applied to politics.) With all the systems of dissenters disloyalty and disaffection were interwoven; and if they were not checked, they would soon revive an Oliverian dynasty. Having made these remarks, he would go on next to show that the symptoms which had preceded the French revolution had begun to appear in this country when he preached his sermon. "When bad men conspire, good men must combine." In their ranks he took his stand against the raging waves, and the blood hounds, and 10,000 other figurative horrors. It was a cool and deliberate act he did. He had yet to learn the head and front of his offending."

Defendant was frequently interrupted by the learned judge, who stated, that his mode of defence was irregular, irrelevant, and libellous.

Mr. Blacow, however, went on abusing the queen---Mr. Brougham -Mr. Denman's " filthy Greek"

"The Times"-Mr. Creeveyand the radicals-The Common Council of London - aldermen Wood and Waithman, and the Whigs and lastly, "that old crazy-headed goat, lord Erskine" -He eulogized the king, the ministers, the Bridge-street Association, and the Courier; and notwithstanding the frequent reproofs of Mr. justice Holroydsolemnly swore before God, he was not guilty of the charge, and "if racks, tortures, even the gibbet were his reward, he would not abate one word of what he had said."

Mr. justice Holroyd, in the most guarded and temperate language, gave his opinion that it was a libel. The epithets were most

abusive and derogatory. Could he be ignorant that he was traducing and vilifying the queen? By a particular statute they were to judge whether the defendant was guilty. As a clergyman of the church of England, holding himself out as very loyal, and very desirous of the preservation of the state, he gave his opinion on the queen's guilt, left not the people to their own reflections, and thus he disturbed the peace. But it was for them to judge whether it was a libel or not. They were to lay out of their minds all other considerations, and even their own opinion, respecting the question of the queen's guilt or innocence. The only question was, whether the sermon tended to degrade the queen, and was published with intent to vilify her, and to break the peace. In his opinion it was a libel.

The jury retired for a quarter of an hour, and found a verdict of Guilty.

15. Between the hours of two and three o'clock in the morning, an armed mounted party of White boys, to the number of about forty, attacked the house of Mr. John Blakeney Kittson, of Kerry, in Ireland, chief constable for the barony of Irraghtyconnor (who has long been an object of their vengeance, in consequence of his continued and unremitting exertions, in causing the apprehension of a number of their associates), demanded his arms, and accompanied it with a threat, if he did not comply, to burn his house and family. His reply to their demand was a shot; having taken deliberate aim from a window, with a fowling-piece heavily loaded,

at

at three of the men who were in close conference within about fifteen yards of the window, when he perceived one of them fall. The party then retreated, after firing several shots into the house. Mr. Kittson kept up a constant fire as they crossed his windows. In about ten minutes they returned again, and put their threat in execution, by setting fire to the habitation, which, being thatched, was immediately in a blaze, and burned most rapidly. Mr. Kittson and his family, consisting of his wife, six children, and two maid servants, continued in the house, but at length were forced from it by the alarming progress of the fire, when he pushed out in his shirt amongst the assailants, who were still firing shots at the doors and windows. Being armed with a gun and a case of pistols, the party retreated from him to the rear of the house, and Mr. Kittson having pursued in that direction, fired upon them, when the whole party fled; he, however, continued the pursuit a long distance, when he perceived them taking off one dead body, leaving a horse behind covered with blood.

violence of the storm. The cotton-works in Holywell sustained much damage from the overwhelming torrent forcing its way through the lower stories with such rapid progress, that the lives of the people employed in the works were greatly endangered, the lower rooms becoming literally filled in a few seconds. Greenfield appeared most awful, the inhabitants of which were crying in all directions for help, and flying for security to the sides of the hills. The copper-works were also speedily filled with the flood, which created no inconsiderable degree of alarm. On the waters reaching the heated steam furnaces, the latter burst, with an explosion resembling a heavy clap of thunder; some part of the works, in consequence took fire; and it was not without difficulty extinguished. Coals, and lead, and copper ore, were washed in considerable quantities from the different works in the neighbourhood. On Saturday morning, the marsh (below Holywell) presented a scene of desolation, in which were discoverable the wrecks of valuable property which had been swept away by the impetuous deluge. Coal, copper, and lead ore, cotton in packs, broken machinery, dead cattle, household furniture, stacks of hay, sheaves of corn, and, in fact, all kinds of materials which lay in the progress of the waters, were forced before the storm. It is said that the loss sustained by the cotton and copper works is estimated at several thousand pounds; and it is likewise reported that three persons fell victims to the ravaging deluge.

1821.

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in the establishment of the bank of England. The number of clerks to be discharged is stated at 125, of which forty are from the hall side or cashier's office, and the remainder from the various accountant-offices for the different classifications of stock, with the one and two pound banknote office. In the latter, which employed between 200 and 300 clerks, the return to payments in specie must have led to the expectation of a very material reduction; but the number discharged under the present ar rangement is only twenty-four. It was not at all known till within a very few days, that the change was contemplated by the governors of the bank, and the measure, therefore, being one that involves the welfare or subsistence of so many families, appears a little abrupt. But in the mode of carrying it into effect, the bank have acted with a degree of liberality which merits praise. All the clerks now dismissed will receive an annuity for life, in proportion to the amount of pay and length of service, a selection being made, as far as the interests of the concern rendered it prudent to do so, from those who are the soonest likely from long services to claim the right of superannuation. But every clerk discharged, will be allowed the option, if he prefers it, of receiving a sum of money equivalent to the value of his annuity. Thus to Thus to those who are still young and have a talent for business, an opportunity will be afforded, by a supply of capital, of engaging in trade, and of working out their

-A well of extraordinary depth is now being sunk at his majesty's cottage in Windsor green park. During the progress of the work, many curious minerals have been discovered; and at the depth of 360 feet, several fossil remains, among which is a very perfect specimen of an oyster-shell, have been dug out. At this immense distance below the surface a very large tooth has also been found, which is in beautiful preservation, It is of double fangs, which are at present about two inches long, but have been evidently broken off. The face of the tooth, which is of the sort denominated a grinder, is about one inch and a half long by one inch wide. It is of a dark brown colour, and bears a fine polish. At the same depth was found a horny substance, something like the beak of a small bird.

-The inhabitants of Bristol have lately been amused with the exhibition and sale in their streets of a vast collection of snail-shells, which are reported to have fallen, or at least made their sudden appearance in a field belonging to a farmer at Tockington. An observer of nature, (says the editor

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of a Bristol paper,) has obligingly directed our attention to the natural history of this snail in Montugue's Testacea Britannica. Its name is Felix Virgata; or, Zoned Snail Shell. "It may be considered," he says, as a local species; but is found in prodigious abundance in some sandy or barren stony situations, most plentifully near the coast, especially about Whitsand-bay, Cornwall, and in the south of Devonshire, where it is believed they contribute not a little to fatten the sheep, the ground being covered with them." This snail occurs also abundantly in the neighbourhood of Bristol, and the county

of Somerset.

-At the Lincoln assizes an indictment was preferred against Wm. Williams, for a riot at Stamford on the 11th of November last (on the occasion of the withdrawal of the bill of pains and penalties,) and breaking the windows in the house of Mr. Hunt. Mr. Denman made a powerful address to the jury, and insisted that there was no riot. The judge, in sum ming up, said, that no man could upon his oath say it was not a riot; after which, the jury with drew, and were absent about two hours, when the foreman came into court, and said he was desired to ask whether, if eleven were agreed in the verdict, and only one held out, those eleven might be discharged? The judge said it was impossible. At the expiration of five hours the independent and inflexible juryman came into court, and said that the other eleven had agreed to find the defendant guilty, but he could not reconcile it to his conscience that Williams had riotously

to say

demolished Mr. Hunt's windows; the jury, therefore, wished to know whether his lordship would withdraw him, and appoint another in his place. The judge said he could not. The business of the court ended at five o'clock. At half-past eight, when the jury sworn on this indictment had been for ten hours locked up, and the conscientious gentleman declared that he would sooner eat the mortar of the ceiling than give in, the eleven others, rather than be carted on the circuit to Nottingham (as the law requires in case the twelve cannot agree to return a verdict,) resigned their judg ment, and gave in at the judge's lodgings a verdict for the defendant.

-A few days since, as a young gentleman of this neighbourhood was fishing with a drag net, assisted only by two keepers, they caught, at one draught, 167 brace of tench, the smallest of which weighed above half a pound.— Hereford paper.

-Lately, a young shark, about six feet in length, was taken in Plymouth Sound; not, however, without considerable difficulty: upwards of twenty hooks were carried away before it could be secured, and at last it was killed by a severe beating on the head, after being brought to the surface of the water.

-During the last races of Letterkenny, a dreadful accident took place. One of the horses bolted from the course, and struck down two men in the crowd; in passing over them, he set his forefeet exactly on the windpipe of one man, who expired instantly; his hind feet struck the breast of another man so violently, that the ribs were separated all along on one (K 2)

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FRANCE.

A ludicrous, though a painful scene, took place a little time ago at the Jardin des Plantes. A gymnotus electricus, or electric eel, had arrived, alive and in good health, from Surinam. The savans and naturalists were all in motion, and hastened to the garden of plants to see with their own eyes, and touch with their own hands, this living electrical machine. The greater number were satisfied with a single touch and consequent shock; but one unfortunate doctor, either urged by a greater zeal for science, or governed by a more insatiable curiosity, resolved to try the utmost extent of the animal's powers, and seized it with both his hands; but he had quickly reason to repent his temerity, for he immediately felt a rapidly repeated series of the most violent and successively increasing shocks, which forced him to caper about in the most extraordinary manner, and to utter the most piercing screams from the agony that he felt. He then fell into convulsions, in consequence of which his muscles became so contracted, or from some strange property in the fish, that it became impossible to detach the animal from his grasp. In this situation he remained a consider able time, and would in all probability have expired under the agony of his sensations, if some one of the persons present had not suggested the plunging of his hands in water, when the eel immediately dropped off. He (the doctor) has been ever since most dangerously ill.

The sexton of the church of

find frequently a particular lamp extinct early, and yet the oil consumed only, sat up several nights to perceive the cause. At length he discovered that a spider of surprising size came down the cord to drink the oil. A still more extraordinary instance of the same kind occurred during the year 1751, in the cathedral of Milan. A vast spider was observed there, which fed on the oil of the lamps. M. Morland, of the Academy of Sciences, has described this spider, and furnished a drawing of it. It weighed four pounds, and was sent to the emperor of Austria, and is now in the Imperial Museum at Vienna.

The greatest obstacle to the sincere establishment of the constitutional regime is the existence of that vast organization, called by the name of the Occult Government, which is directed by the presumptive heir to the throne and his partisans. It is almost ridiculous to doubt the existence of this secret organization, after all the proofs of it which have transpired since the re-establishment of the royal authority. There is not a village, there is not a hamlet in France, in which it has not its secret committee, from among the members of which it forces the government in spite of itself to choose the agents of authority. All men of good sentiments, by which is meant all who are slavish in politics and bigotted in religion, belong to this class. Many of them are sincere, but others are only hypocrites who assume this mask to gratify their ambition and cupidity. The existence of this party, and the protection which it enjoys, have often exposed to

suspicion