The Press. — London, England, 1857-04-11 00:00:00

APRIL 11, 1857• - - The further hearing of the case was then adjourned to the 22nd inst., when Alderman Kennedy will be examined. THE PRISONER WEBB, alias :NARY, charged with an attempt, on the sth of March last, to rob and murder, in a railway . carriage between Poplar and the 1 lampstead-road station, one Buckler, a I inendraper's assistant, was tried on Thursday at the Central Criminal Court, before Mr. Justice Williams, found guilty of " wounding with intent," and sentenced to be transported for life. THE SULTAN AND LORD LYONS. LORD LYONS, before leaving the Bosphorus, was honoured by a visit from the Sultan on board H.M.S. the Royal Albert. The following particulars appear in a letter published by a contemporary : The Royal Albert shifted her anchorage from Bujudere, at the Black Sea end of the Bosphorus, to a position imme diately opposite the Dolma Baktchi Palace, which has been recently erected for ihe Sultan at an enormous expense. On the afternoon of the 27th the admiral issued an order which set at rest the reports of the Sultan's intention to visit this ship :—Captains and officers of the squadron to repair on board the flagship, in full dress, at 10 30 a.m. on Saturday morning, the Vtli, to receive the Sultan ; ships to man yards, and the rigging on the port side, that facing the Palace ; ships to be dressed at the same time ; Turkish flag at the main ; the Royal Albert to hoist the Sultan's standard at the main. The early part of Saturday morning was showery, but, with our usual good fortune, after $ o'clock the weather cleared up quite fine. We made the best preparations that we could in the shape of carpeting the ladders and deck, up to which his Majesty had to go. Shortly before 11 o'clock the Pachas, who were to be in attendance, came on board. They were Redschid Paella, Grand Vizier ; Biza Pacha, Minister of War ; Mehe- met Ali Pacha, Minister of Marine ; Omer Pacha, Gene ralissimo of the Army; and Ethern Pacha, Minister of Foreign Affairs. Lord Stratford and suite came on board about the same time. About a quarter before twelve the Sultan was seen to step into his calque. The ships immediately manned yards and rigging, dressing with flags, and a salute of twenty-one guns was at the same time fired by the Curacoa and ourselves. The Marines formed the guard of honour on both sides of the quarter-deck, and presented a fine specimen of British troops. The band was across the poop, and the officers were standing on the after part of the quarterdeck. Six of the youngest naval cadets acted as side boys, two at the bottom of each ladder. The Sultan was received at the entry port on the middle deck by the admiral, ambassador, paellas, and cap tains of the fleet. He was conducted to the upper deck by the ambassador, who was obliged to help him up the ladders. He wore the fez, with a button at the top, a loose over-coat, the collar and crffs of which were a mass of diamonds worth about 50,000/. He appeared very much exhausted and nervous, and did not seem to be at all at ease. After he had recovered a little he threw open his coat so as to show the Riband and Star of the Garter, telling the admiral that he felt proud to be able to wear it before so many " brave soldiers and sailors." A chair was brought out for him, which he refused, saying in French, which he speaks fairly," Je ne suis pas fatigue." After the usual complimentary speeches had been ex changed the admiral conducted him to the cabin, and after a short rest he again came on deck and walked for ward. Returning he noticed the Crimean medal on the breast of one of the marines, and said he observed that all the men wore the same decoration. The marine, poor fellow, was evidently very uncomfortable at having become so conspicuous. While on deck tliis time the Sultan had evidently got over his nervousness, and laughed and chatted a good deal, apparently taking considerable interest in all he saw. On returning to the admiral's cabin he re quested the admiral, ambassador, and pachas to be seated, a thing that I believe has never before taken place. 'l'he Sultan then begged Lord Lyons to;inform her Majesty the Queen how grateful he felt for the prompt assistance that had been rendered to his country, and for having sent such a man as the admiral to be one of the defenders of Turkey. He afterwards paid the admiral a very hand some compliment. His Majesty said:— I loved you when I first saw you, and that affection and regard has since been increased by the nobleness of your conduct, and I feel that it is no small thing to come on board such • ship to see such a man; and I trust that. if again England become the defender of Turkey, your Sovereign may choose you, if your services can be spared, to again command the fleet, and I hot•e that you may long live to adorn the profession of which you are such a bright ornament. The captains and commanders of the fleet were then presented, as also the officer of the guard of honour, Cap tain Adair, R.M., of this ship. Before leaving, the Sultan walked along the maindtek, and, after having been on board about three quarters of an hour, left the ship, the same honours being paid to him, with the addition of the ships' corn pa:des giving three such hearty cheers as his Majesty probably never heard before. The calque in which the Sultan came off was very handsome, painted white, the top inside and out being richly carved and gilded. In the bows was the figure of a white dove. This marks the Sultan's calque. We left the Bosphorus on the following evening. The squadron weighed together and steamed a short distance np the Bosphorus, then turning, came down, passing the Palace quite close, all ships as they passed manning yards end rigging and dreasirg with flags, the Curacoa and our selves firing a royal salute. The ambassador was on board during the time, and, on his leaving the ship off Seraglio Point, was saluted with nineteen guns. In the morning, before leaving, Lord Lyons had a farewell audience of the Sultan, who received him without the slightest ceremony THE PRESS. a nd without any oue being present except the flag•lieu tenant, a nephew of the admiral, and the Turkish inter preter, Mr. Sarrell, one of the dragomans to the British Embassy. The squadron are at present anchored in Bashika Bay, about nine miles out of the Dardanelles, where we remain for two or three days and then leave for Smyrna—thence to Malta. A " CORRESPONDENT " FROM LAHORE writes thus on our foreign policy in Affghanistan LawonE, FEB. 23.—The interview between Sir John Law- rence and boat Mohammed still forms the chief topic of in terest in the Punjab. The result of that interview has not been formally announced, but the bargain struck was, I believe, nothing more or less than this :—l)ost Mahommed under takes to fight the battle with Persia in Herat and Affghan istan, and we undertake to furnish him with 120,0001. per annum so long as the war lasts. Part Gf the subsidy, in the first instance, is to consist of muskets and other muni tions of war. Three English officers, the two Lumsdens, and Dr. Coxe, to Affghanistan to watch the distribution of the subsidy—in other words, to see that we get our money's worth. Of course, this arrangement is the sub ject of very severe criticism. It is said that with an em barrassed exchequer we are deliberately throwing away twelve lacs a year on an ally whose capacity to serve us, if honest, is doubtful ; and on whose honesty, if once opposed to his interest, no one professes to depend. We are not only wasting the money, we are sowing dragons' teeth ; putting arms into the hands of those who never can be real friends, and who have been, and may well be again, our deadly enemies. If we are to meddle with Central Asia at all, let us do the work well ourselves—not pay others to do it ill; which means, let us send a British force into Affghanistan, or wherever else events may lead. THE KING OF SIAM, in order to enforce the execu tion of the treaties concluded between him and different European nations, has published the follow ing edict, dated 25th December : We, Sovereign of the country of Siam, of the States of Laos, Cambodje, Malacca, and l)jonkseylou, being desirous that the treaties which we have concluded with the power ful nations of Europe, France, England, and Russia, shall he executed in all their clauses, make known these con ventions to the governors of our provinces, the officers of our customs, and all our subjects. We will that the mem bers of these different nations shall freely circulate in our States, transact commerce, and exercise their religion, while conforming to all our laws, and respecting the acts of our authority. Done at our Palace at Bangkok, the seventh day of the twelfth moon. ( S igned ) Phra- Bard •Somdetch•Phra-Paratnen d M aha-Mongk u t-Phra-C how- Klau-Clauyn-flua. (Countersigned) Ramki•Mahisvvar, Minister of the Rcyal Edicts. To this document is annexed a long list of customs tariff, with the import and export duties to be paid on each. A special ambas , ,ador from the King is now en route to Paris and London. The continued absence of any news about the Australian mail-steamer Oneida is exciting lively ap prehension as to her fate. The Oneida sailed from King George's Sound for Suez on the 4th of February last, and has not since been heard of. The Simla, coming over the same ground, sailed from the same Sound on the 22nd of February, and arrived at Suez on the 26th of March without sighting or discovering a track of the missing vessel. Every sort of doubt, ap prehension, and downright fear has arisen concerning her safety. With two hundred passengers on board. and a large amount of gold, her non-arrival justifies anxiety; but there is no reasonable ground to sup pose that she is lost. It is not at all improbable that her screw has become damaged ; we know that she was unable to lift it, and she may now be dragging her slow length across the Indian Ocean. A writer to the Times yesterday makes some very reasonable suggestions. Speaking of the high cha racter for seamanship of the commander, Captain Hyde, he observes : If he had an accident from fire, it must be remembered he had plenty of Ipiats, and was supplied with Clifford's lowering apparatus. In that event he would have been heard of at Mauritius in some shape before the Ist of March. If his engines broke down—and he would try their strength to make this first passage—he could bear up for no other port, with a fair wind, than that island, or he must carry on, and " carry on" George Hyde would, if he had to make a handspike into a topmast. Having thus determined, he had no help for it, could expect no assis tance, he would crawl past the Cocos Islands, under all the vexations anti roasting of that purgatory called the middle passage of the great Indian Ocean. I was there last year about the same time that Capt. Hyde would be this year, going up to Galle in a smart sailing vessel (the well-known circle-sailing Constance), in ballast trim, and well managed, and we were exactly thirtyfour days from entering the tropics to making Point de Galle. Aud if Capt. Hyde has crippled engines, and nothing but his canvas to depend on, at the season, too, of the north-west monsoon, with that big ship almost coal-laden, we may wish him joy of his voyage, but we shall assuredly soon hear of him. Whatever may have happened to him or his vessel, let us who have friends on board, and those who are picturing sorrows to themselves and others, bear in mind one fact—the Oneida is under the charge of as good a sailor as ever trod a deck, a man of lion heart and cool head. I have known him very many years, and I have sailed with him when his temper, courage, and endurance have never flinched amid appalling dangers. 359 A BLACK HOLE AT HONG KONG. THE China Mail of the 15th Feb. gives the following description of the gaol accommodation afforded to the Chinese prisoners detained on suspicion of being concerned in the bread-poisoning attempt : We have just been witness to a scene such as our readers will have difficulty in crediting—one we can scarcely believe would be perpetrated under the most savage and tyrannical Government, and such as no one could ever have dreamt of seeing in a British colony. We allude to forty-two Chinese crammed into a cell six teen feet long by fitleen feet broad, furnished with only one small aperture for ventilation, and confined there for twenty days ! with the bare and damp ground for a bed ; and in this space they had to perform all the require ments of nature. Covering, they required none, for, as may easily be supposed, the den was in a perfect stew, the air-hole being only eleven inches high by six feet long, and placed in the extreme upper corner of the room. We assure our readers this is s fact. And will it be believed, too, that the miserable wretches subjected to this brutal treatment are not condemned felons —no, for them the best of treatment is reserved ; but men under no charge, against whom the most active inquiries of our most active Attorney-General, enlisted heart and soul in the cause, have been unable to ferret out even a breath of suspicion —some of them old men tottering to their graves, some mere boys yet in their teens. Better far to have deported, or hanged, or shot them at once, than to have exposed them to such frightful sufferings as they must have under- gone during twenty days' suffocation in this " Black Hole of Hong Kong." the walls of which are newly erected, and the plaster and floor not even dry We cannot suppose that Sir John Bowring and his council will permit so inhuman an act to pass unquestioned. A second case of similar ill-treatment is also re lated : It may be remembered that, a few weeks ago, about 150 men were apprehended somewhere in the Taipeugahan, but afterwards all liberated except half a dozen. These men were taken up on the Friday, and placed within that portion of the gaol compound where the treadmill stands, there being no room for them in the prison itself ; and they were left all night, some of them until Sunday even ing, if not longer. We Pay nothing of the inhumanity of leaving men thus exposed to the sun by day and the dews by night, without covering of any sort, and without even a mat to lie down upon ; but on the Sunday the neighbours were alarmed by their cries, and it has since been ascer tained that nothing was given them in the shape of food from Saturday at ten a.m. till Sunday at two p.m.—twenty eight hours. Yet on inquiry we are told, no one is responsible for such cruel neglect ; some one surely must be. These men, be it noted, were afterwards discharged on finding security—they were accused of no crime. RAISING SUNKEN VESSELS AT SEBASTOPOL. —The apparatus now in process of construction in this country to be used in raising sunken vessels in the Sebastopol harbour is larger and more complete than any heretofore employed for a similar purpose. The work will be done from immense caissons of wooden floats supporting eight engines of 40-horse power, each of which drives a double action pump connecting with enormous hydraulic rams. These rams weigh 54,0001 b. a piece, and have a lifting power of 500 tons. They consist of nothing but a cylinder and piston, to the latter of which a chain is attached, which is also fastened to the sunken vessels. When the piston has been driven up to the cylinder head by the pressure of the condensed water the chain is kept at that point, the piston is run out again, and so by suc cessive hitches the work is done. Four rams can be brought to bear on one vessel at a time. Gear work may also be attached to the engines, so as to derive from each of them an additional lifting power of 500 tons. Four engines and the same number of rams operating together will therefore supply an aggregate power of 4,000 tons, which is more than is required to raise the largest ship in the harbour. Of the 107 sunken vessels, only 15 are equal in size to the U.S. frigate Pennsylvania, weighing in water 3,500 tons and the rest will average 2,000 tons. The chains, now being forged at Pittsville are much larger than those spoken of by the English papers as making for the steamships Adriatic and Great Eastern, being 100 yards in length, weighing 300 lb. to the link, and capable of sustaining a strain of 500 tons. The submarine operations will be performed by the aid of Gowan's diving-bell, a contrivance never yet exhibited in this country, and his armour which was used with success in the raising of the U.S. steamer Missouri, in the recent extrication of a safe from the sunken boat Atlantic in Lake Erie, and on several other occasions. Mr. Gowan expects to get up at least forty of the vessels whole. The rest lie will blow to pieces, the Russian Government con tracting to furnish the powder. As the greatest depth of water is only 60 feet, and the surface is smooth as a mill pond for the greater part of the year, Mr. Gowan will be able to prosecute his labour to great advantage, and hop es t o com pl e t e t h e job within two years. He receives for his pay one half of the value of all the ships raised, as appraised by an officer of the Government and himself. The larger vessels cost some 1,100,000 dollars each, and were only a year old when sunk, so that it will be seen that Mr. Gowan has a chance to make a snug little profit on his contract. The expense of the entire outfit is not far from 250,000 dollars.—Nein York Journal of Conunerce.