Ste .413robinces.
The Office of Chancellor of the University of Cambridge having become vaoant by :the death of the-Duke of Northumberland, a great excitement has sprung up on -the choice of a -successor. Themembers of St. John's put forward Lord Powis; but a ,mejority of the -Senate, anxious .for the election of Prince Albert, applied to his Royal Highness for.his consent to be nominated. The Prince,- however, politely declined; intimating that the want of perfect unanimity was the cause of his refusal. Nothing daunted, the Committee determined, 'in spite of the Prince's refusal, "to record, their
votes at the election." .
The polling eommenceaLat ten - o'clock on Thursday morning: The Earl of Powis had begun with.a decided. majority-30 . at the-end of .an hour; -and by two o'clock-was 65 votes in advance. He-then-lostgrouncl, and at the close of the day Prince Albert remained with s. majority of 17; the numbers,being—For Prince Albert, 6-18; for the Earl of Powis, 601.
The contest was continued yesterday with spirit. Among-those who voted for Prince Albert may be mentioned the Marquis of Lansdowne, Earl Grey, Mr. Macaulay, Viscount Melbourne, the Bishop of London, the Dean of Ely, and Sir Herbert Jenner Fust, The Duke aof .Buceleuch and Mr. Justice Pattison voted ,for the Earl of Powis. At the close of-the poll for the day the numbers were—For Prince Albert, -875;.- Lord Powis, 789; -majority for the Prince,-86.
The Guardian -Society of .Liverpool celebrated its twenty-fourth anni- versary on Friday week, by a public dinner; to which Mr. Rowland 11111 ,was invited. This gave 'Mr, Hillun opportunity bf explaining his position At the Post-office- His duties-were to advis' &the.. Postmaster-General on all points- to which-he .Lordship might be pleased to direct his attention, and to carry out gradually the remainder of his awn-system of Post,effiee improvement, of which the penny rate -was only one feature. Without a general understanding to-this effect, , he need scarcely say that he should not have felt justified II) accepting Office. Of the management-of the present details he had no control whatever. But, though-a slight consideration would show that it was impossible that he could exercise aoy Idirect power in the Post-office, he had the good fortune to serve under a , noble- -man who,- with excellent-business habits, united a thorough appretiation of-the iluties and. responsibilities.of his important-office, and who was sincerely desirous of making the institution over which he presides as useful to the public as possible. An illustration of the magnitude of the establishment would be afforded, by a mention of one or two points— Last night, when he left London, he was at Euston Square when the mail was brought in to go by the train this being only one of many which are despatched by railways. It was considered an exceedingly light mail: but, small as it was, it literally filled six large omnibuses; and the heavy mails forwarded on .a Satur- day night filled nine carriages of a similar description. Again, the number of dead letters since the adoption of prepayment had become a very small fraction— leas than the two-hundredth part of the whole; nevertheless, the average amount
i of money found in such letters, n coin, bank-notes, and bills of exchange, was 400,0001. per annum. Many thousands of pounds were actually found in letters with no address whatever. The company would see, therefore, that in so vast a machine the difficulties in the way of any extensive change was very great. Another difficulty was, that the machine was constantly in motion—it never stood. still night or day; and the greatest care, forethought, and calculation, were therefore necessary in making alterations. In improving it would not do to make a mistake—that might stop it altogether; they could rarely try an experiment— all must 1,:e investigated and settled with unerring certainty beforehand. If s steam-engine became defective, it could be stopped, and the requisite repairs made; but not so with the Post-office. He wished the Society to bear these facts in mind, and to continue to him some portion of that great confidence which they had hitherto reposed in him; assuring them, that so far as he was concerned, no time should be lost in carrying out the remaining portions of his plan.
Speaking of local defects, Mr. Hill thought there was much room for improvement; but there were really good reasons for adhering to some eidst- ing arrangements which might appear injudicious. It seemed at first sight absurd that letters should be carried past a town for which they were intended: but it was a necessity arising from the impossibility of every town's making up a bag for every other town. There were about a thousand post-towns; if every one of these made up a thousand bags, there would be &million of bags—in fact, more bags than letters. It was very important that the public should clearly understand what arrangements were possible and whet impossible. A great change had been effected by the penny postage— Immediately before the introduction of the reduced rate of postage, the num- ber of chargeable letters delivered—not including franks—amounted to seventy- five millions annually. Last year it had amounted to two hundred and ninety- nine millions and a half, or to fourfold the original, number. It would require something more than that to bring the Post-office revenue up to the former gross amount; -but less than fivefold Would effect that object. At the present moment, the number of letters delivered in the London district, -comprising a-circle of a radius of twelve miles round the Post-office in St. Martin's-le-Grand, was quite as great as that which under the old system was delivered in the whole United King- dom. The increase was rapidly going on: it amounted to twenty-eight millions last year compared with the previous year. It was the opinion of many gentlemen that the introduction of the penny rate increased the difficulty of effecting improve- ments: it was said they could not afford to give cheaper postage, and greater fa- cilities also. But, in fact, improvements had followed one another more rapidly since the penny postage came into operation than before. When the plan was first proposed, the large towns had only a single mail connecting them with London; now they have two mails per day. In England and- Wales there were formerly only-two thousand post-offices of every kind; now there were four thousand. There was a growing conviction in the minds of all connected with the Post-office, that to make the establishment profitable, they must make it as useful as possible; and to that great object his best efforts should be devoted.
A meeting of the nobility, gentry, and clergy, of the diocese of Worces- ter, was held in that city on Thursday week,—the Bishop of. Worcester in the ohair,—to memorialize the Government on a grant of money for the maintenance as well as for the establishment of elementary schools, and also for giving assistance to .1raining-institutions. The feeling expressed by the speakers was in favour of the Government measure, as a great im- provement; and the memorial was agreed to. Among those who expressed a general concurrence was' Lord Lyttelton; though he had a misgiving that the more Government did, the less would individuals do.
Dr. Peel, Dean of Worcester, to show the necessity of schools for the in- struction of masters competent to the education of. youth, mentioned the fact, that at that moment there was a vacancy, for a master . in .Bishop Lloyd's school at Worcester, which he feared could not be filled up next day, in consequence of the want of proper qualifications in the candidates, whose letters betrayed great ignorance. Yet this was an endowed school, allowing 501, per annum, with coals, a house,.and other advantages.
On the seine day, a meeting was held at Leeds to oppose the Govern- ment measure of education. There was a very strong muster of ministers and gentlemen belonging to the Congregational body. Resolutions, pre- pared by Mr. Edward Baines junior -were -adopted by the meeting with perfect unanimity. Some of the speakers indulged in very decided ex- pressions. The Reverend D. Hamilton spoke of the " iniquity " of the Government scheme. The Reverend James Parsons denounced it as making servility a part of education. The ReverentUJ: L. Pool charac- terized the plan as intended to" seduce and corrupt the Dissenters." The Reverend Jonathan Glyde and the Reverend Thomas Sta-atten formally objected, but thought that the' Dissenters ought to accept the grants. Mr. George Leeman spoke of the " temptations " of Government schools, and of "bribery." He also denounced the plan as "unjust, .unconstitutional, and highly dangerous to the liberties of the country." The Reverend John Ely objected to centralization: -under the Government plan, for every twenty-five pupils, a teacher might be employed in the pay of Government; each of the twenty-five pupilsin his turn would be eager for such a prize—
Heretofore our grammar-schools had held out their lure to our- youth of the middle classes, and had often drawn away the more gifted of them from the ranks of Dissenters: university exhibitions and all the prospects of ecclesiastical pre- ferment were likely to operate as a bribe at an age when the principles and cha- racter were yet unformed. But the scheme now proposed would-act in the same way upon our youth of the humbler classes. He farther adverted to the example of bondage exhibitedem those boroughs and districts where Government institu- tions existed. He had spent some of his earlier years in a vicinity where royal dockyards and large barracks for the military had their seat; and he well recol- lected the miserable bondage of workmen and tradesmen who durst not vote at an election according to their convictions, or whoneutralii.ed their 'votes by giving one to the man of their own choice and the other to the Government nominee. By this scheme the whole community would be . brought into a similar state of bondage. In, the mean while, the friends of voluntary 'education would have to labour at serious disadvantage. One gentleman had spoken of schools in our cities and towns which would be ruined unless their supporters should be dis- posed to counteract the enormous bribery by which the scholars were to be lured from them, by expending a greatly augmented sum in offering a like bribe for their continuance. But much more fatal would be the effect on rural districts; where, according to a letter he had seen on the previous day, from an active, energetic friend of voluntary education inn Southern county, it was anticipated that village Sunday-schools -would be swamped and annihilated. 'Mr. Edward Baines junior spoke at -considerable length; dwelling with disgust on the tendency of the measure "to sap the virtue of Voluntaries."
The resolutions set forth the mode of opposing the Government measure. Petitions from towns, villages, congregations, and Sunday-schools, were recommended, as also the holding of public meetings, and the formation of a central committee in Leeds, and of local committees in all the towns and populous villages of Yorkshire; a letter by Mr. Edward Baines to the Mar- quis of Lansdowne was recommended for general circulation; the same gentleman was requested to drew up -an address to Sunday-school teachers; and a deputation was appointed to wait on the Ministers, and express to them the feelings of the meeting.
A more correct statement of the accident at Bideford has been published. lit appears that as the omnibus was about to leave the quay at night, having nine inside passengers and one outside, the horse became, restif plunged, and broke the shaft; the vehicle thus liberated, rolled into the river, the tide being up to the level of the quay. The driver escaped, and also the outside passenger, a wo- man. Mr. Michael Chappell burst open the door of the vehicle, got out, and SWIM ashore. The other eight passengers perished: the omnibus slowly floated down the river, and sank to the bottom; there being no means of aiding the sufferers. After a lapse of two hours, the carriage was got up; and in it were found the corpses of three married women, Mr. Chappell's brother, a child, two aged women and a man. A Coroner's Jury has return a verdict of" Accidental death," witli a reference to the insecure state of the quay.
A frightful accident happened on the Hull and Selby Railway on Sunday even- ing. The mail-train left Hull for London, drawn by two engines, with eight passenger-carriages and five fish-waggons; when it had nearly reached Hessle, the second engine sprang off the rails, dashed into the passenger-carriages, forced sevea off the line, and smashed them to pieces. One passenger was killed on the spot; another died soon after; and eight more were dreadfully hart. An inquest was held on Tuesday; but the cause of the disaster was not ascertained, and a verdict of "Accidental death" was returned. It is surmised that some "sleepers "'had given way, several having been found broken.
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