any disease breaks out; to cause the removal of patients
from crowded rooms; and to speedily remove from the
rooms of the living, corpses of persons who died from
contagious or epidemic disease. All medical men are
directed to report cases of death from epidemic or
contagious disease to the medical officer of the district.
The instructions for the general public are simple.
Occupiers of houses shall, when directed by the
guardians or medical officers, continuously cleanse the places
adjoining their houses, and remove nuisances. Any
person present at a death from epidemic disease, not
attended by a medical man, is to notify the same to the
medical officer of the district. The above directions
relating to nuisances equally apply to "any matter
injurious to the health of any person." In the washing
of streets, persons are directed to use fluids or substances
for preventing the escape of noxious effluvia during the
operation. Newcastle is the place where the disease
has assumed the most serious aspect. The deaths there
for the six days preceding the 24th inst. have averaged
94 daily. The total number of deaths up to that time
has been 995. The general state of Newcastle has been
very dirty, but a place called Sandgate has been the
worst in the town; the inhabitants being crowded
together without regard either to decency or cleanliness.
The London Board of Health peremptorily advised the
immediate removal of the population—about 4000 in
all. Some have been removed, and are now lodged
healthily in tents, lent by the Board of Ordnance:
some have dispersed themselves over the better part
of the town; while the cholera has fiercely broken out
among the people still living in the place. Two of the
most over-crowded churchyards in the town were closed
on Saturday, and three others are to be closed. The
upper and middle classes seem to suffer from the
disease as much as the lower classes.

The Queen and Prince Albert have offered to subscribe
£300 towards Improving the Lodging of Families in
Dublin, on condition that a subscription, with fair
promises of liberal support, be commenced. It is also
intimated that her Majesty is of opinion that some
attempt should be made to improve the feeling of the
lower classes in Ireland with regard to their clothing,
so that they may be induced to keep them in a decent
state of repair.

The School of Design, with all its apparatus, is now
removed from Somerset House to Marlborough House,
there to form part of the Central School of the Department
of Science and Art. The elementary instruction
formerly given at Somerset House will now be afforded
in the district schools.

The commissioners appointed to inquire into the alleged
Mal-administration of the Birmingham Gaol, commenced
their sittings on the 30th ult., and sat daily till the 13th
inst., on which day the investigation terminated. In the
course of the inquiry, Lieutenant Austin, the present
governor of the prison, Captain Maconochie, the late
governor, Mr. Sherwin, the chaplain, Mr. Blount, the
surgeon, the warders and other subordinates, and a
number of the prisoners, were examined. A great many
complaints were investigated. The charges applied to
the governor, the surgeon, and the wardens; and they
consisted of allegations of cruelty, neglect, and other
misconduct, sustained by the evidence of persons
connected with the gaol. The cases inquired into were
very numerous, and the evidence voluminous. One of
the complainants was an old man named Dodson, who
had been imprisoned a month for the non-payment of
his wife's maintenance. He stated, that when he was
too ill to work, he was shut up in the crank cell; that
when he was very ill, and rang for assistance, a warder
threatened to chain him up, and took away some of his
clothes; and that the Governor Lieutenant Austin called
him a blackguard, and threatened to horsewhip him.
Finally, so badly was he used, that he tried to hang
himself. From the surgeon's evidence it appeared that
he had thought Dodson always fit to do his work at the
crank; that he had made no entries in his journal as to
what Dodson was suffering from,—thereby violating the
regulations; and that he could not distinctly answer
questions, because he did not anticipate this inquiry.
The chaplain deposed that Dodson was always ill.
Several warders were examined; but Dodson's testimony
does not appear to have been shaken. On the
contrary, it appeared that it had not been uncommon to
keep prisoners, even boys, at work in the crank cell as
late as ten and eleven o'clock at night, and to send them
supperless to bed because they had not done their work.
The warders pretended that they thought Dodson's
attempt on his life was a sham; but, hard pressed, one
admitted that he believed it was a real attempt; and the
commissioners told them their conduct was disgraceful.
Lieutenant Austin denied that he had called Dodson a
blackguard, or had threatened to horsewhip him. He
had not entered Dodson's "attempt" at suicide in his
journal.—Captain Williams, one of the commissioners:
Are the "attempts" never entered in the journal at all?
—Witness: There are entries, but there is no register
kept.—Chief Commissioner; What made you think this
was a sham attempt?—Witness: From the state of the
handkerchief.—Chief Commissioner; In this return of
the magistrates, setting forth the attempts at suicide,
here is one on the 6th December, 1851, which is called
"attempt at imposition;" from what is this return
made up?—Witness: I think the surgeon supplied those
returns.—Chief Commissioner: I see nothing on the
subject in the surgeon's journal. How, I say, was this
return made up?—Witness: Partly from memory, and
partly from the surgeon's journal.——Lieutenant Austin
further stated, that the practice of keeping prisoners in
the crank cells after dark, and of inflicting corporal
punishment, existed in Captain Maconochie's time. No
entry of the former appeared on the books, but there
was one entry of the latter. In the course of the
investigation of other cases, it appeared that more than one
prisoner attempted suicide; that the surgeon did not
properly attend to the sick prisoners; that in the cell
of one man who died, several loaves were found
untouched; that another was put into the strait jacket and
deluged with water on a cold day in February, and left
in his wet clothes for some hours; that a boy named
Andrews committed suicide in consequence of the
cruelties inflicted on him; that the jacket was put on
another boy named Shaw, and while on the floor of his
cell three buckets of water were thrown over him,
and he was left lying in the wet extremely ill; and
that the surgeon stuffed the mouth of a prisoner with
salt to stop his cries while the jacket was put on.
The last part of the investigation consisted of examinations
of the Visiting Justices, Mr. W. Wills their
chairman, and two of their number, Mr. Howard
Luccock and Mr. H. Smith; and also of Mr. Perry the
Government Inspector of Prisons. Of their evidence
it may be said in general, that it did not tend to refute
any of the charges, while it showed, on their part,
inattention to and ignorance of the manner in which
the gaol had been managed. Towards the close, Mr.
Lucy and Mr. James, both magistrates, brought a serious
charge against Captain Maconochie. They alleged that
he had received £300 in three sums, which he had
never accounted for. The charge was only made public
at this investigation, and had not been mentioned by
the two magistrates to their colleagues. Captain
Maconochie explained, that he had received the money
from the treasurer of the Corporation as a loan, and
he considered it a perfectly open transaction: he came
down from London at great expense, and had to furnish
a house—that was the reason why he wanted the money:
when the treasurer died, he immediately communicated
with the then mayor. The Commissioners did not
consider that Captain Maconochie had intended to
misappropriate the money, which it appeared, had been
repaid. The report of the Commissioners has not yet
appeared.

The Commissioners then proceeded to a similar
investigation respecting Leicester Gaol. They examined the
governor, Mr. William Musson, and the chaplain,
surgeon, and other officers of the gaol. The evidence
of these persons generally, shows that a system of
extreme severity was rigidly but not partially carried
out. The separate system and crank labour were first
used in 1846. Prisoners above seventeen were required
to perform 1800, and prisoners under seventeen 1500
revolutions per hour. Eight hours a day was the longest
period of crank work; and the difficulty of the labour
was proportioned to the strength and previous occupation