At the Central Criminal Court, on the 21st, a very
fashionable looking gentleman, named William Augustus
Shean, was tried for Bigamy. On the 23rd of June he
married Miss Cecilia Charlotte Franchall, a lady of good
fortune, and on the 2nd of February, his first wife
being still alive—ruined and deserted on the continent
—he married Miss Mary Whittaker Greene, on whom
a fortune of £15,000 was settled. In 1849 his second
wife discovered his nefarious character, and left him;
he resorted to annoyances, and threats of criminal
accusation against her, and her friends instituted this
prosecution for bigamy. He was found guilty, and sent
for twelve months to Bridewell.

Mary Fitzgerald was indicted and convicted for
Bigamy; but many extenuating circumstances being
proved, and the object of the prosecutor (her second
husband) being merely to get rid of the burden of her
support, she was only sentenced to seven days' imprisonment.

The appearance of a person named John Bull before
the Bankruptcy Court, to pass his last examination,
elicited some singular circumstances. The bankrupt
was in the coal trade, and Messrs. Colson, in the same
trade, were his creditors to the amount of £792. He
afterwards took a lodging-house, and fitted it up at an
expense of £148, the furniture having afterwards been
seized by the landlord. He afterwards made an assignment
to his daughter, and lastly came before the Bankruptcy
Court, the petitioning creditor being his own nephew.
The bankrupt asserted that he had borrowed the money
from his daughter to fit up the lodging-house, which
was the cause of the assignment to her, and that the
debt to his nephew was a real debt. The commissioner
observed that the accounts were very unsatisfactory;
that he had reason to believe that the bankruptcy had
been concocted for a family purpose; and that the
examination must be adjourned.

Lord Brougham delivered judgment in the appeal of
Norris v. Cottle, confirming the decision of the Court
of Exchequer, and settling finally the Non-liability of
Provisional Committee-men.

NARRATIVE OF ACCIDENT AND
DISASTER.

On the 29th of July, a portion of Brinkway Mill, a large
Cotton factory recently erected at Stockport, Fell, burying
ten of the work-people in the ruins. It was the
dinner hour, and most of the people were absent, otherwise
the destruction of life would have been much
greater. The part of the building that fell was where a
large water-wheel was about to be erected; for which
purpose a larger space than usual was without an iron
pillar to support the upper floors, a long iron beam bearing
the weight, and it appeared that this beam had
given way. The inquest on the bodies found that the
Moors had been supported by a cast-iron beam of an
imperfect construction and of an improper calculation,
considering the weight it had to bear.

A Fire broke out at midnight, on the 1st inst., at the
New Model Prison for juvenile offenders at Parkhurst,
of a serious description. One of the principal wings,
containing 200 cells, was totally destroyed, besides
damage to other parts of the prison. It has been found
that the prison was fired by some of the elder convicts,
to enable them to effect their escape.

A dreadful Railway Accident happened at Glasgow
on the 1st inst. A special train left Perth in the morning,
by the Scottish Central Railway, to convey a large
party of excursionists to view the Highland Society's
exhibition in Glasgow. On approaching the city, the
train was divided into two sections; when the first went
forward it was detained by another train being on the
line at Cowlairs.  While thus stationary, the second
portion of the train suddenly approached at a great
speed, and dashed into the first train. Two cattle-
trucks, in which were twenty or thirty persons, were
smashed to pieces, and the other carriages were damaged.
Five persons were killed, and several others were
dangerously, if not fatally, injured.

On Sunday, the 3rd, the Prince Arthur steamer, while
on a pleasure excursion from Preston to Bangor, and
crowded with holiday passengers, was Wrecked near
Formby. Having sprung a leak, and being in a sinking
condition, she was run ashore, and the passengers saved
with the utmost difficulty, but the two firemen perished.
The vessel, an old boat, fitted for river navigation,
went to pieces almost immediately after striking.

Gravesend has suffered from a terrible and destructive
Fire, which broke out early on the morning of
Sunday the 11th, and destroyed no fewer than twenty-
nine houses, and damaged eleven others. Several
engines were obtained, but they did not prove very
efficient, and the fire in a great measure burnt itself
out. It is said that there was a difficulty in getting
people to work the engines, the authorities not having
paid those who gave their assistance on a former
occasion. The magistrates held an inquiry into the origin
of the disaster, but nothing decisive was elicited.

On the morning of the 20th, the Minerva steamer,
plying between Liverpool and Kingston, Ran down a
merchant brig, called the William Rushton, laden with
mahogany, from Mexico. The vessel sank immediately;
four of her crew were saved by the Minerva's life-boat,
but the remaining seven perished. The accident
happened about one o'clock in the morning, during a
hard gale; and the brig was not seen from the steamer
till it was too late to avoid the collision. The steamer
was so much damaged that it was necessary to run her
into Beaumaris, where the passengers for Kingston
were landed.

On the afternoon of the 21st, the roof of the Brick-
layers' Arms Station of the South Eastern Railway, in
the Old Kent Road, Fell in, burying in the ruins
several men and a number of first and second class
carriages. Happily there was no passenger train at the
station, and most of the workmen were saved from
death by the carriages round them. One man, however,
named Ryan, was killed, and several others were
seriously injured. About six years ago, the roof of a
portion of this station fell in with loss of life, and was
afterwards reconstructed on a new plan, supposed to be
perfectly safe.

SOCIAL, SANITARY, AND MUNICIPAL
PROGRESS.

The Registrar-General has made his Quarterly Return
of Marriages, Births and Deaths; comprising the
Births and Deaths registered by 2189 registrars in all
the districts of England during the Spring quarter
ending June 30th, 1850; and the Marriages in more than
12,000 churches or chapels, 2869 registered places of
worship unconnected with the Established Church, and
623 superintendent-registrars' offices, in the quarter
which ended March 31st, 1850.

The Marriages were 30,425 in the quarter that ended
on March 31st. 1850; the marriages in the corresponding
quarters of 1847-8-9, were 27,480, 28,398, 28,270. The
number of marriages in the first quarter of 1850 was
only once exceeded in the 11 corresponding quarters of
1839-49; and the proportion of marriages to population
is shown to be much higher in the first quarter of 1850
than in any corresponding quarter since 1839, except in
the March quarters of 1845, 1846, when the labouring
classes were in full employment.

The Births registered in the quarter that ended March
31, 1850, were 144,602; in the quarter that ended June
30, 155,727. Births are always more numerous in the
first than in the second half of the year; and from 1840
to 1845 the births registered in the first quarters were
more numerous than those registered in the second
quarters of the six years; but in 1846-8-9-50, a change has
taken place, and the excess of births has been thrown
upon the June quarters. The number of births in the
June quarter of 1850 is the greatest ever registered in
England in the same time. The annual rate of births
is obtained by comparing the number of children born
in a given time with the corrected population. It was
in the last June quarter 3·489 per cent., which is the
same as the rate in the corresponding quarter of 1849;
and less than that in the June quarter of 1846; but