firobinces.

A highly complimentary address was presented to Sir Robert Peel on Wednesday from the inhabitants of Darlington, on the occasion of his pass ing through the town in his way to Wynyard Park.

The return of Sir John Tyrell and Major Beresford for North Essex was celebrated at Colchester on Tuesday. There was a procession, with an allegorical device exhibiting in juxtaposition enormous loaves of wheaten bread, immense cheeses, and fat poultry, the alleged food of the peasantry of old England; with diminutive loaves of black rye bread, a basket of water-cresses, and a cabbage, the nourishment obtained by unfortunate foreigners. There was afterwards a dinner, at the Cups Hotel. In his after-dinner speech, Sir John Tyrell attacked Sir Robert Peel, and de- clared that one of his measures had spread bankruptcy in Mark Lane. Major Beresford spoke of Lord George Bentinek as " the noblest, the most honest, and the most zealous leader he could have selected." There was a demonstration of the friends of Mr. Fielden and Mr. Cob- bett at Oldham on Tuesday. A procession, public meeting, tea-party, and ball, were got up for the occasion; and the defeated candidates held forth at some length. Mr. Fielden, after showing that he had been instrumental in obtaining the Ten-hours Bill—for which object chiefly his constituents had sent him to Parliament—said, that his defeat was to be attributed to the 440 electors who voted against him having gone "stark staring mad."

A meeting was held at Blackburn on Wednesday, presided over by Mr. Fielden, for the purpose of forming a " Commercial Association," having the same objects in view as the Manchester Chamber of Commerce. The rules of the Association were agreed to, and Mr. Fielden was chosen Pre- sident.

At a special delegate meeting of operative cotton-spinners of Lancashire and the neighbouring counties, held on the 29th August, resolutions were passed regretting the continuance of the depression in. the cotton trade of the district; and, taking into account the great disproportion which con- tinues to exist between the prices of raw cotton and of the fabrics manu- factured from it, the meeting recommended a general suspension of work " for a few weeks, during the present mild and genial season, when, incon- sequence of the abundance of vegetable food, the warmth of the weather, and the possibility, in many instances, of finding out-door employment, the privations to which the operatives would be exposed would not be so severe." The resolutions were to be forwarded to Mr. Wilson Patten,

Mr. Brotherton, Mr Mark Philips, and Mr. C. Hindley, with a request that they would endeavour to obtain the opinion of the masters on the course proposed.

The Mayor of Birmingham presided at a public meeting in that town on Wednesday, to aid in the Shakspere's house movement. There was a good attendance of artisans and labouring men; but the wealthier classes evinced no interest in the matter. A considerable sum was subscribed by those present.

The Great Britain steam-ship, which has lain stranded in Dundrum Bay since last September, has been at length floated and towed into dock at Liverpool. The Times gives the following account of this successful effort of perseverance, enterprise, and mechanical ingenuity. "Mr. I. Brunel junior was the engineer who first undertook the task of rescu- ing the Great Britain from her perilous situation. It was necessary to preserve her from the risk of breaking up under the terrific surge which rolls into the un- sheltered Bay of Dundrum from the Irish Sea when the wind blows freshly from any point from E. to N. or N.N.E. In order to accomplish this important object, he caused a substantial breakwater to be erected, about a pistol-shot astern of the steamer, to seaward. This barrier, which was upwards of 150 yards in length, was formed of several rows of piles, the trees for which were furnished gratui- tously by Earl Roden, from his plantations at Bavensdale, on the opposite side of the bay. The outer row was composed of pliable piles of green or sapwood; an improvement upon the original plan suggested by Captain Claxton, who has been actively engaged dating the operations in directing them, on behalf of the owners of the Great Britain. This had the effect of resisting the most violent assaults of the surf; the green timber yielding to the advancing wave, and rebounding by its own elasticity as it receded. Between the inner rows of piles, immense bun- dles of fagots, formed of brushwood, substantially bound together, and loaded or moored by vast quantities of stones, served to deaden the billows as they rolled in among them. This invention _proved eminently successful in saving the vessel from what at one time seemed inevitable destruction; so much so, indeed, that when her bottom was examined, after the first attempt to float her bad been made, her hull was found to have suffered no other injury than three perforations, of no serious importance, caused by fragments of rock torn off in passing over a reef in the furious gale of April last. "It is known that during the springs of last month, the gigantic ship, under the direction of Mr. Bremner of Wick, to whom the operations for floating her bad subsequently been intrusted, was raised entirely out of the sand in which her keel had been imbedded, by means of great caissons, or camels as they are termed by shipbuilders, suspended over rows of piles driven into the beach from the vessel's bow to a point about midships, and descending by means of chains and blocks as the tide rose and the steamer floated. The actual impulse was given by power- ful levers, acting on fulcra under the bilges, and worked by capstans and other purchases on the vessel's deck. All these appliances, however, had been cleared away previous to the tide of Wednesday night last, preparatory to the final at- tempt to remove the vessel from the shore; where, for upwards of a month past, she had been resting upon two ridges of stones under the bilges, which permitted the workmen effectually to repair her bottom. " On the flowing of the tide on Wednesday night, floating operations were com- menced, by means of anchors laid out astern, and the warps attached to which were hove upon by the vessel's windlasses and capstans. These were so far successful as to move the ship about three fathoms farther to seaward; in which position she MB permitted to remain until the following day. The Birkenhead iron steam frigate, of 1,400 tons and 600-horse power, had come down from Kingstown early in the week to act as a tug when required; and the Scourge steam bomb- ship, of 400-horse power, which had fotmed one of the Royal squadron in her Majesty's excursion to Scotland, had also been despatched to the Bay of Dun- drum, and anchored about a mile and a half to the South-eastward of her stranded sister. A large number of the crews of those two steamers were aboard the Great Britain, and very efficiently contributed to the success of the experiment.

"Mr. Bellamy, Second Master Superintendent of Portsmouth Dockyard, and a strong detachment of riggers from the dockyards both of Portsmouth and Ply- mouth, were also on board the Great Britain, and rendered good service.

"On Thursday recourse was had to the steam power of the Birkenhead; but, owing to the failure of the floating apparatus in two large lighters alongside the Great Britain, and to the lowness of the tide which, owing to a Northerly wind that had prevailed for some days, did not rise so high as had been expected, all the efforts made to remove the vessel were entirely unsuccessful, she not having been towed out even one foot.

" On Friday, at the flowing of the tide about twenty minutes before noon, the final experiment to float off the ship was made; and, we have the highest satis- faction in stating, was attended with the most complete success. Two best bowers' had been laid out a cable's length astern; and in addition to these, two strong warps had been spliced to those of the Birkenhead. By heaving on these, the mammoth steamer was towed out to seaward upwards of eighty fathoms, and into snug moorings. The ship, everything considered, made very little wate; —not, we should say, more than six inches an hour; a leakage which was easily kept under by ten out of the forty pumps which bad been provided to meet any possible emergency, and some of which were of the most powerful description." The arrival of the Great Britain in the Mersey, on Monday, caused as great an excitement in Liverpool as her departure on her first trip to New York. She was taken by a steam tug into the Prince's Dock basin, and placed on the "gridiron," to be examined. "Her masts, rigging, &c. looked much worn from long exposure to the weather; but the general appearance of the noble ship was much better than could have been expected. With few exceptions, the upper part of her hull does not seem to have sustained much damage. On the larboard beam there were a few indentations in the iron framework, some of which were cut entirely through; and in the neighbourhood of the bow might be seen in two or three places similar marks of damage."

The Liverpool Times of Thursday states, on the authority of an expe- rienced engineer, that the Great Britain, on inspection, proves to be quite safe and sound in her hull and frames: not being in the least shaken or strained, or giving any indication that her back has been injured

The proprietors and the directors of the Birmingham and Oxford Junc- tion Railway were again in collision at the half-yearly meeting in Birming- ham on Monday. Mr. Mozeley, the director who opposes all the others, moved a resolution, to the effect that the seal which the chairman had affixed to the registry of shareholders was not the seal of the company, and that it should be delivered into his custody. The resolution having been carried, Mr. Mozeley demanded the seal; but the chairman refused to give it up. The usual motion for the adoption of the report was also success- fully opposed by Mr. Mozeley; and the meeting was adjourned to the 22d of October.

At the half-yearly meeting of the South Devon Railroad Company, held at Plymouth on Saturday, the report of the directors announced that the atmospheric system had triumphed over all difficulties, and that the line from Exeter to Teignmouth, a distance of fifteen miles, is worked exclu- sively by atmospheric traction. Another Roman Catholic priest, the Reverend Robert Gillow, has fallen a victim at Liverpool to the typhus fever. The deceased was the son of Mr. Gillow of Leighton Hall, near Lancaster.

An entire suspension of work on the Oxford and Rugby Railway has taken place. Messrs. Sherwood, the contractors for its formation, are about to resign the works into the hands of the Great Western Company, whose property the line is.

There has been a formidable visitation of sharks this season on the Southern coast, attracted by the large shoals of mackerel. On a fine evening they may be seen close in-shore at the Isle of Wight, skimming along the water, a large triangular dorsal fin being visible above the sur- face. Almost every fine evening the fishermen may be seen harpooning.

A severe thunder-storm broke over Lincoln and its vicinity. on Sunday after- noon; during which the parish-church of Welton was struck by lightning, in the midst of service. The greater part of the congregation were more or less affected by the shock; those who were underneath the three chandeliers, suspended from the roof, were seriously hurt; and one man, Mr. Brownlow, a wheelwright, was killed. There were no marks of wounds or abrasion about the body. The but- tons of his waistcoat were melted; the right leg of his trousers was torn down and his coat literally burnt off. His wife was in the same pew with him, but. escaped injury. A gentleman named Frith occupied the next pew, and was and down by the shock, and hurt rather seriously. The floor Of the pew where he stood was perforated with a number of small holes. A portion of the. battlement of the church-tower was struck down by the lightning.

A fatal accident, occasioned by want of caution in crossing the rails at a rail- way station, occurred at Sudbury on Monday night. The sufferer was Mr. John. Hinxsman, of Queen Anne Street, London. He was waiting at the station to return to town; and hearing a train approach, be crossed the rails believing it to be the train for which he was waiting. It proved, however, to be an express- train from Newcastle, which was behind time; and before he had crossed the line he was struck by the buffers, and all the carriages passed over his body.

A fatal accident has occurred on the Newcastle and Berwick Railway, near the Tweedmouth station. While a train of waggons laden with coke, stones, &a and on which were a number of workmen, was in progress, one of the labourers at tempted to step from one truck to another; but he fell, and several of the car- riages passed over his body; the obstruction eventually threw the train off the rails, and some of the people were pitched from the trucks, receiving hurts more or less severe.

A breaksman has been killed on the Lancaster and Carlisle Railway, by falling from a goods-train: twenty waggons passed over his body.

A large quantity of hay, which was stacked near the Eastern Counties Railway at Chelmsford, was set on fire on Saturday, by sparks from a locomotive engine, and consumed in a abort time.

The boiler of one of the steam-tugs on the river Tyne exploded last week ; but no fatal injury was done. The boiler was a tubular one, similar in that respect to the boiler of the Cricket: one of the tubes gave way, and the rush of steam destroyed the fore cabin.

The Coroner's inquest at Nutbourue, on the body of Gregory the engine-driver, who was killed on the South Coast Railway, reassembled on Tuesday; but, from the illness of a juror, it was again adjourned for a month. It does not appear likely that Peel, the fireman of the train, can be examined: be experienced a concussion of the brain, sad is an inmate of a lunatic asylum.

John Goldepink, the footman who was found concealed under the bed of Mrs. Fuleher at Brighton, and who on the lady's escape from him cut his own throat, has recovered sufficiently to be examined by the Magistrates. He was commi,ted for trial on the charge of aggravated assault.

Henry Hanks, a boy only fourteen years old, has shot himself dead, in a old near Malmesbnry. He had previously asked another boy to shoot him.