1843.] 
THE GARDENERS’ CHRONICLE. 
853 
mittees were then supplied, after which the accounts were 
read and ordered to be printed. From these it appeared 
that the total expenditure of the institution for the past 
year had been 3,505/. The annual dinner of the Corpo- 
yation took place in the evening at the London Tavern, 
the Duke of Sutherland in the chair. The subscriptions 
of the evening amounted to upwards of 3502. His Grace 
the Chairman subscribing 50 guineas in addition to his 
annual subscription. 
Anti-Corn-Law League.— On Thursday night the 
monthly meeting of the League took place in Covent- 
Garden Theatre which was crowded to excess. Mr. 
Wilson opened the business by announcing that the League 
had won London and Kendal and had not won Salisbury, 
but intended to do better next time. Mr. Cobden then 
addressed the meeting on the late elections and on the 
usual topics connected with the Corn Laws. Mr. Lambert 
Chairman of Mr. Bouyerie’s Committee at Salisbury, Col. 
Thompson, and Mr. Bright, next addressed the meeting 
at very great length. At the close of Mr. Bright’s speech 
the Chairman said he must now close what all present 
would probably consider to have been not the least in- 
teresting of the series of meetings. Mr. Bright had 
informed them that arrangements had been made for 
holding during the next month meetings in the principal 
towns of Yorkshire and Lancashire, for the purpose of 
promoting subscriptions to the great League fund. When 
they met again this day month he hoped they would have 
the pleasure of seeing that their labours for that object 
had not been unrewarded. 
The Model Prison.—Although this prison has been 
open so short a time, and the prisoners have been 
carefully selected from the various gaols in point of 
health, two have become insane this year, and have been 
transferred to Bethlehem; viz., John Reeve, on the 24th 
June, and John Hill Stone, on the 17th August. The 
Times observes that it is remarkable that insanity only 
occurs in the Penitentiary and Model Prison under Go- 
vernment inspectors, and not in magistrates’ prisons. 
Light Gold.—\n consequence of the numerous com- 
plaints made by the merchants in the City and the public 
at the practice of the Bank’s issuing light gold, orders have 
been given by the Governors that no gold shall be issued 
unless it has been previously weighed and is according to the 
standard currency. Henceforth all gold presented at the 
Bank will only be received according to weight, and will 
be defaced so as to prevent the possibility of a re-issue. 
Metropolitan Improvements.—Workmen are pulling 
down the houses in the vicinity of Buckingham Palace, 
leading from James-street into the Pimlico-road, to make 
way for the new improvements. The houses in Tothill- 
street, York-street, and Castle-lane, Westminster, are also 
to be pulled down in the spring, as well as Sion College 
Almshouses, for the new road, which will run across the 
ground of Elliott’s brewery into the Vauxhall road. The 
Rookery which has been for several centuries the West- 
minster nuisance is at last coming down, and a square 
will be built on the spot. 
Embankment of the Thames.—At the meeting of the 
ommon Council last week the Lord Mayor laid before 
the Court a copy of the following letter from Lord 
Lincoln, together with a plan for carrying out the 
projected embankment, which he described as a mea- 
sure of considerable importance to his fellow-citizens : 
—‘1, Whitehall-place, November 8, 1843—My Lord,— 
As chairman of the Commissioners appointed by Her 
Majesty for ‘inquiring into and considering the most 
effectual means of improving the metropolis, and providing 
increased facilities of communication within the same,’ I 
have the honour. to transmit herewith for your lordship’s 
information a plan of the proposed embankment between 
‘Westminster and Blackfriars bridges, for the construction 
of which it is the intention of Her Majesty’s Government 
to submit a bill to Parliament in the course of the ensu- 
ing session. It will afford me, as it will I am sure afford 
the Commissioners, great pleasure to find that the result 
of these inquiries into the expediency of the course pro- 
posed will be acceptable to the Corporation, directed as 
those inquiries have been to the interests both of the navi- 
ation of the river and of the trade carried on upon its 
Shores, and ultimately to the accomplishment, without pre- 
Judice to those interests, of a great metropolitan improve- 
Ment. I have the honour to be, my Lord, Your Lord- 
ship’s most obedient servant, Lincoln.’ On the motion 
of Mr. R. L. Jones, the letter and plan were referred to 
the Navigation Committee and the London-bridge Ap- 
proaches Committee for them jointly to report upon. 
‘everal members expressed their satisfaction that Govern- 
Ment have assumed the responsibility of so great an 
Undertaking. 
Westminster Bridge.—Since the carriage-way of this 
bridge was closed, workmen have been engaged in removing 
the great body of loose sand and rubble walls which loaded 
the east pier of the centre arch unnecessarily, and are pre- 
paring to substitute brick arches as was.done to the 
sunken pier on the Middlesex side. The lessening of the 
weight upon each pier by this operation and by the pro- 
Posed lowering of the roadway will not be less than 1700 
tons, and since this lightening began there has not been 
the smallest movement in any part. Messrs, Walker and 
urges have thought it prudent to take the opinion of 
two other engineers, Messrs. Cubitt and Rendel, who 
have stated as their opinion that the sinking of the piers 
18 caused by the great load upon the clay foundation, there 
being no piles under this bridge, and the ground on the 
Surrey side being of a loose nature. 
Shops of London.—The attempt now making to abridge 
the protracted hours of labour in the shops of the metro- 
polis has received the support of the leading drapers :— 
Messrs. Swan and Elgar, Piccadilly; Mr. Redmayne, 
Bond-street ; Messrs. Hitchcock and Rogers, St. Paul’s 
Churchyard; Messrs. Peters and Underwood, Sloane- 
square ; Mr. Owen, Great Coram-street; Mr. Edwards, 
Soho-square, and otkers, close their respective establish- 
ments at 7 o’clock,—examples which are likely to be soon 
followed by the trade generally and by other classes of 
shopkeepers, provided that the public will lend their aid 
by abstaining from evening purchases. 
Roman Remains in the City.—On Thursday in the 
course of excavations making for a sewer in Bridgewater- 
square Barbican, the men found the foundation of a Roman 
wall four feet from the surface, which extended in a direct 
line across the square from east to west. It was about 18 
feet in depth and 43 in width. Pieces of a Roman pave- 
ment were also met with. In one part of the square a 
workman dug up a square plate of metal one side of which 
had a polished surface, but was unfortunately broken. A 
quantity of pottery was also found. During the week, in 
‘Tyefoot-lane (a narrow passage leading out of Queenhithe 
to Fish-street-hill) where a sewer is forming, the men 
came against three Roman walls about 4 feet from the 
surface extending in parallel lines, and at about 12 feet 
distance from each other. They were about five feet in 
depth. The two external walls were about 4 feet in width 
and the inner one about 7 feet wide. ‘They appeared to 
be of a circular form and were so firmly constructed as to 
be only separated and broken by an iron wedge. 
Westminster School.—The ‘“ Phormio’’ of Terence 
will be performed by the Queen’s Scholars on Monday 
the 11th, Thursday the 14th, and Monday the 18th inst., 
with a prologue and epilogue on the 14th and 18th. 
The Daily Papers.—lt is said that the proprietors of 
the daily papers intend to raise the price of their papers 
from 5d. to 6d. Assuming the circulation of the Times to 
be 12,000 a day, this will give to that paper an addi- 
tional profit of 15,650/. a year. 
Mortality of the Metropolis.—The number of deaths 
registered in the week ending Saturday, Nov. 18, was as 
follows:—West Districts, 183 North Districts, 230; 
Central Districts, 224; East districts, 285; South Dis- 
tricts, 208; Total, 1,230 (males, 615; females, 615). 
Weekly average for the last five years, 903 (461 males, 
442 females) ; and for the last five antumns, 908. 
*robinctal Wes. 
Birmingham.—Mr. Weale, one of the assistant Poor 
Law Commissioners, commenced an inquiry on Friday 
last in the workhouse of this town, in consequence of an 
anonymous letter which the commissioners had received 
respecting some cruelties practised in that establishment. 
In September last four young men entered the workhouse 
as tramps, and were put into the tramp ward. When 
there they tore up their clothes and were found in that 
state by the tramp-room keeper. He communicated the 
circumstance to the governor, who according to the charges 
in the letter ordered the men to be taken to the black 
hole in a complete state of nudity. They were put into 
this vault and there detained eight days and nights, 
during the whole of which time they had only one rug 
each to wrap themselves up in by day or night; they 
were in that state compelled to lie on a bare guard-bed 
without any straw or bedding, were daily fed on bread 
and water gruel, there was no fire or hot air or any other 
means of heating the place, and in this state they were 
kept until discharged on the 3d of October, but not until 
one of the men was so ill as to require medical advice. 
The second charge was that the governor had put a boy 
into this place of confinement and kept him there until 
it was necessary to give him a warm bath to ensure his 
recovery when released, The third charge was that a 
woman had been put into the tramp-room for punishment ; 
and the fourth was that a sane woman had been put by 
the governor into an insane ward for punishment. The 
governor in reply to the charges denied that any punish- 
ment had been inflicted. The keeper of the tramp-room 
however deposed that the four men above named entered 
the house in September, and that they were in all respects 
treated in the manner set forth by the commissioner, and 
detailed other circumstances connected with their confine- 
ment of a very revolting nature. The house surgeon 
deposed that he found one of the tramps ill and ordered 
medicine for him, The governor’s wife swore that the men 
had each two rugs in the hole, that she had ordered them 
bread and broth, but she could not. swear whether they 
received it, and that on one Sunday she ordered them meat, 
but she could not say they got it. The room was not cold, 
indeed the men complained of the heat, and she directed 
the keeper to open the door. The Commissioner said they 
ought to visit the place, and proceeded thither, The 
sight of it caused an unqualified expression of indignation 
and abhorrence, It is a low arched vault, into which there 
is a descent of two steps, six feet wide, nine feet long, with 
a small iron grating at the top without any guard glass. A 
bed is raised under this grating, and in this hole situated 
in a dark passage the men were confined. The’ ommis- 
sioner on returning said he never could have believed that 
there existed any such place of confinement in any work- 
house in England, He certainly never beheld such a place 
for human beings to be placed in, no matter what might 
have been their offence. In this expression of disapproba- 
tion the whole of the guardians concurred, and declared 
that they did not know such a place had been used for the 
purpose. The governor said that the hole had been used 
most nights for tramps, and that on that very night they 
would most likely have more tramps than they could 
accommodate, and would be obliged to put them in that 
vault. The Commissioner said he should institute a 
searching inquiry into the entire establishment, and 
adjourned the inquiry. 
Bury.—The Blackburn Standard says that singular as 
it may appear, it is nevertheless true that at noon on 
Friday the petty sessions were adjourned for haif-an-hour, 
in order to allow the solicitors, county policemen, over- 
seers, and other officials, an opportunity of witnessing 
the entrance of Van Amburgh with his large collection of 
wild beasts. 
Carmarthen.—The toll-gate between Bettws and the 
Holyhead road was destroyed last week by the Rebeccaites. 
The gate-posts were sawed asunder and the gates carried 
off. A letter in Welch was left under the cottage-door 
where the toll-taker resides, stating that if the gate is re- 
placed the house will be destroyed.—The Special Com- 
missioners arrived at Cardigan on Wednesday week, and 
proceeded at once to examine the road-surveyors, and to 
investigate the trust accounts and the apportionment of 
tithes in the parish of Pembryn. The Commissioners are 
understood to have expressed a wish to further any agree- 
ment which might be come to between the titheowners and 
tithepayers to allay the bad feeling which exists, and as 
far as possible to remedy what seems to be regarded (so 
far as relates to this parish) as an oppression. The Com- 
missioners make numerous inquiries of intelligent witnesses 
as to their opinion of the best remedy to remove the 
grievances complained of, no doubt with the view of ex- 
tracting some practicable suggestion to embody in their 
report to Government. They concluded their inquiry at 
Cardigan on Friday and proceeded thence to Aberystwith. 
Gloucester.—A calamitous fire burst out at 3 a.m. on 
Wednesday the 29th ult., in a large farm-house in the 
village of Willersey near Broadway in this county, by 
which the house and furniture were completely destroyed, 
and the farmer’s wife and five young children and a char- 
woman were burnt to death. The farmer (Mr. Rimell) 
and three of his sons escaped through a window with much 
difficulty, but the rooms were so filled with smoke that 
the rest of the family were soon suffocated, and the mother 
of the children could not be prevailed upon to fly with her 
husband and leave the children to perish. It was a heart- 
rending scene and no assistance could be rendered. The 
house was fitted up im the old style, with wainscotting, an 
the divisions between the rooms were all of wood. Had 
not the engines arrived speedily from Campden and Eve- 
sham, the destruction of property might have been very 
extensive, as the house was close to thatched barns and 
sheds on two sides, and several stacks of corns were a 
short distance apart. The consternation in the village 
may be easily imagined, and the cries of the people of all 
classes on hearing the loss of life were most distressing. 
The premises are insured in the Phoenix Fire-office for 8007, 
Knowsley.—Information has been received in London 
that a man called Hillingham, another of the party con- 
cerned in the late murder of a gamekeeper at Knowsley- 
park, has been apprehended, and is now in prison. 
Kirkdale—The Privy Council have ordered the plans 
of the first Industrial School under the new system of 
education to be published in their forthcoming report. 
This ig to be erected at Kirkdale, near Liverpool, from the 
designs of Messrs. Lockwood and Allam, and is for the 
stpport and education of 1200 children, divided into three 
classes—infants, boys, and girls. ‘The plans are remark- 
able for simplicity of arrangement and capabilities for the 
master’s and matron’s supervision of the charges to be 
entrusted to them. Well-ventilated workshops for the 
teaching of carpentering, tailoring, shoe-making, &c. are 
found upon the male side ; and upon the female side are 
those of laundry work, straw platting, &c. Some notion 
may be formed of the extent of this edifice by mention- 
ing that the space occupied by the masonry alone will 
cover upwards of six acres of land. An infirmary detached 
from the main building is provided. The site is an open 
ground of i bie altitude, Jing the mouth of 
the Mersey. 
Keswick—On Monday a meeting was held in the town- 
hall,of this town, for the purpose of carrying into effect a 
wish very generally expressed that a public testimony of 
regard and respect to the memory of the late poet-laureate 
should be placed in the church of Crosthwaite, in which 
parish he had spent the greatest portion of his life, and in 
which churchyard his mortal remains were deposited. A 
committee was then formed, and resolutions entered into 
for that purpose ; one of which was that a white marble 
tablet, on which is to be a medallion likeness of Dr. 
Southey, should be executed by some eminent sculptor, 
and affixed to the wall in a conspicuous part within the 
church.—-Since this announcement appeared Lord John 
Manners has sent a letter to the English Cana, 
suggesting that the most appropriate monument to . 
Southey ere be the institution of an establishment of 
Protestant Sisters of Mercy, and proposing a subscription 
for that purpose. 3 i 
Lane correspondent (ee Facile s) informs us 
that corn still remains unhoused on Nateby and Pilling 
oss, in consequence of the wet weather. Since the 10th 
October there has scarcely been a fine day, while the 
nights have been cold, leaving a white frost which there 
was neither wind nor sun to clear off. The farmers are 
now housing the crops in their wet state. After threshing 
out the corn they send it to the kilns to be dried, and 
give the wet straw to the cattle, which seem very fond of 
it. This step is rendered necessary not only by the 
advanced state of the season, but by the ravages made 
upon the outstanding crops by the hares and partridges. 
Leeds.—On Thursday, Mr. James Bryam, of Gilder- 
some, shopkeeper, appeared before the magistrates at the 
court-house to answer to an information preferred egainst 
him by the clerk to the Excise at Leeds, for having in his 
possession and offering for sale 40 lbs. of spent tea- eaves, 
which had been redried and coloured in imitation of black 
tea, Mr. Rose, grocer, deposed that on or about 11th July 
