The Week.

rental and not a rating franchise : At the interview with Earl Eussell this was the tone of all the speeches . Earl Russell said in reply that he could give no intimation of what would he the character of the Government bill . The Government would do what they believed for the best , and by that they would stand or fall . A conference of the members of agricultural societies was held on Thursday , the 18 th inst ., at the St . James ' s Hall , to take

steps iu reference to the cattle plague . Several resolutions were proposed and agreed to , the purport of which was to prohibit -entirely all movements of live stock in the country , io order that all infected animals and those in contact with them should be killed , to provide remuneration for owners of animals affected by these measures , aud to do all these things by Act of

Parliament . The case of " Edmunds v . Lord Brougham" caine on again on Thursday , the 8 th inst , in A ^ ice Chancellor Stuart ' s court . Mr . Edmunds had filed a hill to recover £ 5 , 000 lent to Lord Brougham in 1811 , and which his lordship offered to pay . He coupled certain conditions with the payment , to which Mr . Edmunds could not agree , and the bill was filed . To this bill

Lord Brougham made a reply , in the course of which he said he had been obliged to turn Mr . Edmunds out of his house . Mr . Edmunds applied that the paragraph containing this charge should be removed from the reply . After hearing arguments , the Vice-Chancellor ordered its removal . In the court of Queen's Bench on the 8 th inst ., Mr . Desmone Byan , musical

critic for a contemporary , sued the proprietors of the Orchestra for damages , for a libel on him printed in that paper . He had been charged with levying black mail on professional singers , by inducing them , under fear of hostile criticism , to sing without fee at concerts given by him . Mr . Sims Reeves , Madame Sainton-Dolby , and other artistes were called as witnesses for Mr . Ryan , and they said they sung for him as a matter of

friendship . The jury found for the plaintiff with £ 250 damages . At the Bow-street Police-court on Thursday , the 8 th inst ., the six sailors charged with piracy on board the Scotland were again examined before Sir Thomas Henry . Further evidence as to the mutiny having been given , the whole of the prisoners wero committed for trial . The inquest on the remains of a man found in the bed of the Thames near AVaterloo Bridge some

time ago , was resumed on the 8 th inst . Some interest attached to the proceedings in consequence of a lady named Clephan making a statement to the court . She stated that her husband left one day iu 1851 , and she had never seen him since . She described his person and some of the articles he possessed , hut though there was some likeness between these and the remains

found in the river , there was not sufficient proof to amount to identification . The jury returned an open verdict . Charlotte Winsor has been again respited . It seems that the indefatigable solicitors who have taken her case ill hand have called the attention of the Attorney-General to the fact that the recent decision in the Court of Queen ' s Bench , iu reference to the discharge

of the first jury without giving a verdict , is directly opposed to a ruling of the Irish judges a few years ago in a similar case . The Attornoy-General has therefore issued his flat for a writ of error in the case to he argued in the Exchequer Chamber before all the judges . The arguments will probably be heard in Easter term . A mistake which is likely to have fatal

results was made at Sydenham on Saturday morning last . Mr . Joseph Ferguson , a pianist , was going home from a party at which he had been engaged , and at half-past two o'clock passed the Crystal Falace , against which a policeman in plain clothes , named Maddock , was standing . Mr . Ferguson was carrying a bag , and Maddock thinking this suspicious , followed him . Mr . Ferguson quickened his pace , and so did Maddock . Then Mr . Ferguson , who thought he was being

pursued by a garotter , ran , and Maddock ran likewise , and being by far the quicker runner of the two , soon came up with Mr . Ferguson . Then began a struggle , in the course of which Maddock was stabbed in three places . He shouted for help , and two policemen came up , when Mr . Ferguson willingly surrendered . Maddock was taken to Guy's Hospital ; and on Saturday afternoon the Greenwich police magistrate went there

and took his deposition . Mr . Ferguson was brought up at the police-eouvt and remanded .- In the Court of Queen ' s Bench on Saturday last , an action , Campbell v . Lord Wenlock , was tried . The action was to recover the rent of a furnished house

in Eaton-place , which had been let to his lordship by a houseagent named Douglas . His lordship and bis family went to the house , hut only remained there a very short time , leaving it for the alleged reason that it swarmed with hugs . For the plaintiff it was sought to be shown that the cause of leaving was to be found in the fact that Lord Wenlock ' s butler had had no commission paid to him , and that therefore he reported

against the house . It was denied that there were any bugs in the house . The case was not concluded when the court rose . A lamentable railway accident took place near Leamington , on Saturday morning last . Owing to a goods train having run off the line on Friday night only a single line of rails was worked on Saturday . Three platelayers

were ignorant of this fact , and the result was that an up train from AVolverbampton dashed upon them . Two were killed , hut the third was fortunate enough to escape . An accident which might have been attended with serious consequences occurred a short time since . AVhile some labouring men were engaged in a cutting the earth fell in , exposing all to most

—imminent peril , and completely burying one of them . A courageous volunteer—a member of the first Middlesex engineer corps—was lowered down the aperture ; and after five hours' grubbing with the hands , assisted only by a trowel , he fortunately succeeded in effecting the poor fellow's release . A man was killed on Friday night the 9 th inst . in Dublin . His name was Clarke , and it seems that while on the south bank of the Royal Canal , near Margaret-place , he was

set upon by three men , who knocked him down and then shot him . A policeman named Curran heard the shot and went to the place . He also was fired at , but fortunately the assassins missed their aim . Clarke died on Saturday night . It is believed that he was a Fenian , and that he was murdered by other members of the brotherhood who thought that he

had given information to the police . A telegram from Plymouth tells of the loss of the Wanato , one of the Black Ball line . She came into collision in the Bay of Biscay with the Queen of Beauty and sank . Her crew and passengers were saved . Fifteen men engaged in casting pewter articles in Aldersgate-street were severely wounded on Monday evening

by the bursting of a pot of molten metal . A deputation of those anxious for a revision of the Prayer Book , with Lord Ebury at their head , waited on the Archbishop of Canterbury on Tuesday , in order to urge their peculiar views on his Grace . The Archbishop received tbem with all courtesy , but expressed his entire dissent from their views , and reminded them

that if the question were once opened other parties would press for alterations in a sense widely opposed to theirs , and the result would he that the Church , which now embraced various schools of thought in her bosom , would be rent in twain . Tho action which has been brought by Mr . Gore against the Right Hon . Mr . Walpole , for acts done by him ministerially when Home Secretary , was concluded on Tuesday . The plaintiff occupied the Court the whole day with his own statements and the depositions of his witnesses to facts , ' which the Court