3iortIlautung.

We understand that a Treasury commission has been issued, appoint- ing Lord Portman, H. Ker Seymer, Esq., M.P., I. K. Brunel, Esq., C.E., Robert Rawlinson, Esq., C.E. Professor J. T. Way, J. B. Lewes, Esq., and Southwood Smith, Esq., M.D., to inquire into the most effect- ual means of distributing the sewage of towns and of applying it to be- neficial and profitable uses.—Globe.

The Registrar-General reports a further decrease in the mortality of London. The deaths registered last week were 1060; in the preceding week they were 1243: according to the corrected average the number should have been 1300, or 240 above the actual number.

The College of Physicians has lost its President, the medical profession a distinguished brother, and science a devoted follower, by the death of Dr. Paris, who expired on Wednesday morning, at his house in Dover Street. Born at Cambridge in. 1785, James Ayrton Paris graduated at Caius College, Cambridge, and went thence to Edinburgh, at that time famous as a school. of medicine. In 1807 he came to London ; and, although only twenty-two years of age, he was elected Physician to the Westminster Hospital. This appointment he soon gave up, having a desire to settle in Penzance. In Cornwall he turned steadily to science; founded the Royal Geological So- ciety of that county ; and invented the " tamping-bar," an instrument whereby the miners are enabled to pursue their business amid inflammable gases without the fear of striking fire from the rock. He did not long re- main at Penzance. In 1810 he returned to London, and pursued his pro- fession as a physician here, for the rest of his days. In 1844 the College of Physicians chose him as their President. In 1854 he voluntarily under took the arduous duties of President of the Medical Council of the Board of Health, and with his own hand wrote the introductory report on the cholera- of 1854. Dr. Paris was known beyond his profession by his writings,—his Life of Sir Humphry Davy, his " Philosophy in Sport," and other works: The last ten days of his life were spent in the midst of excruciating suffer: :Inge, which were borne with the most remarkable fortitude. His chief con. eern appeared to be to console and comfort those around him who could ill disguise their grief at the impending and irreparable loss. His intellect re- mained to the hat as clear as at any time of his life, and while power of speech remained nobody who listened to him could believe that the end was so near at hand.

John Douglas Marquis of Queensberry died yesterday week, at Edinburgh. By his death a vacancy. occurs in the representation of Dumfriesshire as his son, Lord Drumlanng, Member for that county, will now take rank in the Scottish Peerage as Marquis of Queensberry.

One of the Commissioners of Greenwich Hospital, Rear-Admiral Sir Henry Hart—an old sailor, who saw considerable service in the French wars—died on Monday, at his residence in the Hospital. His age was se- venty-six.

In consequence of new postal arrangements with France, from the let January 1857, there will be a considerable reduction in the rates of postage on letters to France and Algeria, and such letters as pass through France to other countries. Thus, letters to France and Algeria, under ounce, will be charged 4d. if prepaid, and so on in proportion ; letters under the same weight addressed vio.ance, to Baden, Luxemberg, the Netherlands, Rhen- ish, Prussia, Bavaria, Wurtemberg, the Minor German States, Sardinia and Switzerland, will be charged 6d. ; letters to Spain and Portugal, under ounce, 8d. ; letters to Prussia, the Rhenish Provinces excepted, to Hanover, Saxony, Brunswick, the Mecklenbergs, 8d. ; letters to Tuscany, Austz Servia, Denmark, Parma and Modena, 9d. ; letters to the Ionian Islands Trieste, 9d. ; letters to the Papal States, the Two Sicilies, and Greece, 11d. ; letters to Norway, Russia, Sweden, Poland, Turkey in Europe, Wallaahia and Moldavia, ls. 3d. Letters may be registered by the prepayment of double postage-rates.

January the 1st will be the fiftieth anniversary of the Prince of Prussia's entering the ranks of the army : it will be celebrated by the offer of various presents to the Prince. The regular army will give him a splendid shield, the landwehr a helmet of gold, both paid for by general subscriptions of officers and men ; the King will present a highly-decorated sword to his brother.

The Emperor of the French lately sent to the King of Prussia the Broad Riband of the Legion of Honour—not, as was reported, the Grand Cross : the riband is of the first class of the order, the grand cross only the third.

The King of Prussia recently sent some fine porcelain vases to the Vice- roy of Egypt : in return, Said Pasha is about to present four Arabian horses to the King—steeds of unrivalled beauty and excellence.

There is a talk at Dresden of an approaching visit of the Russian Grand Duke Constantine to Paris, on his return from Nice, to which place he is to conduct his wife on a visit to the Empress Mother.

Many a literary home has been made brighter this Christmas-time by the noble sympathy of John Kenyon the poet, whosedeath we recently announced. The poet was rich as he was genial. Scarcely a man or woman distinguished in the world of letters with which he was familiar has passed unremembered in his will, and some poets and children of poets are endowed with a princely munificence. Among those who have shared most liberally in this har- vest of good-will, we are happy to hear that Mr. and Mrs. Browning, reeeilce

10,0001., Mr. Procter (B 60001., and Dr. Southey-a-very handsome sum, we think 80001. We hear that there are ithout, eighty' legatees, many, of them the old literary 'friends 'of the deceased poet.--

Atheneum.' • • • ' • • •

Mrs. Cargenven, of Tram, widow of a Captain is theRoyal Navy, died on the 7th instant, in her hundred-and-seventh year. • Not onlyhad all the com- panions of her youth departed before her, but also many of her junior re- latives—as her nephew-in-law, the Reverend William Curgenven; . and yet lie had reached the ripe age of seventy-eight.

The will of Viscount Harding° has been proved in London; the property is sworn under 80,0001.

According to the Wiltshire Independent, "1dr. Sidney Herbert will be- come the owner of a considerable amount of property in Odessa,and some other parts. of Southern Russia; through the death of Prince, Woronzow, whose sister was the mother of the right honourable gentleman,," A painful accident is stated by.the Brussels journals_ to have befallen M. Nothomb, the Belgian Minister of Justice. A, few nights ago, Madame l'!Tothomb having occasion to use a flask of ether, some of the, liquid was spilt, took fire, and burnt her face 'severely, as well her infant, 'AMA- the had m her arms. M. Nothomb, in attempting to extinguish the flutes, was' also much burnt.

The Lord Bishop of Gloucester and Bristol provided lodgings, at his own expense, for every candidate for the recent ordination, and directed that all their needs should be promptly and liberally supplied. The want of a Ralacie at Bristol has thus not been held by the Bishop to be an excuse for •neglect- ing the rites of hospitality.

The rectory of St. Giles-in-the-Fields, which has become vacent by the elevatioa of Dr. Bickersteth to the bishopric of Ripon, has been conferred by the Lord Chancellor on the Reverend E. H. Carr, M.A., Incumbent of Glirist Chapel, Maids Hill. Mr. Carr was for some years Rector ef Mill- brook, Bedfordshire ; and obtained his appointment to Christ Chapel a few months ago, on the nomination of the Reverend thorge Fisk, who was minister of Christ Chapel, to the vicarage of Great Malvern.

The directors of the South-Western Railway, on the announcement of Redpath's frauds, though they go into a rigid scrutiny of their books and accounts at the end of every half-year, and had no reason to suspect anything wrong, closed the books at the end of November, andinstituted a rigid examina- tion into every department,inoluding the transfers and registration, ordinary and preference shares, with the debentures, the whole comprehending Boole 56;00 aocounts. The labour of course was exceedingly great ; but the result repaid them with the confirmation, to a penny, that all was, right.—Hera- path's journal.

Another vessel that was known to be a slaver recently left New York ; yet there were no legal grounds upon whiCh the autherities could capture her. New powers to stop the .nefarious trelfic are called for by the press.

The New York Times is dissatisfied with the Atlantic Telegraph scheme : it puts too much power.into the hands of the British Government, and the two ends of the line where it touches the land are in British territory.

By a recent decision of the French Government, travellers coming , from England, and proceeding direct to Belgium or Germany by Boulogne and Calais or vice versa, are not required to have their passport vieed by the French Consul, but can exhibit itwithout that formality with their railway-. ticket to prove that they are. only passing through the country and, not intending to stop in it. A similar facility is afforded in Belgium.

The Government interference at Paris to reduce the price of meat is a failure: wholesale, meat is cheaper. in Paris than in London, but in Lon- don the retail price is less than in Paris. A pretty illustration of the good effected by interference with the freedom of trade !

'The retail trade of Paris is very dull: numbers of persons are remaining in the provinces this Christmas, to avoid the tax of presents'which prevails in the capital.

A 'fine bittern, or mire drran;was shot by Mr. N. E. Serjeantson, while in pursuit of wild-fowl, near Snaith, in the West Riding of Yorkshire; a few days ago. This beautiful and rare bird is the first of 'this description that has been seen in this part of the country.within living recollection. It meet- Bared from tip to tip four feet twoinehes.

Mr. Martin T. Smith M.P. shot a -very rare bird on the 17th October, at Baynham in Norfolk—the scolopix Sabini, or Sabine's snipe. This was only the fourth known to have been killed in England. The prepared speci men is now in the possession of Mr. Smith's son, a member of Trinity Col- lege, Cambiidge.

The ruins of a. Roman theatre have been discovered at Trigueres, near Montargis in France ; it is 70 yards long from the back of the pit to the stage, and 60 yards wide. It could have held 10,000 spectators. The interior of the theatre is not yet uncovered.

In 1855, the people of Newark contributed a great variety of articles for. the use of our soldiers in the Crimea : it was believed that the Mayor Mr. Ragsdale had forwarded them ; but the present Mayor, Mr. Riddell, •has twit discovered them in a room at the Town-hall !

Mr. Henry George Kuper, British Consul at Baltimore, has been suf- focated in a house which caught fire during a large conflagration.

A train on the Cleveland and Pittsburg Railroad ran into an express-train on the Ohio and Pennsylvania Railrood at Alliance, smashing two of the passenger-cars of the latter train, killing eightpersone and wounding several others. One of the cars was thrOwn into the rotunda at the station, and another through a public room whieh constituted apart of Sourbeck's Hotel, in which several • persons were sitting ; of whom, singular to relate, moat of the killed and wounded consisted. One of the gentlemen who were killed was just about to be married at Alliance. The accident had caused the greatest excitement, and the fireman of the Cleveland train had fled to the woods to escape the fury of the people.-4,nerican Paper.

South, a soldier of the Twenty-eighth Regiment, was recently found dead at Malta, having been stabbed in the neck : on the same night a second sol- dier of the same regiment, John Schofield, was discovered in the street badly wounded; the assassin in the latter case has been arrested. Govern- nient has offered a reward of 1001. for the detection of the murderer of Soueh.

It appears from letters in the Times that rogues and thieves have adopted a new dodge to fleece or rob " unprotected females." Two fellows watch the departure of the master of the house ; then they almost force an admit- tance to see the "lady of the house" ; offer to sell a bottle of "French polish"—ehe must buy it to get rid of them ; if opportunity serves, the scoundrels do a stroke of thieving business. This has occurred in the neighbourhood of Covent Garden, as well as in places more remote from the centre of bustle. The following—WV-copy, 'ye attire etliteratinr,--cd--a letter -received-the other day by- &landed gentleman in the Stewartry, who anxiously preserves .

the game on his estate, from one of the most notorious poachers tiled's- trict. " Rhonchouse, Dot. —,• 1856. Sir—as i mad a promis to Mr.

last year that i wud mak no more Hair nets if the gentlemen of the dis' trick would allow me aney thing for giving it over. for it is worth six pounds a. year to me and i -will become Bound that I will:make no more. Pleasput Down what youCriew Signed) 6— G. To Mr. —, Esqr."—.Thonfries courier. - ■ •

'Forged notes, admirably executed, to the amount of 30,000 dollars, have been seized by the police of New York at certain money-brokers' premises.