Events from the year 1867 in the United Kingdom. Incumbents Monarch – Victoria Prime Minister – Edward Smith-Stanley, 14th Earl of Derby (Conservative) Parliament – 19th Events By February – The Society of Arts inaugurates the Blue plaque scheme, advanced by William Ewart, for erecting memorial tablets on London houses previously the homes of notable people, the first being at Lord Byron's birthplace, 24 Holles Street, off Cavendish Square. 11 February – abortive Fenian attempt to seize Chester Castle. 5 March – Fenian Rising in Ireland. 15 March – 'Conference of Trades' first meets; later forming the nucleus of the Trades Union Congress. 16 March – first publication of an article by Joseph Lister outlining the discovery of antiseptic surgery, in The Lancet. 29 March – Canadian Confederation: the British North America Act receives Royal Assent, forming the Dominion of Canada. This unites the Province of Canada (Quebec and Ontario), New Brunswick, and Nova Scotia as of 1 July. Ottawa becomes the capital, and John A. Macdonald becomes the Dominion's first Prime Minister. 1 April – Strait Settlement of Singapore, formerly ruled from Calcutta, becomes a Crown Colony under the jurisdiction of the Colonial Office in London. 11 May Treaty of London: the great powers of Europe reaffirm the neutrality of Luxembourg, ending the Luxembourg Crisis. The first comic opera with a score by Arthur Sullivan to be publicly performed, the one-act Cox and Box with libretto by F. C. Burnand, opens at the Adelphi Theatre in London and runs for 300 performances. 18 May – John Stuart Mill's motion to give women the vote is decisively rejected by the all-male House of Commons. 20 May – Laying of the foundation stone of the Royal Albert Hall by Queen Victoria. 22 May – Henry Chaplin's Hermit wins the Epsom Derby in a snowstorm at 1000:15 odds, ruining Chaplin's rival in love, Harry, Marquess of Hastings, who has bet heavily against him. 3 June – The sport of lacrosse is introduced from Canada. 1 July – Canadian Confederation: British North America Act of 29 March comes into force, creating the Dominion of Canada, the first independent dominion in the British Empire. 14 July – Swedish chemist Alfred Nobel demonstrates dynamite in a quarry in Redhill, Surrey, having patented it in the UK on 7 May. 15 August – Benjamin Disraeli's Second Reform Act enfranchises many urban working men and adds 938,000