The total length of this canal is 53 miles, 1,024 yards, the artificial portion of which is only 2,739 yards, the remainder being formed by a chain of deep lakes and the Shubenacadie river.  The summit level is 95 feet 10 inches above the high-water surface of medium tides in Halifax harbour; and is attained by seven locks, each 87 feet long, and 22 feet six inches wide; and the tide locks nine feet in depth of water.  The descent into the Bay of Fundy, at highwater surface medium tides, is by eight locks.

The estimated expense of this interesting work is L54,000.

J.M.

* * * * *

MINSTRELS.

(To the Editor of the Mirror.)

Sir,—­Sometime ago a discussion arose in the public papers respecting the right of the King’s Sergeant Trumpeter to grant licenses to minstrels for carrying on their calling in London and Westminster.  I do not recollect whether this officer succeeded in establishing the right; but the following account of a similar privilege in another part of the country is founded on fact, and may furnish amusement to some of your readers:—­

About the latter end of the reign of Richard I., Randal Blundeville, Earl of Chester, was closely besieged by the Welsh in his Castle, in Flintshire.  In this extremity, the earl sent to his constable, Roger Lacy, (who for his fiery qualities received the appropriate cognomen of hell), to hasten, with what force he could collect, to his relief.  It happened to be Midsummer-day, when a great fair was held at Chester, the humours of which, it should seem, the worthy constable, witless of his lord’s peril, was then enjoying.  He immediately got together, in the words of my authority, “a great, lawless mob of fiddlers, players, cobblers, and such like,” and marched towards the earl.  The Welsh, although a musical people, not relishing this sort of chorus, thought it prudent to beat a retreat, and fled.  The earl, by this well-timed presto-movement, being released from danger, returned with his constable to Chester, and in reward of his service, granted by deed to Roger and his heirs, authority “over all the fiddlers, minstrels, and cobblers in Chester.”

About the end of the reign of John, or the beginning of that of Henry III., the fire of Roger being extinguished by death, his son John Lacy, granted this privilege by deed to his steward, one Hugh Dutton and his heirs, in the words following:—­“Dedi et concessi, et per hac presenti charta mea, confirmavi Hugoni de Dutton, et heredibus suis, magistratum omnium lecatorum, et meretricum, totius Cestershiriae,” &c.