The Press. — London, England, 1855-11-03 00:00:00

1046 '...9 , " decorations will at the same time be sent to the chief officers of the army. A Constantinople letter of the 14th, published in the Augsburg Gazette, states that a rumour prevailed in that capital that the Turkish Government had applied to the Austrian Cabinet to have General Coronini replaced in the command of the troops occupying the principalities, but that the Austrian Government had refused to comply. The presence of Field• Marshal Count Paar at Constantinople had excited some curiosity. It was said that he had come on a mission from Austria, relative to the prin cipalities. By letters, via Berlin, the Porte is said to have refused any communication with the Count, on the plea that its hands are tied by the Western powers. The Porte is said to have given notice to the Hospodars of Wallachia and Moldavia that an allied corps would shortly proceed towards the Truth by Varna and Bucharest, and that English and French military commissioners would precede them by a week or two, to prepare supplies. Mahmed Pacha, the present Seraskier, was making every effort to ameliorate the condition of the Turkish army, and to sustain the Asiatic army in efficiency and force. A letter from Constantinople states : Baron Koller has made a formal demand of the Porte for the prolongation of the powers of the Hospodars of Wallachia and Moldavia, and he has declared that a change of the Princes would be a misfortune for the provinces. Another letter states :-- Prince Stirbey has again fallen seriously ill, and has been obliged to leave to the Administrative Council the duties of Government. Many persist in believing that Stirbey is not only suffering in body, but that his mind is seriously afflicted. The ex-Hospodar Michael Stourdza is under the menace of an inquiry which, in fact, must be held some day or other, and then the source whence millions have been derived will probably be known. It is to be hoped that the same will take place for Stirbey. The report that the Austrian army in the princi palities was to be increased to 25,000 men was credited at Bucharest. SWEDEN. In Sweden the question of the Western alliance becomes every day more and more canvassed. The question has been treated at length in a pamphlet recently published at Stockholm, and entitled "The Policy of Sweden in the War of the Western Powers with Russia, and the Question of the Constitution of Finland in a distinct State." The conclusions come to in this pamphlet are the following : The policy of Sweden cannot differ from that of Europe ; that is to say, it must tend to form a counterpoise to Russia. This cankot take place except the three Scandi navian States—Sweden, Norway, and Denmark—are united together under the same Government and form one single State, preserving their distinct constitutions. Sweden cannot take part against Russia unless she can look for ward to the formation of a union of the north, guaranteed by the Western powers. The artival of General Canrobert was eagerly anticipated. it is believed that a strong squadron of the allied fleet will winter in some of the Swedish ports. The following extract from a private letter of the 23rd ult., from Gottenburg, is indicative of the po pular feeling upon the subject of the Western alliance:— It is not yet decided whether Sweden next year will eo-operate with the allied armies in restraining the power of Russia, and destroying that barbarous empire. There is no doubt that if we here should be governed of a descendant from our old Swedish Charles or Gustavus, we already would have fought for the liberty and huma. nity as long as England and France; and perhaps, then, Cronstadt at this moment should have had the same fate as Sebastopol. Everybody here is enthusiastic for a war against Russia, and we hope that our Government at last will be forced to listen to our sympathies to partake in the existing war, of which we could have a great deal to profit. DENMARK. A letter from Copenhagen of the 20th gives the following details, which are not generally known, relative to the Sound dues, and which proves, as far as it goes, that the United States have not much reason to complain of the amount they pay. The letter states : The resistance made by the United States is really not justifiable, when the small amount it pays is compared with other countries. The Sound dues paid from 1851 to 1853 may be divided as follow :—United States, 4,810 f. ; England, 196,000 f ; Holland, 80,000 f.; France, 96,000 f. ; Prussia, 118,000 f.; Russia, 45,000 f.; the Scandinavian flag, 170,0001. The export duties for the ports of America and the imports from the commercial ports of the United States for the Baltic amounted in the same period to about 2.5t 1 ,000f. ; for Holland, 400,000 E; England, 3,370,000 f.; Scandinavian ports, 200,000 f. ; Bremen and Hamburg, 100,000 f.; France, 400,000 f.; Belgium, 100,000 f.; East Indies, 250,000 f.; the duty on vessels amounted in one year to 7130,000 f., and that on goods to 5,785,000 f. The capitalisation of the above amount would be from 125,000,000 f. to 130,000,000 f. Denmark will only treat with the States which have ports in the Baltic for the purchase of the Sound dues, because she has found, on minute examination, that the base of this revenue comes from merchandise imported or exported, and which repre• aents the majority of the interests connected with the question. THE PRESS. ITALY AND NAPLES. The Corriere Mercantile of Genoa asserts, upon what it states to be good authority, that Chevalier Cibrario, Minister of Foreign Affairs at Turin, is to resign, in consequence of the diplomatic difference existing between Piedmont and Tuscany. This difference, according to the correspondent of the Times, it is intlieved, is on the eve of an amicable solution. Piedmont no longer insists on confiding to M. Casati a diplomatic post at the Court of an Austrian Archduke, and is to be represented in future at Florence by a simple chargé d'affaires, instead of a Minister Plenipotentiary. M. Mazza has not yet started upon his mission to Vienna, but still remains at Naples. The differences between the Western powers and Naples are patched up for the present, but they are not, at least in Naples, considered as satisfactorily arranged. An emeute had taken place at Catania, Sicily, on the 24th, but had been speedily suppressed. SPAIN. -.:.,~ U The Ministerof Finance, M. Bruil, has, with the consent of his colleagues, decided that half the produce of the sale of national effects during the year 1856—that is to say, 109 millions—sball be em ployed in paying off the debts of the State, and that in this arrangement the holders of the passive bonds shall not be tOrgotten. The Saragossa faction had been destroyed, end its leaders made prisoners. The illness of the King had been caused by a severe fall from his horse. INDIA AND CHINA. The following despatch from Trieste in anticipa tion of the overland mail was received on Thursday : Trieste, Oct. 31. The steamer Calcutta arrived to-day in 125 hours from Alexandria. The India and China mails left Alexandria on the 25th for Marseilles, with dates from Bombay of October 3 ; Madras, September 27; Calcutta, Sep tember 23; Hongkong, September 15 ; and Shanghai, September 7. The Santhal insurrection was dying out. Mr. Conolly, collector in MaleLar; - had been mur dered by the Moplabs. THE SANTHAL INSURRECTION. THE following account of the origin of the outbreak of the Santhals in Bengal is from the pen of an officer on the spot, and may be implicitly relied on : The Santhals inhabiting the hilly country to the north of Berhampore as far as the Bhagulpore district subsist almost as much upon the produce of the chase as from the cultivation of the soil; hence they contributed but little, till within the past few years, in the way of taxes. Per haps the whole Santhal revenue, at the commencement of Lord Dalhousie's reign, did not exceed six thousand rupees per annum, being levied at the rate of four annas per beegah. The existing state of the revenue did not, however, keep pace with the aggressive policy of the uew governorgeneral, and it became necessary before long to devise some new sources of income. To the imagination of Lord Dalhousie and of the officials by whom he was surrounded, well trained in the school of torture, nothing appeared so well adapted for the purpose as to put on the screw. The Santhals having the character of being a race of demi-savages, easy to be controlled, and by no means fcrrnidable in point of number or organisation, it was de termined to commence with them. The process was gradual. First the rates were raised from four annas to eight annas, then to one rupee per beegah. Year after year did Mr. Poutel, the. Government tax-gatherer, report the fruit of his labours in an immensely-increased revenue, until in 1851 he was enabled to show by his returns that the district which a short time back yielded only six thou sand, now produced sixty thousand rupees yearly to Go vernment. Such a state of things could not be otherwise than gratifying to the microscopic mind of the Scotch marquis : it was accordingly deemed fitting that Mr. Poutel should receive some substantial mark of viceregal gratitude. Accordingly, a few months ago Mr. Cecil Bea don, the Financial Secretary of State, forwarded to Mr. Poutel on behalf of Governments gold watch, accompanied by a letter, in which that official was expressly informed that the watch was intended as a token of the satisfaction of Government with his conduct in increasing the state of the revenue. _ . By this gift the Government, with Lord Dalhousie at their head, distinctly took upon their own shoulders the responsibilty of Mr. Poutel's acts. This will be the more readily conceded when it is considered that the Govern ment was composed principally of men who had spent their lives in judicial and revenue employ, and who must therefore have known how impossible it was to increase a revenue from six to sixty thousand rupees in so short a period by fair means. Let us now examine what were the means employed by Government, means which have at the same time succeeded in raising simultaneously a re venue and an outbreak. . . To the first increase the Santhals patiently submitted. To meet the second and third, however, they were com• pelled to have recourse to native gomashtas or bankers. By this class they were accommodated at the reasonable rate of cent. per cent. Thus matters went till 1854—the revenue being gradually raised, and the debts of the San thals, to meet the new revenue, increasing in monster proportion. In 1854 they found themselves unable any longer to satisfy the gomashtas, and they represented their case to the collector, but represented in vain. The SATURDAY, gomashtas, unable to obtain the money, at once proceeded to distrain, and seized all the cattle upon which they could lay hands. Hearing of this outrage, forty-four of these men, Santhal chiefs, men of great weight amongst the San. thals, went to the gomashtaa as the cattle were being e ar . ried off, and, without making any attack, simply threatened them with vengeance if they should attempt a like outrage again. For this threat these chiefs were seized, brought up before the civil courts, and sentenced to transportation for fourteen years! It can easily be imagined the state of ferment in which the whole tribe was thrown on receipt of this intelligence. For a time, however, they were pacified by being informed that the sentence would not be valid until confirmed by the Sudder Court in Calcutta. Will it be believed that, notwithstanding their complete know ledge of all that has been related above, the sentence was confirmed, the Santhals were transported, and, as a matter of course, this insurrection at once broke out? Such are the main facts of the case. The Punjab and Burmese wars, and the other notorious extravagances of Lord Dal housie, led to an increased expenditure of revenue ; this led to exorbitant taxation and its consequent tyranny and oppression. By the combined influence of these, the most devoted subjects of the Company have been driven into rebellion, blood has been shed like water, private pro perty destroyed, villages burned in profusion (that favourite system of Lord D.), our prestige injured, and as for th e revenue, the sixty thousand will have diminished to zero. Such is the policy of Lord Dalhousie—on the eve of his departure the goose has been killed fur its golden eggs. THE AUSTRIANS IN THE PRINCIPALITIES. THE following account of some of the leading brutalities committed by the Austrian soldiers during their occupation of tho principalities is not without interest. The total impunity which the Austrian soldiery enjoy in the committal of their brutal atrocities upon the inhabitants is a proof bow little justice those unfortunates can hope for at the hands of their protectors: — On the 2nd of October the proprietor of a vineyard nett to the Prussian consul's house, outside of Bucharest, was murdered by a band of fifteen or twenty Austrian soldiers, and two of his watchers were severely wounded. This vineyard had been robbed the two preceding nights by a similar band of Austrian soldiers, and it was in the hope of protecting his vines that the proprietor was these watch ing with his servants. The plunder was continued on the two nights following the murder, for the family of the murdered man kept close in their house, which they barricaded for the protection of their lives, while no one fora moment thought of making the facts known to any of the local authorities, long and painful experience having convinced the population of the total impunity which the Austrian soldiery enjoy. Two Wallachian surgeons re fused to have anything to do with the treatment of the men who had been wounded by the Austrians, lest a similar fate should befal themselves. A Prussian surgeon, at the request of the servants of the Prussian consul, who had been brought to the spot by the cries of the wounded, wok one of the watchers into his hospital, where he also died on the second day. Previous to his death the surgeon prevailed on the family to make the outrage known to the Government, that the depositions of the dying man might be taken in time. The officials at the Ministry of the Interior refused to draw up any precis verbal, or take any official notice of the matter, as soon as they heard that Austrian soldiers were concerned. These bands of soldiers, varying from fifteen to twenty in number, who thus made nightly razziaa outside the town, must in each case have passed the barriere, where an Aus trian guard is posted to watch over all ontgoers and in comers, and have returned unquestioned, although the time of the sortie was from ten till twelve o'clock at night. Within a few days of the above affair the proprietor of another vineyard outside another barriere was also mal treated within an inch of his life by Austrian soldiers, whilst watching his property during the night. The Moldavian Government is already in possession of substantial evidence of forty odd cases of murder committed by Austrian soldiers in that principality alone up to the end of the summer. These crimes are in almost all cases committed in connection with petty thefts, either for the purpose of stealing or in consequence of meeting with resistance. 'f he above statement my friend had from the private secretary of the reigning Prince, M. Greiner. Unlike his brother Hospodar in Wallachia, who endeavours as much as possible to hush up any complaints against Austrian subjects, Prince Ghika is very frank and plain spoken in his remonstrances with the Austrian military authorities; but, as he assured my friend, " There is no discipline in this army ; the officers have no power over their men to control them in their excesses." The same statement he met with unvaryingly from the different local governors, and throughout Moldavia the hatred and fear of the Austrian soldiery have now reached as fearful a degree as in Wallachia. Throughout the two principalities there is but one voice and one sentiment with regard to the brutal conduct of the men, and the reckless behaviour of the officers. Two of the most flagrant instances of these excesses that have recently happened in Moldavia were, first, that of the president of the municipality of Fokschani, who was grievously maltreated and bad his arm broken by Austrian soldiers, because they refused to find them qoar ters, they not being at the time provided with any billeting tickets. The other was that of a Moldavian officer, who had the misfortune to get into a wordy contention with twenty-seven Austrian soldiers at a place of public enter tainment in Bakan, on which they fell upon him and stabbed him to death with their bayonets. A member of the committee of investigation which inquired into this matter (the officer was in the household of the Prince) explained to my friend that nothing had actually been proved, since it was impossible to ascertain which of the