The Press. — London, England, 1854-06-10 00:00:00

JUNE 10, 1854. SPAIN. In consequence of the hostility of the Moors, and the insults committed by them on the Spanish fl ag , it is said to be the intention of the Madrid Govern ment to send a war-steamer and two small sailing vessels to the African shores, with orders to visit the creeks and roadsteads, and destroy all the carabos and other Moorish craft which they meet with, and also to bombard the Moorish villages on the coast. TURKEY. From Constantinople, under date of May 30, we receive accounts of another change in the Ministry. Mehemet Yachts, reeently Minister of Marine, and formerly ambas.-,; to iu London, has been appointed Grand Vizier. Hail Pacha, brother in-law of the Sultan, succeeds Mehemet Pacha as Minister of Marine (Capudan Pacha). Some other Ministerial transmutations were expected. The Moniteur, in announcing the event, states that the change in the Turkish Cabinet had no political significance. Orders have been transmitted from Constantinople to the Turkish authorities in Albania to receive the troops which Austria is about to send thither. It is understood that a special treaty, concluded between Austria and the Porte with the consent of England and France, authorises this transmission of forces into the Turkish territories. The Bishop of Gibraltar has been in Constan• tinople for some weeks past, holding a confirmation. Upwards of three hundred persons were confirmed in a single week, and amongst them a considerable anmber of the troops. His lordship has submitted a project to the British Ambassador for the con struction of an English church at Constantinople, and Lord Stratford de Redefine has promised to propose the subject to the Sultan. RUSSIA. The St. Petersburg correspondent of the Vienna Press states that on the 20th ult. there appeared an order of the Minister of Police prescribing what the inhabitants of the Russian capital are to do in the event of siege, or rather a blockade, of that city. If Cronstadt should fall into the power of the allied fleets, women, children, and old men are immediately to leave the capital. The troops are to be removed from the houses, the streets are to be unpaved, and the bells of the holy churches and the images of the saints are to be removed to Moscow. Notwithstand ing all these precautions, the order expresses the assurance that the enemy's fleet will perish on the rocks, and under the cannon of Cronstadt. All mea sures necessitated by a long and energetic war are being taken here. Both sides of the mouth of the Neva are being protected with strong defensive works. Another letter from St. Petersburg relates that their Imperial Highnesses the Grand Duchess Maria, wife of the Cesarewitch (a born princess of Hesse Darmstadt); Alexandra, wife of the Grand Duke Constantine (a princess of Saxe-Altenburg, and sister to the Queen of Hanover) ; and Maria Nicho lajewna (widow of the Duke of Leuchtenburg), have proceeded upon a pious pilgrimage to the celebrated and wealthy monastery of Troitsk (Holy Trinity), near Warsaw. This monastery was erected and dedi cated to St. Sergius, who was buried there in the fourteenth century. Here it was that Peter the Great took refuge during the insurrection of the Strelitz. The riches of the cloister are enormous. Its possessions extend over many thousand acres, containing nine large parishes, with nearly 100,000 serfs. The enormous walls contain within their cir cult about 1,000 monks, and a semintry for 300 students, and its treasures and property are valued at 600 million roubles. GREECE. Affairs in Greece seem tending towards quiet and pacification, the King having yielded at the last moment to the representations so vigorously urged and backed of the English and French Ministers. In the Moniteur we find the following particulars of his Majesty's surrender. On the 20th ult. the King invited the Ministers of England and France to wait on him. His Hellenic Majesty received the two envoys in the throne-room, and spoke to them in the following terms " I declare that i will faithfully observe a strict neutrality towards Turkey; that I will without any delay take all the necessary measures to effect it; and that, for this object, I will call to my counsel new Ministers, who, by their cha racter and their intelligence, are the best calculated to eary this engagement of mine into execution." Mr. Wyse, as the senior Minister, replied:— " Sire,—We shall hasten to report to our Governments the words which your Majesty has just addressed to us, and we doubt not that, your Majesty giving your support to the new councillors whom your Majesty has deigned to call to your aid, we shall no longer have to transmit to our Courts any information but such as will be very satisfactory as regards Greece." King Otho afterwards signed a declaration of strict neutrality, in the presence of the Ambassadors. The new Administration was inaugurated on the 2nd mat, It is composed of M. Mavrocordato, Pre- THE PRESS. sident of the Council, and MM. General Kalergi, Palamides, Argyropoulo, Calligas, and Isika. The new Ministers would, it was said, recal the chiefs of the insurgents, change the personal of the Court of King Otho, dismiss the functionaries who have compromised themselves, and demand from the French Government to renounce the idea of placing a garrison at Athens and Syra. Of the French force that arrived at the Pirteus 3,000 were landed, and the remainder proceeded to Patras. In token of restored amity the English and French flags were saluted with 21 guns from the Greek batteries. Austrian vesael9 rill join in cap turing pirates. According to a despatch received from Athens of the 29th of May, but of doubtful authenticity, the Greeks had gamed a victory over the Turks in Thessaly. Three generals and 700 Turks remained on the field, and the victors took five guns, seven standards, 600 prisoners, and a sum of money. MOROCCO. The Governments of France and England have in formed the Court of Morocco of the state of war ex • isting between them and Russia, and the obligations resulting therefrom for neutral States. The Emperor Muley-Abder Rhaman has declared that no Russian vessel, or vessel beating a flag friendly to Russia, shall be received in the ports of his empire during the war. UNITED STATES. The last New York dates, received by the Atlantic, are of the 27th tilt The Spanish difficulty remained unsettled, and continued to occasion much excitement. It was ex pected that two special envoys would be despatched from Washington to Madrid, to endeavour to settle the disputes. The New York Herald announces that, probably in view of the unsettled state of the relation* between the United States and Spain, the Secretary of the Navy has issued an order directing that all ves sels of war on the point of departure shall be de layed. _ _ After debates of almost unprecedented duration the Nebraska Bill had passed both the House of Re presentatives and the Senate. The measure awaited only the signature of the President to become law. From the Ist to the 21st of May 424 vessels ar rived at New York from foreign ports, bringing over 48,000 passengers. Lord Elgin, Governor General of Canada, had arrived in Washington on a brief visit. The usual budget of disasters is reported by this mail. A fearful calamity had occurred on the Mis sissippi, near St. Louis. The steam-packet Pike, with 180 passengers on board, struck a snag, and sunk immediately. About fifty persons were drowned. On the 22nd ult. twenty men were killed by the ex plosion of firedamp in a coalpit near Richmond, Virginia. During the fury of a storm at Wheeling, on the 25th, the superb wire suspension bridge across the Ohio was blown down. It was 1,000 feet in a single span, and cost 200,000 dollars. Marine dis asters have been very numerous. With scarcely an exception, each vessel arriving at New York a week before the steamer left had reported the loss of spars, sails, boats, and in many instances every moveable article on deck. Terrific hurricanes, innumerable icebergs, and dense fogs, bad been encountered by navigators this season to a degree unprecedented. Immense excitement prevailed at Boston on the 213th on account of the arrest of a fugitive slave. The military were called out, and one man killed. Californian accounts state that the miners were in the most flourishing condition, and the accounts of the yield of gold more flattering than ever. The markets were dull, prices being generally depressed. The ship Golden Fleece and the barque Walter Clax ton had been totally wrecked in the harbour of San Francisco. By the explosion of the steamer Gazelle, on the Columbia river, Oregon, twenty-five persons were killed, and thirty others dangerously wounded. The accounts of Walker's expedition are to the 22nd of April. He had crossed the Colorado near its month, and at this point most of his men de serted him. About fifty of them were reported on their way to the settlements. Finding himself de serted by most of his followers, Walker turned back, with the intention, as is supposed, of joining Smith, who was left in command at San Vincente, Lower California. MEXICO. On the Sunday after Easter a fearfully destructive earthquake occurred at San Salvador. Upwards of four million dollars' worth of property was destroyed, and 200 lives. The first shock was felt on the Thnrsday night of the Easter week, the earth being disturbed by a movement similar to the rolling of heavy billows, but no serious attention seems to have been given to the matter. The great shock occurred on Sunday, at noon. Hundreds of houses were thrown down, filling the air with dust. Private letters report an amount of destruction of life and property still more awful, stating that nearly live thousand persons had been killed by the catastrophe. On the sth nit. Santa Anna summoned the garri son of Acapulco to surrender. Alvarez, the com mander, refused, and, sallying out, attacked Santa Anna's forces, taking three hundred prisoners. The victory of Alvarez, if accounts be true, was a very de. cisive one, the loss of the defeated party having been immense. Santa Anna, with but a remnant of his forces, fled before the victors. INDIA AND CHINA. An overland mail, with Calcutta news of the lat of May; Iltbdras, 5 ; Bombay, 10; and Canton, April 20; reached Tneste on Wednesday. The news as commu nicated by telegraph contains only the information that "affairs in Normal were satisfactory, and the Imperialists have been driven from Shanghai by Europeans, assisted by the rebel army." A telegraphic despatch received by a mercantile firm in the City adds some further details of this affair. It says :—" An attack made by the Imperialists on the foreign settlement of Shanghai led to the storm ing and destruction of their camp on the 4th of April by the English and American forces. Two seamen were killed and twelve wounded. All was quiet on the 12th." AUSTRALIA. According to advicws just received, gold has at length been discovered in the only one of the Aus tralian colonies in which it remained to be found. Letters from Freemantle, Western Australia, of the 25th of March, state that surface specimens have been obained within fifteen miles of that place, yielding a good per centage of pure metal. A number of persons, with provisions and proper tools, had started for the locality, and in a short time the real character and value of the deposits would be tully tested. 533 THE PLANTAIN FIBRE A NEW material for manufacture, and a new source of wealth to some of our West Indian colonies, would appear to be on the eve of development. At all events, the possibility of use and profit exists in abundance, and waits only for the proper appl►cation of skill and capital to convert it into an actuality. The material is the plantain fibre. In a recent discussion in the Court of Policy of British Guiana, one of the members, M. Van Netcher, referred to this material as being of extreme importance, and holding out a splendid promise of return. He said : " Here was an article much wasted, and which would be wasted for a century unless the Legislature brought it forward. It wag well known that it had taken nearly two centuries to bring sugar making to what it was now, and the idea of making flax from the plantain fibre was new. It was not a perishable article. It would not sour like cane. The colony was losing from 30,000 to 40,000 tons every year. From his own estate of 500 acres a ton and a half of that valuable material was lost every day." At an anti-slavery meeting held lately in London, samples of cord made from the plantain and Spanish dagger fibre by a fugitive slave were exhibited to gentlemen on the platform, and greatly admired by Sir Edward Buxton, Messrs. Alexander, Joseph Sturge, Chame rovzow, and other persons. Measures, it is stated, are being taken for forming industrial schools in all the West India islands, in which these fibres may be fitted for market. There is a possibility that, within a few years, they will be substituted for Russian hemp and slave-grown cotton, and the short fibres used for paper. The colony of British Guiana ()tiers 1,0001. for the first introducer of machinery which will prepare 100 tons of clean fibre for market. THE PRESENCE. OF LARGE FIELD 3 OF IcE in the Atlantic (luring the month of May has been shown by the narratives of many passengers in the steamers bound to or from the United States, and may explain the disappearance of the City of Glasgow steamer as well as of other vessels whose loss is now little short of certain. The latest accounts of these icefields is given by a passenger in the American liner which left Liverpool on May . 13 and reached Boston on the 26th :—On Saturday, May 20th, he says, when in lat. 49.42, and long. 44 30, they sighted a mountain of ice, about five miles distant, and for the next five and-twenty hours there was a deadly chill, as it may he said the ship was traversing an unknown sea in a hazy mist studded with moving islands of ice, so many as five having been visible at one time. They were of various shapes and sizes, but may not inaptly be compared to large hayricks after a snowstorm. Next day the ship ran close past an immense iceberg, which wow aground on the edge of the bank of New foundland ; there was a cave formed in the centre of it, and the sea around was covered with floating ice. It is said that the oldest voyager has never before seen the same quantity of ice so far south at so late a season of the year. THE Paris Siècle states that reports were current in Constantinople of Lord Stratford de Redcliffe's recal. but attributes it entirely to the state of his health, and adds that the new English Ambassador will be General Rose, better known as Colonel Rose, who was the first to fathom the real object of Prince hienschikors mission. --.1.