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    SANITARY MATTERS. : Health of London , d...

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    If Signs, Extra-Official Documents, And ...

    increase in the securities to the amount of - * 1 , 324 , 827 ? ., and a decrease in the bullion to the amount of 363 , 2301 . But that was only a part of the change which has been going on much more severely since . This corridnuesk outflow . « £ the means at the command © f 4 ft * * Bank was rant stopped by the increase of dfa «© unt from 4 £ fcft » 0 per cent ., on the 1 st instant ; after the first st ^ gfet check at that momgaJ ; it bscajatffiercer aadfigfteer , until , at last , on th * 6 th insiant , the BanTMErectors raised their discount to 6 per cent , for bills

    having 60 days to run , and 7 per cent , for bills having 90 days to run . This rate of discount is more than equivalent to that of France , for it has always "been considered that , in consequence of various differences between the two countries , the Bank of England can safely rest aboiit one-naif per cent , below France , even in times of great pressure . When , therefore , the rate of discount is positively equal , we may assume that the pressure upon the Bank of England has been greater , or that the directors see the necessity for a more peremptory course . :

    It is not to be denied that the conflict in the United States becomes more painfully severe , although we still believe that the great mass of public opinion will sustain the Union and the promotion of American , interests against every attempt to make sectional opinion paramount . Some men , however , are using their position to increase the confusion . ' Amongst these is Mr . Banks , Speaker of the House of Representatives , ¦ who is * making fun' of the dispute between North and South , and throwing out a hint that the South will never be admitted again to "Washington , even , by its representatives , except

    as a " humbug . " Surely , this- is a gross misrepresentation of American feeling , which ought to lose him his position for ever . Men who talk in this manner ought to be personally responsible . When some of the Northern , men are made responsible , they astonish their irresponsible followers by the course of action which they are conscientiously forced to take . Thus the new Governor of Kansas has declared in favour of the local Government and the local law , simply because they are the Government and the law ; and he has suppressed the volunteer Governmentthat is , the irregular Government by mutiny .

    Brighton has had its *¦ demonstration' - —a public meeting at the Town-hall to support the political Union of the Danubian Principalities . Some good points were brought out , general and special : the sea-side constituency being addressed by Mr . Schoxefield , representative of Birmingham ; and other speakers , who convinced it that people who are not diplomatists have duties to perform in connexion with European affairs .

    There has been a great bUow of agricultural meetings in agricultural districts , but the style has varied extremely . At Basingstoke , for example , Wiltshire and Hampshire have been represented by the Bishop of Gloucester , the Bishop of Salisbury , and several other clerical persons , in a meeting to promote adult education amongst the rural labourers—the third anniversary of a society that gives prizes , and is actually successful . At Epsom , through the moufch of Mr . Henry Drubimond , Surrey is demanding a reduction of the malt duty , and ho actually canvasses

    for petitions on the subject next session , with a hint that Mr . Disraeli would have done it if he hftd not been prevented by Manchester . At the « ama time , at Castle Hedinglmm , Mr . Bkmssfoiid is announcing that the Tories will stand by Church . rateB and anti-Maynooth agitation—a cootbo which places Major Bebesford completely at issue with his Castle Hedingham predecessor , Mr . Disraxw ; while Sir John Pakington uppears at another agricultural meeting arguing in fa-vour of agricultural Btatietica like the stoutest . Liberal of them all .

    " Thatftis a skeleton m every house , " but some families cannot prevent their skeleton from being brought up at the-police-court and exposed to public view . 3 fcfe is thus the public has learned the miserable taflte ^ n the family < tf the drug-gist affiatcliflfehigWtty , vAt > ngure & fest wask as ottponaiUe for the wild conduct of YQ & wife . She had attempted to ft » wa !«• sorrow or ( to frighten lam into sentfe by feojfeuig a gijgaatic titese of © pium ^ Tke man 'Ka » 4 Ked a vio * u » to -iKtempeTance' ^ wnd agitation—died confessing his trespasses , and bequeathing all to his " dear wife . " According to the tale , she had nearly become a victim to his example , ¦ while the devotion that she showed to him in his

    illness , and his own affection for her , attest higher qualities / How many a creature is lost with capacities unknown , and is condemned as worthless , simply through the cruel ignorance and indifference of those who look on 1 The picturesque history of modern bankruptcy receives new incidents : —Robson \ the Crystal Palace share manufacturer and " zinc smelter , " has been captured at Copenhagen ; James Sadlkir's goods have been brought to the auction mart ; and the Royal British Bank has been seized , not

    only by the Court of Chancery under the Windingup Acts , but by the Court of Bankruptcy under an Act for extending the remedies of creditors of joint-stock banks . Under this last Act , the Court of Bankruptcy possesses extraordinary powers of inquisition and persecution by aid of the Attorney-General ; so that while there is an intervention with a double series of law proceedings , threatening to place the property under a double course of devouring , the public is promised a history and anatomy of the defunct bank under the authoritative hand of a Bankruptcy Gcnnmissioner .

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    ¦; ¦ ;¦ - ¦¦¦¦ ¦ ¦¦ . ¦ ¦ ¦ ¦ ¦ ; : . . .. - ¦ . . . ' ; . ; .. Vv ? -- . "V ; - -. w -v . / . •* ' - ¦ "¦ ' - -V v " - ' : ' y > - . V ¦ ¦ . ¦ .. ' ¦ . ¦ ¦ . : \ 962 __* THE ijlDEE , [** ° -lJ ^ Saturday ,

    Sanitary Matters. : Health Of London , D...

    SANITARY MATTERS . : Health of London , dubing Last Week . —The return of deaths for . last week is a not unfavourable indir cation of the present state of health in London . The total number of deaths registered was 1071 , of ¦ which 540 were those of males , 531 those of females . The deaths from diarrhoea declined from 72 in the previous ¦ week to 64 last week . Scarlatina carried off 47 children , nearly the same number , as in the previous week . A house is reported , No . 7 , George ' s-cottages , Briston-hill , in , which three cases of " fever" have occurred within the last month ; the drainage is stated to be " in very bad condition . " In Wellesley-street , Somers-town , also , there ia a house , No . 16 , where fever and other complaints are common , these being caused , or much aggravated , by the offensive state of the drains ; and in the adjoining house , No . 15 , a woman died from disease and want combined . Seven persons died last week whose ages were from 90 to 93 years . Last week , the births of 828 boys and 768 girls , in all 1596 children , were registered in London . In the ten corresponding weeks of the years 1846-55 , the average number was 1417 . — -From tlie Registrar-GeneraVs Weekly Return .

    THE KEGUSTBAJt-GENERAL ' S QUABTERMT RETURN . — In the thirteen weeks that ended September 27 , 14 , 066 persons died in , London , which is about 1000 more , than in the same quarter of 1855 . Diseases of the zymotic character were fatal in 4093 cases , against 3661 in the summer quarter of last year ; of these 101 were due to croup , 108 to small-pox , 382 to liooping-cough , 393 to measles , 433 to scarlatina , 573 to typhus and common fevor , 1610 to diarrhoea ( against 1258 from this complaint in the same period of last year ) , 131 to cholera , ohiofly " cholera infantum ; " the rest to various other diseases of this class . Very young children wero the sufferers from diarrhcea in a very large proportion of the cases . The deaths from measles ^ vere moat numerous in tho south districts , those from scarlatina and typhus in the east . Diarrhoea appears to have prevailed with considerable uniformity over tho great divisions of the metropolis , though , if the sub-districts bo compared with

    each other , both with reference to population and deaths , results , in many instances , widely different will be obtained . Phthisis ( or consumption ) carried off 1794 persons , tho number in tho corresponding quarter of 1865 having been 1 G 45 ; bronchitis , 5 G 2 ; pneumonia , 581 ; boing an inorenso on tho previous year from both diseases . Eighty-six women died from diaenses of tho puerperal state . Eighteen persons died of carbuncle , tho numbers in tho summer quarters of tho last five years ranging only from 15 to 19 . Ten persons died from the intemperate use of liquor , besides those who sustained fatal injuries when intoxicated , and those who diod from maladies generated by intemperance , which , howover , ia not shown in tho medical certificate ; 35 from delirium ( remeiw , 6 unfortunate persons from want , and 145 children from want of hrcastmilk . Poison destroyed 22 lives , tho number in fivo quarters of 1852 to 1856 ranging from 13 to 23 . Drowning is recorded in 188 cases , wbich is considerably more than tho average .

    liOim BLANC'S REPLY TO THE FRENPTr GOVERNMENT . ^ ya Bens srftjjoined letter from M . Louis . Blanc , having refferenaft-to the sophistical defence of the Cavennp crueKii « jpuMHshed in the Moniteur , appears in the L . on *» mifc % papers : — •; .. . e Sirj—The Times , but two days since , very propeilv safd ,- — " -When a man is put on his defence there IV nothiog Jk « a bold denial . There" is Eo argument in * tb *^ M » ia Bke your strict contradictory . If anything f fe dteclarad-tjj be death , assert at once it Is life . " * So has the French Government done , as if taking the hint , through the official columns of the Montteur Hitherto the prevailing notion about Cayenne wa = that " scorching suns , thick-matted vegetation , growin g withering , and rotting through centuries , with a soil of alluvial mud beneath , made Guiana one of the most fatal regions of the world for men of European birth " 4-AU this was a mistake of . oura . We are taught W the Moniteur that , " in the establishment of Cavenrie it - \ vas justly considered that the convicts of the " ba « -nes encumbered in Prance withia confined and unhealthy spots , might be much better -treated in a colony . " So that it was merely from a feeling of morbid philanthropy that the French Government resolved to favour its conquered enemies with a transportation which according to the Times and to all the world , is " a sentence of death—death , lingering and liorrible ; death , to which a file of musketeers or the guillotine would be mercy . "J Now , to give us a striking illustration of how beneficent the climate of Cayenne really is , tlie Monitenr proceeds to state that , in the course of four years , 52 men only have been carried off out of much , less than 320—as those must be deducted £ rom the total number who happened to escape or were discharged . Fifty-two deaths out of some 250 or 260 men is a number that may " surprise by its small amount" such as did not scmple on the 2 nd of December to shed blood like water . ; but we cannot possibly share in this self-exalting astonishment . It is true that we are told of -the yellow fever raging in Guiana during the above-mentioned period . Well , it is precisely because yellow fever is an evil incident to the climate of Guiana that that climate is considered a murderous one . But the accuracy of such a statement , terrible as it is , may be questioned when one refers to the following passage of a letter sighed by a man unfortunately entitled to say : — " : ' .. - ¦ Qusequeipse miserrima , vidi , Et quorum pars magna fui . " " Five-and-thirty bodies , out of 20 O men , have been , in a few months , cast as prey to sharks ; for in the Island of St . Joseph the prisoners have no other cemetery than the sea . " § . : Whereupon , we must not let pass unnoticed how carefully the Moniteur hides from the French public a most important fact , namely , that the accusations it eiideavour 3 to repel , were brought against tie French Government by the very victims of the system denounced , in a letter intended for publicity , and to vhich as many as thirty-eight prisoners did not hesitate to affix their signatures , utterly regardless—so intolerable were their sufferings!—of the awful consequences likely to follow upon such a step . Why was the 3 Ioniteur afraid to allude to this circumstance ? Why was its answer calculated to make the French public believe that tlie political exiles at Cayenne found nothing -to complain of , and were perfect strangers to tho charges levelled , on their behalf , at the French Government ? Again , why was the Moniteur so slow ia meeting these charges with which the world has so long become acquainted through the channel of the English press ? And how is it that no French paper has been allowed to whisper a word concerning a question in which so many French families are deeply interested ? Is it fair that poor prisoners , living at a distanco of about 9000 milea from their native land , under the despotic sway of subaltern agents , whom the absence of control and the sense of impunity may goad into all manner of -violence , should be deprived of every means to have thoir cause advocated in their own country by their friends or relatives , and the justice of their complaints discuased in their own language ? Is there not something dreadful and quite heartrending in tho fact of tho French Government raising a loud voice to terra every distant complaint a calumny , wliilo all those aro torriuod into silence who- could throw light upon tho subject and afford irrefragable proofs ? But let ua examino the official answer , as published in tho JMonitcur , Tho following wore the questions put to the 1 'rcnch Government by public opinion : Is it true—Yes or No—That w . ithout any regard to tho lows of civiliziUion in this nineteenth century , men " who aro guilty only because they wero unsuccessful , " !! havo been sent , in ecmscquencc of sham trials , or without any trials at ull , into a country to which transportation ia " a seuUnco of death ?" * Times , October 2 . - | - JTbid , August 28 . ± Ibid . § Letter from JasaiUoz , published by tlie English press on the 15 th of February , 1855 , and loft unanswered . I ) Times , August 28 ,

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), Oct. 11, 1856, page 2, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_11101856/page/2/