the cash is still more doubtful. There are
about eighteen thousand licenses granted by
Doctors Commons and by country surrogates
every year. The usual cost of the license at
Doctors Commons is £2 12s. 6d. There is
10s. 6d. additional for minors; and in the
country, surrogates, it is said, obtain higher
fees. At only £2 12s. 6d., the tax on eighteen
thousand licenses is £47,250 a year. The
stamps on each license are 12s. 6d. Deducting
this sum, the licenses to marry yield at least
£36,000 a year. The expense of granting
licenses in a manner the most useful and
convenient to the public would not be considerable;
and it is not easy to see why the surplus
revenue derivable from the tax, should not go
into the public treasury, when a portion of
the expenses of the registration of births,
deaths, and marriages, is paid out of the
Consolidated Fund. The aggregate amount of
charges for the General Register Office, at
which all the returns of the country are
examined, indexed, and analysed, and the Act
is administered, was £13,794 in 1846; and the
six hundred and twenty-one superintendent
registrars received £9097 for examining certified
copies. After discharging the expenses
of the civil registration, defrayed by the
Consolidated Fund, and the cost of the decennial
census, a large surplus would be left, out of
£47,250 for licenses, to go to the public
revenue of the country. And this would not
interfere in the slightest degree with the
marriage fees; which would continue to be
paid to the officiating clergy. In the places
of worship registered by Dissenters, there
were not quite ten thousand marriages in one
year; nearly four thousand in the same year
took place in the Superintendant Registrar's
offices; one hundred and eighty-four according
to the rites of the Jews; and seventy-four
marriages between Quakers. The only fortune-
teller who can henceforth be believed, is the
one who answers the question, " When will
the wedding take place? " by saying, " When
trade flourishes, and when bread is cheap."

CHIPS.

FROM MR. THOMAS BOVINGTON.

Long Hornets, June, 1850.

SIR,
I want to ask you a few questions,
Mr. Conductor. In the first place—What am
I to do with my beasts? Those I got back
from Smithfield, after two months' care and
no small expense, have come round again, and
I've got a few others ready for market; but
what market? Country markets don't suit
me, for I can't get my price at them; and, as
you know, I would rather kill the cattle
myself than send them to Smithfield.

Again,—What is the Royal Commission
about ? They have reported against Smithfield,
and why don't Government shut it up? Isn't
there Islington? Everything is ready there
to open a market to-morrow. I can answer
for that, for I was there yesterday and went
over it. I inquired particularly about the
drainage, for, if you remember, Brumpton told
me they could not drain it. Well, perhaps
they could not very conveniently when he
was last there, but now they tell me that a
thousand pounds would do the entire job.
I'll tell you how:—You see the market stands
about fifty-one feet above the Trinity high-
water mark of the Thames. Well, close by,
in the Southgate road, there is a new sewer,
that runs into a regular system of sewers
which drain Hoxton, Spitalfields, and all that
part down to London bridge—and the cattle
market being eighteen feet above the level of
the Southgate sewer, it will only be requisite
to cut a culvert into it, for the entire space to
be drained out and out.

Now, my last question is this: Why don't
the people belonging to the Islington market
make the necessaiy sewer at once? If they
did, what excuse could government have for
not shutting up Smithfield, and moving the
cattle market to Islington?

I am, Sir,
Yours to command,
T. BOVINGTON.

THE OLD CHURCHYARD TREE.

A PROSE POEM.

THERE is an old yew tree which stands by
the wall in a dark quiet corner of the church-
yard.

And a child was at play beneath its wide-
spreading branches, one fine day in the early
spring. He had his lap full of flowers, which
the fields and lanes had supplied him with,
and he was humming a tune to himself as he
wove them into garlands.

And a little girl at play among the
tombstones crept near to listen; but the boy was
so intent upon his garland, that he did not
hear the gentle footsteps, as they trod softly
over the fresh green grass. When his work
was finished, and all the flowers that were in
his lap were woven together in one long
wreath, he started up to measure its length
upon the ground, and then he saw the little
girl, as she stood with her eyes fixed upon
him. He did not move or speak, but thought
to himself that she looked very beautiful as
she stood there with her flaxen ringlets hanging
down upon her neck. The little girl was
so startled by his sudden movement, that she
let fall all the flowers she had collected in her
apron, and ran away as fast as she could.
But the boy was older and taller than she, and
soon caught her, and coaxed her to come
back and play with him, and help him to make
more garlands; and from that time they saw
each other nearly every day, and became great
friends.

Twenty years passed away. Again, he was