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    information as to his treatment . He has said that for some time past he has been given sometimes a little bread in the course of the day , sometimes a little gruel , and sometimes nothing at all—never what he wanted . This course has been pursued for the last two months . He has further stated that a little one ( a neighbour ' s child ) died since he was ill , and that his father made the coffin ( there are also rumours of improper treatment in that case ) , and while doing so told the poor sufferer he wished it was for himself . Henefer , the father , was getting good wages . On the child being taken away , and the facts coming out , he left his work , and has not since dared to appear ; for , such is the feeling of the

    men , that , if he had , something in the shape of Lynch-law would certainly have been administered . On Saturday last , he sent for his wages ; since which time , both he and his wife have been missing . Murderous Assaults . —Polly Gallagher , a wellknown woman of the town , was brought before the Clerkenwell magistrate on Monday for stabbing a young woman with a table-knife . The injured woman was coming out of a public-house in company with a male friend , when the accused picked a quarrel with the latter , and afterwards turned her wrath upon the woman , and stabbed her in the face . Gallagher also nearly cut the top of the man ' s finger off .

    The woman lies in so dangerous a state , that the magistrate found it necessary to remand the prisoner for a week . —On the same day , at Westminster , a bricklayer ' s labourer was committed for six weeks for biting a pu blican at Chelsea , and assaulting the policemen who took him into custody . He was drunk ; and , having behaved offensively to other customers , the publican attempted to put him out . Upon the arrival of the police , " he bit at them , " said the sergeant , " in all directions , like a dog . " It required the efforts of three or four men to take his dogship to the station . —At Southwark , a young woman , an inmate of Bermondsey workhouse , was committed for two months for scratching and kicking

    the clerk to the master . Having taken offence at him , she threw him down and kicked him on the lower paris of his person . She was taken 4 nto custody with great difficulty ; and it appeared that she had been in charge several times before for assaulting the ^ master ^ -pn one occasion with a poker . Her conduct while in the police-court was very-violent . —On Tuesday , at Westminster , a porter inCovent Garden Market was sentenced to sjx months' hard labour for so violent an assault upon his wife that -she became insensible , and was conveyed to the hospital . Before the magistrate , ' the man said that his wife had abused him and torn his shirt ; but this was denied . It appeared that her only offence was that she came

    in late from the City , where she had been on business . —At Iiambeth , on the same day , William Tyler , a respectable-looking man , was charged with assaulting a police constable . In answer to the charge , lie Etited , and called a witness to prove , that he had only endeavoured to take the constable ' s / number on account " of liTs having ill-used his ( Tyler ' s ) wife ; and that for this he was taken into custody . The statement of the wife was , that , as her husband had not come home at a late hour of the night , she went to a neighbouring public-house to seek him ; that she therd saw two policemen who used the most disgusting language towards her ; that , upon quitting them , she met with the policeman who now charged her husband with assault , to whom she complained of the other policemen , calling them " fellows ; " and that he was so irritated with this expression , that he

    made a ferocious assault upon her , threatened to kill her if she did not go on fast , and used the most filthy and violent language . Upon getting away from him , she ran home , found that her husband had returned , and went out again with him to seek for her assailant . The scene then took place which led to the present complaint . When before the magistrate , the woman ' s face was frightfully disfigured from recent injuries . The magistrate said the constable was not justified in taking the man into custody ; and , as for the alleged misconduct of the police , the charge was so serious that it must be investigated by the commissioners . —It must be recollected that these assaults arc only a selection from those which have come before the magistrates in the course of the week ; but as the others belong to the same genus , the foregoing will sufficiently exemplify the present state of " Our Civilisation . "

    Forgery by a Bot . — An errand-boy has been charged before the magistrates at Doyonporfc with forging the name of John Elliott to a bill , and afterwards cashing the bill at a shop in the town . Tho amount was forty pounds ; and , from the evidenco of a friend of the prisoner , also a boy , it appears that the accused , upon getting the monoy , left his place of business , and in company with several youthful companions , whom ho treated , wont to fairs , eatinghouses , &c , bargained for a gun , amused himself with shooting in tho fields ( first at tho witness ' s hat , and then at a dead dog ) , and pursued for a brief time tho career of . a boy of pleasure . Ho was remanded until Saturday ( to-day ) .

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    NAVAL AND MILITARY NEWS . Tms Baltic FlKRT loft tho Downs on Moiiduy . At / ivc a . m ., tho'Signal was mack to get steam up , and fllwr on in their cables , which wan nt onoo obeyed ; » n « at **" minutcs # > six , the signal to weigh was made . 1 He AiJj led thp van , and tho other ships in succession iollovcU in two lines . Tho weather waa rainy , and persons on shore could not discern tho licet very fur . . t KMBAitKATioH of Titoovs tnkos place almost dtuij " tho principal ports for tho Crimea . The Peninsular , nd Oriental now ship Alma arrived at Portsmouth on bun

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    344 THE LEADE R . [ Saturday , I MBBi ** ^ ' . ¦ ' ¦ ' tv ^^ iVi ' rememberedundertook to l

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    SPEECHES OF PUBLIC MEN . In the recess of Parliament , several of our public men have been addressing large audiences in different parts of the country . On Thursday week , speeches were delivered by Mr . Bright at Manchester , and by Mr . Layard at Aberdeen—the latter on the occasion of his installation as Lord Rector of the Marischal College and University , to which he had been elected by a large majority of the students .

    MB . I / AYAKD AT ABERDEEN . After a few preliminary compliments arid thanks , Mr . Layard referred to the all-egrossing topic of the present day—our Crimean disasters , and mentioned , as one of the causes , " the reckless manner in which merit is overlooked in public employments , and passed over to satisfy private and party interests and influences "—a reference which has been supposed to imply some degree of personal feeling . Mr . Layard , however , said he did not wish to dwell upon this subject ; and he therefore passed on to what he conceived to be another cause of our recent calamities , viz ., the defective condition of our national education . On this topic , lie judiciously observed : —

    " I believe that our present system of education is rather directed to the overcharging of the memory than to the true cultivation of the intellect and strengthening and discipline of the mind—that it is leading us to treat men as mere machines , rather than as reflecting , responsible beings . Only a few nights since , I listened to an able and conclusive statement , from one of the most distinguished members of the House of Commons , supported by undoubted evidence , proving that , in the number of children receiving education , as compared with the entire population , we are * far behind almost every country in Europe . Still , it is not the quantity , but the quality of our education to which I now wish to direct your special attention . The mind may be as much cramped by too

    much knowledge—if knowledge is to consist of the mere acquisition of isolated facts—as by ignorance . For our village schools we are training teachers to be superficially acquainted with almost every department of human learning 1 . The examinations to which they are subjected , before being ~ pronounced by Government fit to undertake the charge of children of the humblest classes of society , would have been considered , but half a century ago , almost too severe a test for the master of" a public schooL These teachers impart to their pupils , according to fixed rules , and in certain prescribed portions , instruction as multifarious and superficial as that which they have received . The memory of the child is charged with an endless variety of facts , which , although succeeding each

    other in regular rotation , have no logical connexionexcite in him no sympathy or interest , lead to no practical result , can be of no use to him in after life—and which , consequently , are , for the most part , speedily forgotten . I never lose an opportunity of visiting a village school , and I have rarely spoken to a teacher of good sense and honesty who has not confessed and complained to me that he has been taught too many things , and . none sufficiently well . I have listened with surprise to the examination of children of tender years , destined to follow the callings of their parents in humble life , and have felt somewhat humiliated when their instructor , turning to me , has asked me whether I had any further questions to put to his pupils . They had long outstripped me . There really seemed nothing left within

    my knowledge that I could ask them . This remarkable proficiency led me to deep reflection and inquiry , and I soon found that this readiness and apparent knowledge , which had so much surprised me , were but feats of memory , or mere tricks , enabling the children to answer difficult questions , but which , > unconnected with any logical process of tho reason , left them , when once forgotten , in their original state of ignorance . Whilst these children could thus solve very difficult problems , they were unable to reply to the most simple questions when thrown entirely upon tho exercise of their own intelligence and reason . Their memory had been highly cultivated , but their reasoning powers had been totally neglected . The end , therefore , of education had not been attained . Tho samo observations apply to examinations as tests for public employment . "

    Again referring to our Crimean disasters , Mr . Layard remarked that public men look upon themselves as parts of a machine , and thus case their consciences of the burden of individual responsibility ; and , alluding to his investigations at Nineveh , he said that ho had learned amid the graves of dead empires many lessons for our own country and time . He observed that no man , however proud of his ndtivo land , could deny that wo have fallen from our high catnto ; and he believed that the great want of tho ago is in earnest and true-hearted spirits , imbued with a sense of the solemnity of life and with a deep feeling of religious responsibility .

    Mr . Layard was . afterwards entertained at a ddjeuner given by Messrs . Hall and Co ., ship-builders , on tho occasion of tho launch of tho Aberdeen clipper , Schomberg , which wns christened , by tho now Lord Hector . In tho brief Bpccch which ho made , ho highly complimented Mr . M'Kny , of Liverpool , who was then present , and who , it will bo

    , suppy our troops in the East with rations at a very low cost . MR . BRIGHT AT MANCHESTER . At the usual weekly meeting of the Peace Society at Manchester , Mr . Bright made one of his accustomed an ti-war speeches , which was chiefly re markable for the increased appearance of confidence with which it was uttered , as though the speaker felt that the opinions of his party now possess a greater weight of public sympathy at their back than they could boast a few months ago . Mr . Bright evidently thinks—whether rightly or wrongl y—that the tide is beginning to turn . After expressing the shame which he felt , and which he believ ed most sensible people must feel , in the recent policy of this countryt ^ ie made an attack on Lord Stratford de Redcliffe , whom he depicted as a very irritable man with a feeling of direct personal hostility to the late Czar , owing to the EmperOr having refused to receive him as ambassador some twenty years ago . M > . Bright also described the English Minister at Vienna as totally incompetent ; and our Government , he sai J , is made up almost entirely of lords . But he added that he had never been a party to concentrating the indignation of the people in the mismanage ment of the war , because he considered the war itself much more execrable . Nevertheless , though so violently disapproving of the contest , Mr . Bright blamed the Government for choosing old men for commanders , as they are unable to carry on hostilities with vigour . He then denied that the liussians have shut up the Danube ; and asserted that the Russian fleet in the Black Sea before the war did not consist of more than six sea-worthy ships , and that Russia now says , in effect , " England and France may , if they like , maintain ships of war in the Black Sea , which shall keep watch upon ours in Sebastopol , and take care we do not engage in those felonious attempts uponTurkey with which we are unjustly charged . " Mr . Bright , however , said that Turkey " naturally objects" to English and French ships of war passing through the Bosphorus in order to enter the Black Sea . He then made the astounding assertion that " it is not the interest of Russia to embroil herself with the nations of Europe , and that the-treaties which she has made with this country have been kept as faithfully as treaties generally . are . " He concluded a Jong speech , which was received with much applause , by remarking that domestic improvement and reform had been stopped by the war , and that , in the course of a few nights , the country has been burdened with nearly forty millions of additional taxation . —' MR . BOUVERIE ON HIS RE-ELECTION FOR KIUIA . BNOCK . Mr . E . P . Bouverie , having accepted the office of Vice-President of the Board of Trade , vacated his seat for KUmarnock , but was on Saturday last reelected without opposition . In the course of his address , Mr . Bouverie was interrupted by the braying of a donkey ; upon which he humourously said , amid much laughter , " It seems I aw to have a rival , after all . " He attributed our Crimean disasters to the imperfections of our military system , and descanted upon the bravery and patience exhibited by the troops . Referring to the bill for the abolition of the newspaper stamp , he observed : — " I must say that , of all the marvellous things which this age has produced , I wonder at nothing more than that wonderful thing , a newspaper . Take one of our great London morning papers—you find recorded there the events which have taken place in every corner of tho globe ; and you find not only this , but you find the wants of every man detailed by means of advertisements . You find statements that have been made and opinions offered by the best and wisest heads in the country . You find there the writings of the most profound thinkers of tho day ; and all this published every twenty-four hours , and circulated over the length and breadth of tho country . I look upon all this as no menu advantage ; and I think that the greater freedom wo can give to a system which yields such vast results oven when restricted , tho greater would bo tho boon to tho community at large . " In answer to a person in the crowd , Mr . Bouyeno said ho had voted against Mr . Roebuck ' s Committee , because ho thought tho motion was an indirect attempt to upset the lato Government , which lie < uu not conceive was guilty ; and because tho House 01 Commons had no constitutional right to intortoro m the management of tho war .

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), April 14, 1855, page 344, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2086/page/8/