'bhp Vniniurto.

The Honourable Arthur Duncombe was elected at Beverley on Tuesday, by the electors of the East Riding of Yorkshire, to be their Parliamentary representative in room of the late Mr. Broadley. Mr. Duncombe gallant- ly adhered to his opinions against " the reckless policy " of Free-trade.

Mr. Disraeli has been again rehearsing political tactics to the farmers of Buckinghamshire. Lately he delivered his counsels to the farmers of North Buckinghamshire, assembled at Aylesbury ; on Tuesday he again "partially transgressed the rules" of the South Buckinghamshire Agri- cultural Association, after the ploughing-match dinner at Slough, to " touch again upon the interesting circumstances of the hour." Mr. La- bouchere should have presided, but as he is still in Spain, the chair was taken by the Honourable Mr. Irby. Mr. J. Trumper, a gentleman of great intelligence and local repute, withal a still faithful Protectionist, proposed the toast which drew forth Mr. Disraeli—" whose honour was before the whole community, and who had graced both the literature and the senatorial history of the country."

Mr. Disraeli, referring to the observations he had made in the North of the county, and to the fact that he has been "described as changing his opinions," observed, that what he lately said, and what he has now to repeat, is "what he has been saying for three years in the House of Commons almost in the same words."

"There is one point on which we must all agree, and that is, that pro- tection to a articular class, irrespective of all other classes, is quite out of the question;" In the next place, "it is quite clear, after the change that has occurred, that if this country arrive, after experience, at the conclusion that the change was erroneous, it will not arrive at that conclusion in haste or a hurry." It is for the agriculturists to show the causes why they suffer from the change which other classes think so beneficial. " I shall not enter into any details now ; but, in my opinion, the reason why we find such dif- ficulty m entering into competition with the agricultural producers of other countries is, that we are suffering under a heavy weight of taxation. (Cheers.) And I am quite convinced that you must bring the mind of the farmers generally to consider that subject, if they wish anything practical to be done at once which may alleviate the suffering which they now every day more experience. (A Voice—"Remuneration of price is of much more conse- quence.") Remuneration of price must depend in a great degree upon the cost of production. If you diminish the cost of production, which you do if you reduce taxation, you increase the remuneration of price. Remuneration of price is what every man wants, but we are to find the different means by which remuneration of price may be obtained; and then every one must ad- mit that one of the sources of the remuneration of price is the reduction of the cost of production. (Cheers. A Voice—" That won't do it.") If my honourable friend can get laws in this country that will at once give him that remunerative price which he requires—if he finds the vast majority of the country in favour of such laws—no one will be more glad than myself. No one fought more ardently, no one I hope fought more sincerely, than I did : my sabre was notched from top to bottom before I ceased to struggle. But if you think that you cannot immediately and at once return to that system which has been abrogated, but which you have found beneficial, then i With to know whether it is your opinion that you should try to do any-

thing else But if you, instead of understanding this part of the ques-

tion, instead of giving your intelligence and energies to this part of the question, determine that you will only try to get a remunerative price by bringing back an abrogated system, which you know at the present moment the country generally will not support you in bringing back, the consequence will be, that when the new system of taxation is established, there will be imposed fresh burdens on the land, and fresh injustice will be entailed on you.'

Briefly repeating the statistical arguments which he advanced at the Aylesbury meeting, he proceeded to notice an objection to one of the founda- tions of those arguments. "I say that the principle on which your new commercial system is established is, that there should not be a tax upon the raw material ; and, in my opinion, a tax upon land, like all your local taxes, is a tax upon the raw material. Since I made that observation, I see that there has arisen a great controversy upon the subject. Indeed, almost as I entered this room, a most intelligent gentleman now present demurred to me on this point. He said, I don't understand how land can be a raw ma- terial. Land always remains.' Now I think that in that observation I trace that fallacy which is very prevalent in this country, and which I am convinced should be exposed, as it is most injurious to the farmers of this country. Since I made the observation at Aylesbury, I have seen the opinion of the moat distinguished writer on political economy of the present day— Mr. Stuart Mill ; and he says, that it is a fallacy to treat land as a raw ma- terial, because he says that man did not make the land. But there I think that the fallacy of the whole opposition to the principle which I have laid down is to be found ; because what I maintain is, that man did make the land—that you the farmers of Buckinghamshire, did make the land of South Bucks. I say that it is your cultivation, your manures—your artificial manures—your various processes to which the land is subjected under your science and experience—that invest it with certain creative qualities ; that a portion of those qualities is wasted by every crop that you produce, and is in fact the raw mate- rial of your manufacture : in fact, if you did not cultivate the land, it would cease to produce your manufacture. Your machinery is the plough, the clod-crusher, the thresher, but not the soil. The soil is the raw mate- rial, and it is created by you ; and every time that the crop is produced some creative qualities of that raw material are expended—some portion, in fact, of that raw material which you must supply by renovated skill, by re- newed experiments, and by increased culture. Therefore, I say, that land is the raw material of the British farmer, and that in this country you tax his raw material, whereas the raw material of the manufacturer is not taxed ; and you announce this to be the great principle of your new and enlightened system of commerce, that no raw material of manufacture should be taxed ; and you don't apply to agriculture the same principle that you do to commerce."

He deprecated any antagonistic comparisons of the political power of the various producing classes ; and again, as formerly, disclaimed the responsi- bility of pointing out relief to the distress which it is acknowledged that agriculture feels. What has happened since the repeal of the Corn-laws has placed the farmers in a much better position as regards public opinion than they once enjoyed. Their industry and enterprise are acknowledged ; the fallacies—calumnies he would call them, if he were not that day disposed to use the gentlest terms—which had been diffused at the expense of their energy and intelligence, are now refuted by notorious facts. "Even the highest authority on this subject, Mr. Pusey, says he has been at work at high farming for several years, and that he never could put on 61. an acre. There- fore, all those stories which carried in a great degree the repeal of the Corn- laws, such as that no farmer should have less than 101. an acre on his farm, and that no farm in England had more than 51. an acre, are put in limbo. (Laughter.) Those discussions of 1846, also, have very much cleared the reputation of the farmers. We have had since then a great commercial dis- tress in 1847, and there was a Committee of the House of Commons ap- pointed to inquire into the cause of that commercial distress. I was a Mem- ber of that Committee. The gentleman who might have been your chair- man today (Mr. Labouchere) was also a Member. We investigated that subject with our utmost efforts. I supported those views which are popular among ourselves. My friend Mr. Labouchere, a Free-trader, took another view of the general question ; but we all arrived at one conclusion. It was the unanimous decision of that Committee, which consisted of Fixed-duty men, Free-traders, Protectionists, and kanchester men, that the commercial distress was principally occasioned by commercial carrying on their business without capital. (Laughter and cheers.) I really think that is the best vindication of the farmers of Great Britain that has yet been made. The year after they repealed the Corn-laws this distress oc- curred, and we came to the unanimous conclusion that the principal cause of the commercial distress was men trading without capital. But I am re- minded of another circumstance. It was always said that one reason why the farmers could not carry on their business to advantage was that they could not keep accounts. Now, a great many of my friends who are farmers keep accounts. I can go to Wycombe market and buy a farmer's account- book which might com,pete with many of this ledgers of commercial men. But, since that was said, since every leading member of the Manchester school held up the farmers of Great Britain as men who could not keep accounts, there has been an immense investment of capital—no less than 200 000 000/.—by commercial men and the middle and trading classes, in the construction of railways. Very few of those speculations have turned out so satisfactory as was expected ; and committees of investigation have been

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formed to inquire into the reasons why they have not yielded what my friend has called remunerative prices ; which committees have all come to the conclusion that this 200,000,0001. has been invested by commercial men who cannot keep accounts. (Laughter and cheers.) These circumstances tell on the mind of the people ; and year by year the impression is growing stronger, that the farmer has not had justice done to him, and that even if the change of 1846 was beneficial, as many suppose, it was obtained upon false pretences: You have a case the strongest in the world, if you go forward and ask for justice instead of protection. Take protection if you can get it. If others get protection, you will have it; but no other class can call for financial justice except the agricultural class. It is their own case ; and if they choose to unite, depend upon it, that the bill which they prefer to the Ministry of the country cannot easily be satisfied, and that some compromise —which, after all, is an arrangement most in accordance with the common sense and experience and character of this country—will be entertained and gained, which, if they follow the advice of other gentlemen than the present Member for Buckinghamshire who now addresses them, they will have very

little chance of obtaining Therefore I think there is a general disposition on the part of the public opinion of this country to view what is called the agricultural question in a temperate and moderate spirit ; and I believe there is an anxiety to come to some arrangement, which, without mainly interfering with those financial principles prevalent in this country, would make the position of the cultivator of the soil easier by reducing the cost of his manufacture. If you see those tendencies, is it not extremely politic and expedient that the agriculturists should put their case in a form in which all classes can sympathize? I ask no man to give up his opinion. You may believe that what is called protection is the only thing that can se- cure you remunerating prices ; but if you believe that at the present moment you cannot have back protection, and if you feel that at the present moment you are suffering, is it not the wisest course to ask for that which, in the name cif justice, cannot be denied, and -which is in the way of securing you aid and assistance, and which you have every chance and every certainty, if united, of obtaining ?" (Loud sheers.)

The "consultative " meeting of clergy from the Midland Counties at Derby, on the subject of Diocesan Synods, took place on Wednesday. The Reverend Thomas Collins of Knaresborough presided; Canon Tre- vor, Archdeacon Denison, Mr. Meryweather, and Mr. Sweet, wore .the chief clerical speakers. The meeting was made public to a considerable extent ; and the laity, who were last week invited to attend, took some part in the proceedings,—Captain Moorsom, for instance, moving a -reso- lution. As we last week stated the substance of the proposed business, it is not necessary now to say more of that than that the prepared reso- lutions were unanimously adopted. The features of the conference were the speeches of Archdeacon Denison and Canon Trevor. Archdeacon Denison spoke with a studied gentleness of expression. He declared, that if he has put forward truths which he strongly feels, in a harsh -or severe manner, he is sincerely sorry for it; but at thesame time, he warned his clerical brethren, that unless they state positively, dogmatically, and uncompromisingly, what they hold, there is no safety for the Church of -England that more will not full away fro:u her, either to the ranks of Rome or the ranks of Dissent, or what is worse into Latitudinarianism and Infi- delity. The laity have been hardly used, in so far as the clergy themselves

have not kept to their distinctive doctrines. They must proceed quietly, patiently, and temperately ; never compromis'ng one jot or tittle, but trying to do all things with that charity without which they could not hope tosue- , coed either in that or any other course of action. He hoped that the meet- ing, though it was larger than the most sanguine might have expected, would be but the prelude to still more numerous meetings for the same great pur- pose.

But under no circumstances let them de pond ; "for surely in such questions as these a Churchman's success is to do his duty."

Canon Trevor insisted that the strongest arguments for Diocesan Synods

lie in the state of things which is advanced as an objection to them—the divisions of the Church, and the confessed impotence of particular bishops to restore unanimity. In respect to the laity, he declared that he had been ." perfectly astonished," in conversing with them, " to find what they have to submit to, and how little redress they receive from their ecclesiastical superiors." " The laity, who are the larger number of her members, had a right to a fair administration according to the general views of the bishop and clergy, and to all the laws, constitutions, rites and doctrines, which arc their inheritance, but which they never could enjoy, according to the pre- scnt system, as long as they were absolute slaves to the parochial clergyman —whilst he in his turn was a slave to their diocesan bishop—who again in his turn must be a slave to the Prime Minister—who again (for they had not yet the chain of slavery far enough) was the slave of the predominant voice of the public press."

In reference to the general question, Canon Trevor, ,deciared that he has had the satisfaction of hearing from the lips of the Bishop of Ripon, (and he was sure he was justified in stating it publicly,) that nothing would be more grateful to him than to feel authorized, from the united opinion of the cler- gy-, to throw himself on their support in the numerous diffioulties of the present time. The general success of the meeting was the subject of warm congratu- lations at the end of the proceedings ; and all departed with warm hopes of having made still greater advances by the next quarterly assemblage,— to be held in London, on the 22d of January next.

The sale of Lord Derby's aviary and menagerie at Knowsley corn-

-meneed on Monday. Buyers have been attracted from all the states of Europe,--commissioned on behalf of the public zoological repositaries in ' the capitals of Paris, Amsterdam, Antwerp, and Berlin. Lord Hill is the only amateur of note whose attendance is mentioned. The auctioneer, Mr. J. C. Stevens of London, took his customers round the grounds, and put the lots up to bidding as they came under successive notice. Mr. Thompson, the keeper of the aviary, seems to have held many commis- ; sions; but M. l'reveaux of the Paris Jardin des Plantes, and Lord fill, were often competitors. The sales scorn nevertheless to have brought what connoisseurs consider to be anything but good prices.

An extraordinary murder has been perpetrated at a lone cottage in the

parish of Gayton-le-Marsh in Lincolnshire. On Friday sennight, a man who was passing some distance from the cottage, heard a gun discharged ; and presently Baker, the cottager, ran bleeding from his house, and exclaimed that his wife had been killed and himself wounded by a gun, through the , window. The woman was indeed dead ; but on a surgeon examining Baker's ' head no shots could be found in the wounds. The Bakers had not been an very good terms together, and latterly the husband had with difficulty in- duced his wife to mortgage the cottage, her property, to get money to emigrate.

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Baker was arrested. But subsequent inquiries showed that this was too rash a proceeding. A surgeon did find a shot in the man's head, on the top of it ; there were foot-marks in the garden, marks where a man had knelt under the window, and shots in the window-frame ; and the marks were in a direction corresponding with Baker's statement of the position of his wife and himself when shot. Several shots were taken from the deceased's neck, and a bit of glass was found in her dress. In the house was a loaded gun : it had not recently been discharged.; the cap had rusted on the nipple. When these facts came out, the Magistrates immediately liberated Baker. Ile hints that among his wife's "friends" the culprit might be looked for : they wanted to get possession of the cottage and three or four acres of land attached to it.

Three men have perished in Wheal Margaret mine, at Nancledra in Corn- wall. They were at work in a level contiguous to the old workings of the mine, when "a house of water," forty fathoms above -them, burst, and a torrent of water and stones poured down. The stones actually tore the clothes from one man's body. Had the disaster occurred two hours sooner, many more lives would have been sacrificed.

Marie, a labouring man, set out at night in a cart to return home from Bishop Auckland to Herasterley. lie had with him his wife and one of his children, a boy of twelve. The night was stormy and dark, and the rivu- leta were much swollen with the rain. At a narrow and dangerous ford, the cart was swept down the stream. Next day the woman's basket was found on the bank : search was made, and at different spots the three human bodies were found, and at another place the dead horse.