ENGLISH NEWS.

New Zealand Spectator and Cook's Strait Guardian, Volume II, Issue 99, 11 July 1846, Page 2

ENGLISH NEWS.

On the 10th February, the sixth anniversary of her Majesty's wedding-day was celebrated at Buckingham ' Palace, by a dinner to a select few, ami a large party in the evening. The entire of the royal family were in excellent health. Among the amusements of the evening was a reading of A.ntigone of Sophocles by Mr. C. Kemble. A stage was erected at the «nd of the great gallery, on which Mr. Kemble sat with the chorus arranged around him. Mr. Bartholomew read the chorus speaker's part while the musical chorusses were played from the music of Bartholdy. Among the presentations to her Majesty's levee on the 11th February, were Sir Charles Fitzroy, on his return from the Government of the Leeward Islands, by Mr. Secretary Gladstone, and Commanler D. Robertson, on promotion and return from New, Zealand, I" by the Earl of Elleriborough. The Earl ofHarewood will succeed the late Lord Wharncliffe as Lord-Lieutenant of the West Riding of Yorkshire. Captain Johnson, of the Tory, who committed so many dreadful murders on his crew, has been acquitted on the scoie of insanity. The Times has an able article -on the abuse to which such a plea is liable, and especially denounces it in the present instance, because drunkenness, not madness, seems to have been the exciting cause, or if not, at least the madness was produced by drunkenness. Consols, on the 10th _ February, were 97 to §, on the 18th they had declined to 95§ to 96.

An Augmentation of the Army. — With reference to a paragraph which appeared in this paper a few days since, on the subject of the augmentation of the army, we have to state that the following slight alteration has since been made : — The 76th wall be augmented to 1,200, and the 24th will have but 200 ; the 98th will not have any increase, and the 56th will have a double battalion instead of the 59th. The Rifle Briga.le will-have an increase of ],000 men, not 2,000. It may be added, that the increase, not including that to the Marines, will amount to the numbers stated in the estimates — 10,000. — M. Her. The g«les in the channel during the early part of the year, had done an immense deal of mischief. Quantities of goods and fittings have been picked up at sea, supposed to belong to vessels foundered during the storm. There had been fearful inundations in Germany. The tributaries of the Rhine and the Elbe in particular, have flooded the whole of the low countries on their banks. Half the town of Minden was laid under water. The results have been most calamitous, especially as supeiadded to the failure of the harvest, and the ffse in the price of provisions. A new comet has been discovered at Rome, by Father de Vico. It is situated in Eridanus. The Constilutionncl (French Paper) gives an account of another attack made by Abd-el-Kader upon Setiff, a place in the possession of Arabs friendly to the French interest. lie ravaged it most mercilessly, and has followed it up by razzias upon all the tribes which have not declared in his favour. He has with him a flying body of 2,000 horse, splendidly mounted and armed, with which he flies from place to place, making the most unexpected and successful attacks wherever he appears.