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"means a judge of the High Court other than the Lord Chancellor, the Lord Chief Justice of England, the Master of the Rolls, the Lord Chief Justice of the Common Pleas, and the Lord Chief Baron." Section 34 of the Act of 1875 is to be continued until Jan. 1, 1879. In consequence of the discussion as to the title of the judges, it is stated to be expedient that a uniform style should be provided for the ordinary judges, those of the Court of Appeal, and of the High Court of Justice.

RICHARD COBDEN.-Mrs. Cobden has left a collection of valuable documents which deal with several interesting episodes in the public career of her distinguished husband. Several years ago Mrs. Cobden had under consideration the expediency of publishing these documents, but as some of them related to transactions so recent as hardly to have passed into the domain of history, she decided to postpone the undertaking till a more distant period. Our readers will be able to form some idea of the valuable nature of these materials when we state that they include a diary of events connected with the negotiations of the French Commercial Treaty, written in Paris at the time when Mr. Cobden, as the chief English Commissioner, was in constant communication with the Emperor Napoleon, M. Rouher, Michel Chevalier, and other notabilities. We also hear that Mr. Cobden left a diary of his last visit to the United States, which took place about two years before the outbreak of the American civil war. As his tour embraced a visit to Washington and the South, at a period when the agitation on the slavery question was already threatening to culminate in a crisis, the narrative of so keen an observer can hardly fail to shed light upon an interesting page of contemporary history.

FIRST PRINTED BOOK.-The first book ever produced in England was printed by William Caxton in the Almonry at Westminster in the year 1477, and was entitled the "Dictes and Sayinges of the Philosophers." A copy of the original is extremely rare and valuable, fetching when sold many hundreds of pounds. It is a small folio volume, very beautifully printed on ash-gray paper, with red initial letters, and is remarkable for its evenness of colour and distinctness of type. There is a fine copy of the "Dictes" in the British Museum, and Mr. Elliot Stock is, it is said, engaged in producing a fac simile of it by the permission of the trustees of that institution.

MAY.

2. THE TWO THOUSAND GUINEAS was decided at Newmarket. There were eleven runners, and the first favourite was Morier, a

colt belonging to the Duke of Westminster. The winner was the second favourite, the Count de Lagrange's Chamant, a son of Mortemer and Araucaria, which, ridden by James Coater, won easily, the American colt, Brown Prince, belonging to Mr. Sanford, and ridden by Custance, being second, and Lord Falmouth's Silvio, ridden by F. Archer, being third. The favourite came in ninth.

- THE LAND OF MIDIAN.-A correspondent of the Times, writing from Alexandria, informs the public that Captain Burton, the African traveller, has made a "find" of unusual interest. At the request of the Khedive he has visited the "land of Midian," the desolate region on the eastern side of the Gulf of Akabah, the easternmost of the two long and narrow estuaries in which the Red Sea ends. Accompanied by Mr. George Marie, a French engineer, Captain Burton landed in Midian on April 2, and in an exploration of some weeks explored a region full of ruined towns, built of solid masonry, with made roads, aqueducts five miles long, artificial lakes, and massive fortresses, all marking a wealthy and powerful people. Their wealth was based on mining operations, and Captain Burton reports the existence of gold, silver, tin, antimony, and turquoise mines. The auriferous region is extensive; indeed, the discoverer believes he has opened up a California, and the Khedive proposes to have the country worked by European capitalists. It will be remembered that in the Bible, Midian is always described as a land full of metals, especially gold, silver, and lead. It is more than probable that Solomon's Ophir was situated there, as the small ships in which he imported gold, ivory, and peacocks were launched at the head of the Red Sea. Midian is part of the Egyptian Viceroyalty.

THE MAY MEETINGS of religious and benevolent societies are now in force. At Willis's Rooms the Archbishop of Canterbury presided at the annual meeting of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts, which employs 533 missionaries, besides 800 catechists, and has an income of 137,000l. Several colonial bishops described the operations of the society in their dioceses and in India. His Excellency Sir Thomas Wade, K.C.B., examined minutely the results of the work in China, and paid a high compliment to the Jesuits for the schools they had established. For success in the Chinese empire, men of intelligence and superior education were required. Illustrated papers, in his opinion, would be found the best means of paving the way to extend Christianity, as the Chinese were a curious people, and might be gradually led from such papers to the enlightenment characterising the nineteenth century in Europe.

MANUFACTURE OF TORPEDOES.-The Royal Arsenal at Woolwich, in which ten thousand hands are employed by her Majesty's Government to fabricate the artillery and ammunition for land and sea service, has lately been producing different kinds of torpedoes. The merits of the Whitehead torpedo were made, the

other day, a topic of discussion in the House of Commons, and some observations were made there upon its extraordinary destructive powers. The Harvey torpedo is designed for totally different purposes. It might be used with good effect, during the chase of one vessel by another of superior force, to give the former a chance of destroying its pursuer. The torpedo is encased in a wooden chest, which is buoyant, and can be set afloat by lowering it from the ship's deck with a windlass; after which, by the aid of a rope and one or two cork buoys, if required, it can be placed so as to drift or keep in the position for coming into contact with the enemy's ship.

7. THE WAGNER FESTIVAL. The first of the series of Wagner concerts was given at the Albert Hall to-day. The audience that had gathered to greet the greatest of living composers was large; almost all the seats in the amphitheatre and the arena were occupied; the rows of boxes showed well; but in the balcony a few unpleasant barren tracts were discernible. The gallery was very thinly populated. The audience was an essentially intellectual one, and the English Wagnerites were there in full force.

Wagner was greeted on his first appearance with long and oftrepeated cheering. It was a hearty generous welcome, which seemed to move the composer deeply. Wagner looks, by the way, somewhat more careworn than he did at Bayreuth; he seems to have lost much of that unresting vitality that was so characteristic of him in Bayreuth; and even with the conductor's baton in his hand, he seems to rule with more subdued power than was his wont some years ago. Perhaps it is that he does not as yet feel quite at home in England as he does in Germany.

8. THE BRIGHTON AQUARIUM. In the Exchequer Division, before Mr. Baron Cleasby and a special jury, an action was brought against the Brighton Aquarium Company by Mr. Girdlestone, to recover a penalty of 2001. from the company for keeping the Aquarium open on Sunday. It appears that the company, in order to obtain the benefit, in respect of their conviction in 1875 under the Act of George III. against Sunday amusements, of the power conferred upon the Home Secretary by recent Act of Parliament to remit fines imposed for such offences, entered into an arrangement with Mr. Rolfe to proceed against them for opening the Aquarium on several Sundays, and allowed judgment to go against them by default. The company now contended that this was a straightforward and bonâ fide arrangement to procure a settlement of the question, and, as action had already been taken by Mr. Rolfe in respect of the offence to recover the penalty for which the present proceedings were instituted, this second action could not proceed. For Mr. Girdlestone it was contended that his action had been begun before Mr. Rolfe's, and that there was evidence of collusion between the company and Mr. Rolfe in respect of the action which he had brought. Mr. Baron Cleasby held that the priority of date in the plaintiff's action did not invalidate the judgment of Mr. Rolfe's

action, but as regarded the second question, he thought that as Mr. Rolfe's action was really the defendant's action, there was, in the circumstances, ample evidence of collusion. The jury found a verdict for the plaintiff for 200l., and his lordship entered judgment for that amount.

EAST LONDON HOSPITAL FOR CHILDREN.-The new building for this institution, at Shadwell, has recently been opened by her Royal Highness the Duchess of Teck. This building has been erected from the designs and under the superintendence of the architects, Messrs. Henry and Charles Legg, of Bedford Row. The institution combines the two objects of an hospital for children. and dispensary for women. It was founded by Dr. N. Heckford, in a warehouse at Radcliffe Cross, on Jan. 28, 1868. A tablet in the new hospital declares that he "was born in Calcutta, April, 1842; died Dec. 14, 1871, aged twenty-nine. He lived for the institution, and died a few days after the site of this building was purchased.'

THE TOTTERING LILY of fascination, wife of the Chinese Ambassador, has been interviewed by several ladies. She is a gentle-looking creature, with almond-shaped eyes, and jetty hair held out in a stiff tail over a tortoiseshell pin behind. Her attire, a loose many-coloured embroidered jacket with large sleeves surmounting a skirt or trousers worked in gold. A pardonable ruse was perpetrated to obtain what was most coveted, viz., a view of her feet. The conversation was, by means of the interpreter, brought round to the subject. An American lady present, celebrated for beautiful feet, as we here understand them, exhibited one of hers to the "Lily." "Immensely huge," was the remark; and the explanation that they were useful to walk on was not accepted as a valid reason for their dimensions. Again another lady showed a tiny boot with no more effect; and the "Lily," not to be pleased by European models of perfection-which have no doubt turned many heads in this country-was challenged to show what she considered the sole of excellence. Coyly, for the Chinese have a genuine horror of a profane eye in such matters, Her Excellency exhibited what she was pleased to call her foot. Small it was; just the size of a lady's doubled fist, and much the same shape apparently, swathed in bands of blue silk. Graceful it could hardly be called to European eyes; but for absolute absence of utility it certainly bore away the palm. Her visitors did not. think it would become popular here.

12. AN HISTORICAL LOSS.-Lovers of noble trees, and especially of those which have artistic associations, will regret to learn that one of the magnificent elms in front of the Manor House at Chiswick-a tree which Pope and Hogarth must have known quite well, and which the latter drew in the etching styled "Mr. Ranby's House at Chiswick "-was blown down in a late gale. Mr. Ranby was Serjeant-Surgeon to the king; he attended Sir R. Walpole in his last illness, and is said to have sat to Hogarth for

the hero of "A Rake's Progress," probably in the marriage scene. He was much in the confidence of George II., and attended at the Battle of Dettingen; he is often mentioned in memoirs of the time, and was buried in Chelsea Hospital, near Cheselden.

13. THE REV. A. TOOTH.-Further unseemly proceedings took place at St. James's, Hatcham, early this morning.

The bell was tolled for service at a little before eight, and the senior churchwarden proceeded to the church and found a communion service being conducted by Mr. Tooth, the vicar, who had announced his intention, notwithstanding the inhibition, to celebrate it before his own altar on his return from Italy. He was assisted by one of his late curates, whose licence had been withdrawn by the bishop. The church had been entered through a window, and there were some three hundred persons present at the celebration, including Mr. Webb, the vicar's churchwarden. Mr. Fry, the senior churchwarden, attempted to stop the service, but failed; and the police declined to arrest Mr. Tooth on the ground that a serious breach of the peace would be the result, and the service proceeded to its conclusion. Mr. Webb steadily upheld the conduct of the vicar, and there was at one moment a demand made by some of the congregation for the forcible ejection of Mr. Fry.

14. PRINCE ALBERT VICTOR and PRINCE GEORGE OF WALES were examined at the Royal Navy College at Greenwich last Monday and Tuesday, precisely in the same manner as ordinary candidates for naval cadetships. Both princes passed a very satisfactory examination, and in some of the subjects exhibited a more than usual degree of proficiency.

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AN ARTISTIC STORY.-In connection with the recent sale of some pictures by Adrian Van de Velde, the Flemish painter, the Journal d'Anvers relates how he became possessed of his country house near Antwerp. This house belonged to the great Lord Clarendon, and Van de Velde, happening to pass by it one day, was so much struck by the beauty of the site and of the gardens that he determined to transfer them to canvas. He took up his quarters in a neighbouring village, and after completing the picture, went with it to London, where he put it into a public sale with a heavy reserve upon it. Lord Clarendon, who was in London at the time, happened to attend the sale, and, recognising his own house, bid for the picture. There were several other offers, and Lord Clarendon, after having been outbid several times, said, “ I will give the original for this copy." At the word "copy" the painter, who was in the room, apostrophised Lord Clarendon in no measured terms, and asked him what he meant by suggesting that the picture was a copy. Lord Clarendon repeated his offer, adding, "I know that Van de Velde is the painter, and I will give him the original for the copy." There was no mistaking what this meant ; the picture was withdrawn.

15. THE POPE'S JUBILEE.-Cardinal Cardoso, the Patriach of Lisbon, left that city for Rome with a number of Portuguese pil

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