HOME NEWS.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume VIII, Issue 126, 27 May 1873, Page 2

HOME NEWS.

The following is from the London letter of , the Australasian, dated March 21 :— Whatever may be the result of the session of IBTS/it cannot be denied that it has opeiied in .a most decidedly sensational manner. We bad scarcely begun work a month: ago, and yet we have contrived in that short space of time to : defeat the Government,' ; tui ; n it put of office, and be obliged^ lb ,ask it to come in again. I think, therefore, I am justified in saying that we have already had one sensation for this year. Few poople had any idea of thenedr approach of this catastrophe until within a fortnight or so of the event. The session opened so sedately, not to say mohotbndusly; that, we did not dream of the volcano" that slumbered underneath. Nor at the first announcement, of the Irish University Bill did public opinion appear so very hostile; Indeed, considering that it,. was.r understood to be Mr Gladstone's grand firework. of the year, everybody was wonderfully :civil and quiet when the Prime Minister detailed its provisions. But the storm. very soon began, and it was very soon lashed into fury by the Catholic party, who saw in the bill just so much concession to their wishes as made them savage for its : not offering more. Still, matters need not havo become serious had not Mr Cardwrell alienated a good many Irish ;waverers by his very, injudicious speech—^-and, even theo, it remained for the Premier to allay the tempest by gracefully declaring himself to have been mistaken in his estimate of public opinion, and .declaring the. bill withdrawn. But he declined )to yield, and: pressed the bill on to a-second reading. It is difficult to believe ; th'nt ! all Mr Gladstone's large majority, should have so dwindled down as to a^ov^j^f his being beaten by three; but sa.it;was?-4apdiHothing was left for him but to acknowledge himself vanquished, i and to 'resign office. Here, however, the couh^y'^i's'thtfeatehed with a deadlock, a^very'tiii usual thing in England-— for Mr Disra9li,.w,he,n appealed to by the Queen, avowed himself equal to forming a Cabinet, but; unequal "to carrying on the Government <>with the present House of Commons. The end of it has been that th'^old Gladstone Ministry is to 'carry on again for the present. Aiilqugh :we' cannot deny that Mr Gladstone, 'during his four years and a half ot office, has successfully carried through an ninusualanaoUn't of legislation, much of which is of an exceedingly imIportant character,: yet most people seem to think, that it was time; for a rchange. In fact, V?ith' . nearly, all classes, the , Ministry was decidedly unpopular, and it was felt that? Somehow Ithe honor -and dignity of Old England-had;becopae seriously impaired. On r ppntinent : we have sadly gone do wfi-hiir in' estimation, while at home everything has been sacrificed to .a.cheeseparing economy*. Xt, is . not. likely, that, under jths circu imsiances, we shall have much 'more 1 Serious talk for this session; for, as the Government only stays in by tolerapcej\very; little but the bare routine of business will b 8 attempted. Indeed, with tho exception of Mr Gladstone's unlucky bantling, there has been very little of importance introduced. Mr Plimsoll (MvP. for Derby) made a splendid and telling speech iv his proposition for a Royal .Commission Tto inquire into the state of ithe merchant service, and had got up his case sp, well that no opposition was manifested to the proposal. ! Indeed, many shipowners in , the House would have liked to have opposed it, had they dared, but he would, have been a. bold man to confront the sympathetic cheers of the members and the Universal cyfjrent of public opinion. It is to be hoped that one of the very greatest blots on our national prosperity may be speedily wiped away, and tha t;in future: eyery shipowner whose crew (goes to the .bottom may be arraigned for the loss of life as though he were

guilty of manslaughter. The Deceased Wife's Sister Bill, after getting through the Commons, met its usual fate in the Lords, and w.as flang out. ~ - A Government does not fall every day with us, and it is rather surprising how little excitement the occurrence has caused. Funds were scarcely affected, and beyond a good deal of very natural curiosity, society did not seem to care much about it. I do not think, indeed, that tho society of the present day takes the same interest in politics which it used to do — in other words, we seem to be getting more frivolous aud more anxious as to who should spend the most moDey. The note of preparation has now fairly sounded, and we are supposed to be in the thick of it, or, at all events, were so until Lent began, for there is n very perceptible falling off in festivities directly that Ash Wednesday has gone by , For a wonder, her Majesty has held a levee, and a very crowded and brilliant affair it was, although the arrangements were none of the best, and more pushing took place than was seemly. The Prince of Wales has been taking a final look at tbo shires before knocking off hunting and taking to dancing for the season, and had a merry few days of it at the Duke of Rutland's at Belvoir. He is now going to be Lord Fitz-Hardioge's guest at the Bristol Races, which in themselves are quite a restoration of the fallen glories of that ancient dirty city. We had some rather stirring cases in our crimnal courts, showing that, notwithstanding the generally wide-awake state of our bank-managers, they are occasionally caught napping. The Bank of England (through one of its branches) has been defrauded of about £100,000, by means of forged bills. The scheme has. been cleverly concocted by its chief promoter — a Mr Warren — an American, who is very much " wanted" just now, and had been carried on with a rare amount of caution and audacity, until the amount of discount for these bills had reached the sum named. Indeed, it was only discovered when it was by a piece of carelessness on the part of the forgers, who had omitted to put the date of the bill, and thus led the manager to send it to the acceptor, who of course repudiated it. There has also been a great crash of a well-known merchant' — A Mr De Lizardi, who kept a

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Fur remaind/r of news see fourth page.

large bouse at the West-end, arid Tli ved iiH great style. Jostag he < was wanted to/ dear up some queer-looking transactions/ he disappeared, greatly to, the regret of two#f befriends, who believed in him, iand had gone hail the day before in f^JoOO a-piece. But.he was too slippery for them, and is now believed to be in Spain — the h.°Pßy land of swindlers— because there, is no extraditiori -7 treaty in force. Mrs Cotton, the female poisoner, has just been tried at. the Durham assizes, and without going into the whole case, it was proved that she murdered a sufficient number of peopleto warrant her being bung, which she' will accordingly be. But even in such a gross and terrible case it is probable that there will be some weak foolß ready to get up a petition in her favour.. There has ; heen another candidate for notoriety as the principal actor in the Eltham murder, in the shape of a crazy soldier, who has minutely gone through the case, and declared that he, and he only, killed j the girl. But nobody believes the poor fellow. . Mr. Edwin' James, whose fiasco in his profession gome years ago may be remembered by all, has returned from America, at the bar of which he was practising, and has made a formal appeal to the Benchers | of the Temple to reinstate him in his old statusan England, So that the old story waft opened up again, and Mr James again stood, upon his defence. . But It was all to no purpose, for the explanations failed, in the eyes of the judges, to turn the black man white, and so Mr. James is still out of the pale of legal society. Next to the Government upset there has. been but one topic of conversation throughout the kingdom, and that is coal. The London coal merchants have been brought to bay by public opinion, and have cleverly endeavored to shift the odium of high prices upon the colliery pwners.T But after all the writing and ty, quoques that have been freely bandied about, the fact remains that the London merchants have fattened at the expense of the public, arid have the pleasure of knowing, (if they have any consciences) that they have done' incalculable damage to the general trade of the country,. and that a good many people have died from cold arid starvation induced by the high prices. Of course, this latter is to them a trifle, but the other is more serious. The railway companies, too, are nearly as big sinners as the merchants, for they refuse to carry coals ..for anyone who is not what they call a " registered trader," and does not possesss a wharf at the terminus, so that the general; public is utterly, at . 7their mercy. A Coal Commission has, been appointed in the House of Commons, and maybe we Shall hear of a remedy to this state of. things. Mr Scott, the registrar of the Coal Exchange in London, calls attention to the fact that an\ enormous bed of peat exists in t^^.ssesPmarshes, which would dp: ample, combustible duty at about 4s. per ton. If this is the case, it is a realgodsend to the Londoners, and will do more to keep the coal merchant in his place than anything $lse. The South Wales strike is on its last legs, .. and, after a desperate struggle of at least 12 weeks, the ironmasters have beaten the Union, the leaders of which find that they had undertaken a task far too much for them.' The iron trade, which has again experienced a very brisk upward time, is yet terribly hampered by the coal question ; and no wonder, for America can beat us by at least 60s. per ton, while tbe price ofthe raw material is so great that our iron producers cannot afiord to lower their quotations. ' ,n — n