The Press. — London, England, 1854-09-02 00:00:00

lIPPO = wirti-17 824 c i~. announces that the King of Bokhara was menaced by 20,000 Persians, who ha .1 entered into an alliance with Russia. WEST INDIES. The August mail from the West India Islands and Brazil reached Southampton on Tuesday in the Atrato steamer, together with seventy-five passen gers, and specie in dollars from the Pacific, worth 325,0001. The news from Jamaica is of slight importance. Cholera was abating generally throughout the island, although it still lingered in some parishes, picking off a victim here and there. The island was otherwise healthy. The first shipload of immigrants from China had arrived in the ship Epsom. The number embarked at Hong-Kong was 312, all of whom continued to enjoy good health until about fourteen days before the vessel arrived at Kingston, when a disease ap peared amongst them which was believed to be scurvy, from which no less than forty died before the Epson& reached Jamaica, and upwards of twelve subse quently. Immediately on the vessel's arrival such of the Chinese as were affected were removed to the public hospital, where every attention was paid to them, but it was found impossible to save many of them. The disease which has been thus fatal is found to be an Asiatic one, caled " berry berry," a dropsical disease which speedily destroys life. The ship was 118 days from Hong-Kong. The healthy immigrants had been forwarded to their destinations. They appear happy and con tented. From new Granada we learn that there is every prospect of a revolution. Bogota, the seat of Go vernment, was in the hands of General Melo, with 4,000 troops, well supplied with munitions of war. The constitutional Government, under General Herrera, were at Honda, and the troops were slowly progressing towards Bogota to dislodge General Melo. General Lopezlh ad succeeded in pacifying the southern provinces, and, with '2,500 men, was marching to Honda to join Generals Herrera and Mosquera. DISPOSAL OF RUSSIAN PRISONERS. THE Moniteur of Wednesday publishes a decree regulating the disposal and distribution of Russian prisoners of war, according to the provisions of a convention negotiated between Lord Clarendon and Count Walewski. The chief articles of this conven tion are the following : " Art. 1. The prisoners who may be captured in the course of the present war shall be, as far as possible, di vided between the two countries in the following wanner : " In case one of the two countries should have had to maintain a greater number of prisoners, or shall have had a certain number during a longer time under its charge, there shall be drawn up, every three months, an account of the excess of expense resulting from such charge, and the repayment of the half of such excess shall be made by the Government of the other country. " Art. 2.. Instructions shall be subsequently arranged between the two Governments, in order to make known to the military and naval officers the places or ports to which the prisoners are to be sent. " Art. 3. If a place of depot for prisoners should be fixed upon out of the possessions of one of the two coun tries, the expense of it shall be supported by the two Go vernments, but the advance shall be made by the Govern ment which may have appointed its officers to the care of the establishment. " Art. 4. Whenever the two Governments shall agree with the enemy to make an exchange of prisoners, no dis tinction shall be made between the respective subjects who have fallen into the power of the enemy; but their libera tion shall be stipulated for according to the prim ity of their capture, except under special circumstances, of which the two Governments reserve to themselves the natural right to judge." This convention is dated May 10, and to it are appended the signatures of the Emperor Napoleon, Lord Clarendon, Count Walewski, M. Drouyn de l'Huys, and M. Abbatucci, French Keeper of the Seals. PRESERVED MEATS. Is annsequence of the war in the East, and the difficulty of obtaining good supplies of animal food, several experi ments have been made in Paris for improving the mode of preserving meat. A nephew of M. Payen, the celebrated chemist, has submitted to the Uovernrnent some dried meat, but it was objected to by the War department. The Minister of War is now trying some remarkable specimens supplied by MM. Delabarre and Bonnet Their meat, dried nearly five months ago, has resisted all the changes of damp and heat to which it has been subjected. It is dried by natural means ; and in preparing it nothing is used that is not furnished by the animal itself. When the water which forms so large a proportion of the component parts of fresh meat is removed, a varnish composed of the pure osmazone of the animal is applied, and this, entering the pores, augments the nutritious properties of the meat, which has undergone no process of cooking, or been ex posed to artificial heat of any kind, and, covering the surface, the meat is protected alike from damp or heat, and exposure to the air produces no effect upon it. The ineat, although raw, may be eaten in that state, and is highly agreeable to the taste. It is reduced by desicca tion one half, so that half the expense of carriage is saved; . , . . 1 ' ,_ • t • . , , . t I 1 t 1 1 4 i I 1 . ; I 1 ( . , 1 . , : t II 4 t 7ml=7 - " • ''''' " • w• THE PRESS. but when it has to be cooked it is just put for about half an hour into warm water. It then recovers nearly its original volume, and, when cooked, cannot be distinguished from fresh meat which has just been supplied by a butcher. A still more extraordinary discovery is svoken of. It is said that a gentleman in one of the provincial towns of France has discovered the means of preserving for several mouths meat, fruits, (Pc., without in any manner reducing them in size, flavour, nr appearance. A leg of mutton, or a piece of beef, at the end of six or eight months or more, it is asserted, retains its original appearance and all its original qualities. One of the most eminent scientific men in Paris stated that he saw and tasted strawberries gathered two months ago, and that they were just the same iu flavour and appearance as if they had not been gathered half an hour. PRESS RESPONSIBILITIES IN CALIFORNIA. MR. BATEMAN, the father of the two little actresses, so well known for the precocity of their talents, and who were performing some time since in London, offered a prize of 1,0(0 dols. for a drama to be enacted by the children. There were twenty-one competitors, but all their compositions were rejected, on the ground that they did not suit the children's talents, and a drama was produced which carried off the prize. Immediately after the award it was dis covered that the successful piece was written by hire. Bateman, the mother, and she confessed that she threw it off in an incredibly short time. The editor of the California Chronicle, an exceedingly well conducted paper, in a sharp criticism, easily ac counted for the facility and despatch with which the prize drama was produced by the fact that it was plagiarised—taken wholesale from a play or farce written for the stage some time hack, in which the scene was laid in California. This discovery created a great sensation, and Mr. Bateman determined to take his revenge, "according to the manner of the country." He waited with several of his friends in the street until the editor came by, when lie at tacked him with his fist. This is the proved testi mony, as given by the editor :—" A friend parried the blow. I drew my pistol (he had been warned, and armed himself on his way to his office), and at the instant was seized from behind, and my arms pinioned by a stout man, an accessory to this at tempted murder ; and, being thrown upon my knees in the struggle to retain my weapon, one of Batetnan's friends held me while Bateman fired at me twice from behind a cart, where he had shielded himself.' A general firing hereupon took place, and, as the streets were crowded and ten shots were fired, it seems a miracle that. no one was killed. The matter was in vestigated before the Recorder (the police magistrate), and he punished the offence by a fine of 300 dols. imposed upon Mr. Bateman. Judging from the Recorder's reasoning, it would appear that, bad the firing not taken place in the public streets, where the lives of women and children were put in danger, the assailant would have been let off scot free. The editors of California are in continual scrapes, and several of them have been shot for their writings. THE CONFESSIONAL IN FRANCE. A SINGULAR trial has Just, taken place at the Court of Assizes of the Seine, resulting in some striking illustrations of the consequences to which the system of confession too often leads. The proceedings caused intense excitement in Paris during the two days occupied in trying the charge, which was that of murder, a man named Gauvain being the defen dant. The circumstances as disclosed by the wit nesses examined are as follow : On the 11th of April last, at seven o'clock in the morn ing, the Abbe Gay, filling the distinguished office of trea surer of the Imperial Chapter of St. Denis, was, while reading a placard describing certain clerical arrangements for the week, near the church of St. Vincent de Paul, shot with a pistol by a jealous husband, who made no attempt at escape, and, being seized, was soon known as a respect able compositor, for years employed on the Siecle news paper, of the name of Henri Gauvain. It appears that Gauvain, a man of fifty-four years of age, had been mar ried to his wife for twenty-five yearitoby whom he has two children, and with whom he lived on goal terms until the Abbe Gay introduced himself into the family as her spiritual director. The acquaintance began in 18-04, but it was not till 1811 that the husband's suspicions became awakened ; and, even then, it was only on the 20th of December, It<i3 ; that he discovered full proof of the injury inflicted upon him. On that day, taking advantage of his wife's absence, he searched her drawers, and found two daguerreotype portraits of the " gallant (lay," and with notes headed ".lours Henreux." Even this he bore with patience. and only broke out in reproaches against the reverend author of his ruin three days afterwards when, on his arrival home, he found him seated by his wife, who was in tears. What added to Gauvain's irritation was the discovery that his wife, who managed a little book-shop, was clandestinely putting money aside, as he believed, according to the advice of her worldly as well as spiritual director. Notwithstand ing the effect produced on Ganvain's mind, he denied that he had any settled intention of shooting the offender. and what gives colouring to the circumstance is that the pistol which he fired was charged with that sort of very small shot which is used in cleansing bottles, and, if one bad not lodged in the brain, the probable object, that of maiming the offender, might have been achieved. The conduct of Gauvain on his trial might seem to disprove his own eng- SATURDAY, gested hypothesis, for he conducted himself with the most perfect resolution. He neither attempted to palliate or deny what he had done, nor did he seek to take shelter under the plea of insanity, which the prosecutor would willingly have accepted. But this resoluteness of a man conscious of his own motives, which ho did not disguise, and regard ing which his sole difficulty consisted in his inability to make clearly comprehensible to the court, is not at all in- consistent with the confused, unstable behaviour of one who, however suffering and desirous of vengeance, yet shrunk from imbruing his hands in the blood of another. To show the sort of wavering pitrpose with which his mind became inflicted, we must state he armed himself with two pistols, one, as we have seen, loaded with small shot, and the other unloaded ; and the latter he said he would have used to commit suicide had he not been arrested ; nor would he have done even that on account of previously settled purpose, but from a sudden idea pro- duced by the effect the sight of the abbe's blood excited in him. Had he indeed resolved upon committing murder, he must have had opportunities enough, for he was con stantly following the abbe about, while the latter affected to treat him as a monomaniac. During the long inter course, or rather mastership, exercised in the unfortunate man's family, the priest had probably acquired an habitual ascendancy, which Gauvain could never well shake off, and in this way the declaration of the accused assumes an air of truth, that it was on the spur of a fresh provocation, and in a sudden burst of anger, he screwed his courage up to the point of just hurting the priest,—a statement rendered still more probable by the extraordinary testimony of the Abbe Roy, than which nothing more curious was ever heard in a court of justice. The abbe began by deposing to an altercation which occurred the day before the assassination at Gay's house, when he heard Gauvain accuse him of having robbed him of his wife and his money ; and it is his conviction that Gauvain had come to execute his project, and had been prevented by his (the abbe's) presence. Now, Gauvain'a version of the same story is, that Gay had called out from his window to the passers-by to take care of the dangerous madman, on which he forced his way into the house, to show the world he was not the person described. But we may easily reconcile apparent contradictions by the general circumstance of Gauvain dogging the steps of the abbe to his own door, and the latter's efforts to shake off the intruder by crying out he was mad. To proceed, however. Gay addresses his brother priest, telling him that Gauvain was, indeed, mad, and as proof thereof main tained that his monomania had taken the form of jeal'msy of himself. What follows is almost diverting. The abbe, instead of relying on the impossibility of a clergyman com mitting adultery under any circumstances, begins to describe the appearance of the lady, her age, and uglines se enough to acquit him of all suspicion. She has, says the tasteful abbe, " neither youth nor beauty, she is as meagre as a skimmer, and as sottish, foolish, and doltishly-shaped as she is old, ugly, and thin." How could Father Confessor Roy suspect Father Confessor Gay of making such a choice? By way of securing revenge for his martyred friend, Abbe Roy determines on having a fling at the old skimmer, and he voluntarily tells the court of a letter, an actual love-letter, from the said spoon or skimmer, which he bad found in the pocket of the priest Gay. He spoke of it, as he simply avowed, because he knew it could not compromise the reputation of his stainless friend, while it showed Madame Gauvain to have sinned in heart. Madame, stupid and old as she was, fired up ; the priest, losing his temper, gave her the lie. The judge reprimanded the priest, the latter became confused and angry, and the truth came out. The abbe had, indeed, destroyed the letter, most shamefully, as the court told him ; but such a description of the contents were extracted from him as left no doubt of the doings of the priest with the skimmer; and Gauvain was at once acquitted, as he must have been by any court on earth except that of the Inquisition The effect of this exposure on the populace is not to be exaggerated ; and the clerical reaction, which had been setting in with characteristic violence, has received a check which it is not likely to recover. 1 ONE of the most interesting excursions of the Emperor and Empress of the French in their visit to the south-west of France was to the Refuge of St. Mary at Anglet, founded by the Abbe Cestac, canon at the Cathedral of Bayonne. All the nuns came out in procession to receive their Majesties, who entered the chapel, and, after having prayed there for some time, proceeded to visit the gardens, dormitories, refectory, (tc. The Emperor expressed him self highly pleased with the order and neatness of the whole establishment. Their Majesties then went to visit the establishment of St. Bernard, about a mile distant. The Empress took the arm of one of the sisters, Al agde laine de Pazzi, and conversed with her during the walk to St. Bernard. All the nuns of this order, to receive their imperial visitors, stood in two ranks, in their usual attire, which covers them so entirely as not to allow a feature of the face to be seen, a large hood being drawn far over the face. The Emperor and Empress passed between the ranks, and when they had arrived at the end his Majesty inquired if the rules of the order would not allow the hood to be thrown back. The Abbe Cestac. who accompanied their Majesties, replied that there was nothing to abso lutely prevent that being done, and immediately ordered the nearest sister to uncover her head. This she did, and presented to view the face of a young girl of sixteen, of great beauty. The Empress took this nun with her in her visit round the establishment, and at the end, handing to, the abbe her purse, she said , " Here , Monsieur TAbbe, you will take the contents of this purse as a souvenir of my visit to this establishment." 'The purse contained 1,600 f. Is the Journal (le St. Petersbourg of August 18 we read :-- "An anonymous inhabitant of the Netherlands, moved by sentiments of devotedness to Russia, has offered the sum of twenty Dutch florins for the expenses of the present war His Majesty the Emperor has deigned to accept this offering' and to express his imperial gratitude to the giver."