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The meeting at Lord Derby's on Tuesday was attended by upwards of 200 Conservatives. Lord Derby, says the Globe, is said to have held out a threat of dissolution in the event of the Reform Bill not being carried. The members present agreed to support the bill, but on the condition that the clause be persevered with which disfranchises, guoad counties, all freeholders in boroughs.

Two of the most notable men in Lord Derby's Cabinet, Mr. Walpole, and Mr. Henley, having retired, Lord Derby has had to obtain fresh colleagues. Mx. Sotheron Estcourt, supplies Mr. Walpole's place at the Home office : Lord Donoughmore succeeds Mr. Henley at the Board of Trade ; Lord March takes the Presidency of the Poor Law Board vice Estcourt ; Lord Lovaine becomes Vice President of the Board of Trade; and Mr. Lygon succeeds Lord Lovaine as a Lord of the Admiralty.

Lord Henry Gordon Lennox has also resigned his Lordship of the Trea- sury. He will be succeeded by Mr. Peter Blackburn, M.P. for Stirling- shire.

The Queen on the recommendation of Lord Stanley, has approved the appointment of Sir Robert N. C. Hamilton, Bill., as Provisional Mem- ber of the Council of the Governor-General of India.

Signor Farini has written an admirable and statesmanlike Letter to Lord John Russell which deserves the attentive perusal of all who would fully comprehend the whole bearings of the Italian question. A full translation was published in the .Daily News of the 4th instant. Signor Fari- ni sets forth in strong but temperate language the violations of the treaty of Vienna systematically persisted in by Austria ; shows grounds for the policy of Piedmont, and the alliance with France; and laments the change of opinion in England which has shown itself in a leaning to- wards Austria and a jealousy of France.

The silence of the Westminster clock has attracted attention. In Parliament it is asserted, on the authority of Mr. Denison, that the clock room is not ready. " Out of doors," ' it is said, that " the clock room is ready and that the clock ought to be there." It is hard to decide when doctors differ so completely.

Prince Alfred was in Egypt in the middle of February. He landed on the 13th in state, conveyed ashore in the Viceroy's barge to the thunder of a salute from the Euryalus, the Macedonian, an American frigate, and the shore batteries. He was received with royal honours by Said Pasha. Sub- sequently. the Viceroy's son, a little fellow of six, dressed as an Egyptian general visited the Prince on board the Euryalus.

The United Service Gazette states that Major-General Charles Havelock, the brother of the late Sir Henry, has been appointed Chief of the Consta- bulary of Lancashire.

Mr. George Hunter Cary, of the Chancery bar, has received from Sir Bul- wer Lytton the appointment of Attorney-General of the new colony of British Columbia. Mr. Cary was a pupil of Sir Hugh Cairns.

Mr. Sheridan Knowles, we understand, is now at Cadiz; his /health having very greatly improved. Our obituary announces the death of Rosa Jane the daughter of Dr. Charles Mackay. Her loss is very severely felt; she was but nineteen years age, a very engaging and accomplished girl.

Sir Francis Graham Moon, Bart., whose visit to Paris when Lord Mayor of London may be remembered, has just been nominated by the Emperor of the French Knight of the Legion of Honour.

General Dessalines, head of the police and aide-de-camp to the Emperor Solouque, who left Port-au-Prince at the same time as the dethroned sove- reign, has arrived in Paris.

The once celebrated Frederick Lemaitre, is to reappear in Paris, next week in a piece entitled Le Maitre d'Ecole.

The Illustrated London News of this day contains, with a remarkably concise and well written memoir of Prescott the historian, a port it from a photograph taken a year ago in Boston,—taken, we believe, for Charles Mackay. " It is," says the writer, "considered an excellent likeness. But no picture can do full justic to his pleasant face and beautiful smile ; and no words can describe the cordial, gentle, yet dignified manners of the most accomplished and most conscientious historian of the age." As we cannot " quote" the portrait, we cannot do better than tell our readers where they may find it.

A Russian squadron, composed of a line-of-battle ship and two frigates, having the Grand Duke Constantine on board, entered the grand harbour of Malta on the 24th. He sailed thence on the 2c1 March for Athens.

A few days ago the Emperor of Austria made the Protestants in Vienna a present of a piece of ground on which to build their school-house.

Experiments are being made at Paris to explode mines by electricity. The Imperial Guard is to be supplied in the course of next month with four batteries of the new rifle cannon. The Emperor will, it is said, be present at the trial of the guns at Versailles.

The Reverend Aaron Roberts, curate of St. Peter's Carmarthen, has sent the following interesting statement to the Times. " On Friday, the 11th of February, there fell at Mountain Ash, Glamorganshire, about nine o'clock a.m., in and about the premises of Mr. Nixon, a heavy shower of rain and small fish. The largest size measured about four inches in length. It is supposed that two different species of fish descended; on this point, however, the public generally disagree. At the time it was blowing a very stiff gale from the south. Several of the fish are preserved in fresh water, five of which I have this day seen. They seem to thrive well. The tail and fins are of a bright white colour. Some persons attempting to preserve a few in salt and water, the effect is stated to have been almost instantaneous death. It was not observed at the time that any fish fell in any other part of the neighbourhood, save in the particular spot mentioned. Appended is a paragraph on the ease taken out of the Monmouthshire Merlin.

Shower of Fish—Much excitement has been occasioned in the valley of Aberdare by the fact of a complete shower of fish falling at Mountain Ash on Friday last. The roofs of some house were covered with them, and seve- ral were living, and are still preserved in life and apparent health in glass bottles. They were from an inch to three inches in length, and fell during a very heavy shower of rain and storm of wind.' "