The public buildings and institutions of Manchester are well worthy of its wealth and importance. The Exchange and Commercial Buildings, facing the Market-place, form a spacious handsome edifice, built of Runcorn stone: containing the News-room, Exchange, Library, Post-office, Chamber of Commerce, a spacious Dining-room, and other apartments. The members of the Literary and Philosophical Society have a suitable building for their meetings, and have published many volumes of Transactions in the English, French, and German languages, which are much circulated on the continent. The Royal Institution, embracing a variety of objects connected with literature, science, and the fine arts, has a fine building in the Grecian style, from a design by Mr. Barry, forming a splendid addition to the architectural ornaments of the town. The centre comprises the Hall and Lecture Theatre, lighted by a lantern from the ceiling, which may be darkened instantaneously at the will of the lecturer. One of the wings is appropriated as the Academy of the Fine Arts, with Exhibition-rooms, and the other as a Museum of Natural History. The whole cost of this elegant pile was estimated at £50,000. The Town Hall is a noble edifice, from a design by Mr. F. Goodwin, after the model of the Temple of Erectheus, at Athens, with a beautiful tower and dome in the centre, resembling the Tower of Andronicus, called “The Temple of Winds:” it contains various apartments for transacting the public business of the town, and one splendid room, 132 feet long, decorated with great elegance. The Town Hall at Salford is a handsome and commodious stone edifice by the same architect. The Society for promoting the study of natural history, has a valuable and extensive Museum also; and the town possesses flourishing Mechanics’ Institutions, Philological Society, Agricultural Society, Botanic Garden, several Libraries, two Theatres, Assembly-rooms, Concert-rooms, Annual Races, and Triennial Musical Festivals. There are twenty-six churches and chapels belonging to the Establishment, and more than fifty places of worship for the various denominations of Dissenters. The windows of St. John’s Church, in Byrom-street, contain some very ancient and beautiful stained glass, brought from a convent in Rouen; also, pictures in the vestry, and a fine piece of sculpture, by Flaxman. The Free Grammar School, founded in the 7th of Henry VIII., has a revenue of £4,000, and the number of scholars is from 150 to 200. The Blue Coat, St. Paul’s, Lancasterian, National, and Infants’ Schools, are all highly useful, and well-supported establishments; and the various Sunday Schools instruct as many as 30,000 children. The Hospitals and other Charitable Institutions are equally extensive in their sphere of usefulness, and together with the establishments before mentioned, worthy of the wealth, intelligence, and liberality of this great and important town. * * * * *