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sub-feuars to have an immediate meeting of all parties concerned, with a view to forward an amicable adjustment, which the Committee and the feuars and sub-feuars even yet join in being most anxious to effect.

The Committee find, by a communication received from the sub-feuars, during the meeting, that they are willing to refer the amount of their indemnification to the Lord President, Lord Justice Clerk, and Lord Chief Commissioner; and that the sub-feuars have requested the Lord Provost to inform them what sacrifice the Town asks from them, and have acquainted his Lordship, that they will immediately take his communication on that subject into serious consideration, and with no wish of throwing unreasonable obstacles in the way. The Committee trust, in these circumstances, that the Lord Provost and Town Council will reconsider the determination communicated in the letter from the Agents for the Town to Mr Stuart.

Mr Stuart stated, that he felt it to be his duty to apply to Mr Claud Russell for precise information on the subject of the balance remaining of the South Bridge funds, and he laid before the Meeting a letter from himself to Mr Russell, of yesterday's date, with that gentleman's answer, from which it appears, that those funds amounted, at Whitsunday 1817, to £12,087, 7s. Id. of which the Town is possessed of £11,381, 9s. 5d.—£9781, 9s. 5d. being due by promissory notes of the Chamberlain of the city of Edinburgh.

Mr Stuart farther stated, that, from information communicated to him by the subfeuars and respectable builders, it appears that the above balance, with the value of the feu-duty for the North Bridge buildings, will far more than discharge all the claims of the feuars and sub-feuars, supposing them entitled to full indemnification for taking down the houses to the height of fifteen feet above the causeway of the bridge.

At an adjourned meeting of the Committee, held on 17th February, Thomas Allan, Esq. in the chair;—Mr Stuart laid before the Meeting a very long letter, from Messrs M'Ritchie and Murray, agents for the city, to him.

These gentlemen state in that letter, that "the Lord Provost cannot enter into any reference or submission, whatever the form of it may be, and however unexceptionable the arbiters may be, which shall assume that the City may thereby become liable to indemnify the sub-feuars, and ought, upon this footing to become parties to a valuation by architects, to ascertain the amount of that indemnification."—Messrs M'Ritchie and Murray farther state, in the concluding part of the letter, that "they are desired to say, that the Lord Provost must be permitted to decline, as irregular and improper, all extra-judicial discussion, by private correspondence or otherwise, while the cause is in dependence before the proper Judges."

The Committee have received this communication with equal surprise and regret, and they cannot doubt that the Lord Provost's declaration of his determination not to agree to a reference, however respectable the arbiters may be, and to decline all extra-judicial discussion while the question is in dependence before the Supreme Court, will induce all classes of the community to come forward to furnish the Committee with the means of bringing that question, which was not commenced until the most eminent legal advice had been obtained, to the most speedy, and as they cannot doubt, to a successful termination.

The Right Hon. John Robinson, and, in his absence, the Right Hon. Thomas Wallace, is appointed President of the Committee of Council for the consideration of all matters relating to Trade and Foreign Plantations.

Mr William Lake, as Consul at Falmouth for his Majesty the King of the Netherlands.

The Right Hon. Frederick John Robinson to the office of the Treasurer of his Majesty's Navy, in the room of the Right Hon. George Rose, deceased.

William Fullarton Lindsay Carnegie, Esq. of Spynie and Boysack, has been pleased to present the Rev. Thomas Cannan, preacher of the gospel, to the church and parish of New Spynie, in the presbytery of Elgin, vacant by the death of the Rev. George M'Hardie.