The Press. — London, England, 1854-07-08 00:00:00

632 quarter of a million sterling, sailed from St. Helena a few days before the last Cape steamer (the Calcutta) arrived there. She was bound to St. Petersburg. The governor was not aware at the time that war had been declared. The captain of the Russian was a German, and had furnished himself with double sets of papers. A telegraphic despatch from Ham burg of the 3rd inst. contains some further account of this vessel. It says:— " Four English vessels were in pursuit of Russian mer chantmen. The Cesarowits, having a cargo of India goods worth a million, has managed to escape them, and entered Cuxhaven." GREECE. Advices from Athens, of the 30th ult., state that the rebels have been defeated at Calambaca. Fuad Effendi took that place by assault. Hadgi Petros's band was dispersed. 1,000 were killed, and many made prisoners. The Turks sent 000 heads of the slain to Larissa. Austrian, French, and English ships were still cruising in the Greek waters. M. Mavrocordato, the President of the Greek Ministry, reached Marseilles on the 30th ult., and de parted immediately for Athens. THE EARTHQUAKE AT SAN SALVADOR. A BULLETIN extraordinary from the Governor of San Salvador gives the following detailed account of the catastrophe which overtook that town on the 10th of April last. It states : The night of the 10th of April, 1854, will ever be one of sad and bitter memory for the people of Salvador. On that unfortunate night our happy and beautiful capital was made a heap of ruins. Movements of the earth were felt ou the morning of Holy Thursday, preceded by sounds like the rolling of heavy artillery over pavements, and like distant thunder. The people were a little alarmed, but it did not prevent them from meeting in the churches to celebrate the solemnities of the day. On Saturday all was quiet, as was also the whole of Sunday. The heat was con siderable, but the atmosphere was calm and serene. For the first hours of the evening nothing unusual occurred, but at half-past nine o'clock a severe shock of an earth quake, occurring without the usual preliminary noises, alarmed the whole city. Many families left their houses and made encampments iu the public squares, while others prepared to pass the night in their respective courtyards. Finally, at ten minutes to eleven, without premonition of any kind, the earth began to heave and tremble with such fearful force that in ten seconds the entire city was pros trated. The crashing of houses and churches stunned the ears of the terrified inhabitants, while a cloud of dust from the falling ruins enveloped them in a pall of impene trable darkness. Not a drop of water could be got to relieve the half-choked and suffocating, for the wells and fountains were filled up or made dry. The clock tower of the cathedral carried a great part of the edifice with it in its full. The towers of the church of Sun Francisco crushed the episcopal oratory and part of the palace. The church of Santo Domingo was buried beneath its towers, and the College of the Assumption was entirely ruined. The new and beautiful edifice of the university was demolished. The church of the Merced separated in the centre, and its walls fell outward to the ground. Of the private houses a few were left standing, but all were rendered uninhabitable. It is worthy of remark that the walls left standing are old ones ; all those of modern construction have fallen. The public edifices of the Government and city shared the same common destruction. The devastation was effected, as we have said, in the first ten seconds ; for, although the suc ceeding shocks were tremendous, and accompanied by fearful rumblings beneath our feet, they had comparatively trifling results, for the reason that the first had left but little for their ravages. Solemn and terrible was the pic ture presented on that dark funereal night of a whole people clustering in the plazas, and on their knees crying with load voices to Heaven for mercy, or in agonising accents calling for their children and friends, whom they believed to be buried beneath the ruins! A heaven opaque and ominous ; a movement of the earth rapid and unequal, causing a terror indescribable ; an intense sulphurous odour tilling the atmosphere, and indicating an approach. ing eruption of the volcano : streets filled with ruins or overhung by threatening walls; a suffocating cloud of dust almost rendering respiration impossible. Such was the spectacle presented by the unhappy city on that memo rable and awful night. It was believed that at least a fourth part of the inhabitants had been buried beneath the ruins. The members of the Government, however, hastened to ascertain, as far as practicable, the extent of the catastrophe, and to quiet the public mind. It was found that the loss of life had been much less than was supposed, and it now appears probable that the number of the killed will not exceed 100, and of wounded 50. Among the latter is the Bishop, who received a severe blow on the head ; the late President, Senor Duenas ; a daughter of the President, and the wife of the Secretary of the Legis lative Chambers—the latter severely. The movements of the earth still continue, with strong shocks, and the people, fearing a general swallowing up of the site of the city, or that it may be buried under some sudden eruption of the volcano, are hastening away. THZ EDUCATIONAL EXHIBITION which has been for some time in preparation under the superintendence of the Society of Arts was opened on Tuesday even ing by a conversazione in St. Martin's-hall, which was honoured by the presence of his Royal Highness Prince Albert, and was attended by upwards of 1,200 gentlemen more or less connected with educational literature in England, America, and the continent of Europe. , • THE PRESS. THE WAR. THE ARMIES. Some further progress in the advance movement effecting by the combined forces in Turkey is re corded in our intelligence of the week. Prince Napoleon and Marshal St. Arnaud left Constanti nople for Varna on the 26th of June. The total force which has reached that place amounted to 50,000 English and French, of whom a first detach ment had marched for Schumla. On the 22nd ult. a cannonade was heard at Varna in the direction of Schumla, and General Canrobert sent a squadron of dragoons to reconnoitre. The whole body of allied troops were then, it is stated, immediately to advance towards the seat of war. At Adrianople 16,000 troops, all French, had arrived on the 22nd ult. General Bosquet's division had marched thence 13r Schumla. One Turkish brigade has been placed under French, another under English, command. It is still believed that a joint attack by sea and land on the Crimea is under consideration by the allied chiefs. THE FLEETS. The combined fleet in the Black Sea was again off Baltschick on the 24th nit. Three steamers, the Terrible, Furious, and Descartes, were watching Sebastopol, where on the 15th of June a squadron of seven or eight Russian steamers made their appearance without the har bour. A disaint encounter took place, in which shot were exchanged, with the result of inflicting some damage to the Furious. The largest Russian steamer, the Wladimir, it was believed suffered much from a shell which was seen to burst on board. Although the disproportion in numbers was so great the Rus sinus could not be enticed into a nearer conflict, and speedily retired again behind the batteries of Sebastopol. The Wladimir is the frigate built by Mare and Co. of Blackwell, with 400 horse-power engines by ltennie. She was constructed ostensibly as a yacht for the Emperor, and as such passed through the Dardanelles and into the Black Sea; but she had fourteen 08 pounders in her bold. Two steamers are said have stranded off the Suline mouth of the Danube. Fortunately they were beyond the reach of the Russian batteries, and the crews were endeavouring to get them off. Soundings have been taken by the British at the mouth of the Dniester, not far from Odessa. There had been some trifling skirmishes with the Cossacks. The Highflyer left for the coast of Circassia on the Bth with a Turkish steamer, taking two field pieces to be used against Redout Kaleh, where the Itussians have a force of 8,000 in the vicinity of that fortress. In the Baltic Sir C. Napier, with nearly the whole of the combined fleet, was off Cronstadt on the 29th ult. Some accounts state that an attack was in preparation for the next day. The Moniteur says that the admiral had gone to Cronstadt to make a reconnaisance. A Russian steamer, we are told, had made its appearance outside, and was chased back by the Desperate, which had the honour of firing the first shot at Croustadt batteries on that occasion. The bombardment of Bomarsund, which was begun on the 21st, as we announced last week, was renewed on the 28th by the three steamers Hecla, Odin, and Valorous, under Captain Hall. The forti fications were more than half destroyed, the maga zines blown up, and the fortress set on fire in several places. The Russians were endeavouring to trans port their stores from Bomarsund to Gelaby. The British loss amounted only to six men wounded. News has been heard of the boat's crew taken pri soners at Gamla Carleby. The officers and fifteen men were at Helsingfors, and are treated very well. The remainder are left behind at the place of action, having been wounded. Murphy, the mate of the Vulture, who it was feared had been killed, is among the prisoners. The cholera is stated to have broken out in the garrison of Cronstadt. A letter from an officer of the fleet, dated Baro Sound, June 20, says : "We are ordered off very suddenly. The admiral has just made a signal for the captain of our ship to prepare for sea. The Commander-in-Chief has gone up with the screw fleet to have a look at Cronstadt. Whether he intends having an attack on the place or not I canot say. Admiral Corry, with the sailing-ships, is in company with us; they sail for Helsingfors (about ten miles eastward of this place ), so as to prevent the Russian fleet from coming out of that place, as it is expected they will ; so we hope to have ago in at them before long. We are to join them again in a day or two." The son of the First Lord of the Admiralty, and the 801 of the Duke of Newcastle, the Minister at War, have both proceeded in the Dauntless to join ships in the fleet. Mr. Graham serves with the Hon. Captain Keppel in the St. Jean &Acre, 101, screw ; and the Hon. Mr. Clinton joins the Impe rites/et, 51, screw, Captain Watson, C.B. SATURDAY, THE WAR ON THE DANUBE. All doubt as to the real character of the retrograde movement of the Russians is now at an end. It is simply an act of precaution against Austria, and an attempt on the part of Russia to resist the intention announced by that power of occupying the principa lities, and driving the Russians out of them if they should resist. A letter from Bucharest, dated the 20th of June, and published in the Moniteur, leaves no doubt of the fact. It shows that the Russians, in abandoning their position on the right bank of the Danube, and in front of Silistria, had very different intentions from those of evacuating the principalities. If their intentions had been to obey the summons of Austria, they would have taken the direction of Reni, on the frontiers of Bessarabia, or of Fokschani, in Moldavia, which are the great routes towards their own dominions. But, in place of adopting either of these courses, they have gone in the direction of Urzitseni, to the north-west of Silistria, from which place they are to proceed to Floreschti, which is still further in the same direction, and ultimately to ad vance to Kimpina, on the borders of Transylvania, through which the great road to Kronstad, the Tran sylvanian capital, passes. The town of Kimpina commands the defile through which is the principal means .of communication between Transylvania and Wallachia, from which it may be concluded that the Austrians will not occupy the principalities without opposition. This representation of the event is somewhat dis countenanced by the Prussian Correspondence , which announces from Bucharest, June 25, that M. de Budberg, who had been appointed by the Czar to the administration of the Danubian provinces, has de clared that the Russians were about to evacuate Wallachia, and perhaps Moldavia, from motives of strategy. A Vienna despatch of Wednesday states that the head quarters of Prince Gortschakoff were trans ferred on the Ist to Urzitseni. The Russians have undermined all the roads &mu Moldavia to Transyl vania. The Vienna correspondent of the Cologne Gazette writes : " Official reports have just arrived here from the Russian army of the Danube, according to which discipline is en tirely broken up. As every retreat before a victor acts fatally on the morale of the vanquished, so in this case dis cipline, order, and obedience to authority have ceased, the soldiers roam about in gangs, robbing and plundering, harkening no longer to the word of command, shootiug their own officers if they attempt to enforee subordination, and the scene of all this is pour Wallachia, already ex hausted by Russian exactions. Prince Paskiewitsch only left the Danube because nothing more could be done with this army. He made a full report to that effect to the Czar, who is said to be upon the whole in so excited a mood that not a soul ventures to whisper even a breath about peace to him." According to the Russian muster-rolls there were 75,000 men concentrated at Silistria on the 19th of May. On the 21st of June 40,000 men had recrossed the Danube, on the 22nd 15,000 more were ' about to quit the Bulgarian bank of the river, 3,000 men were on one of the Danubian islands, and 5,000 sick had been transported to the hospitals. As the total number is but 03,000 men, it must be supposed that the Russians have suffered the enormous loss of 12,000 men. Three Russian transports laden with ammunition were lost while going down the Danube towards Oalatz. The crews were saved. Seventeen steamers, with Austrian troops on board, bad gone down the river from Orsova on the 2nd inst. In Asia, according to a despatch from Vienna, the Russian General Andronikoff has been completely efeated. The army of Asia has been totally dis persed by Selim Pacha, who captured thirteen guns, several stand of colours, and the materiel of three camps. The Independance Belge publishes an account, dated also from Vienna, completely reversing this statement, and declaring that the Russian General Andronikoff had beaten the Turkish army, 34,000 strong, com manded by Selim Pacha. The conquerors, it is added, captured thirteen field-pieces, thirty-five flags, three camps, and entirely dispersed the Turk ish army corps. THE REINFORCEMENTS. The reinforcements to the British army in Turkey will amount., in new regiments, drafts, and detach ments, to nearly 10,000 more troops. They are to be sent as soon as possible to the seat of war, or rather as quickly as steam tonnage can be procured. The additional regiments are to include the Scots Greys, the 4th Light Dragoons, the Ist battalion of the Rifle Brigade, and the 20th, 21st, 34th, 46th, and 83rd Foot. When these new drafts have all arrived there will be more than 40,000 British soldiers in Turkey. The Himalaya takes out another regiment of cavalry, and it is reported that this magnificent ship will become the property of the Crown. The Admi ralty pay for her hire nearly 9,0001. a month, while she could become the property of the country for... r lib.