that equal or higher duties exist in the Colonies on the importation of fish from the United States."

There was a thunder-storm in London on Tuesday evening : after ceasing for some hours, it broke out again with great violence about Midnight, ac- companied by torrents of rain. A young man was struck dead at Islington.

The country has suffered vet:), generally from recent thunder-storms. A good deal of damage has been done in some places by floods, or by the light- ning. At Langham, near Colchester, the lightning set fire to a barn on Mr. Blyth's farm, and the whole steading except the dwelling-house was de- stroyed : the loss was estimated at 2000/. Many persons in different parts of England have been struck by lightning, and have been hurt more or less, death, however, is reported only in three Scotch cases.

Working hands have been so abort in West Sussex, that two farmers of Boaham have been obliged to hire a number of soldiers to assist in saving their harvest. The commanding-officer of the Scots Fusilier Guards con- sented to the employment of his men, on condition that they did not com- pete with agricultural labourers.