SCOTLAND.

Southland Times, Volume III, Issue 37, 1 February 1864, Page 5

SCOTLAND.

(FEOJr OTJB. Off.V COKRESrONDEXT.) GLASGO W. 24th November, 1863. The feature of the month has been the election of municipal representatives" to the various vacancies occurring in the Glasgow Town Council. These elections appear to be attended with less and less interest, aud those which have just closed are acknowledged to have been the quietest on record. In the fifth ward, or Stockwell district, something like " a scrimmage " threatened, but Bailie Fowler has • been re-elected without difficulty. The reason for the contest being in the fact that the Bailie is prone to raise his voice against the petty persecutions to which publicans are subjected in our city, and has, consequently earned the declared hostility of those Avho devote themselves to the pump. The StockwelL from being a rendezvous for farmers and country visitors arriving by the omnibuses which start from that street, has an unusual number of grog shops within its limits. As a stronghold for dram drinkers, the whole street is, therelore, particularly obnoxious to the teetotal faction, and in order effectually to besiege it a temperance clique endeavoured to oust Bailie Fowler and put in his place Robert Simpson, the draper in Jamaica-street, wellknown to your Glasgow readers for • his preaching predications, and his belief in Loch Kabime water. Those opposed to " parson Simpson's" principles took good care to show their animus with sufficient plainness. They sent about placards referring to the " reverend" candidates antecedents, and endeavoured to make capital out of the fact that he had kept a coal-office or coal-shed. The publican interest in the ward was decidedly too strong for the cold water partisans, and the " parsons" supporters were subjected to a defeat. In the Tenth Ward, a threatened contest between Mr. Thos. Murray, the publisher in Buchananstreet, and a cold water apostle named Torrens, or " Torrents" as his opponents facetiously dubbed him, was nipped in the bud through the intemperate conduct of the temperance faction. Mr. Thos. Murray walked the course, and this " liberal" patron of literature will, no doubt, co-operate with Dr. Blackie, now Provost Blackie, to uphold the printing and publishing interest, to which they both belong. Thomas Corbett, the founder of oxu* cheap cooking depots, has been returned for the Fourteenth Ward, and promises to be both a practical and philanthropic member of the Council. The mentiqn of Mr. Corbett's name suggests some reference to his cooking depots, and which, if not altegether connected with municipal matters, have naturally enough introduced themselves. The favor extended towards these cheap dining rooms in Glasgow is unmistakable, and they now occupy the place of a local institution. I have recently had dinner in both the Jamaica and Argyle street depots, and on both occasions fared sumptuously for four penes half-ponny. Tlie basin of broth or pease-soup, which costs one psnny, is, if anything, superior in quality, and quite equal in quantity, to the same dish charged for in restaurants, 4d., sd.and 6cl. The mince collops highly flavored ; plate of sound beef and potatoes charged 3d., ai*c quite up to the sixpenny half-plates of first-class places, and the halfpenny worth of pudding is as good i and plentiful as the 4cl. desert of the Buchanan-street houses. For 4J-d the dinner given is certainly not inferior, and would be a I cheap '' feed" at lOd. or Is. elsewhere ; and | unless for certain discomforts, the most re- j fined " loafer" about town could neither cavil ' with the bill of fare, nor the attendance : given. Among the objectionable features are the knives, fork? and spoons laid down with the foocl, and which have a decided charity school look. The spoon is of the commonest kind of pewter, never scoured clean, and improved in shape by various geniuses, intent upon making the article utterly useless for the conveyance of meat to the mouth. The knives and forks appear to have been raked out of some thieves' den, no two of them being alike, and most of them most uncomfortable to use. Another disagrcablc feature is the number of visitors who are apparently suffering from incipient diphtheria, and who betray their sufferings by clearing their throats and spitting abundantly over the floor. This illustration of bad manners has, I observe, not been specially referred to, but it could only escape comment in a city where the standard ot refinement is at the lowest. It is very ! amusing to look round the Jamaica-street j room, which by the way is three stories up, j and almost opposite to Bowman's photographic j establishment, and observe the character of the ! numerous visitors. At your elbow, perhaps, j sits a carter in corduroys, who grins from car to ear, as his three courses are ;;et down before him for tho price of a " sma' gj.11." Further tip sits the political shoemaker dividing his attention equally between his meal and his ' ; Mail." Beyond hjm sits the economical bagman, whose position is hardly up to the commercial room, aud who smiles benignly upon the smart girl who whispers " Soup or broth, sir ; cold meat or collops, sir ; puddings, sir. Yes, sir !" and hurries off to obey his behest. In one corner a misanthropical remnant of gentility eats Ms plain dinner under protest, indicated by every ■wrinkle in his humiliated visage, and opposite him proudly sits the schoolboy permitted to dine in town, and who deeply ponders over the expediency of ordering four pence halfpenny worth of pudding right, off, and sending the soup and collops to Jericho, A very curious spectacle, indeed, is the whole room, and no one can fail to think over it who casts a careful eye across the table. Passing from matters of taste connected with the tongue, I may. naturally enough, comment upon those associated with thesatisfaction of the eye. The third Exhibition of the Glasgow Art Institute ij opened in the Maclellan Galleries, Sauchie-hill-street and is reckoned by those who have watched the progress of the Instil uro to be a very capital collection of pictures. Ths finest pictures ' exhibited have been contributed by Continental artists, and some of which are very charming. The Knglish artists are pretty fairly represented by such names as Bodding- | ton and'Petitt, but our Scrftch artists of repute , send few pictures. Three magnificent pictures by MacOulloch are exhibited, but none of which have been painted for this Exhibition. The chief of these is " Kilchurn Castle, " a magnificent picture belonging to the Glasgow portrait painter Daniel M'Nee. This picture is unlike any of the other Kitchurns painted by McCulloch, and with some-pf which your readers must be .acquainted. The gray grim castle and the gray steel water are finely contrasted in M'Nee's picture with a broad yellow band of flat land filling up middle distance, wrought up with all M'Oullooh's picturesque handling and bold dash. Tho mighty Beneruachen, lost in a rugged veil of mist, is, a fitting back-ground to the noble picture, the only weakness in which ia a mass of brown conventional dotty foliage filling up the foreground. A fine picture, by M'Ouiloch, of the famous Glencoo, is in i another room, aud a largo pioturo of Loch ! Lomond is exhibited as it wove to show that tho great Scottish landscape painted is not always up to the mavk, AvtUuv Pwigal contributes several pictures, hut this old Edinburgh favourite is falling sadly ofl". A largo picture of Strathearn, by Poagal, exhibited in tho Galleries, shows how a noble soonemay ho lTiisrepi'esented, and have dissipated out of it all that is striking, romantic, and touchod with pootic feeling; This urtist exhibits a view of my favourite Holy Loch with #lon Messen in the background, and. which is suoh a Vile oaricaturo, that lain fairly.. tempted to send jny foot through, tUo canvass. Among the wctur.es hung in lino w?o those at r fovr fayarod incUyiAuals, and. whw jwtUtio skill juurify

enabled them to cope with, the average sign-, board, painters. AMr Williams, who writes A. W. A. after his name, exhibits a view 'of the Trossaohs, and which looks like a dirty clay bank vising out of a recently 'disturbed horsepond. This specimen of local art belongs to W. Grovan, whose pictiu*e gallery must be a treat to go over. Samuel Bough, late of the Theatre lioyal, cxMbits the " Upper Pool on tlie Thames," which some compare to Turner. When I hare had some more time to examine the collection, and when your readers hare a little move patience, I will give afewmore scraps from the galleries. I met Mr JY X: Hunter the other day the Kilmarnoclc cobbler and portrait painter, well-known to some of your west country emigrants, and asked the cobbler how he liked the exhibition, " Well, there's naething o'my am in it,' ' answered Saminas, 'as his friends call him, and "Ye ea.nna expec' me to think niuclde o' it. The loons hae honored me wi' sich a high place the twice they hung me up, that I've modestly declined a third elevation," and which honest comment the cobbler declared to bo his correct opinion. Speaking of pictures, I've just been seeing a very splendid work of art in the gallaries of Messrs. Maclure, Buchanan-street. This picture is entitled " Icebergs," and is from the gifted and facile pencil of .Mr. Church, the American landscape painter. The " Icebergs " represent icebergs adrift off the coasts of Labrador, among which Mr. Church cruised for two months, in order to complete his studies of these artic islands. Any attempted description would fail to give an idea of the sad solemnity of the scene, and the gorgeous splendour of the artistic color. Huge ice cliffs fill up the picture, rent across with sapphire belts and cleft with emerald caverns, through which the violet tinted waves come rolling from the setting sun. Between Stewart's isle and the antartic volcanoes which lie to the southward of New Zealand, the summer sun must set upon many a similar scene in the icy waste, and upon which no human eye may ever fall. It may interest some of your Renfrewshire readers- to know that a fine statue of the late Mr Bre water, Minister, Paisley, by Mossman, of Glasgow, has been put up in Paisley, and gives much satisfaction to the friends of the deceased clergyman. The Paisley " bodies " are speaking of having a bust of their " townman," Lord Clyde, stuck up in some prominent place. Like canny Scotchmcu as they are, the promoters of this scheme [ are anxious to save the outlay of an original work of art and are very properly flunking of having just a copy of the best bust of the Paisley hero extant, and which is the fine face of Lord Clyde, moddelled by Mr. Ewing, the Grlassjow sculptor, whose rising I fame does so muchhon or to his munificent patron — Robert Dalglish — the member for Glasgow. Among local matters of import, I may refer to some excitement created by the building of a privateer for the Confederates, by Messrs. J. G-. Thomson, the shipbuilders at Govan. The Government it appears has had its eye upon this craft for some time, but a more decided warning was given the Foreign Secretary respecting the character of the vessel, by i Messrs" Andrew Patron, of Virginia-street, and several of the Gallowgate Secretaries of the Glasgow Emancipation Society, and wellknown for their philantrophic efforts. . The j Government has sent a gunboat up j from Greonock to lay alongside of the j suspected vessel least she attempt to clear out sumiptitiously, it being strongly believed that i the builders intended fo violate the Queen's jwoclamation of neutrality and abet the escape of the vessel. I was told by Mr. Paton that j ho had pretty accurate knowledge that the ! gun-ports of the vessel had been nailed up by ■ tje Messrs. Thomson, the gun-tackle, ring- | bolts, dray.ii, and the lining of the powder i magazines taken down in the hope of hiding ! her for the purpose for which the vessel was ; built, but which will now, of course, only • render more palpable the evidence against the alleged cruiser, her builder, and her owners, whoever these latter may bo. I hare seen the craft lying in the Brooinielaw, and she is certainly a splendid looking barque- rigged screw. Of her suitability for cruising, and of her fitness to follow tho Alabama, the most J casual glance gives an undoubted assurance. About 1,000 tons burthen, she has still the fine lines of the swiftest yacht, and carries spars over her which suggests her fitness to overhaul any merchant craft afloai, even without the aid of her screw. Her sides are plentifully supplied with davits for boats, : suggesting a more numerous crew than ! a sea-going screw would require, and her whole ' rigging and fitting betrays her character pretty j broadly. She has been known as the Canto;!, ' but has been re-named the Parripeo, and she ' certainly would come down like a hurricane upon the unfortunate Federal craft likely to fall into her way. That she will be detained | like the Alexandra, I do not doubt, and if her j builders have been trying to embroil us with the Federal Government it will be a pity if j they do not suffer tho pains and penalties of | their misdeeds. An Ironclad, now alleged to | be for the' Confederate Government, has made considerable progress in one of the Lower Yards, but she is not likely to escape from tho river after what has befallen the Mersey rams. Mr • Spenee, the Confederate agent in Liverpool, has been invited by a coterie | of Glasgow sympathisers with the South | to lecture in the City Hall. It is un- I fortunate that no Southern Beecher can be i found to accept the post of spokesman for the cause of slavery, and which Southern clergymen say is specially provided for by the Mosiac law, binding upon the Jews of Charleston and i New Orleans. Mr. Spcnce is simply a partisan of the poorest order, who had nothing better than bold assumptions and transparentfallacies to offer, and if the defence he makes | in Glasgow is no better than that made in the | Times, his case will be poor enough indeed. j Qn Monday week, a Mr. M'Dowcll, belong- \ ing to the Confederate army, made an oration j in defence of the South in Edinburgh, and appeared to have had some difficulty in finding a chairman willing to brave the public opinion of " Auld Reekie." The doctor is a cool and collected fellow, but was evidently unprepared for a " scene" that beggared description. The partisans of both sides were pretty numerous, and the doctor was put through his facings by a storm of questions, and which finally overwhelmed him. One of tho audience brought a large cartoon to the meeting, showing a negro's back after it had been lacerated by the whip, and which appeared to have been converted into a sort of battle flag, under which the abolitionists became sufficiently excited to do any mischief they might have been prompted to, Fortunately the peace was not disturbed, but Dr M'Dowcll nuist leave Edinburgh with a very lively notion that the South has not the unanimous support of the Scottish people. It may interest some of your readers to know that, by ths ship Mary Francis, from the Clyde, 200 tons of railway iron are being conveyed to InvercargLU for local purposes. In the same vessel, a short horn bull half brother to Mastor Butterfily, . a roan coloured heifer aud calf, a Clydesdale bay stallion, and a splendid bay mare are also shipped by Messrs. Donaldson and Hugh Maclean, the latter one of your own enterprising citizens, and now intont upon improving the breed of your cattle. I obaor-vo lying at the Broomiclaw throo splandid stoanwrs, intended for ilia Australian and Now Zaaland trade. These avs—tho Southern Gross, built by Messrs, JV tmd Gk Thomson, of Govan, a handsome screw, of 700 tora and ISO horse« power, fov tho Ta3paaian Steam Navigation. Company} the Albatross, tmilfc b t y Messrs. ■ Barolaj', Cnvlo and Co., a screw' of 750 tons and 135 horao-powor, and intended fov the Australian coasting trade j and the City of Brisbane, a very splendid itu*go steamer, likeWise hitanciod for tho "Australian coasting trftdo. 1 shall ondoavouv to fIU my nsxt witti, ft variety of topics touching Ipqrl entigwtion &Mi otlwtf floogrcta flatter*,

THE: G-REAT NORTHERN RAILWAY: As will be seen by the following account of the mimber of men .employed, . and the references made to the works in operation, tho progress of the Great. Northern Railway hetweenvWinton Bush and Invercargill is of a very satisfactory character. The arrangements which are being carried out by Mr. J. K. Davies, the contractor for the whole of the line, are of the most complete and admirable description, and afford a sufficient guarantee that no delay will occur on his jjart, in completing the contract within the specified time. We purpose giving a brief description of the works on the line between "Winton and this place, commencing at the former-mentioned end. We may remark' that the whole of the coiuitry lying between the two places, does not present any very great engineering difficulties in the construction of a railway. The country is generally of a very flat, and not at all liilly character ; consequently neither embankments nor cuttings of any extent will be necessary. The heaviest of the works will be the construction of bridges over the various rivers which intersect tho line. At Winton township the necessary requirements of the numerous workmen who are employed in the locality have already caused the establishment of stores of various kinds. Of general stores we remarked six, with a baker's shop, a butcher's, a blacksmith's smithy, a shoe-maker's, and that inevitable institution, a public-house. Between Winton and the Makerawa, a distance of tweh'e miles, which is termad section No. 2, there are employed 500 excavators, 40 sawyers, 30 men falling timber, 50 men fencing, 20 bul-lock-drivers with teams, 70 carpenters ongaged on the erection of bridges, assisted by about 20 day laborprs. All these men are under the supervision of six overseers, tho whole being under the general superintendence of Mr. Sherar, who has the entire management of the section. Mr. Sherar, it w.a.y be mentioned, in passing, is a gentleman who has been engaged in Victoria on the G-eelong and Ballarat line. Exclusive of the" foregoing number of men, there are about. 100 who are engaged in different parts of tho adjoining bush, in procuring timber, | and materials for the bridges, &c, for draining which about 60 horses and 80 bullocks aro employed. The heaviest work on this section in the way of building bridges, is the construction of tlie bridge over the Typo creek, which will bo 80 feet long and 20 feet high. Two of the bridges are already finished, one of them over a creek near Winton, which is about 40 feet high, and the other over Winton creek, which is about 80 feet long. A strong two-rail fence is being erected on both sides of tlie section, the latter which is of very good quality, having for ihe posts black pine, and for the rails white pine. At Royal Bush there aro several thousands of sleepers of black pine cut and ready for use. Although there w.-w some difficulty in procuring tliis description of timber, it was found necessary to do so, as the other kinds were not so suitable. At Winton, the contractors have erected a steam saw mill, capable of cutting between 4-,000 to 5,000 feet per day ; a second mill is also in course of erection. The clearing for the station at Winton has already been commenced. It will include an area of ground about 4 chains square, and appears to be admirably adapted for a site fov a station. In about a week, about five miles of the end next ! to Winton will be ready for receiving the ballast for tlie permanent way.