The captain and second mate of the steamer Orion, which was wrecked in June, have been sentenced, the former to eighteen months' imprisonment, the latter to ten years' transportation, for gross and culpable negligence of duty.----Lieutenant Gale, somewhat celebrated as an aeronaut, lost his life while making an ascent on horseback at Bordeaux. He had descended in safety, and the horse was removed; the diminution of the weight caused the balloon to ascend rapidly, with the aeronaut, who was somewhat intoxicated, clinging to it. He of course soon fell, and, a day or two after, his body was found, with the limbs all broken, and mutilated by dogs.----Mr. Mongredien, a London corn-factor, has published a pamphlet, in which he endeavors to estimate the probable amount of home-grown food upon which Ireland can calculate the coming year. As the result of extensive inquiries, he is of the opinion that the potato crop will suffice as food for the masses only until January; and that the wheat-crop amounts to but three-fourths of last year's amount.----The Postmaster General has directed that all letters addressed to the United States, shall be forwarded by the first mail packet that sails, whether British or American, unless specially directed otherwise.----Viscount Fielding, who occupied the chair at the great Church Meeting in Free-Mason's Hall, on the 23d of July, has abandoned the English Church for that of Rome.----A number of the Catholic bishops of Ireland were appointed by government as official visitors of the New College, to which they were known to be bitterly opposed. The appointments have been scornfully rejected by the bishops.----The Britannia Bridge, one of the greatest triumphs of modern engineering, was completed on the 13th of September, by the lowering of the last of the tubes to its permanent resting-place. Some curious acoustic effects have been observed in connection with this work. Pistol shots, or any sonorous noises, are echoed within the tube half a dozen times. The cells at the top and bottom, are used by the engineers as speaking tubes, and they can carry on conversation through them in whispers; by elevating the voice persons may converse through the length of the bridge--nearly a quarter of a mile. The total cost of the entire structure has been £601,865. The total weight of each of the wrought iron roadways now completed, represents 12,000 tons, supported on a total mass of masonry of a million and a half cubic feet, erected at the rate of three feet in a minute.----Mount Blanc was ascended on the 29th of September, to its top-most peak, by two gentlemen from Ireland, Mr. Gratton, late of the army, and Mr. Richards, with a party of the brave mountaineers of Chamouni. The enterprise was considered so dangerous, that the guides left their watches and little valuables behind, and the two gentlemen made their wills, and prepared for the worst. The ascent is always accompanied with great peril, as steps have to be cut up the