Vnutiurto.

The Manchester political gathering was held on Tuesday. Heretofore these meetings have taken place in the Free Trade Hall, in the presence of thousands; but as that room is this year about to be pulled down, a select assembly of what may be called the leaders of the great Northern counties met in the Albion Hotel. Possibly there were about three hun- dred present; the Members of Parliament and the speakers being nearly the same as those who appeared at Sheffield; and Mr. George Wilson occupied the chair. In his opening speech, he dealt largely with the statistics of Parliamentary Reform, establishing the anomalies and in- equalities of the present system. The Reform Bill, he said' was a onesided distribution of political power. It gave the forty-shilling freeholder, the ten-pound householder, and the fifty-pound occupier in the counties of Yorkshire and Rutland, the right to Tote for a Member of Parliament; but it then proceeded on the principle that it should take 37,000 electors to return Mr. Cobden for the West Riding, whereas if he had only selected Rutland 1876 would have done. To show the relative proportion of Members to property and population, he took the three counties of Yorkshire, Middlesex, and Lancashire containing an ag- gregate population of 5,715,817, property reneased lo the amount of 26,597,0621., and 283,994 voters, represented by 77 Members, and placed them in contrast with Rutland, Huntingdon, Hereford, Berkshire, Bucking- hamshire, Dorsetshire, Shropshire, and Sussex, oontAning an aggregate population of 1,286,835, property assessed at 6,837,0541., and 68,876 voters also returning 77 Members to Parliament. The borough system is equally bad. Eleven large boroughs—London, the Tower Hamlets, Marylebone, Manchester, Liverpool, Westminster, Glasgow, Bristol, Dublin, with an ag- gregate population of 3,268,191 persons, and a voting-power of 191,560, return 24 Members to Parliament ; while the same number of Members are returned by twelve small boroughs—Marlborough, Andover, Chippenham, Coekermouth, Devizes, Harwich, Thetford, Honiton, Leamington, Great Marlow, Buckingham, and Richmond ; only possessing an aggregate popu- lation of 67,438 persons, and a voting-power of 3569. Mr. Wilson contended that Lancashire, according to population, or to the rateable value of pro- perty, or to voting-power, ought to have 56 or 48 instead of 26 Members : taking the mean, they had a right to 50.

Mr. Milner Gibson treated of the proposed Reform Bill as relates to the question of war • and insisted that if we are to have war and in- creased taxation, it behoves us all to lose no time in reforming our repre- sentative system, and obtaining a more effective control over taxation and expenditure. What is wanted is a bill really to secure the liberties of the people.- Government is not called upon to give an artificial ascend- ancy to the commercial classes. All they ask for is fair play, and a fair distribution of political power. There must be no attempt to cocker up that balance alluded to by Lord Sohn Russell in 1852, or the scheme would inevitably fail. The members of the present Government differ greatly from each other on this question ; and he was convinced that the time is come when the Cabinet should endeavour to unite upon the ballot, instead of leaving it an open question.

Mr. Cobden contended that the redistribution of political power should follow property and persons; for in England and Scotland wealth in- creases in the ratio of population ; and no permanent settlement of the question on any other principle should be tolerated. But there was an attempt to turn their flanks by showing that the Lancashire people are so little in harmony as not to be fit to be trusted with political power. Now if all who have not yet mastered political economy are not to have votes, he was afraid they must begin by disfranchising Buckinghamshire and_ Dorsetshire. Too much has been made of the strikes, in a public and political point of view ; and he expressed a hope that the notion of the unfitness of the operatives, on the ground of their ignorance of political economy, would not much trouble those who advocate a fair extension of the franchise to the people. The strikes are private matters, as much as the engaging of a butler. Leaving this topic, Mr. Cobden returned to his theory of representation. He was not for extending the franchise to everybody; that is a progressive

question. The people will eventually be, in every c amtry, the depositaries of political power ; and if the franchise were extended to a million of per- sons tomorrow, he would live in hope that it might soon after be extended to another million or two. He had not altered his opinion as to the dura- tion of Parliaments : seven-years Parliaments are a slow and unsafe mode of settlement, adopted when our institutions were supposed to be in danger ; and he saw no reason why we should not return to the good old practice of triennial Parliaments. Mr. Cobden here entered into an argument to show that public opinion is ready for the ballot; that the boroughs want organi- zation, and only organization, to carry it ; and that it must be carried 'pre- cisely as we carried the repeal of the Corn-laws." He gave a good deal of advice, as an "old practitioner," to a member of the Ballot Society present ; telling him, that in his agitation he must ignore all Governments, Minis- tries, and parties, and remember that his business is to carry the ballot and nothing else. With respect to the disfranchisement of boroughs, Mr. Cob- den argued that it would be a great benefit instead of an injury to the popu- lation. "I believe that is the opinion of the more intelligent portion of the population of such boroughs. What does the present system do ? It invests smile great patron—some large landholder in the neighbourhood of these boroughs—with supreme power and authority over them ; or it gives to two men a sort of disputed right which leads to constant broils and contests be- tween them. If there be only one patron, which is usually the case, and the borough belongs to him because his property is in the immediate neigh- bourhood, the present system gives birth to all kinds of servility and toady- ism of the most miserable kind. The great man comes once a year to his mansion, and invites three or four of the leading men of the borough to dine with him ; a professional man or two struggle into the same circle, and a score or two underneath will do anything to gain admission to this pri- vileged class. There are, besides, the wives and daughters of these people, coveting the great distinction of being invited to my lady's ball. Now, this state of things, founded upon the desire of a family to retain political power in the borough, gives rise to the most miserable and abject servility, and is thoroughly destructive of the honest, upright independence of the English character. You cannot therefore do better service to the small boroughs themselves, than by depriving them of the borough franchise and merging them in the counties."

Here the speaker, having exhausted the Reform Bill topic, went at great length into his views upon the Eastern question. He showed that the views he now entertained were not new, but of long standing. He told how, in 1835, there was a crisis on this Eastern question, and how the views advanced by Mr. Attwood and Mr. Urquhart led him to "put pen to paper" ; how he wrote a Pamphlet against the war-cry, set sail for America before its publication, and returned to find himself "a man of some notoriety." He followed up that pam- phlet by another; and both were favourably received. Mr. Cobden contended that Turkey is a decaying country, and that the Turks cannot be maintained permanently as a ruling power in Europe. Russia has no antipathy to Eng- land. English merchants are more influential in St. Petersburg than any- where else in Europe ; there is an "English Club" in St. Petersburg; the children of Russian nobles are nursed by Englishwomen ; the social organization resembles England, in so far as there are Potemkins and Demi- doffs in the one, Sutherlands and Bedfords in the other—a landed aristocracy in each. On what, then, is founded the national outcry against Russia? No doubt, Russia is acting towards Turkey in an unjust, insolent, and aggres- sive manner ; but he would not assume the right to chastise Russia for that. "How am L as an Englishman, invested with the power and responsiblity of acting as policeman all over the world ? Will you say you will not allow any Government to go and take possession of another country without inter- fering? Well, that is a principle ; and if it be laid down, I will ask my interrogator, in reply, 'Are you prepared on that principle in every case?' Because what I want is to have our foreign policy settled on a principle.

Well, then, I ask, will you apply that principle throughout Europe ? If so you must begin in Italy ; you must begin in Rome and the Papal States, where you have a high-spirited people subjected to the yoke of a foreign intervention." If Russia obtained Constantinople, she must cease to be barbarous before she could become formidable; and if she made a great navy, it must be by doing as the Venetians, the Dutch, the English, and the Americans did—by the accumulation of wealth, the exercise of industry, and the superior (skill and intelligence of her artisans. It is a national prejudice to say that Ens- sia is an anti-commercial nation. Her recent protective tariff was adopted because she heard our statesmen protest that through protection we had gained all our wealth. "But does she discourage trade ? Look at the exports of Russia. Why, the tallow, hemp, and corn produced in that country, form ingredients of industry of the greatest importance ; and I say it is most fal- lacious to measure our trade with her by the amount of our exports. If we can't send our manufactures direct, still she takes raw cotton from us and other produce, which we buy for her ; and we carry nearly all her com- merce in English bottoms ; so that I have no hesitation in saying, that, taking both imports and exports, there is no comparison between the trade of Turkey and the trade of Russia with this country. We are told Turkey is a free-trading nation : it is true, dues are not levied in her ports on imports, but we have no security for the produce; and the noble regions, the seat of empire, where once the whole trade of the world was found, have become a desert, and our trade to Constantinople is a transport trade carried on through Trebizond into the interior of Asia. Now I challenge you to this: did you ever see a Turkish ship, armed by Turks and manned by Turkish sailors, leaving one of these ports on a quiet errand of peace. Never. The Turkish trade is carried on by Greeks, who do not dare to do so till they have gone to St. Petersburg or some other place to take a foreign citizenship, by which they may be protected against the violence of the Turkish Govern- ment." If we go to war, we shall do so against the wishes of the majority of the people of' Turkey; they are glad to see the Russians menacing their old masters. But the British Government have pledged themselves to Turkey and the French Government, and that pledge must be fulfilled in honour and integrity. That alliance, however, might be found to be a hasty and unwise approximation of the two countries, whose traditions are not much in unison with their position in the Black Sea. Mr. Cobden defended the policy of Lord Aberdeen, and was loudly cheered. Under every. speene. of provocation and obloquy, Lord Aberdeen had shown that the guiding motive of his life is to prevent the country going into an European war. He knows that the beginning of' strife is like the letting out of water ; he remembers the outbreak of the French war in 1793, when every Government in Europe aided or sympathized with us, yet in ten years they were nearly all against us. He knows that the silly people who cry out for war will be the first to turn round and denounce him for bringing its distresses upon them. "But war is imminent; everybody feels it." The Governments of Europe are all chin-deep in debt. We, it is true, have multiplied the shoulders to bear the expenses of war, and our exchequer is in a prosperous state. But if we go to war, "let us pay the year's expenses of the war by taxes raised within the year." Let the Income-tax be raised. "Increase it to 20 or more per cent, if necessary ; lower its range to 100/. or 501. a year income : that will be much better than to fetter industry. But it is not my vocation to find the means to pay for this war. (Cheers and laughter.) I can't bring my mind to regard it as inevitable. I can't think it possible. I won't believe it till I read the bulletin of the first battle. I can scarcely believe we are capable of such folly—of such wickedness, I will say—as going to war. For have we no works at home which will be checked if we begin to talk of war ?"

Mr. Cobden was cheered as he sat down ; and Mr. Bright followed him with an oration devoted almost exclusively to the war topic. His argu- ment was, that Turkey is a decaying nation, Russia an advancing one ; that Russia, although a despotism now, will not always be a despotism. " We had a despotism once, and it gave us trouble enough to get rid of it." Russia is in its natural progress from a worse to a better state. If we had not interfered, the difference between Russia and Turkey would have been settled long before this—settled by the concessions of Turkey. "Well, we are asked if we will join in this fray. I ask, why am Ito join ? Is it from sympathy with the oppressed, or is it ler any particular object which this country has in it? Why, if you are to go to war for sympathy, 1 ask you when your wars will end ? Why did you put an end to the last war ? Did you leave freedom in Europe after the treaty of Vienna ? You may commence the next war tomorrow, and the youngest man living will probably not see the end of it. Go to war in Hungary, if your appetite is in that way. Go to war for Lombardy. Go to war for the victims of Neapolitan vengeance, Go to war for those magnanimous men who were concerned in the govern- ment of the late Roman Republic. Go to war for three millions of Negroes in bondage in the United States. (Continued cheering.) Why, look at the unlimited consequences to which you are driven, if you are held to be obliged to go to war for sympathy. I shall go none to war for sympathy." (Cheers and laughter.) Mr. Bright spoke briefly, at the close of his speech, on the Reform topic. He would give the franchise to every frugal, industrious, and as- piring working man ; and no Reform Bill, he said, will be carried that does not include tho borough franchise.

The other speakers were Mr. Cbeetham and Mr. Henry Ashworth; and it was resolved, on the motion of the last, that the Liberal Members connected with Lancashire, with other leading Reformers, should consider themselves a committee for aiding any proceeding which would secure an additional representation of the county. This motion was seconded by Mr. Whitehouse, the representative of the Ballot Society ; who introduced that Society and its objects to the meeting. A vote of thanks to the Chairman closed the proceedings.

Mr. Miall, Member for Rochdale, gave his constituents, on Wednesday, an account of his doings in the session of 1853. Touching on the Eastern question, he took views similar to those of Mr. Cobden.

There was a meeting at Southampton on Monday, the Mayor presiding, to consider the Russian aggression and the duty of England. Among the speakers were Mr. T. Falvey, the Reverend J. W. Wyld, the Reverend S. S. Pew, and Mr. Barrett The resolutions, which were supported with great spirit, declared that the insolent demand of Russia to exercise a protectorate over the Christian subjects of the Sultan is opposed to the laws of nations and the just rights of independent states ; that the Sultan is fully justified in resisting the outrage ; that the Four Powers are bound in honour to aid the Sultan, by force, in expelling the Russians, forcing the Emperor to pay the expenses of the war, and enter into new arrange- ments securing the future tranquillity of Europe and opening the Black Sea to the ships of all nations. It was also resolved that the substance of the resolutions should be embodied in a memorial to the Queen, and a copy of them sent to the Emperor of the French, the French Ambassador in London, and the Sultan.

A meeting on the Eastern question was also held at Derby ; the Mayor presiding ; and Mr. Bass, one of the Borough Members, sitting on the Mayors right hand, and taking part in the proceedings. Spirited resolu- tions were adopted ; a petition to both Houses of Parliament, and an address to the Sultan, were passed unanimously. The petition de- nounced the aggression of the Emperor of Russia ; prayed that "imme- diate and active operations" should be undertaken to expel his armies ; and expressed a belief that permanent peace is impossible until the one- aided treaties wrung in past times from Turkey by Russia be abrogated, and the Black Sea opened to all nations.

The Thetis arrived at Portsmouth, last week, from foreign service; but instead of being sent to Plymouth in order to "pay off" the hands, according to custom, the men were ordered to be "paid down." On Saturday, Rear-Admiral Dundee, one of the Lords of the Admiralty, went on board, and, all hands being piped on the quarter-deck, he made this speech to them.

"My men—I have come down, by the request of the Board of Admiralty, to make known to you that we are on the eve of a war, and that war with Russia. My object, therefore, in addressing you, by desire of their Lord- ships, is to prepare you for such event ; and I am sure that you will receive this announcement as becomes Englishmen and British sailors. It is my duty to inform you that the country cannot dispense with your services, however hard it may appear after your having been away for so long a pe- riod; yet the exigencies of the service must be paramount to all other con- siderations. Instead, therefore, of your being paid of, you will all be paid down. You shall have a few weeks run ; after which, I feel assured, you will act as British seamen ever have done in defence of their country. I trust you will reoeive this communication in its right and proper light, and I make this known to you thus early to prevent any feelings of disappointment. I have earnestly to hope that the evil may yet pass away, but we must be prepared for any and every emergency. 'Pipe down.' "

Some of the officers of the Thetia have been appointed to the screw-ship James Watt, 90, recently put in commission.

No fewer than thirty-nine recruiting parties have been sent out from Woolwich during the last three weeks, to enlist men for the artillery.

The longest ship in the world left Southampton last week—the Hima- laya, a steamer belonging to the Peninsular and Oriental Company; des- tined to ply between Southampton and Alexandria. The Duke of Wel- lington is broader and deeper, and her tonnage somewhat greater. No less than 1401. was obtained by sixpenny admissions to view the Himalaya at Southampton : the whole was presented to the South Hants Infirmary.

It now seems pretty certain that Sir William Heathcote will meet with no opposition at the forthcoming election for Oxford University. Dr. Travers Twiss has declined to come forward ; and "Mr. Perceval's party" are satisfied with Sir William, who, if elected, will take his seat as an in- dependent Member.

A vacancy has been caused in the representation of South Shropshire, by the death of the Honourable It, a Clive.

Death has also deprived Brecon of its Member, Mr. Charles Rodney Morgan. The Brecon candidate is Mr. Lloyd Vaughan Watkins, Lord- Lieutenant of the county.

A vacancy in the representation of Devon has been created by the death of Sir Ralph Lopes.

The subject' of juvenile delinquency, and the necessity for checking it by reformatory institutions, brought together, at the summons of the Mayor of Liverpool, a number of local notables, not, perhaps, ever seen on the same platform before. Under the presidence of the Mayor were, Dr. M'Neile, Dr. Goss, the coadjutor Roman Catholic Bishop, the Reverend Rector Campbell, the Reverend James Martineau, Mr. William Brown M.P., Mr. Horsfall M.P., Mr. Joseph Pollock, the Judge of the County Court, and Mr. Mansfield, the Stipendiary Magistrate. These gentlemen addressed the meeting ; and resolutions were carried unani- mously, that reformatory institutions should be established for children, in lieu of prisons, and supported by the Government funds. It was also resolved to petition Parliament.

The annual meeting of the Birmingham Reformatory Institution was held on Tuesday, in the school-room at Saltley ; Lord Calthorpe in the chair. Mr. Adderley also was present. It appears that the expenses have outstripped the income of the Institution. The Honourable and Reverend W. H. Lyttelton moved for the appointment of a committee to take steps towards the establishment of a reformatory school for girls. Mr. Wright, who seconded the motion, said that if it were adopted, Mr. Jonah Mason, of the firm of Elkington and Mason, would give 10001. and subscribe 1001. a year towards its support ; and that Miss Burdett Coutts and Mr. W. Chance had each offered 100 guineas towards the same ob- ject. The motion was carried unanimously.

The Bishop of Hereford presided on Wednesday over a public meeting held by the Diocesan Board of Education in the College. The report showed that there are only fourteen parochial schools in the county of Hereford. About five per cent of the population attend the schools. The teachers receive on an average only 25/. a year. There are 114 parishes without schools. Houses lie far apart in many districts, and that helps to prevent attendance. Archdeacon Freer said, he had been successful in establishing a mixed school for farmers' sons and the sons of labourers ; but it is a mockery to talk of education to people ground down to such starving wages as 78. or 88. a week, with wheat at 128. or 138. a bushel. Archdeacon Waring stated that he had not succeeded in establishing a mixed school : he condemned the laity and clergy for allowing the poor to be brought up in a manner inconsistent with their temporal and eternal 'welfare. Earlier in the proceedings, Dr. Hampden attacked secular edu- nation ; which, he said, often made the wickedly-disposed able to become toiore wicked : the great evil is, not ignorance, but moral depravity, and that cannot be counteracted by secular knowledge. If the State, there- fate, gave grants only on condition that secular knowledge be imparted, they would do literally nothing to remove depravity.

At a thin meeting of "Protestants," held in the Manchester Corn Sichange on Monday,—the Reverend Hugh Stowell in the chair,—reso- lutiuns were adopted, censuring, as unfair, impolitic, and "fitted to pro- voke Almighty God," the plan announced by Lord Palmerston of appoint- ing and paying Roman Catholic priests in our convict gaols.

8Ir Robert Peel delivered a lecture at Derby on Monday, in aid of the As.sociated Mechanics' Institutes of the Midland Counties. His sub- ject was "the progress of society, social and intellectual." The large lecture-hall was well filled ; the Mayor presided ; and among the more conspicuous persons was Mr. Edward Strutt M.P.

Sir Edward Bulwer Lytton presided over the soiree of the Leeds Mechanics' Institute and Literary Society, on Wednesday ; and delighted a respctctable audience with an resthetic speech on education and progress.

A meeting at Redhill, last week, resolved to establish a Mechanics' Institution.

The choice of the Governors of Crediton has fallen upon the Reverend C. Smith, of Pendlebury, near Manchester, to fill the vacant Vicarage. The living is worth upwards of 6001.

The party in favour of incorporating Brighton have obtained a triumph, by returning seven Town Commissioners ; all the candidates on the other side having been rejected, though by a narrow majority, ob- tained only in the last few hours of the final polling-day.

There were hopes that the protracted struggle at Preston was ap- proaching a close. Messrs. Almond and Co. agreed with their hands ; who were to resume work at a price very near the Blackburn scale, so soon as the Masters Association had consented to the scheme. It is rumoured that the people of Messrs. Swainson, Brothers, are willing to resume work at the terms offered, if an advance be given when trade improves. Spite of the exhortations of the delegates, some of the locked-outs are prone to violence : two young women who are working at Mr. Hollins's have been maltreated in the street. The total contributions for the operatives up to last week amounted to 46,000/. The masters have re- ceived the first instalment of their "defence fund" from the Lancashire manufacturers. An anonymous placard has accused Cowell of neglecting to convey to the Committee of Delegates a proposition which might have led to a settlement of the dispute—Cowell afterwards said he " forgot " the matter : the inference is that the delegates wish the war to continue.

On Thursday the hopes of an accommodation received a check. The masters met, and resolved, as the applications for work, though more nu- merous than before, were yet insufficient to put the mills in operation, they would adjourn to the 23d of February. The workpeople afterwards met, and received the masters' resolve with a loud hurrah, and then passed the usual vote tantamount to "no surrender." It was announced that numbers of weavers have been assisted to emigrate from the town.

The Hinclley strike is at an end. The operatives have sent a deputa- tion to the masters, who offered to pay the prices they gave in July last, with an advance when wages are increased in other towns. The work- people closed with these offers. At Wigan all the mills are running; but some are ahort-handed, as about 800 workers are still out on strike.

The artisans and labourers in Devonport Dockyard are very discon- tented with their wages, the price of provisions being so high. Mr. Charles Mare, of Blackwell, being in want of shipwrights,—apparently in consequence of some dispute with his men,—a number of the Devon- port Government men have left the public service and engaged with him. He offers 68. a day : the Government pay is only 48., but there are ad- vantages not enjoyed in private yards, particularly the retiring allowance, • The men hirekby Mr. Mare marched in procession through the streets, and exhibited insubordination by keeping their hats on in the pay-office, The seamen of the North-eastern coal-ports have resolved that the wages for the voyage to London shall be increased from 61. to 71., and in another week to 81., as freights have greatly risen. The owners will pay the advance.

The wages of agricultural labourers always form a topic of fruitful dis- cussion in times of pressure, and are often used for party purposes. This winter, the subject has been taken up in a different form. In Devon- shire and the Western counties, meetings have been held and resolutions have been adopted to raise subscriptions for the more needy. It has also been remarked that the labourer, nominally paid, say ten shillings a week, receives only a portion of the sum in money, and that he is paid the remainder by truck. Stoppages are also made for rent. • The in- justice of the truck system, and its effect on the moral habits of the labourers, were especially pointed out at the public meetings.

The state of the worsted trade at Bradford is reported as very gloomy ; purchases are not made except at reduced prices. The yarn-market is in an equally depressed state. From other manufacturing towns the news is more cheerful ; in some cases trade is very prosperous. At Birming- ham, the iron market is brisk, and the workpeople are contented with their wages : Birmingham sends very small contributions to Preston.

Coals are scarce and dear in the manufacturing districts. This is in some measure ascribed to the great demand for the Southern markets. It is proposed to open new collieries. At Sheffield a Coal-Consumers Company is in progress.

Benjamin lif'Donnal, a private in the Fiftieth Regiment., stationed at Devonport, has been accusing himself of two murders; mere inventions, ap- parently. One victim was a girl, destroyed, as he said, on Roborough Down : when, however, a party of soldiers and constables took him to that wild dis- trict, he wearied them by wandering about in every direction, but could not point out the spot where the body lay. M'Donnal persists in his story. The other alleged victim is his own brother-in-law.

Henry Jones has been committed for trial for the murder of a namesake in the Forest of Dean. They met at night; both had been drinking ; the pri- soner accused the other of intending to rob him; he declares the deceased struck him first, but admits that he then knocked him down, kicked him, and finally stabbed him with a knife.

The Tyne collier Lady Steward was run into at night, off Flamborough, by the Ingerstone : the Lady Steward was thought to be sinking, and most of her people scrambled on board the Ingerstone ; but a man and a boy were in the forecastle, the hatch of which was covered by the bowsprit having been forced over it by the collision—it was feared that they had been drowned by the foundering of the ship. On the contrary, they have brought the vessel into Hartlepool. When the man found that the fore-hatch was ob- structed, he forced a way on deck through another aperture. He perceived that the ship was deserted ; but when he and the boy sounded the pumps, they found that not much water was coming in; so they put the ship before the wind, and ran Northward. They were subsequently assisted by fisher- men and a steam-tug : the new commander, Alexander Archibold, refused to receive people on board as salvors, but agreed to pay them for assistance. The underwriters intend to reward Archibold with 100/, for his brave con- duct.

A number of men have been collecting articles thrown ashore near Holy- head from the wreck of the John o'Gaunt ; in the dusk, one of them missed the footway down the cliffs to the beach, and fell over a precipice, 150 feet high.