The Press. — London, England, 1857-11-07 00:00:00

1080 piVice, and threatened the neighbouring towns and villages. The communication with Lahore and other stations has consequently been cot off since the 10th inst. (the day following that on which we heard of our troops having attacked Delhi on the morning of the 14th). Squadrons of cavalry have been sent to open the line and protect the country, formed into two detachments. If this movement spreads, it may ptove really serious to us. It is to bo hoped that sufficient forces are at hand to keep open the communications. With regard to the provision at Calcutta for the expected troops from England, we extract the follow ing, given by a correspondent from a native paper in Calcutta, to show what our troops will have to suffer on arrival. Under 3,000 are to be distributed in no fewer than fourteen different places, miles apart, some of them in the native and crowded parts of the town : The following are the places in town in which troops that are coming will be accommodated :—No. 1, Garden Reach, 40; No. 11, ditto, 60; Lower Orphan Asylum, 200; ditto Hospital, 50; Pleaders' Chambers, Sudder, 150; Clothing Board, Allypore, 100; Martiniere, 250; Free School, 300 ; Town-hall, 600 ; Mint, 100 ; Treasury, 20; Hindoo College, 400; Madrassa, 300; Ordnance shed, Baboo Ghaut, 2.0; total, 2,B2o.—liindoe Patriot, Aug. 27. Then, again, the commissariat arrangements for their transport upcountry are inefficient to a degree. A correspondent writes : T doubt if there were 3,000 tents in the arsenal of Fort William on the 15th of September; and there were no corn miasariat arrangements adequate to the number of troops that would arrive before the end of October. The steamers and flats available to take them to Allahabad will scarcely be able to make two trips before January—a month going up and two weeks returning. The utmost that can be con veyed in this way will not exceed 2,000 men, with their officers and servants. As already observed, it is doubtful shether tents can be supplied to enable them to proceed by land. Bullock carts may be obtained after they reach Allahabad; but, remember, that is 500 miles beyond Cal• cutte, Cawnpore is 120 beyond Allahabad, on the main trunk road to Agra and Meerut, and Lucknow is 52 N.E. from Cawnpore. It will probably be found that throughout the line of road now mentioned, including Dinnpore and Benares, there is not a sufficient number of tents for the European troops there in September ; and as for commis sariat arrangements, there were none. All this should have been duly considered before so many artillery, cavalry, and infantry were embarked. The result will be, as you may easily imagine, that the troops will sutler. One of the latest letters from the camp at Delhi does not give us a pleasant picture of the healthiness of the situation : This is an awful hole for fever, just now being the break up of the rains. The run is in its full power, drawing malaria from the damp ground. Three thousand men (that is Europeans and natives together) are laid up in this camp from wounds and sickness, and regiments that came here 60.1 strong, have about 330 fit for duty. Many with slight fever will however be able to turn out when required. Our grand breaching battery of some thirty heavy guns is to open on Delhi to-morrow or next day. The light field batteries are to keep the enemy's guns in play. The breaching battery is about 250 yards from the walls; it will do its work well 1 have no doubt, and this mail may inform you of the fall of Delhi. I hope you are sending us out some 30,000 European soldiers at least. We want them. Fancy if these fellows, now in camp, after the sack of Delhi were to play us a trick. I feel pretty certain, however, that all is right. But Lucknow, Hohilcund, and Gwalior a-e still in arms. Our people are holding out bravely in the fort at Lucknow, but Havelock, at Cawnpore, has not force enough to cut his way to relieve the poor fel lows. Some troops, however, are at last coining up the country. H— and C— of my regiment are at Luck now. You must excuse a short letter, I am rather un well to-day. Don't be anxious, however, as Delhi fever, though very common, is not of a bad kind. I may be all well again in a few days. I mean to take care of myself. When this is over I have a chance of an appointment at Lahore or with General V. C. THE PRESS, NOVEMBER 7, 1857. and interesting, for it will most certainly contain the details of the capture of Delhi, and we sincerely hope of the relief of Lucknow. It is quite possible that we might have an Indian telegram via Sardinia, in anticipation of the newi by way of Trieste, next Monday, that is on the 9th inst. THE INDIAN MAILS. On the sth inst. the Bombay and Calcutta packets will be due at Suez, with news from Calcutta up to the 10th of October, and from Bombay up to the 17th of that month. This news should reach London, via Trieste, on the 12th inst. By the last packets Dell'►i. was twenty days' post from Calcutta, and fourteen days' from Bombay, and Cawnpore was six days' post from Calcutta. There was considerable delay in the post reaching Calcutta and Bombay from Delhi for the last packets, on account of the mutinous state of the intervening neighbourhood. If Lucknow was relieved at the time it was expected to be, it would probably be about seven or eight days from thence to Calcutta. It is possible that the roads between Delhi and Calcutta or Bombay might be clearer of interrup tions than by the lest accounts, and that it might be only eight or nine days' post between the former and one of the latter two places. Lucknow was expected to be relieved on the 25th September. It is probable, therefore, that by the next accounts we may have t►ews from Delhi up to a fortnight after it was cap• Lured, and from Lucknow up to nearly a fortnight later. This news will undoubtedly be most important THE INDIAN RELIEF FUND. Lon]) SHAFTESBURY, at a meeting of the Indian Relief Fund, held at the new Town-hall, Wimborne, and at which we are told was " a full attendance of the elite of the neighbourhood, many of whom were ladies," delivered a powerful speech against showing mercy to the rebels. The noble lord dilated at length upon the " exquisite " and " hellish " tor tures the rebels had indicted upon our poor country women, and with edifying perspicuity entered with minute detail into the nature of those tortures. And who, asked the noble lord, were they who perpetrated these atrocities ? Was this a nation risen in the sense of its wrongs, writhing under torture, plunder, oppression, cruelty; under the violation of every sacred and social right ; rising to recover their lost linerties ; rising as one man to assert their independence and the integrity of their re ligion? No such thing. Has any proclamation been put nut by the rebels that they had a single wrong to complain of? Have you found in any one instance a national, or even the sympton of a national, rising? Has not the whole country, with a very few exceptions, been perfectly tranquil and quiescent? Have not the greater part of the villages assisted the royal troops, and attempted to dis comfit the mutineers ? Wherever an exception has occurred it may be traced to the brigands and dacoits, and those wild and lawless hordes that will always be found in the continent of India wandering from one village to another? The villagers themselves iu no instance have risen against the British power; they have known that their security consisted in the vigour and permanence of her Majesty's dominion. From whom, then, rose this frightful rebellion ? • - The noble lord then answered his own question in a manner perfectly satisfactory to himself if not t his hearers, and concluded by obierving that justice simple justice," demands that we should exact of the mutineers that compensation due upon the perpetra tion of crimes unparalleled in the history of mankind." The noble earl, in an address of considerable length and much earnestness, urged the presenting of a memorial to her Majesty, and afterwards to Parlia ment, seeking "better government" in India for the future; the granting to ell religions their full liberty ; and urged also the placing of unlimited power in the hands of Government to put down the mutinies. The fund continues to progress most satisfactorily. Subs.7riptions daily pour in from all quarters—from towns and villages, counties and boroughs, from soldiers, sailors, and civilians, public societies, and public offices. The sum already subscribed exceeds, we believe, 200,0001. With respect to the recent complaint at Worcester of Mr. Acton, Sir J. Paking ton, in a public letter to the county paper, has suc cessfully vindicated the administration of the Patriotic Fund from the charges brought against it by Mr. Acton and the Roman Catholic body generally. LORD bIF_MGUND ON INDIA. LORD MELGUND, M.P. for the counties of Clack mannan and Kinross, was entertained at dinner on Friday evening last, at Kinross, by the electors of the counties to the number of above one hundred. In the absence of tho Lord Advocate, Mr. Adam, of Blairadam, presided. In his reply to the toast of the evening, Lord MELOUND alluded to his recent election, and to some domestic events of subsequent occurrence, and then proceeded to speak of India. Having re• marked that it was a remarkable instance of human want of sagacity and foresight that such an event should have taken place, and that it should have been so little foreseen, Lord Melgnnd said : I think there is a very great disposition just now, and a very natural one no doubt, to attach blame to the East India Company ; and I am certainly very far from saying that they have acted with wisdom throughout their pro ceedings. But, at the same time, I think we ought to bear in mind that one of the most wonderful instances of a rapid conquest, and, to a certain degree, of a permaner.t conquest, that the world has ever seen, has been exempli fied by the policy and through the agency of the East India Company. That Company is now tiFon its trial, and there is no doubt that great changes are likely to be made in the manner in which India shall be hereafter governed. There is a strong disposition, I think, in many quarters at once to bring the government of India under the influence of the British Government. I must say that I think there is great danger in following up this principle too fat. I have heard it said by persons who have known India pretty well, that the electric telegraph will lose us India. The meaning of this is that the Government will think that they know a great deal better how to govern India than the people who have been brought up to do so, and who know the character and prejudices of the people, and that by too much inter ference with the government of the country they will disgust them, for undoubtedly we ought to govern as far as possible according to their wishes. This is a question which will no doubt occupy the attention of Parliament at all events next year and probably for some years to come, and I have therefore thought it right that I shonli say thus much on a subject which is exciting so much interest in the minds of us all. MR. LINDSAY, M.P., AT TYNEMOUTIL Mn. LINDSAY addressed his constituents at Tyne mouth on Monday last. After alluding to several matters of local interest, Mr. Lindsay touched upon a topic just now interesting to the public, " The Leviathan ": If that ship answered it became a question how they would stand with their small vessels. It was a matter of great interest to all, but particularly to those directly or indirectly interested in shipping, whether the ship was likely to answer commercially or not. He had strong opinions on the subject commercially; but first let him say she would be a great triumph of mechanical art. He be lieved no finer or stronger ship was ever put together. With regard to speed, he doubted whether she would attain to what had been stated, though he fully believed that she would attain a greater speed than any ship ever yet launched in the waters. Our nation had reason to be proud of such a great triumph of mechanical skill. But commercially, it to them was a most important question, because, if such a ship as that answered commercially, then all their property in shipping must in a short time go to the wall. His experience, however,—And he believed it would coincide with theirs,—his experience was that they had found they had, in fact, been building their ships too large. The Americans, who were a farsighted people, had discovered this fact. They said a 3,000-tons ship was too large for the ordinary purposes of commerce, and it had been found that a ship of from 800 to 1;200 tons for the East India trade was the most profitable description of ship, while from 1,5(10 to 1,800 tons was about the limit. The course of commerce was, if a Manchester merchant had 1,000 bales of cotton to send to Calcutta he did not send the whole in one bottom, because that might overstock the market. The merchant did what was called " feed the market." The same thing would hold good as to passen gers. They did not go altogether, or in masses, but at intervals, to suit convenience. So for the purposes of war, politicians found it the wisest policy to send out their troops—not 1,000 in one bottom, much less 10,000, but send them out in numbers of 40U or 000 at the very most. That was the policy. Imagine, then, a whole army sent out in this Great Eastern. He did net say anything of a wreck, he did not contemplate any such fearful tragedy; but suppose her engines went wrung; he said it was not policy to send so many troops, so that, looking at the matter both politically and according to the ordinary course of commerce, he was of opinion that the ships we hail had nothing to fear from the competition of such vast leviathans as the Great Eastern. With respect to India, Mr. Lindsay doubted whether our government of India after all had been more advantageous to the people of India than that of the 'Endo° princes. We had drawn an enormous revenue from the country, and done nothing fur public works:— ‘Vhen he looked at the enormous revenue derived from India, he asked how much was spent in public works ; and, taking Glasgow or Manchester, he found that one of these large cities,—namely, Manchester—had spent more in a year in institutions for the benefit and elevation of the people than the Court of Directors of the East India-house had done for the whole of India in the same period. Ile said we had not governed India wisely, and we had not done it well. To him there seemed a sort of fatality to follow this course of aggrandisement—grasping vast ex tents of territory without taking the means to govern well the territory we had already. It seemed to him it would have been much wiser if we had limited our territory and governed it better. • He thought from this that there should be a great change in the government of India:— What that change should be it would be presumptuous, to a certain extent, for nitn to say; but it struck him if they were to govern the people of India well that the Government ought to be in India itself. He said, let them send out a Governor-General, and let there be a Council, though not such as at preseiit, inasmuch as some might be sent from this country, and the others chosen from among the European residents ' • and let them be the executive residing on the spot, and be subject to the cheek of the House of Commons, one member of which should be Secretary of State for India. They would then have some one whom they could hold responsible if India was misgoverned. He hoped that in future, by the changes which would be introduced, a great deal would be dune for India and to develop its immense resources. MR. AYRTON ON INDIA. MR. AYRTON, NT., at a meeting of his constituents, said, that although he had lived many years in India, he felt the greatest difficult) in approaching that subject. The Government seemed to think they were not responsible, because there was a Court of Directors; the Court of Directors threw the responsi bility on the Governor-General; and perhaps the Governor-General would disclaim all responsibility because he did not nominate persons to the great offices in India : Thus the calamity was ascribed to Providence instead of being attributed to a want of capacity and energy on the