NEWS BY THE MAIL.

Globe, Volume IV, Issue 426, 25 October 1875, Page 3

NEWS BY THE MAIL.

OUR LONDON LETTER. {From a correspondent of the Press.) London, September 3rd, 1875. We are at present in the lowest depths of what is called the “dead season.” The West-end presents a melancholy appearance of empty streets and closed up houses. There is a legend to the effect that those unfortunate members of the world of fashion who are detained in town at this time of the year shut up the fronts of their houses and live in the back premises. I used to regard this as apocryphal, but with experience has come a painful belief that such idiots do exist. As I walk along the nearly deserted pavement I occasionally meet an acquaintance, and I notice the first remark is invariably, “ Only came up yesterday from the country, my dear fellow, and going back again to-morrow,” in an agony of apprehension lest I should think he was staying in town in August or September. To be seen in London at this season of the year is regarded by some people as a loss of caste. Most of the theatres are closed, and so are

half the clubs. It is certainly very dull, and as soon as I have despatched this letter I shall flee from the scene of desolation myself. . The greater portion of my news this mail regards collisions at sea and on land. The first case, perhaps, is the most sensational. Towards the close of last mouth the Royal yacht Alberta, while conveying her Majesty from Cowes to Portsmouth, ran down, in broad daylight, the schooner yacht Mistletoe with a party of ladies and gentlemen on board. The schooner immediately sank, and in spite of every effort made by the officers and crew of the Alberta two lives were lost. The mate and a lady, Miss Peel, the sister-in-law of the owner, Mr Heywood. were drowned. The master, an old man, sevenly years of ago, was fatally injured by the falling of the Mistletoe’s mainmast, and died on board the Alberta before she reached Gosport. Her Majesty was most painfully aSected by the occurrence, and has done everything in her power to express her sympathy with the relatives of those who lost their lives before her very eyes. A coroner’s inquest on Miss Peel and the master (the other body, that of the mate not having been recovered) has been held, but the jury were unable to agree. Eleven, it is said, were for returning a verdict of manslaughter against the officers in charge of the Royal yacht, while two were in favor of a milder decision. The officers in charge were Prince Ernest of Leiningen, a nephew of the Queen, and Captain Welch. In consequence of the disagreement of the jury, the coroner, according to the law, has sent the inquiry to the next general assizes at Winchester. A court of inquiry is now being held at Portsmouth, but the proceedings are not allowed to transpire. The event has raised fierce, and in many cases, bitter discussions throughout the country. The royal yacht was proceeding at a rate of fifteen knots an hour—that is. about seventeen statute miles ; and to drive a vessel at this rate throught the Solent in the very height of the yachting season is somewhat similar to galloping a horse down Fleet street in the middle of the day. The day before yesterday the body of the mate of the Mistletoe was picked up and landed at Portsea, The borough coroner has opened an inquest, and a curious complication will probably arise out of two juries inquiring into virtually the same occurrence.

An excursion train between Bradford and Morecatnbe was run into from behind a few nights ago by an express. In the latter train no one was seriously injured, not even the stoker and engine driver, but the unlucky excursionists fared badly. Five were killed on the spot, and between thirty and forty were seriously injured, two of whom have since died. Fortunately the express was slackening speed before stopping at a station, and was going at only ten mile s an hour, or the catastrophe would have been one of the most awful in the annals of railway accidents. The excursion train was crammed, there being upwards of 1000 people in it, and the terrified shrieks were heard for miles over the country. A Government inquiry is now being held into the circumstances attending the collision. The day beforeyesterday morning,in the Irish Channel, eight miles off Bray Head, H.M.S. Iron Duke came into collision with H.M.S. Vanguard during a dense fog, and the latter sank in nineteen fathoms of water within an hour. All hands on board the Vanguard, 450 in number, were saved, and the Iron Duke, with her bows stove in and her fore rigging carried away, proceeded at once to Kingstown, where she now lies at anchor. Both ships were ironclads, and strangely enough, sister ships. The Vanguard was an iron-plated ram of 6034 tons and 5812 horsepower. She carried ten twelve ton guns and three thirty-pounder Armstrongs, and her armour was 4-Jin thick. She was built at a cost of £360,000, but subsequent alterations and additions had run her total cost up to nearly half a million. The Iron Duke is exactly the same tonnage and class of ships, but her horsepower is only 4268. Both vessels belonged to the reserve squadron under Admiral Sir W. Tarieton. The squadron left Kingstown, where they had been feted and entertained by all classes during their stay, at eleven o’clock in the morning, and before three hours had elapsed one of the stateliest ships of the number was lying at the bottom. The Iron Duke was proceeding at about a cable’s length astern of the Vanguard, and the latter, in order to avoid a collision with a large sailing vessel which suddenly appeared through the dense fog, put her helm hard astarboard, and so crossed the path of the Iron Duke, which ran into her right amidships, Captain Dawkins of the Vanguard, who was on the bridge, called out to his crew that if they preserved order all would be saved, but that any confusion would lead to the loss of all. On this the men stood at their stations like a regiment on parade, and not a man moved until directed to do so. The sick were first transferred to the Iron Duke, and the last to leave the ship was of course the captain. Not a human life was lost, and this, considering the suddenness of the catastrophe and the dense fog prevailing, speaks volumes for the discipline which must have reigned supreme during the trying time. The remainder of the squadron proceeded on its way to Queenstown in unconsciousness of what had happened in their very midst. The only living thing lost was a dog belonging to the captain. The hero of the hour is Captain Webb, who has just performed the unprecedented feat of swimming across the channel from Dover to Calais. The exploit is an instance of human endurance and strength without parallel. Leander’s and Lord Byron’s feat of swimming the Hellespont is mere child’s play in comparison. The distance, as of course all your readers know, is about twenty, two miles, and this Webb accomplished in twenty-one hours and forty minutes. He was weak on landing, but soon recovered himself, and after a long sleep was fresh and hearty. He is now in his usual excellent health, and not one jot the worse for his extraordinary exertion. Hot coffee, beef tea (towards the end), some brandy, and (once) codliver oil were the refreshments he took during his task, and which were handed to him from a boat. The most marvellous part of the feat is not so much the sustained muscular effort —though that is wonderful in itself —as the extraordinary conditions under which he retained sufficient animal heat to keep body and soul together during twentytwo hours’ immersion in the water. J. B. Johnson, the champion swimmer of England, who has just easily defeated the American champion, tried two or three years ago to do what Webb has just done, and failed miserably after one hour’s immersion. The doctors are anxious to know by what arrangement or modification of the heat-producing and heatconserving process did Webb manage to

sustain immersion for this lengthened period. Before starting he was rubbed all over with porpoise oil, and doubtless this in some measure protected him from the cold action of the water ; but of course this could not have contributed very much to the result, and it was mainly Webb’s own pluck and magnificent physique which carried him triumphantly through the ordeal. The last few hours he himself describes as “ cruel work.’’ This may easily be imagined, particularly when we remember that Boyton, though encased in a waterproof and air inflated suit, said after he had thus crossed the Chan el that all the wealth in England would not tempt him to try it again. Comparisons have been made between Webb and Boyton, but there ought to be no comparison between the two. As an exploit, Captain Boyton’s achievement is placed in the shade, but as a matter of practical utility his feat commands the greater consideration. For a few pounds, the cost of his life-prererving suit, Captain Boyton will make any moderately hale man or woman almost as great an adept in floating as he himself is; while Webb’s feat awakens our admiration and wonder, but will never be of the slightest service to any one. Webb is a captain in the merchant service, and hails from Shropshire, in which county his father practises as a surgeon. He has been received with great rejoicings down in his part of the world, and he is now in London being lionised wherever he can be caught. At the Royal Exchange, the Stock Exchange, and at Lloyd’s, all of which places he visited the/lay before yesterday, he was received with the wildest enthusiasm, and he cannot show his nose in public without being mobbed. Everyone wants to shake his hand. Boxes at theatres are placed at his disposal, and if he appears at any of these places of amusement he is received with royal honors The audience stand up and cheer while the band plays “ See the conquering here comes.” We are overdoing everything as usual, and much, I imagine, to the discomfiture of Captain Webb, who seems to be a simple, manly, and outspoken sailor, averse to humbug and nonsense One paper wants to know what Her Majesty is about that she has not ere this conferred the honor of Knighthood on Captain Webb. Subscriptions are being raised throughout ihe kingdom to present him with a testimonial, which will probably take the substantial shape of a purse of several thousand pounds. The consequence of all this is that the Serpentine and other metropolitan sheets of water are every evening crowded with pale youths from city offices and counters, who all going to swim the channel. Hay before yesterday old Father Thames bore on his dirty old bosom a young girl of fourteen, clad in a tightly fitting dress of “ rose-pink lama”—whatever that may be —trimmed with white lace ; Jamidst ringing plaudits from bank and boat and ship, this young lady swam from London Bridge to Greenwich, a distance of five miles, in an hour and nine minutes. It is hard to know where the rage for swimming, started by Captain Webb, will end. We have received by the Valorous, which has just returned, news of the Arctic Expedition up to July 17th. On that day the two ships, Alert and Discovery, were at a place called Ritenberg, a few hours’ steaming north of Disco. They put in here to obtam some dogs for sledge travelling, and proceeded on the same day to Proven and Upernivik, where they were to complete their complement of dogs, thirty for each ship. The health and spirits of the Expedition were excellent when the Valorous parted company. For the first week or two after leaving England the ships encountered heavy adverse gale®, during which the Alert and Discovery shipped a great deal of water, owing to their heavily laden state, and lost a boat each. They did not reach Disco until the 6th of July, afterone of the longest passages on record.

The British Association for the Advancement of Science met this year at Bristol. The meeting, which has just been concluded, was not up to many of its predecessors, and was as a rule decidedly “ slow.” Nothing particularly startling or new was advanced. An interesting paper was read by Dr Hector on the geology of New Zealand. He has brought home a large collection of specimens, which are to be submitted to the inspection and judgment of competent autho rities. He pointed out on a map the situation of the coal seams in New Zealand, the coal being in some places, he stated, twenty-three feet thick, and containing only one per cent of water. He exhibited drawings of some fauna which he found, and which he said were closely allied to the fauna of the British Isles. He also found remains of reptiles, showing that they had been of gigantic form, and he gave a curious account of the discovery of bones of the moa, traces of which he found very extensively in different parts of the island. Altogether the paper was about one of the most interesting read at the meeting. Dr Hector has just been made a companion of the order of St Michael and St George. We are at last to have a monument to Byron. A committee, with Mr Disraeli at its head, has been formed for the purpose of rendering this tardy tribute to the memory of the poet. The Greek Government, mindful of what Byron did for Greece, has offered to supply whatever quantity of Pentelic marble the committee may require for the monument free of cost, and to defray the expense of its transmission to England. A site on the Thames embankment has been offered to the committee. The murder of Commodore Goodenough by islanders of the Santa Cruz group is regarded as a serious national loss. It was mainly on his report that the annexation of the Fiji Islands was made. His blood lies not at the door of the unreasoning savages who took his valuable life, but on the heads of the traders in the detestable Pacific labor traffic. His successor, on the Australian station will probably be an officer of the rank of admiral.

The Feast of St Partridge was duly observed on the Ist instant. Reports of sport vary, but altogether the season is a fair average one. The Serapis, screw troop ship, now fitting out at Portsmouth dockyard for the reception of the Prince of Wales and suite, is under orders to leave on the 22nd inst. for Venice, where she will embark the Royal party for passage to India, Sir Julius Vogel is in Paris, and intends, I hear, returning to New Zealand towards the close of the month.