The Chief Commissioner in his annual report gives the number of prostitutes apprehended last year as 5,420. Of these 1,256 were charged with the offence of annoying male passengers for the purpose of prostitution, and 1,017 were convicted. During the last 10 years the number of prostitutes apprehended is 65,837. 27,249 were charged with the offence, and 23,793 were convicted. Superintendent Thoms, of the C division (in which the Haymarket is) states that after the public-houses are closed at half-past twelve some 20,000 persons are brought into the streets and are subject to police control. Many at once leave the neighborhood; a large proportion, chiefly young men of all grades of society, remain to promenade, and as a consequence prostitutes from various parts are present also. Disorder is the result, and the police receive scant assistance and support from the public. Respecting the presence of so many prostitutes in Piccadilly and Regent-street, and the surprise expressed by the public from time to time that they are permitted to ply their calling, he says many of the public were unaware that such women are free to walk the streets so long as they behave themselves. The police have done, he maintains, their utmost to check the evil, and without the assistance of the public. This is proved by the following figures:- For the three years ending 30 June last, 4,286 of these unfortunates were arrested in that district, of whom 2,813 were English, 769 French, 641 German, and 63 Belgian. Superintendent Draper, of the D division, states that there is a great diminution in the number of prostitutes arrested as compared with the previous year in that division, which, he states, is due to the result of the action taken against Endacott.

The number of people killed in the streets in the Metropolitan police district during last year was 142; 4,567 were maimed or injured. Cabs and omnibuses are responsible for the majority of the deaths and injuries.

George Mountain, a short, thick-set man, of about 30 years of age, has been arrested on the charge of having murdered his mother at Sherburn-in-Elmet, in Yorkshire. Mrs. Catherine Mountain, was the landlady of the Travellers' Rest public-house, and was between 70 and 80 years of age. On Wednesday night, about ten o'clock, the only persons in the house were a boy, who was asleep in bed, the accused George Mountain, his mother, and Annie Hutchinson, the servant-girl. About half-past eleven the man began to knock his mother about, and, getting her on the floor, kicked her to death, the old woman dying, between one and two o'clock, in the presence of the maid, who was perfectly helpless, and who was threatened by the accused that he would "do her the same." His brutality did not stop with the death of his mother, for, having stripped off all her clothing, he

up to about four o'clock in the morning. The features of the murdered woman were disfigured beyond recognition, and the body was frightfully injured.

Another account says that after Mrs. Mountain had expired her son pulled off her clothing, and threw portions of her body into the fire. Part of the corpse was consumed, leaving nothing but the whitened bones.

At the examination of the prisoner Superintendent Stott said the woman presented a frightful appearance. One leg and one arm were fractured. The face was completely unrecognisable; the teeth were strewn all over the floor. The roof of the mouth was also found on the floor, and fragments of bones in the fireplace. The walls up to the ceiling were

The prisoner had the girl locked up in the room from eleven p.m. to half-past seven a.m., and a great part of the time held her down and threatened to do the same to her as he had done to the deceased. Mr. Stott produced in court the man's boots, which were completely saturated with his mother's blood, and had portions of flesh and hair adhering to them. The roof of the mouth and fragments of bone, teeth, and the jaw were also exhibited.

Annie Hutchinson, servant, said: He commenced about half-past eleven, and kept on kicking, off and on, up to four o'clock in the morning. She died some time between one and two, but he continued to kick her up to four o'clock. The

I saw him throw some bones into the fireplace. He threatened to murder me, and kept me on my knees a good part of the night. I was confined with him in the room till half-past seven this morning. Before Mrs. Mountain was dead he pulled all her clothes off, and left her in a state of complete nudity. I screamed out during the night, and Mrs. Mountain screamed once. All the doors and windows were fastened.

On the prisoner being asked if he had anything to say to the charge, he answered, "I thought it was some one come to rob us, and did not know it was my mother." The prisoner was remanded for a week. He looked rather wild.

Frequent allusions having been made to the murders in Texas which bear a close resemblance to the Whitechapel horrors, a representative of The Star dug out a Texan gentleman at present on a visit to London, and got from him details of the occurrences in his native State.

The gentleman came from the town of Austen, the capital of Texas.

How many persons were killed in your town?" asked the reporter: - Twelve; all women, and all, or nearly all, of questionable character. Ten of them were negresses and two white women. They mostly belonged to the servant class, who were of loose reputation. The two white women moved in fairly good circles; but they were also women who had not the highest character. A curious fact about one of the white women was that her husband was found greatly bruised on the night of her death. For some reason or other, however, it was thought that he himself was the murderer, and that he had taken advantage of the prevalent scare to get rid of an unloved wife. He was tried for murder, and was once convicted, but on an appeal he was acquitted.

Was there any resemblance between the modus operandi of your Texan murderer and the plan of the Whitechapel fiend? - No except that both selected women and women of a certain class.

Was the method of murder the same. Had any of the women their throats cut? - No; not one. They were all killed with a blunt instrument; their skulls in most cases were battered in. They were also very much bruised and slashed about the body; but again with a blunt instrument.

Were the murders periodical, as in the Whitechapel cases? - Yes; but the intervals were longer. They took place usually at a month's interval, though sometimes a couple of months intervened. It was curious, too, that they always took place when the moon was full. The idea was that they were the work of a madman who became more intensely insane under the influence of the full moon.

What course was taken to put the murders down? Two murders were committed on a Christmas Eve. The next day there was a meeting of the citizens, and patrols were arranged. These patrols of the citizens went about for months, and often caused great inconvenience and annoyance. I myself have been stopped several times when coming home with a lady from the theatre, and have been asked my name, destination, &c. These inconveniences, however, we were all willing to put up with.

Did this intimidate the murderer? - Apparently, for we never had any others. I may add that the effect upon the city was somewhat the same as in the East-end with you. Our houses are differently constructed. The room in which the servant sleeps is usually in the yard apart from the house. For a long time after the murders servants refused to sleep in these rooms, and had to be taken into the house. In some cases they slept in the halls, there being no room elsewhere.

Has there ever been a trace or a suspicion of anybody? - Never; the secret remains as impenetrable to-day as at the time when they were in full scare.

A solicitor writes us: I think that the detection of the Whitechapel murderer will be made impossible if the police and the public persevere in what appears to me a false scent. The general idea seems to be that the murderer lives in a low lodging house, or in some poverty-stricken den where the houseless and homeless gather together. This is absurd. The inmate of such a place would betray himself at once. The hour at which he returned would be recorded or remembered; and he would be observed washing the stains from his hands or clothes. No; the murderer is some man living with his wife and family; or, in rooms of his own or a house of his own, which he can enter with a latchkey without attracting the attention of anybody, and without anybody's permission or notice. In the quietness of his own bedroom he can calmly wash himself and his clothes, and go to bed without observation and without care. I think he must, however, live in the East and not in the West-end, as this theory might suggest. If he were living in the West-end, he would be almost certainly caught either walking away or driving away. A quiet house or private lodgings in the East-end - that's where the fellow skulks.

(Further news relating to the Whitechapel murder will be found on page 3.)

Mr. R. Hancock asked Mr. J. Lobb, at a meeting of the City of London Tradesmen's Club, yesterday evening, whether he, as one of the trustees of the Spitalfields estate, the property of St. Bride's Church, Fleet-street, knew if The Star reporter was correct in describing their property as harboring vice and filth. - Mr. Lobb explained that he had only recently been elected as a trustee of the Parochial Estates Committee of St. Bride's, and until he read the report in The Star he did not know that the parish possessed such an estate. Something should be done to improve it. - Mr. S. Weingott, a member of the same committee, stated that the property was bought by the rich parish of St. Bride and let out at a mere nominal rent. A Mr. Bedford took it off their hands at £400 per annum. Mr. Bedford unfortunately became bankrupt, and died within the shadow of the workhouse. The property fell into the hands of the Capital and Counties Bank, and being only the mortgagees, they were not under covenant to continue the improvements commenced by Mr. Bedford. The committee had done their utmost. They had closed a disreputable public-house, the Northumberland Arms. From one end to the other the estate was inhabited by a very poor class.

Mr. A. C. Morton, C.C.: Do you say this report in The Star is an incorrect one?

Mr. Weingott: I say nothing about it.

Continuing, Mr. Weingott said he thought no blame should be attached to the committee. They were in the hands of the Charity Commissioners, and they had no power to lay out any money without their permission.

Mr. Morton said he considered that the committee and London were deeply indebted to The Star for exposing this serious scandal. The St. Bride's people had plenty of powers for carrying out the work of improvement. What surprised him was that the St. Bride's people did not know anything about the matter till

The only time he visited the neighborhood his pocket was picked. The mischief arose from the bad way in which they let the property, and the conditions in their leases made it impossible to get good tenants.

Mr. Lobb said if he found the committee possessed no power he would go to the Charity Commissioners. At the back of Robin Hood-court there existed some frightful hovels that required to be pulled down, and substantial houses erected in their place.

Mr. Hough: Yes, the property is rented of the freeholders by two policemen, and they get a good thing out of it.

How long does the lease of the St. Bride's property run?

Mr. Weingott said the lease of St. Bride's property expired in three years.

Superintendent Dunlop, of the A Division, in his annual report to Sir Charles Warren, says a remedy for the evils of Trafalgar-square could be found in its conversion to a garden. There is ample space here for a landscape gardener to display his abilities.

Henry Glennie was again charged at Clerkenwell to-day on suspicion of having been concerned in the murder of Frances Maria Wright, at 19, Canonbury-terrace. George Wilson, a milkman, said that on 16 May, while he was standing in Canonbury-terrace, talking to another milkman, he saw a man carrying a bag run towards Canonbury-road. He went alongside the New River. A lady pursuing him called to him he supposed to stop the man, but she spoke French and he could not understand her. He would not like positively to say that prisoner was the man. The man he saw had only a slight moustache. Glennie has a moustache and short beard and whiskers. - Cross-examined: The man was wearing a black morning coat, not an overcoat. He was near enough to the man to have stopped him if he had known in time. He did not pick prisoner out at the station. He was not going to swear that prisoner was the man, though he was a man of similar stamp

.

A pensioner from the Hussars named Conway asked a barman at the Duke of York in Clerkenwell this morning to sign some paper to Captain Milne about his having lost his pension papers. Conway was at first supposed to be the man the Mitre-square victim lived with before she lived with Kelly, but at the police office in Old Jewry he proved he was not the man.

A News Agency says: - The police authorities attach a great deal of importance to the spelling of the word "Jews" in the writing on the wall. The language of the Jews in the East-end is a hybrid dialect, known as Yiddish, and their mode of spelling the word Jews would be "Juwes."

This is absolutely incorrect. A representative of The Star called at the Jewish Chronicle office, and was informed by the editor, and by a responsible member of the staff whose father is a Polish Jew, that the Yiddish word for Jew is Yiddin, the word "Yiddish" meaning, of course, the language of the Yiddins.

Much indignation is felt amongst the Jews at these repeated and unjustifiable attempts to fasten the responsibility for the dastardly crimes on them.

The Jewish Chronicle says: - "We are authorised by Dr. Gordon Browne, the City divisional surgeon, to state, with reference to a suggestion that the City and Whitechapel murders were the work of a Jewish slaughterer, that he has examined the knives used by the Jewish slaughterers, all of which have been submitted to him by the City detectives, and he is thoroughly satisfied that none of them could have been used.

Shortly before twelve o'clock last night a man, who gives his name as John Foster, was arrested in Belfast on suspicion. The prisoner, who was found lodging at the house of Samuel Beatty, Memel-street, had in his possession a bag containing a large knife and three razors. One of the latter bears marks of blood. The man is about 30 years of age, 5ft. 8in. or 9in. high, of slight build, and fair complexion, and is shabbily dressed. He had also close upon £20.

A report was current late last night that the police suspect a man who is at present a patient in an East-end infirmary. He has been admitted since the commission of the last murder. Owing to his suspicious behavior their attention was directed to him. Detectives are making inquiries, and he is kept under surveillance.

A man known in Spitalfields by the name of "Parnell" has been arrested on suspicion of connection with the Whitechapel murders. He had long been a regular lodger at the Beehive Chambers corner of Brick-lane and Prince-street, but absented himself on the night of the last murders, and also on the following night, and he has been very irregular in his attendance there since that time. The deputy of the lodging-house thought it his duty to report the circumstances to the police, and the fellow was arrested when he got up this morning. At the Commercial-street Police-station he said his right name was Andrews, and that he was a book hawker. He explained that he had slept at another house on the nights in question, and gave such a fair account of himself that the police believe him innocent, though he will be detained until further inquiries have been made. The prisoner is not more than 22 years of age, and very boyish in his appearance.

Ernest Ady, a mulatto and a journalist, was drunk and disorderly at Stamford-hill last night and obstinately refused to "move on." - In reply to the Dalston magistrate he said he went to the district to make certain reports, and - well, he had no defence to make. - The police said he was not known, and he was discharged.

William Pickard was charged at the Thames Police-court with stabbing Margaret Townley, an unfortunate. - Townley said that while she was standing at her door nursing her baby, a quarrel arose, and Pickard stabbed her on the forehead. - Jane Thrush said prisoner had said that he would do for Townley if it were 10 years to come. - He was remanded.

Thomas Davis, of decidedly bucolic appearance, described as an agricultural laborer, was charged with begging. This was not his worst offence. He was singing in doleful strains an apparently interminable refrain, called "The Farmer's Boy." - Prisoner: I was brought up as a farmer's boy. - Mr. Partridge: How old are you? - Prisoner: I dunno. I reckon about 60. - Mr. Partridge: You don't suggest that you are in your second childhood do you? You call yourself a farmer's boy at 60 years of age. (Laughter.) Where were you born? - Prisoner: I dunno. - Mr. Partridge: Where did you come from - your parish? - Prisoner: That I dunno. I never had a parish. (Laughter.) - Mr. Partridge: Have you any relations or friends? - Prisoner: Not that I knows of. - Mr. Partridge: Where have you been sleeping lately? - Prisoner: Sometimes in lodging-houses. - The Magistrate: You look able-bodied. Do you say that there is anything the matter with you? - Prisoner: Yes, mister, I am subject to fits. - Mr. Partridge remanded him to hear what the mendicity officers know about him.

Mr. Montagu Williams learned a little more about East-end lodging-houses to-day. Mary Hawkes, 18, and a young fellow named Fordham were charged with assaulting a Scandinavian student, who was taken while intoxicated to a common lodging-house in Flower and Dean-street, where he paid 8d. for a "double." A policeman who followed the pair heard the man cry for help, and went into the house in time to see him thrown downstairs minus his purse and trousers. Mr. Montagu Williams, who heard part of the case last week, demanded to have the deputy brought before him. - She appeared to-day in the person of Margaret Brown. The house was owned by a Mr. Coates who kept a chandler's shop in Dorset-street, and lived in Whitecross-street. - Replying to the magistrate the witness said there were 19 "double" beds and seven "singles" in the place. She remembered letting in the female prisoner and a man - a foreigner - the latter paying 8d. for a double bed. Witness also knew the prisoner Fordham, whom she let in ten minutes after. She could not account for Fordham being afterwards found with Mary Hawkes in a "double," when he paid for a single bed. She did know the other four men who attacked the prosecutor - there were no other men that she knew of up there. - Witness had sole charge of the place, and was paid 6s. a week. - Police-constable Dennis said that when he entered the place the deputy was not to be seen. Witness explained that the "single" beds were undivided, and stood in rows in a large room.

were partitioned off. The partitions did not touch the floor or the ceiling, a space of about 18in. being left top and bottom. A person might pass from one to another room by a good squeeze. - Police-sergeant 32 H said, with an inspector he has been to inspect the registered lodging-houses in the district. There were 127, accommodating about 6,000 persons. They were all visited once a week on an average. Witness doubted if a single house would be found without thieves and prostitutes among its lodgers. - The prosecutor was not in attendance, and it was said that he was on the eve of sailing for America. Mr. Williams remarked that he should chance his being in attendance, and committed the prisoners for trial. He also directed that the proceedings at the lodging-house in question be reported at Scotland-yard.

SIR. - We seem to be breathing nothing but the odor of the slaughterhouse. Is it necessary? The murders are horrible enough, and we must hunt, but we are getting too familiar with "ghastly details." What good end is to be served by that? Talking of this a few days ago, I took up a Leicester paper, with no special selection, and just as a test. Here is the result. The following headings appear in this one copy alone: - "Shocking affair at Chorley," "A priest's dead body burned to cinders in church," "Cut to pieces on the railway" (this was so relished that it was repeated in another part of the paper), "Cut to pieces at a railway station," "Sudden death of a child," "The Blackfriars mystery," "A cruel case," "A child worried by a pig," "Another suicide with carbolic acid," "The wife murder at Huddersfield," "The Whitechapel murder," "Attack on a Mormon agent in Wales," "A clergyman fined for drunkenness," "Another Thames mystery," "A human arm found in a timber yard," "Another railway accident in America - serious loss of life."

Why rake so much in one direction? It is becoming a serious question whether a decent and well-ordered household should go on admitting such buckets of slush. - Yours, &c.,

Leicester, 6 Oct.
[We insert "J.P.H's" letter, but we confess we do not quite see his point. How can newspapers avoid telling their readers about these things. We admit that they should record them in a non-vulgar and truthful way, but it is useless to shut one's eyes to what daily happens. For instance, if clergymen get drunk why should they not be fined, and why should not their fine be recorded as an example to other clergymen. If terrible murders occur in the East, why should not the West be told of it, and why should not the public be instructed in the worst as well as the best facts? Truthful realism is good; it is only lying realism which should be avoided. - ED. Star.]

SIR. - The Bishop of Bedford, or anyone having an anxious desire to raise the condition of the East-end population, be they so-called fallen or otherwise, need not fear that Mr. Hayward or his friends will trespass upon their ten years' preserved land or cash with their efforts. By all means let it be a long pull and a strong pull and a pull together. We do not wish to glorify ourselves, but to attempt to glorify God by doing or assisting in a good work. Mr. Hayward only wishes to take out of the streets those who are sleeping on doorstep or wandering about without a shelter from the inclemency of the night, be they men or women, upright or fallen: the same God is over all. Bishop of Bedford, go to work and raise the fallen women; it is Christian work. Meantime, they shall not be shelterless, nor the men, in this Christian land of ours if we can give them shelter. - Yours, &c.,

9 Oct.