efficacy or otherwise of groynes, the result of which has been given in one or more of my numerous articles on storms and tides. It has often surprised me that — if only as an experiment — a small, but strong groyne has not been put down to run slightly to the east instead of the east, and then if it did not answer to place another against it bearing to the west, the acute angle of the two forming the shape of an elongated V. Where so many thousands of pounds are involved in foreshore protection, surely the cost of such an experiment ought not to be objected to.
The Commissioners Accounts. During the warm controversy between the two towns — both of which declared the Government Inspectors’ Report to be very erroneous — the Hastings News, apparently misinformed as to the Commissioners’ accounts not being open to inspection, said “We should very much like to see what Mr. Cressey[1] could not — their accounts”. To this, the Commissioners’ Clerk (Mr. W. W. Burton) replied, in a letter to the News, thus: — “Mr. Cressey[1] having been offered by me on behalf of the Commissioners, every information with respect to their Local Act or otherwise, having relation to the proposed application of the Public-Health Act to the borough of Hastings, and an inspection of the accounts having been subsequently afforded to the committee appointed to carry the last mentioned Act into operation, in the Borough, I feel bound to request you will take the earliest opportunity of correcting the misstatement. I take this opportunity also of reminding the ratepayers and others interested in the prosperity of the town of St. Leonards, that the accounts, as made out annually, are always open to their inspection and scrutiny”. — The St. Leonards Gazette was not then in existence, but after its birth, in 1855, the said annual accounts were published therein.
St. Mary Magdalen Church
On the 6th of January, the committee for the erection of this church met at Bacon’s Saxon Hotel, the said committee consisting of Earl Waldegrave, Rev. G. D. St. Quinton, the Ven. Archdeacon Hare, Rev. J. G. Foyster, Rev. H. Simpson, W. Brisco, Esq., W. D. Lucas-Shadwell, Capt. Davies, Mr. R. Deudney, Mr. G. A. Bacon and Mr. R. Hempsted. — Mr. Lucas-Shadwell gave a second donation of £50, and the subscriptions then amounted to about £3,800. A tender of £4,200 by Mr. Piper of London, for the erection of the church, without the tower, was accepted.
The Foundation Stone was laid on the 25th of June by the Countess of Waldegrave, and in the presence of several hundred persons. The Mayor -
