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considerable force “including artillery "to march to reduce it. It is said to be connected with “the tyranny of tax-collectors"-a fruitful source of rebellion.

ports, to pay the interest of the island debt. A petition was getting up against it, to be sent to the Council, should it pass the House. The island was healthy, but business was very dull.

In Barbados a Public Meeting to promote an extension of the franchise had been held, and resulted in the formation of a committee in furtherance of that object. Two anti-slavery meetings had been held, the first called by the Lord Bishop, the Chief Justice, the President of the Council, and Speaker of the House of Assembly. This meeting adopted a petition to the Imperial Parliament, praying for the enforcement of the treaties with foreign Powers. The second meeting was called to afford a deputation from the Anti-Slavery Society of England an opportunity of addressing the people. These meetings were well attended, the speakers consisting of white, black, and coloured persons. The weather was highly propitious for the ensuing crop. A much larger yield of sugar was expected than in 1849. The corn and provision crops were good and abundant, with the exception of the yams, which had again been destroyed by blight.

The Overland Mail has brought news from Bombay | been brought in to raise a revenue, by a duty on imto the 17th, from Calcutta to the 7th December, and from Hongkong to the 30th November. From Bombay information is brought that more plotting against our rule by the fugitive Ranee has been discovered; agents had been tampering with our troops, and thus had, as in many late instances, been delivered into the hands of the authorities by the honest native subalterns. The young Maharajah had been sent under strong guard to Futtehghur. The chieftains whose arrest for plottings in higher regions were mentioned in late accounts, were to be sent to Calcutta, there to remain under surveillance for life. The Governor-general was on his way down the Indus, and would be at Moultan on the 13th or 14th instant; Lady Dalhousie was coming home ill, and her husband proposed to accompany her as far as Suez. From Calcutta there is an account of personal adventures of two of our officers, which have ended in their imprisonment by the rajah of Sikkim. Dr. Campbell, the British resident of Darjeeling, a station near the Thibetian frontier of Bengal, and Dr. Hooker, a botanist, son of Sir William Hooker, went on a botanical exploration over the Thibetian frontier, and were arrested by the Tartar authorities; they were sent under guard to the rajah of Sikkim, whom the Tartars hold responsible for the sacredness of their frontier. The rajah sent word to our resident at Darjeeling, that he would keep his prisoners in custody till he obtained satisfaction for grievances he had been writing about to our Government for three years past; he was answered with a demand for the prisoners instanter, and with advice to rely on the impartiality of the Governor-general for justice. Meanwhile, the captives were treated with great perso

nal cruelty.

From Hongkong the only news of interest relates to the expedition, consisting of the Phlegethon and Fury war-steamers, and the Columbine frigate, under Commander J. C. D. Hay, against the pirate Shapng-tsai, which set out from Hongkong on the 1st of November, just before the last accounts were despatched. The pirate fleet had retreated to Hainan, and thence to the Bay of Tonquin; the chief trusting to his knowledge of the difficult waters. On the 17th November our ships fell in with one of his look-out vessels; she took to the shallows, but was disabled by the Phlegethon's guns, and then pursued and destroyed in the shallows by the Phlegethon's boats. On the 20th, the pirate fleet was discovered in the mouth of a river twelve miles beyond Hoo-nong. It consisted of a large junk mounting 42 guns, commanded by Shapng-tsai himself, and sixty-three other war-junks mounting armaments ranging from 34 guns down to 6 guns; the whole force afloat being some 1224 guns and 3150 men. Our fleet was steered into the river by a pilot who had escaped from the shore. In forty minutes our three ships were all engaged; in another hour the fire of the enemy had been silenced; and before eight p.m., twenty-seven junks were in flames and nearly all the rest cut off from retreat. Upwards of 1000 pirates deserted their ships and took to some islands, and were there attacked by the natives whose villages they had ravaged. Next day, twenty-four more junks were destroyed. In the end, only six of the smallest junks escaped, with the pirate chief himself on board, and these the mandarins declared they would shortly destroy. Our fleet was assisted by a small force of junks, despatched under a mandarin, Major-general Hwang, by the Governor-general Ho; and it is stated that he distinguished himself by his courageous and intelligent command.

The Jamaica House of Assembly have passed a bill, for one year, giving the Governor a salary of 45001.; and at the same time a memorial has been transmitted to the Queen, praying her to relieve the island of this heavy expense, and requesting that it may be paid from England as is done in some other islands. This bill is a renewal of a previous bill, also for one year, which expired on the 31st of December last. Another bill has

Advices from the Cape of Good Hope, which are to the 16th of November, state that in answer to innumerable petitions to send the convicts away, without waiting for the receipt of the order to do so from England, the Governor said that he would not commit an act so illegal, impolitic, and of dangerous example. The persons who, in defiance to the Anti-convict Association and the pledge, had furnished supplies to the government officials and the military, had lost all their customers. Some of them had intimated to the newspapers, and especially to the South African Advertiser, that actions for damages were to be brought against them. In one instance the damages were laid at 5007.

Sixteen of these

The accounts from Canada state that the Government had dismissed seventeen Magistrates from the commission of the peace, as having been parties to the address for annexation to the United States. persons were men of station in Montreal; two of them -Mr. Jacob de Witt and Mr. Benjamin Holmes-menbers of the Colonial Parliament. Mr. Holmes had

replied to the official notification of his dismissal with the resignation of his place as member of the commission for the management of roads, an office he filled with much advantage to the community

News from Western Australia have been received to the middle of November. The Swan River settlement had been thrown into great excitement by the official announcement that the colony had been converted into vailing boon of a protective force and parliamentary a penal colony from June 1849, without the countergrant, which had been tacitly calculated on as certain with much warmth against the trick by which they accompaniments of the convicts. The journals inveigh have suffered; and express great indignation at the loathsome contamination of their shores which the Colonial Office purposes.

PROGRESS OF EMIGRATION AND COLONISATION. An interesting letter from Mrs. Chisholm, on the subject of Family Colonisation, has been published. It contains the following observations:-"There is one fact I feel most anxious to impress upon the minds of all who are interested in the amelioration of the poor by means of emigration, viz., that their emigrating to Australia improves under ordinary prudence the circumstances of the individuals, and, if they conduct themselves with propriety, raises their position in society. With young women the greatest caution is necessary in this respect, for their opportunities of doing well and advancing themselves by marriage

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The Committee of the Female Emigration Fund have received a report from their Sub-Committee, on the best mode of conducting the emigration. The following points appear to be settled:-The candidates must not exceed thirty-five years of age; they must be free from any bodily or mental defect likely to impair their usefulness as settlers; they should have had the smallpox, or have been vaccinated; their characters for industry and morality should be satisfactory, and it is desirable that they should read and write; they should have been accustomed to washing and cooking, or have had some experience in domestic service as housemaids or nurses.' The candidates will at first be received in a probationary house, in this country, superintended by a sub-committee, with a matron accustomed to colonial life, and a surgeon; there they will acquire some training, and will prepare their outfit, which must be provided at their own expense; the machinery of the Colonial Land and Emigration Commission will probably be placed at the service of the enterprise, both for the passage and the reception of the emigrants in the Colonies; each emigrant will receive 10s. on landing. The report suggests that persons having relations in the Colonies might be invited to apply for assisted passages, one-half of the cost to be defrayed by their friends or the parish. This report has been adopted by the General Committee; and a Committee of Selection has been appointed to prepare a list of fifty candidates.

in the colonies are much greater than in England;
indeed, as regards the working classes, the advantages
in this way bear no comparison. Emigration gives to
every man, who by character likes to try for it, a certain
position in the community which he could not arrive at
in this country; every office, I may say, is open to him;"
and, if he is by education unfit to forward his interest in
this way, he at least can by rectitude of conduct gain a
station which will enable him to give his children every
advantage. We have not in our colonies the titles that
in this country give importance to a name-we have not
old baronial castles to appeal to our feelings of national
pride in behalf of the owners; consequently men look to
men through a more equalising standard, and if one
man is to be raised above another, it is by mutual con-
sent; the suffrages of the people and character become
there, in a more especial manner, the ladder by which
an ambitious man must rise. Bearing in mind what has
struck me on this subject, I have always, in giving
advice to a poor man wishing to emigrate, looked more
to the position his children were likely to gain, than to
any immediate advantages to himself. Since my arrival
in England, a poor man came to me, having three
daughters, aged from twenty-one to nineteen; he pro-
posed to emigrate with his family, through the aid of
the parish to a certain extent. When I looked at his
well-reared and intelligent girls, I was so certain of their
doing well, that I advised the father to send only one
under the care of a friend that was going. He took my
advice. I felt confident that she would soon have a
better offer than 207, a year. Four months after she left, I
sent the second sister. On her arrival in the colony, she
had a married sister to receive her. A letter has since
arrived from the husband of the first married with a
remittance for the third daughter, who is now on the
way out. This again has been followed by a joint letter
from the husbands of the two first girls who went out,
promising a remittance of 50l. to make the father and
mother comfortable, with instructions to an agent for
the emigration of the family. In the daughter's letter
to the father, she says:-"Don't, when you are board
ship, say how you got your living at home, or talk about
what you are to do when you come here. Mrs. Chis-
holm will tell you how to act. Remember, you are to
be a gentleman if you come here; that is, you will be
dressed as well as any country farmer in Scotland-you
will have the best food, a good horse to ride on, and a
farm of sixty acres to go to, well stocked, so that you
can keep my brothers to help you. On no account get
a pound from the parish; if you should run short of
money, get Mrs. C to manage with the agent. I am
so thankful I took advice, and came as I did." This is
one instance of what I call" family colonisation."

A preliminary meeting for the purpose of forming a parochial association, in aid of the Committee recently appointed for enabling Distressed Needlewomen to Emigrate, was held in the vestry-room of Marylebone parish, on the 29th ult. The vestry passed a resolution approving of Mr. Sidney Herbert's scheme for promoting female emigration, and appointing a committee to organise a branch association in the borough of Marylebone, with a view to the assistance of their own female population. The Rev. Dr. Spry, the rector of Marylebone, was requested to act as chairman to the parochial association, and Mr. H. C. Wilson, honorary secretary. -On the 3rd inst., another meeting was held for furthering the object in view, when, after several resolutions of a purely formal character had been agreed to, it was proposed by Captain Holland that a letter should be sent to Mr. Harley, the secretary of the central association, expressing the desire of the parishioners of Marylebone to assist him by a general subscription throughout the parish, and stating that a public subscription had been commenced. The proposal underwent some discussion, and it was finally agreed to forward the letter, as, without pledging themselves to any particular course, it would elicit the views of the central body. A subscription was then opened.

FOR

masters now.

NARRATIVE OF FOREIGN EVENTS.

the continent generally at the opening of the new year, it is to be said of it simply that the People who were lately its masters, have everywhere had to change and make way for the Military, who are its But the late governors have left some awkward immoveables behind them, such as representative government, universal suffrage, jury law, the necessity of popular assent to elections, enfranchisement of serfs, &c., which will not tend to simplify the toils that await the men of the sword. It will be instructive to watch the course of events, to observe the alternate preponderance of argument and arms, and discern to what extent the enlightened, industrious, and liberal classes will be able to stand against the extravagances of the extremes above and below them.

Louis Napoleon has been trying the pulse of France in regard to absolutism, and has set up a journal to preach it. It is edited by an old hanger on or secretary of his in this country, who wrote a book about his captivity in Ham, and was in all respects his convenient flatterer. M. Briffault formerly told his prince that it was his destiny to suffer, and make suffering heroic and sublime. Now M. Briffault tells his prince that his task is to repress and create, just as his uncle's was; and, once and for ever, to lay a strenuous coercive hand on the press, on his own administration, and on all the factions old and new. The parallel is Napoleon at Marengo; and the little Napoleon's journal is to put to flight, as the great man's sword did on that occasion, makers of chimerical schemes (e. g. framers of republican constitutions), advocates of old and effete customs (e. g. such as direct representation of the people), traffickers in the public money (e.g. penurious folk who won't increase the president's salary), slanderous scribblers (e. g. every body who objects to the president), and conspirators of the higher and lower orders (e.g. Thiers and Molé as well as Louis Blanc and Caussidière). Poor President! A path is before him with dangers accumulating at every step; with shadows, clouds, and darkness resting on it; and not a step has he taken hitherto, that has not proved a stumble. The silliness of his present

20

He has

move for absolutism is at once the measure of his gigantic hopes and his miserably incapable means. have the fate of all he has tried. He has flung over the socialists without winning the aristocrats. sacrificed the war party without recommending himself to the bourgeoisie. And now, rejected for the present by all, he leans on-M. Briffault! Alas! poor Louis Napoleon.

And Pio Nono! Still more alas, and well a-day, for poor Pio Nono!

An encyclical letter of the forlorn Pope recants all the hopes and efforts with which he began his popedom The Cardinals are again his masters, and he is the self-announced willing slave to the College of the Propaganda. He denounces the new traffic of book-selling (by which bibles are sold as well as communist tracts), affects to hold his hands in horror at socialism, and calls the ladies who tended the wounded in Rome by the name of prostitutes! Nor does his holiness scruple, in this production, to couple the advance of communism in Italy with the operations of the British and Foreign Bible Society in England,-a comparison which will probably help to open the eyes of some people in this country to the peculiar sort of interest which is taken in us by the College of Cardinals.

up

In America the whig President has delivered his Message to the democratic majority in a tone which party circumstances necessarily render somewhat ambiguous, as it is unquestionably moderate, but of which this country certainly has no reason to complain. If any regret is to be expressed that General Taylor and his government should avow themselves partisans of prohibitive duties for protection as well as revenue, it is for the argument it suggests against all federative governments, wherein it would appear to be so difficult to levy the expenses of the general government other than by means of customs. It is also somewhat ominous that not a word of slavery appears in this Message, when we remember that the claims of the new territories for admission within the Union, now pressing and imminent, are likely to revive that question in its most dangerous aspect.

On new year's day the President of the French Re-
public distinguished the occasion by an Act of Reconci-
liation with an estranged branch of his family-he
created his uncle, General Jerome Bonaparte, a Field
Marshal of France; the first creation of the rank which
has been made since the revolution of February.
Considerable sensation was excited in Paris by the
appearance, on Sunday the 6th, of the first number of a
weekly political journal entitled "Le Napoléon," which
had been announced as being under the patronage of
the Elysée, and which contained a direct attack upon
the majority of the Chamber, in the following terms:-
"With regard to the feeble majority given to the late
measures of the Government, certain journals, whose
intentions are open to doubt, advise the Ministry to
retire. They pretend, in arguing on certain customs of
the past, that, after such checks, Ministers who respect
These
themselves can no longer remain in office.
journals are, or feign to be, ignorant of what is now the
position of the responsible head of the Executive Gov-
ernment. In the new order of things, so long as the
Ministers enjoy the confidence of the President, they
meet with no check. Once for all, we inform the obsti-
nate defenders of the old constitutional routine, that the
chief of the State will retain his Ministers in spite of
jealous attacks, and that the deplorable fact of minis-
terial instability will not be produced again at the will
of parliamentary ambitions." This paragraph appeared
on Sunday night in the "Patrie" and the "Moniteur
du Soir," in the place where semi-official articles are
generally inserted, with the word "communiqué"
attached to it, as an indication that it came from the
Government; but in the Assembly on Monday the
Ministry denied all responsibility with regard to the
articles which had appeared in the "Napoleon."

On the 14th the legislative assembly commenced the
general debate on the organic bill concerning Public
Instruction. Its chief opponents were M. Barthelemy
Seffilaire and M. Victor Hugo. The former attacked it
as a measure which would ultimately lead to the des-
truction of the university,-an evil that would leave the
State unable to prevent the imparting of doctrines
subversive of its own constitution. It would create a
monopoly in primary instruction, most for the advantage
of the clergy, since the members of the religious bodies
devoted to teaching would be those who would princi-
pally obtain diplomas as teachers, although the laical
teachers are to the clerical teachers as 40,000 to only 3000.
Referring expressly to the Jesuits, M. St. Hilaire
declared his opinion that their re-appearance in France
as a body would be illegal. M. Victor Hugo made a
speech in favour of the voluntary principle in religion,
interspersed with declamations against priestcraft and
The clerical party is
the Jesuits. He exclaimed :-
alarmed at Socialism; it sees the waves rising, and it
imagines that it will have saved society when it shall

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To such

have combined material resistance with social hypocrisy,
and placed a Jesuit wherever there is not a gendarme."
The bill was an attempt to petrify human thought; to
arrest France in her onward course; its authors, fatigued
with glory, genius, science, and knowledge, stood fast
and proclaimed immoveability to the nation.
men he proclaimed in warning accents, that amidst the
movement of all around, their opposition would produce
the most lamentable renewal of revolution. M. Hugo
was boisterously applauded by the mountain; and was
so much interrupted by the right, that the President
declared himself restrained from acting as he would
otherwise have done in curbing M. Hugo's Anti-Catholic
eloquence. The bill was supported by the bishop of
Langres, who characterised it as a measure of peace,
concord, and compromise. The debate was continued
on the 19th, when the bill was warmly supported by M.
Montalembert and M. Thiers. M. Coquerel, the eminent
Protestant clergyman, said that he was unable to find in
the bill either real peace or real liberty. The question
of the second reading was carried by a majority of 268.

On the same day, the bill for transporting the insurgents of June to Algeria, was passed by a large majority

At a meeting of the cabinet council, it has been determined almost unanimously that no intervention in the affair of Monte Video shall take place, even should Accounts from the French departments speak of the the government of that republic offer to pay the expenses. immense quantity of snow that has fallen, and which has occasioned several disasters. Travellers lost their way, and a rural letter-carrier was found dead in the snow. In many cantons of the department of the Ariège the snow has risen to the coping of the houses. Many persons have perished in the avalanches, which are frequent; and whole flocks of sheep have been swept away. In the Jura the communication is completely interrupted, aud many persons have fallen a prey to the wolves. In the streets of several towns the snow is more than three metres in depth. In the Saone and Loire, the wolves, impelled by cold and hunger, boldly enter the villages; and in one a woman was devoured by these animals, almost at the door of her house. In other places the bells had to be pealed during the day and night, in order to serve as a guide to the traveller and to the field-labourer.

A villain named Aymet has poisoned a number of persons at Paris. On New Year's Day, he sent packets of pastry and bon-bons to two women; employing boys he found in the street to deliver them. The recipients All were soon after attacked did not know who had sent the articles, and which were eaten by many persons. with the symptoms of poisoning, and suffered much; an officer of the National Guard and a girl died. Aymet had formerly seduced one of the females to whom he sent the confectionary, had been imprisoned, and had

vowed vengeance. Suspicion fell on him from an anonymous letter which accompanied one of the packets; he was arrested; and then a number of circumstances fixing guilt upon him came out. Eventually, he avowed himself as the assassin.

The Portuguese Cortes were opened on the 2nd inst. by the Queen in person, on which occasion her Majesty delivered a speech, presenting on the whole a favourable view of the affairs of the nation. The last and most . interesting paragraph is as follows: "I most especially recommend you to go hand in hand with my Government in studying the real situation of the country, and adopting the measures required to establish upon a solid basis the definite organisation of the national finances." In the mean time commercial and monetary affairs continue in the same depressed state at Lisbon as before. All the civil, military, and naval departmental officers are in arrears of pay from four to ten and twenty months.

.

Considerable agitation has been excited at Berlin, owing to the probable success of the extreme Conservative party in persuading the King not to swear fidelity to the Constitution, and a ministerial crisis was expected. The King, however, has intimated his willingness to take the oath to the Constitution, but with modifications which were to be proposed to the Chambers.

The Plenipotentiaries forming the Council ad interim for managing the affairs of the German Federation have met at Frankfort.

The Journal of St. Petersburg of the 6th instant contains the official sentences passed on twenty-one Russian subjects, arrested some months since, as members of a conspiracy against the Emperor's person. They are chiefly officers in the Guard, or civil officers of rank. Three of the number, Timkovski, Luvof, and Plestscheief, belong to the old nobility of the empire, and the last is a name taking precedence in history of that of the Romanoffs. But Kaschkine, son of a conspirator exiled to Siberia after the revolt of Pestel and Releife in 1825, seems to have played the most remarkable part in this transaction. Confronted with the Emperor, who promised him a full pardon if he would betray his accomplices, Kaschkine indignantly refused; and added, that he had not been inspired with the idea of revenging the condemnation of his father, which was accounted one of the glories of his house, but by the conviction that neither Nicholas nor his family were fitted to make his country's happiness. Twenty of the conspirators were condemned with him to death; and their sentences were commuted into hard labour in the Siberian mines, by the Emperor.

Government. An attempt was made latterly to induce Madame Kossuth, by the offer of liberty and a commodious residence elsewhere, to leave the children, with what success may be imagined. If she had been their mother, instead of their father's mother, the proposition could not have been rejected with greater scorn. Where the wife is remains to this moment a profound secret. The children consist of two little boys and a girl. The youngest boy is a charming little fellow, full of infantine malice. He says to the Austrian officers, "Wait: I will draw you papa's picture;" and then he scribbles one of those naïve ovals which pass current with such artists for symbols of the human head divine, with a lot of scratches at one end for the beard. Sometimes he pretends to smuggle something in as he passes the sentinel, who cries out, "Show me what you have in your hand, sirrah!" The little fist, after some sham reluctance, expands, and shows-nothing! Then off he bounds in ecstacies of laughter. One can never look up at those dismal walls without thinking of the "noble old mother" and that pretty little fellow singing in his stony cage. Nor are these the only family at Presburg struck by the Hungarian calamity. There are some struck indeed far deeper. There is the widow of General Leiningen; there is the widow of General Damjanich, free, indeed, both to carry their sorrows and destitution whither they please. These helpless women, after the execution of their husbands, were not only despoiled of all property in land inherited in their own right, which is contrary to the Hungarian law, but not even suffered to retain a fraction of the personal property of their husbands. Nay, even their wardrobes were sacked, and their dresses and trinkets snatched from them. It does credit to the citizens of Arad that they would not bid for those articles of female apparel when put up to public auction; for that they deserve the blessing of Damjanich. The dresses were knocked down without civil competition cheap to Austrian officers. Leiningen was an accomplished scholar as well as soldier, and had composed a history of the war. This manuscript, secreted with jealous care by his widow, who valued it more than her jewels, did not escape the narrow search to which her effects were exposed, and was also torn from her possession.

Accounts from Stockholm state that the festivities of Christmas Day were interrupted by a large fire, which threatened to reduce the town of Drottnigholm to ashes. There was great difficulty in obtaining water, in consequence of the river being frozen over. The King and the Crown Prince, with several officers, instantly set out from Stockholm, and were among the first on the spot; and by their presence and encouragement greatly stimulated the efforts of the firemen and others, and the conflagration was subdued after destroying several buildings belonging to the Castle.

A letter from Presburg, dated the 30th of December, gives the following information respecting the families of Kossuth, Guyon, and others of the late Hungarian Letters from Constantinople of the 31st ult. announce leaders-A paragraph has gone the round of the Ger- that diplomatic relations have been officially renewed man papers, giving the world to understand that the between Russia and Turkey, the difference relative to mother and children of Kossuth have been set at liberty; the refugees of Widdin having been completely adjusted. that upon their leaving their prison at Pesth they came The exchange of the protocol took place on that day to Vienna, in order to provide themselves with a pass- between M. Titoff and the Minister for Foreign Affairs. port to Turkey. The only word of truth in this story is The last-mentioned accounts add that the Poles implithat this "noble old mother," with her three grand-cated in the late Hungarian insurrection are to be children, left their prison at Pesth, but it was to enter a new jail at Presburg: and such a jail! When these helpless beings were consigned to the hospital of the Schloss-berg, the cholera and typhus fever were both raging there, and "Death, busiest from couch to couch, tended the sick." The cholera and typhus have done their work, and death is not so busy now among the patients; the grandmother and the three little Kossuths are still there, thank God, all well. The children of Guyon are also there, behind that tall black wall, pierced with little square holes, that runs round the top of the conical hill overhanging the town. You are not to understand that, because they are in a prison-hospital, they are in a ward mixed with either the crowd of sick or criminals. Their apartments are such as, separated from such a neighbourhood, and unhaunted by such terrible associations, would probably content their modest wants. The children have a tutor appointed by the

confined in the town of Koniah, in Asia Minor. Neither the Porte nor any foreign power can, for the future, protect political delinquents flying from Russia or Austria into Turkey. No person, however, furnished with an English or French passport can be seized by the Russian or Austrian authorities whilst in the Ottoman territory, unless the crime he is charged with be fully proved before the ambassador, consul, or agent of the government whose passport he holds.

Great excitement has been occasioned by a publication of official documents from Honduras, announcing that Tigre Island, and other islands alleged to belong to the republic of Honduras, had been taken possession of by Mr. Chatfield, the agent of Great Britain, and the commanders of her Britannic Majesty's steamers Gorgon and Plumper. One account informs us that the flag of Honduras had been hauled down; and another, that the

"American flag had been torn down." Mr. Squier, agent of the United States, had previously negotiated with Honduras for Tigre and other islands in the Bay of Fonseca, on the Pacific coast, to be ceded to the United States. We learn also that he had previously taken possession of Tigre. According to private letters, an English force has also seized the ports of Truxillo and Moro. Mr. Squier, it is added, demanded the evacuation of Tigre in six days, which was refused by Mr. Chatfield; but the latter agreed to submit the question to his Government immediately. One letter-writer, dating from Leon, says that Mr. Chatfield denies the right of Honduras to sell-denies her national existence (formerly part of Central America), also of San Salvador (likewise a part of Central America), and also because England has a lien upon the islands of Honduras, and the ports of Moro and Truxillo in San Salvador, in virtue of loans and claims of British subjects, duly guaranteed. These claims arose, it is said, prior to the division of Central America into small republics. Tigre Island is about 120 or 130 miles west by north of Lake Nicaragua, and is naturally a point of some importance in connexion with the projected Nicaragua Canal, and it therefore acquires great value in American calculations.

The message of the President of the United States, on the meeting of Congress, on the 24th of December, embraces many topics; among which, the relations of his government with Great Britain is, of course, the most interesting. On this head, he says:-"Our relations with Great Britain are of the most friendly character. In consequence of the recent alteration of the British navigation acts, British vessels, from British and other foreign ports, will (under our existing laws), after the 1st day of January next, be admitted to entry in our ports, with cargoes of the growth, manufacture, or production of any part of the world, on the same terms as to duties, imposts, and charges, as vessels of the United States with their cargoes; and our vessels will be admitted to the same advantages in British ports, entering therein on the same terms as British vessels. Should no order in Council disturb this legislative arrangement, the late act of the British Parliament, by which Great Britain is brought within the terms proposed by the act of Congress of the 1st of March, 1817, it is hoped, will be productive of benefit to both countries." The President expresses his pleasure at the resumption of diplomatic intercourse with France, after its temporary interruption. Regarding the dispute between Denmark and Sleswig-Holstein, he professes the strictest neutrality. With regard to Germany, the following passage is remarkable:-" Although a minister of the United States to the German Empire was appointed by my predecessor in August, 1848, and has for a long time been in attendance at Frankfort-on-the-Maine; and although a minister, appointed to represent that empire, was received and accredited here, yet no such government as that of the German empire has been definitely constituted. Mr. Donnelson, our representative at Frankfort, remained there several months; in the expectation that a union of the German states, under one constitution or form of government, might at length be organised. It is believed by those well acquainted with the existing relations between Prussia and the states of Germany, that no such union can be permanently established without her co-operation. In the event of the formation of such an union; and the organisation of a central power in Germany, of which she should form a part, it would become necessary to withdraw our minister at Berlin; but, while Prussia exists as an independent kingdom, and diplomatic relations are maintained with her, there can be no necessity for the continuance of the mission to Frankfort. I have, therefore, recalled Mr. Donnelson, and directed the archives of the legation at Frankfort to be transferred to the American legation at Berlin." The message earnestly calls the attention of Congress to an amendment of the existing laws, relating to the African Slave Trade, with a view to its effectual abolition; and sketches out the proposed plan for a canal across the Isthmus of Panama, inviting all nations to co-operate in this great work.

On the 22nd of December, after sixty-four ballots, the Honorable Howell Cobb, of Georgia, the democratic candidate, was elected Speaker of the House of Representatives.

The Hungarian Refugees have arrived at New York, where they have been received with great distinction. Before leaving Europe, Governor Ujhazi, the defender of Comorn, wrote from London to General Taylor informing him of the desire of the Hungarian exiles to find an asylum in the United States. General Taylor said, in reply:-"The people of this Republic have deeply sympathised with the Hungarians in their recent struggle for constitutional freedom, and in the calamities which have befallen their unhappy land; and I am sure that I but speak the universal sentiment of my countrymen in bidding you, and your associates, a cordial welcome to our soil-the natural asylum of the oppressed from every clime. We offer you protection and a free participation in the benefits of our institutions and our laws; and trust that you may find in America a second home.""

General Cass has given notice in the senate of an instruction to the Committee on Foreign Relations, to inquire into "the expediency of suspending diplomatic relations with the Austrian Government,' on account of her cruel political executions of the Hungarian patriots. A resolution proposed by Mr. Root, of Ohio, tending to establish territorial governments in the Mexican conquests, and prohibiting slavery therein, has produced a division of 101 to 81; which the Northern or Wilmot Proviso party deemed a triumph.

The Legislature of the State of Vermont unanimously voted resolutions expressing readiness to receive the Canadas into the American Union, provided the step were effected "without a violation of amicable relations with the British Government and of the law of nations." A strange and romantic incident has occurred in the Boston Lunatic Hospital. A mother and daughter (emigrants) both became inmates at different dates, and were placed in the same story of the building, where they had access to the same hall. They met and recognised each other, though one had left the other years ago in Ireland. They had each crossed the ocean, become residents in New York, and lost all knowledge of the other's history or fate; both became bereft of reason, and in a madhouse, surrounded by those who were hopelessly insane, the child and parent met; though reason was dethroned, and they were there with minds diseased, yet nature triumphed over the clouded intellect, and for a brief moment they conversed on the land of their birth, and of their separation.

Advices from California to the 16th November have been received. The new Constitution, of which we some time since gave the marked features, had been adopted almost unanimously. The rainy season had set in; the streams in the mining country were already much swelled, and large numbers of miners had returned to the coast for winter quarters. In consequence, there had been a sudden rise in the cost of provisions, &c., and an increase of disease; the cholera, dysentery, and fever prevailed-though not so fatally as to cause much alarm. The gold-digging of the year is thought to be only about equal to that of last year-about 8,000,000 dollars' worth.-A letter from San Francisco says,

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Walking through the city reminds me of an immense fair; music issues from every third house, where gambling is carried on to a frightful extent, ragged-looking fellows staking their 10, 20, or 30 dollars at montem, and losing them with the utmost coolness Women occasionally may be seen, with handkerchiefs full of dollars and doubloons, playing with great eagerness.'

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The rush for California from the United States is described as being immense. No less than three steamers, each filled with passengers, left New York for the golden land a few days before the last mail for England. Emigration to the Pacific also from New England is quite active. It is calculated that there are at present 300 ships in the Bay of San Francisco, mostly without crews; that 500 vessels have sailed from the United States for California, besides steamers; that these vessels have conveyed 50,000 passengers; and that 50,000 more have gone by land, making 100,000 in all.

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