13.--Died, Sir William Cubitt, the eminent engineer. Born in Norfolk, in
1785, he was apprenticed to a joiner, and, becoming a very superior
handicraftsman, he rapidly took a prominent position as a maker of
agricultural implements. Within a short time he became a millwright, and
about 1807 invented self-regulating windmill sails, and ultimately became
connected with Messrs. Ransome and Son, of Ipswich. He was the inventor
also of the treadmill for gaols and houses of correction. His reputation
increasing his engagements, it became necessary for him to remove to the
Metropolis in 1826, and after that period there was scarcely a port,
harbour, dock, navigable river, or canal in the United Kingdom with which
he was not in some way engaged. The South-Eastern Railway from London to
Dover was designed and executed by him. He undertook the bold project of
blowing away the face of the Round Down cliff, which he successfully
executed by exploding 18,000 lbs. of gunpowder in one blast, and
precipitated one million tons of chalk cliff into the sea. The great
landing-stage at Liverpool, the deck of which was nearly one acre in
extent, was a unique example of his work. As consulting engineer of the
Great Northern Railway, he materially contributed to the production of
one of the best lines in England. One of his last public works was the
superintendence of the construction of the palace for the Great
Exhibition in Hyde Park in 1851, which he undertook at the pressing
instance of his coadjutors on the Royal Commission, and his services were
recognised in a marked manner by the Queen and the Prince Consort.
22.--The Mayor of Norwich (Mr. W. J. Utten Browne) delivered a lecture to
the members of the parochial library, Lakenham, on "The Times of King
Charles the First."
24.--Died, suddenly, of apoplexy, at his residence, West Parade, Earlham
Road, Norwich, in his 46th year, Mr. Edward Garrod, editor of the NORFOLK
CHRONICLE.
28.--Charles Dickens gave the former of two readings at St. Andrew's
Hall, Norwich. The work selected was "David Copperfield." On the 29th
he read "Nicholas Nickleby at Mr. Squeer's School," and the Trial scene
from the "Pickwick Papers." "Our opinion is," the NORFOLK CHRONICLE
remarked, "that Mr. Dickens as a reader fails to do justice to himself as
an author."