The following is a petition, now in course of signature
at Hull, praying the House of Lords to pass the Irish Municipal Bill without Injury. It is pithy and forcible, as well as polite ; and may be recom-
mended as a model for those who choose to pay the Peers the compli- ment of still addressing them in spite of all that has passed.
"That ■,11r petitioners are grateful to Divine Providence for time changes in the fabric of society, * hich in the place of feudal power, have left your right honourable House supported by the memory of services tendered to the People, by their natural and hereditary leaders, in every crisis of their liberties. " Thai at a taxied when the Commons of the realm, in unity with the Ministers of the Crown, are bent on the consolidation of the empire, by the extension of equal laws, without which Ito just claim to either political or legislative Union can be established, your petitioners confidently hope, that your Lordships *ill not disappoint the expec- tations of the community, by placing yourselves in the rear of this movement instead of the front, nor reject the opportunity of confirming those sentiments and recollection* on which the stability of your Lordships' order does integrally rest. • " The prayer of your petitioners *hereupon is, that your right honourable House willpass the Bill for the Amendment of the Municipal Corporations in Ireland: thereby extending to that country the benefits of popularly-elected municipal bodies, the advantages of which your petitioners are now enjoying in common with the inha- bitants of Miter towns in England and Scotland."
The elections of parish officers are going on very generally throughout the country. Sometimes the Liberals, sometimes the Tones, elect the Overseers and Churchwardens ; but the point to be noticed is, that the Church party almost everywhere meet with opposition, and have to struggle for the maintenance of privileges, which a few years ago were yielded by all as a matter of course and of right.
On Sunday, an order of sequatur from the Ecclesiastical Court was read in Maidstone church against the Reverend Dr. Watson, Rector of the parish of Gravesend, and an order given to the Churchwardens to receive the tithes to the amount of 4,8001., and pay the same into the said court. It will take nearly ten years to raise this sum, and the col- lecting will fall on the Churchwardens.—Maidstone Gazette.
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