The Press. — London, England, 1853-11-05 00:00:00

SECOND EDITION. SA TURDA Y EVENING. LATEST FOREIGN INTELLIGENCE. HOSTILITIES ON THIS DANUBE. The following official communication was received yesterday in Vienna from Bucharest, dated Nov.2:— " Two thousand Turks appeared yesterday at (liar. gevo, and fired into the town. In a conflict near Dam many Russians and Turks were killed. The Turks retreated up the river, and the Russians fol lowed them with cavalry awl cannon. At Kalafat there are daily skirmishes. The Turks respect fo reign property under the Austrian flag." The Vienna Pirate confirms the intelligence of the arrival of 7,000 Turks at Kalafat, and of the advance of the left wing of the Tnrkish army, besides $,OOO of the Turkish reserve from Sophia. The vanguard, under Nainik l'acha and General Prins had a serious conflict with 2,5410 Russian eaval;y, between Kalafat and Krsjowa. The affair lasted two hours, when the liussiana retreated to wards Slating. The Rospodar of Wallachia, Demetri Stirbey, is superseded ; he has retired from his principality, and is already in Transylvania. The members of the civil courts arc ordered into the interior, and all offences are to be tried by the Russian courts-martial. The Russian battalions posted at Karatje have been recalled to Krajowa, to which point l'rince Gortsehakoff has hastened with a considerable force upon learning that Omer Paella was about to cross the Danube. The war with Russia was proclaimed by Izzet l'acha in presence of the Servian ministers and tligni larks at Belgrade, on the 2lst ult. A letter from Constantinople, in the Culogne Gazette, says " There are more than 400,11(X) Turks miller arms. On the 17th Oct., 17,0110 men left for Tn.birmd. The Russians have sent considerable Wolk* of troop, into the Caucasus from Odessa and Sehoultoiml. The check which the Russians lately received iu the t:aucasios is eoutirmed. It is positively stated that MOO l'ireaesiaus of different tribes attacked the Russians in the defiles of Zakartola, and put them to the rout. Sehatnyl lass, it is said, pro mised to Alai Paella a reinforcement of 10,00 o men. On the 9th the following bodies of troops were ill the neigh bourhood of Erzeroum :—:111011 at {Nasal, 10,1510 at bans, MOO at A rolekschato, at Itattoutn, and at 'l'sehuruksu 1000 regular and 20,0119 irregular troops, making a total of 43,4510 men, in aoldit . to ZOO at Eratenutm itself. Adding to this ttttt other the treori which have arrived fluor Syria, there will he an effective force of tWo,falo men." In Paris rumours of a now eonferewe, having its beat at London, for the settlement of the Eastern question, is again revived, and was very prey alert yesterday. Indeed, the rumour went further namely, that the question was completely terminated. On what authority, if any, these reports were founded was not stated. A letter from Marseilles states that. the Turkish fleet in the Bosphorons weighed anchor on the 25th for the Black Sea. The French Minister of Marine has ordered a steam-frigate of the largest sire to be placed on the stocks, under the name of the lopes-airier Euginie. She is to be of $OO-horse power, and is to serve as a model for several other frigates of the same ?Use, which are to be built at Brest, n t, and Cher bourg. It is also stated that another frigate, to be called the Foudre,is to be built at Toulon. The screw steam line-of-battle ship the Tourrille was launched at Brost on the :Ilst ult. She is of MO horse power, and is one of the nine transformed vessels, which, according to the report of the Minister, are to be launched within the nest two or three months. The recounts from the south of Ireland, and eve chilly from (Wk. give further and ample details of the recent fearful inundatimi in that city, as well as In the interior of the eounty. The number of lives lost ha.• not yet been ascertained, but one report estimates the death at no less than thirty. TrsNvsoN, the Poet Laureate, has been started by the Liberal Association of Students in Glasgow t'ni remit) . as a candidate for the Lord Rectorship for the ensuing year. The dignity, though conferred by annual election, is commonly held for two years in succession ; but the Liberal students are now at tempting to break through the precedent, although the present Lord Hector, the Earl of Eglinton, will only have completed his first year of office, and wilt be proposed for re-election. A Cotunaa's INQUEST sat yesterday at Barham to investigate the murder of the woman Sturgeon, of which some particulars are given in another column. The proceedings were adjourned last night, but picious circumstances ha% e transpired which have led to the apprehension of a man named natio, groom to Mr. l.loodirio, the occupier of the fans, and he is now in custody. THE PRESS. CITY, Two O'clock. The funds are firm to day. The following are the closing quotations : Consols, 941 1; Exchequer Bills, 2 5 premium; Mexican 26 1; Peruvian, 72 ; Spanish 441 5, 211 2 def.; Russian 111 114 ; London and North Western, 103 1 ; Lancashire and Yorkshire, 041 to 5; Great Northern, 201 to ; Great Western, Al 1; Midland 61 1; Northern of France, 331 41; Paris and Lyons, 16 1 ; Strasbourg, 3u I. THE WAR IN THE CAUCASUS. (From a Correspondent.) Now that Turkish forbearance has been strained to its utmost limit, and the drawl of diplomacy is about to give way to the onslaught of war, it may not be uninteresting to catch a glimpse of the regions of the Caucasus, and to learn somewhat of the struggles which have been so long pending among a popula tion from whom we may expect to obtain no incon siderable aid in the approaching contest with Russia. Unfortunately the sources from which information is derived, especially as regards the details of the war, are deplorably scanty and unauthentic. But still the enterprise of British travellers has not left us wholly uninformed. Stretching from the Black Sea to the Caspian, in a south-easterly direction for some 700 miles, the mountains of the Caucasus rear in places their snowy summits far above the level of the loftiest Alps, though towards the borders of the Euxine their alti tude is diminished, and their bluff termination near the Russian settlement of Anapu does not average many hundred feet in height. This splendid mountain chain springs from plains and is intersected by valleys of the richest fertility, the wild luxuriance of whose fruits and forests is only matched by the teeming produce of their flocks and herds. Russian dominions bound the region on the north, on the south is the Russian province of (leorgia. The po pulation of the Caucasus may be roughly estimated at between three and four millions. These, however, are not one in race, in habits, or religion. In the north-western districts of the range dwell the Circas- Mans, whose religion is said to be composed of Greek rites and Mahommedan superstitious; in the centre is found the tribe of the Tchetchnetzes ; and towards the Caspian that of the Leoghians. The two latter are darker-complexioned races, and most fanatical followers of Mohammed. This profession of faith it was that gave the Sultans a claim to exercise an indefinite kind of suzerainty over them —though even less substantial than that under which the Porte holds the provinces of Moldavia and Wallachia. The dominion of the Sultan over the Caucasians in fact somewhat resembled in its ungubstantiality that which he pretends to exercise over the Montenegrins, on the western frontier of the empire. And much as the Montenegrins objected to the Emperor of Austria, at the peace of Sistuvo, assigning their country as a dependency of Turkey, so did the people of the Caucasus resent the disposal of their territories to Russia, when the Sultan Mahmond, by the fourth article of the treaty of Adrilumple in 1e29, consented to the stipulation " that all the countries which were situatc4 to the north and east of the line of demar cation between the two empires, towards Georgia, Imeritia, and the tionriel, as well as all the literal of the Black Sea, from the mouth of the Konbau as far as the port of St. Nicholas inclusively, should remain ender the domination of the Emperor of Russia." No doubt. it was a deplorable prejudice of barbarism which prevented the Caucasians perceiving the ad vantages of that European civilisation which permits cabineted potentates to transfer countries and sign away the independency of nations. Certain it is that the Russian advance,. were met with the unmistakable welcome of their unerring rifles. And the territory which 'Russia would fain have added as another re crafting field for her motley forces, whence she might have drawn troops inferior in valour and intelligence to none, became instead a terrible school fiar her armies, wherein they might be disciplined by bloody reverses and barren triumphs. Marshal Paskiewitsch,whoae distinguished services, now iu his old age, the Emperor is said again to have demanded, was the first general entrusted with the subjugation of these mountaineers. After a length ened experience of the country and its inhabitants he matured an extensive plan for securing its sub jection. The Polish war, however, required his pre sence elsewhere at that time. Some years afterwards Oeueral Williamenott was eommantled to carry out this design, which principally consisted in establish ing different routes through the mountains and securing the communications by a continuous chain of fortresses. This he endeavoured to perform aided by an army of '20.000 men ; but when his forces haul become entangled in the narrow defiles of the Caucasus, and commanded by the precipitous heights *hove, the Russian columns were decimated and driven .back by the murderous fire of their assailants. This reverse led to greater efforts, and the tide of Russian soldiery that was poured in for a time seemed to make some headway, and promised at first some permanent success. We cannot retrace the SUCCOthaiTe incidents of the SATURDAY, war--suffice it to say that, amidst its vicissitudes, and after several Russian generals had been ap pointed and superseded in turn, the purpose was unaccomplished ; and the Caucasus remained still unsubdued. The last great effort was made in June, 1545, when Prince Worouzoff endeavoured to cap ture the stronghold of Darga. He attained it, a hamlet consisting of a few wooden huts, but at the price of a heavy slaughter in the achievement, fol lowed by a worse carnage and rout during his subse quent retreat. Twelve thousand men alone could in the end be mustered out of the joint armies of Prince Woronzuff and of General Freestay, who came to his rescue, which originally numbered 54),400. Schamyl Bey was the leader of the gallant mountaineers in this glorious struggle for independence. He is of the race of the Tchetchnetzes, awl greatly influences his mountain brethren by his appeals to their religious enthu siasm. His successes and marvellous adventures have secured to him extraordinary reverence, as to one more especially favoured from on high. Schamyl may be justly considered the Abd-el-Kader of the Caucasus. At present it is reported that the Russian army numbers in those quarters about 60,01 W) men, ten squadrons of which are cavalry, together with a formidable mountain artillery of 180 pieces; besides these must be reckoned the irregular troops of Georgians and Cossacks, whose collected forces cannot be less than 10,000 men. The latest intelligence, by way of St. Petersburg, is conveyed in the ordinary Russian bulletins of uninterrupted successes ; for into such have they the happy knack of transmuting the most disastrous conflicts. We may safely assert that, within the circled limits where the cannon of some Russian fort can hurl its shot, there the Emperor of all the Russias may claim a superficial dominion ; but beyond this magic round the jackal cry of Caucasian warfare still rings in shrill defiance of the Northern Autocrat. And how long will even this uncertain hold be likely to en dure ? The seaboard no longer blockaded by the Russian fleet, when those of England, France, and Turkey combined are masters of the Euxine, a supply of arms and gunpowder, so much required, will be furnished to the inhabitants—who thus, with renovated means, animated by European aid and sympathy, and supported by the armies of Turkey advancing from Batrum, will soon show us what achievements can be performed by a nation thirsting for vengeance and panting to establish their freedom and independence. DEATH OF LOAD CLoscranv.—Another of the men who figured remarkably in the troublous period which preceded the union between Great Britain and Ireland has passed to his final account. Lord Clon curry died on the 28th ult., at his residence county Dublin, at the advanced age of eighty years. His lordship published his own memoirs about four years ago. From this book and other sources it appears that lie MIS at all events suspected and openly charged by the Government of the period (179 e) with being a disaffected person. lie suffered a long imprison ment, but was not brought to trial. In 1803 Lord Cloncurry was married to the daughter of Major- General Morgan, and some years afterwards the lovers of scandal were entertained by a trial for crim. con., iu which his lordship was plaintiff, and Sir John Bennet Piers defendant. His lordship ob tained heavy damages, and the marriage was dis solved. He then married the daughter of Archibald Douglas, Esq., who died in 1841. Lord Cloncurry is succeeded in his titles and estates by the Hon. Ed ward Lawless, deputy-lieutenant of the county Dublin. DEATH OF THE Bisiioe OF Danny. A vacancy has been left upon the Irish Episcopal Bench by the death of the Hon. and Right Bev. Dr. Ponsonby, Lord Bishop of Derry and Raphoe, which took place at the episcopal palace on Thursday week. The de ceased prelate was a supporter of the national edu cation system, and his political principles were those of the Liberal party ; but. the natural suavity and un obtrusiveness of his manners, and the perfectly un biassed mode in which lie exercised his patronage, were such as to secure for him the esteem of all par.! tics. His lordship had, for the last few years, been in delicate health, having arrived at an advanced age. While he held the dignity of Dean of St. Patrick's he was a very popular preacher, his pulpit discourses being remarkable for chasteness and beauty of com position, and his appeals to the sympathies of his audience for the principal charities of the Irish me tropolis were found most effective, never failing to elicit a liberal response. In the year 1826 Dr. Pon sonby was elevated to the episcopal bench, having been then appointed Bishop of Killaloe and Kilfe nora. He was translated to the diocese of Derry in 1831, and on the death of Dr. Bissett he suceeeded to the see of Raphoo, the two dioceses being united under the Church Temporalities Act. The income of the see of Derry was formerly very large, but the late bishop, on his appointment, consented to a curtail ment of the episcopal revenues. which are further to be reduced to 0,000/. per annum henceforward, in ac cordance with the provisions of the Church Temporali ties Act.