the Thames will there be carried out; but for this
remaining part it will be impossible to do without
mechanical aids.

The committee for the management of Evening
Classes for Young Men in London had a supper at the
London Tavern on the 20th, at which the Earl of
Harrowby presided. This institution has been founded on
the principle which the Committee of the Privy Council
are endeavouring to introduce in all the schools under
their control—that of founding a good secular education
on a sound religious basis. The report for the past year
stated that 24 classes had been established, which were
attended by more than 600 students, whose general
good conduct had secured the entire approbation of the
teachers. 29 lectures had been given freely by gentlemen
of talent and reputation, and 23 teachers had in
the same spirit devoted nearly 400 evenings to the
instruction of young men of a different class in society.
The subscriptions received during the last year amounted
to £220, while the expenditure had not exceeded £130,
nearly half of which was provided by the students
themselves.

The fourth annual meeting of the Grotto-passage
Ragged Schools and Refuge for the Destitute was held
on the 26th, at the Literary Institution, Edward Street,
Portman Square—Lord Ashley in the chair. The
Report stated that during the last year, 36 boys had
been boarded, lodged, and educated there, 11 of whom
had been convicted thieves; of this number 8 had been
sent to Australia, 6 apprenticed to sea, 1 expelled,
1 removed by the parish authorities, 1 sent back to the
workhouse, where he died, 3 had left of their own
accord, and 2 had been enticed to leave. There were at
present 15 in the Refuge, leaving 5 vacancies. In the
Industrial School there had been an average attendance
of 74—25 of whom were provided daily with a dinner.
Mat-making, shoe-making, tailoring, and net-making
are the trades in which instruction is given, and each is
expected to earn his dinner before partaking of it. The
evening and Sunday schools are both well attended;
the number of scholars in the former, averaging 40, and
in the latter, 143. Lord Kinnaird suggested the
establishment of model lodging-houses on an extensive scale:
and Mr. Arthur Hill expressed his persuasion that it
was extremely necessary that the boys who had passed
through ragged schools, and were intended as emigrants,
should, previously to leaving this country, be subjected to
a kind of rural training, in order to fit them for their
new situation, a rural life being the only one which can
at present be properly and advantageously pursued in
the colonies.

PERSONAL NARRATIVE.

The Queen, Prince Albert, and the royal children
returned on the 18th from Osborne to Buckingham
Palace. On the 20th Her Majesty held the first drawing-
room of the season; it was of extraordinary
brilliancy, and the presentations were unusually numerous.

The Baptism of the Infant Prince, Her Majesty's
third son, was celebrated on Saturday the 22nd, in the
Chapel at Buckingham Palace. The sponsors were the
Duke of Wellington, the Duchess of Kent as proxy for
the Duchess Ida of Saxe Weimar, and his Royal Highness
the Prince of Prussia (who had arrived only the
same morning from the Continent). The royal procession
entered the chapel about seven in the evening, the
orchestra performing the March in Handel's occasional
oratorio, followed by a chorale composed by Prince
Albert. The ceremony was performed by the
Archbishop of Canterbury, who named the royal infant
"Arthur William Patrick Albert." There was afterwards
a magnificent state banquet in the picture-
gallery; and the evening was concluded by a brilliant
assembly and concert, at which the Nepaulese princes,
among many other illustrious personages, were present.

An Embassy from Nepaul arrived at Southampton
on the 25th of May. The Ambassador, General Jung
Bahadoor Koorman Ranagee, is the Nepaulese Prime
Minister; though only turned of thirty, he is said to be
already a distinguished warrior, and the most influential
statesman in Northern India. He brought a
complimentary letter to the Queen, and presents stated to
be worth a quarter of a million sterling. An awkward
affair took place on his arrival. The Southampton
custom-house had orders to pass the presents without
search, but not the ambassador's own luggage. When
the officers were proceeding to examine it, his excellency
(a Brahmin of high caste) declared that if an article was
touched he would return to India by the first steamer,
and posted a Hindoo guard, with a drawn sword, over
the luggage. Alter an interchange of telegraphic
messages the blunder was rectified, and the ambassador,
with his suite, presents, and property, landed and
proceeded to town. The ambassador and his two brothers
(all three handsome young men) have been since their
arrival the chief lions of the metropolis. They have
gone freely into society, visited the chief places of public
amusement, and accepted invitations to numberless fêtes
and parties, public and private, enjoying every thing
(except the creature comforts of the entertainment, of
which they decline to partake) with infinite zest, and
creating a very favourable impression by their intelligence,
frankness, and good humour. They have their
box at Her Majesty's Theatre, where they are seen every
opera night, seemingly delighted with the performances,
especially the ballet. The principal fête in their honour
was that given by the East India Company on Saturday
the 15th, at the London Tavern, and attended by a host
of people of distinction, including several members of
the government and of the diplomatic body. The
Nepaulese did not partake of the sumptuous banquet set
before them, but, retiring into another room, had some
fruit, and then rejoined the company. The ambassador,
on his health being given, returned thanks in his own
language, in a speech of excellent taste and feeling,
which was translated to the company by Captain Cavanagh,
an officer attached to the embassy.—On the 19th
the ambassador and his brothers were presented to the
Queen by the President of the Board of Control, when
his excellency delivered a letter to Her Majesty from
his sovereign, and the presents, of which he was the
bearer.

Prince Albert, as Chancellor of the University of
Cambridge, has addressed a letter, dated the 27th of
May, to the Vice-Chancellor, on the subject of the
Royal Commission of Inquiry. After expressing his
conviction that the proposed measure does not cast any
slur upon the university, by implying want of confidence
in their ability or inclination to carry out useful reforms,
and that the government are anxious, by the selection of
persons who are to compose the Commission, not to
expose the university to needless hostility, his Royal
Highness concludes by giving the following advice:—
"Although I had hoped that the university would have
been allowed to go on in their course of self-improvement
without any extraneous interference, now that I find
the Government irrevocably pledged to the issue of the
Commission, I would recommend the authorities of the
university not to meet it with opposition, but rather to
take it as the expression, on the part of the Crown and
Parliament, of a natural desire to be accurately informed
upon the present state of institutions so closely connected
with and of such vital importance to the best interests
of the nation; and to take a pride in showing to those
who have indulged in attacks against them, that they
have conscientiously and zealously fulfilled the great
task entrusted to them. Any hostility or opposition on
the part of the university could not prevent the issue
of the Commission by the present government; and,
while it might add strength to the accusations of their
enemies, would only lead to the result of the inquiry
remaining incomplete, and, as based upon one-sided
evidence, probably injurious to the universities
themselves."

The Freedom of the City of London was presented to
Lord Gough on the 30th of May, at a full Court of
Common Council; and in the evening a grand banquet
was given to him at the Mansion House. The Duke
of Cambridge and a number of members of both
houses of Parliament were among the three hundred
guests.

At the Oxford Commemoration on June 12th, the
degree of Doctor of Civil Law was conferred on the
Indian warriors Lord Gough and Major Edwardes. The
same honour was conferred on Major Rawlinson the