lEbt Probirttes.
The accounts from the manufacturing districts are more satisfactory. The year has commenced with fair prospects; the only drawback being the tendency to a rise in the price of cotton. In Manchester, 2,400 additional hands have found employment on full time as compared with the previous week. At Oldham, "the cotton trade is showing decided symptoms. of improvement. Several manufacturing establishments have commence& working full time, and very few concerns in the cotton trade are now at an entire stand. The greater number of the mills are, however, working short time; and therefore there is still considerable suffering from short- ness of work and low wages. Machine-making continues in an improving condition, and few in that trade are now entirely destitute of work."
The prices of iron in South Staffordshire and Shropshire have fallen greatly. At the preliminary meeting of iron-masters, held at Dudley on Tuesday, sheets, quoted last quarter-day at 131. 10s. were fixed at 111.10a; bars were reduced from 10/. to 81.; hoops from 101. 10s. to Si. 8s. The manufacture is considerably diminished. In the neighbourhood of Bir- mingham, 4,000 or 5,000men are out of work; and the masters generally have resolved on a reduction of wages to the extent of 15 or 20 per cent. This the workmen threaten to resist; but their power of resistance is small at present.
At the recent rent audit of the Marquis of Downshire, at Great Shefford, the Marquis expressed his anxious wish to assist his tenants by every means in his power; and offered to provide at his own expense any new kind of implement that they might select, for the use of the tenants gene- rally; or, if they thought it would improve the breed of their horses, he would send a Suffolk horse for their use. The Marquis also gave per- mission to all his tenants" to shoot or sport" over their farms; and directed that all ash and elm trees which were damaging their farms should be cut down; empowering them also to grub up any hedge-rows which might be inconvenient.
The Bishop of Exeter has put forward an appeal to the Christian cha- rity of England for aid in relieving the spiritual destitution, " almost un- equalled in intensity," from which Devonport suffers. For 26,000 in-. habitants there is no parochial church or chapel. There are two conse- crated chapels, but they have no proper free seats. In three districts containing a population of 18,000, and separated from the town under 6 and 7 Victoria c. 37, there is no church or even chapel whatever. There is another district similarly unprovided. In no part of Devonport is grar tuitous accommodation afforded even by Dissenting meeting-houses. The absence of free schools is equally to be deplored. There is only one "ragged school," recently established, and a day school for the sons of seamen, &c. Applications have been made to the Government; but they have "no funds applicable to such a purpose." Four large churches are required for the four districts; and to build and endow them a large sum is needed. It is to meet "such an accumulation of spiritual wants that the Bishop makes this " unwonted " appeaL The clergy of the Archdeaconry of Ely have agreed on a petition to the Legislature against the admission of Jews to Parliament. The spirit of the document appears in the following extract- " While your petitioners look back with shame and Borrow upon the cruelty and injustice which the Jews have in former ages too often suffered from those who have borne the Christian name, but have been strangers to the spirit of their holy religion, and while they truly rejoice that the Jews now possess, in common with all other members of the state, the fullest protection to their lives and pro- perties, under the equal and impartial administration of the laws, together with the amplest toleration, they would nevertheless most earnestly deprecate their admission to political power."
The Vice-Chancellor and the Heads of Houses in the University of Oxford have determined on the adoption of very stringent measures to check the extravagant expenditure on the part of the under-graduates. Hitherto, a law has been in force which provides that all accounts of trades- men shall be sent to the tutors of the Colleges, and be by them dis- charged; but this law has been evaded. The new rules on this subject will be communicated to the University immediately after the commencement. of Lent term, on the 14th instant.—Globe. At the Chelmsford Quarter-Sessions, on Thursday, a remarkable case of lady shoplifting was tried. Miss Ann IdaRucks, thirty-three years of age, the daugh- ter of highly respectable parents living at Norton Mandeville, was charged with staling goods from three several shops at Chelmsford; from one, a quantity of silk and a victorine; from another, twenty yards of ribtuid; from the third, a pair of boots. The victorine only was missed; but on searching the prisoner's room at en inn where she was staying, the other articles were found. She gave a false name at the shop whence she carried off the silk and victorine, paying for some articles, and stating that she would call again for others. The only defence that could be offered was an allegation of temporary insanity. Witnesses deposed to the extra- ordinary conduct of Miss Ma!lucks on various occasions. But the Jury were not satisfied that she was unconscious of the wrong that she was eommitting at the time of the theft, and they found her guilty, on the first charge only, the others not having been pressed. Miss MuRacks (who was almost insensible during the proceedings) was sentenced to be imprisoned for six months, with such hard labour as she could undeno.
At the Bury Petty-Sessions, last week, Mr. Parkinson, a cotton-manufacturer, and John Pilling, a servant on the East Lancashire Railway, were charged with patting the lives of passengers on the line in jeopardy. Mr. Parkinson had pur- chased an old banding from the railway company; and in removing the materials he had employed waggons on the rails at night, without the least authority. Pil- ling and other officials connived at it. The result was, that one night the points of a siding were left open by Pilling; and a passenger-train ran into the siding: but as the speed was small, no mischief resulted. Both the accused stand com- mitted for trial at the Salford Sessions.
A soldier at Warrington, in a jovial company at a public-house, offered for a wager of five shillings to thrust a stick two feet long down his throat: and he did force down a thin wand to the extent of eighteen inches; he then fainted; and died three days afterwards, from internal wounds.