The Press. — London, England, 1857-01-17 00:00:00

JANUARY 17, 1857. the very stewards of its faith, will only add to the injury that may accrue to the clerical office by the commission of this foul act. The Roman priest is accessible to evil passion in common with others. He is not exempt from the failings of humanity, although the infallibility of the tonsure is impressed upon feeble minds to increase spiritual power and tyranny. At the same time it must be deplored by all religionists that the course of jastice should have to deal inexorably with one whose profession of sanctity it is impolitic to dishonour. Verges, from his earliest youth, was educated for the priest- Lold, and has never received other tuition than from the fathers of the Roman Church. His application to theological studies was great ; he was said to adopt. rather a severe than an enlarged system of morality ; was exclusive and exaggerated on points of doctrine ; until his mind was at last shaken by recent acts of superstition impossible of acceptance ; and a result of this infallible education of Romanism will be shortly tried before the tribunal of crime. The mission of Mn. Barinann and Veon pro raises to have a favourable termination. A doubt, however, is expressed on the engagement taken by France and England for the King of Prussia being in strict conformity to the wishes of that Sovereign. There is no hesitation on the part of the Federal Council in the acceptance of the following terms that have been arranged at Paris :- 1. No stipulation shall he made agreed to that shall be contrary to the complete independence of Neufchatel. 2. All the parties concerned in the late insurrection ( tens les provenus) shall leave Switzerland until the affairs in dispute are definitively settled. 3. The military preparations of Prussia are to be sus• pended, the Federal Assembly declining to deliberate under the seeming pressure of military menace. 4. When the royalist prisoners are liberated, no hostile step shall afterwards be taken by Prussia. 5. England and France to consent to be direct me• diatom. On these terms being made known, the Band, the official journal of the Swiss Government, published a lengthened article, headed " Une Paix Honorable et Assnree." The conditions have been already accepted by the Federal Council, and the General Assembly is convoked for this day, the 14th, to re ceive and take them into consideration. It is said, and with a certain show of reason, that the King of Prussia desired that the liberation of the prisoners should be unconditional, and demurred to their obligation to quit Switzerland under a seeming ban of disgrace. On the other hand, the abandonment of trial and immediate liberation of the royalists ought to be construed as a concession of principle in favour of the King of Prussia, and their temporary removal from the scene of conflict to be merely an act of precaution. The above arrangement being a modification of the acts of the Congress of Vienna, touching the rights of the King of Prussia and Switzerland, will require a conferential settlement by England, France, Russia, Austria, Prussia, and Switzerland. By letters of the 10th from Berlin, there would still seem to he a determination to con tinue military preparati .n until the actual release of the prisoners shall have been officially notified to the Prussian Court. Neither are the Swiss less ac tive in tbeir defensive operations. General Dufour has left for the head quarters at Zurich. The speech of the King of Piedmont on the open mg of the Chambers at Turin was received with loud acclamations. After expatiating on the firm alliance with England and France, and on the glad return of friendly relations with Russia, the King congratulated the Chambers on the attitude of Italy at the Paris Conferences, where an example was given —the first on record—and a precedent was afforded, of an Italian power defending Italian interests at a Euro. pean congress. This observation was received with immense cheering. It is highly satisfactory to state that the Royalist party in the Chambers has sensibly augmented. M. Carlo Cadorna, a Royalist, has been elected President of the Chambers. He obtained 70 votes out of 119 ; M. Gavagno. 28 ; M. Depretis, 15; M. Pareto, :1; M. Batta, 1 ; M. Dariani, 1. The votes of M. Gavagno may be added to those of M. Cadorna in the support of the Ministry ; and the Austro-Papal Opposition is confined to the parties of Depretis and M. Pareto, numbering only eighteen. C. A. H. /ortign an Colonial luttlityntt. PRUSSIA AND SWITZERLAND. SETTLEMENT OF THE DISPUTE. A private telegraphic despatch from Berne ow tha 15th announced that the National Council had adopted the propositions of the Federal Government, with the considerations of the Commission, by 91 votes against 4. The message of the Federal Government proposed to annul the proceedings commenced against the in- THE PRESS. surgents of Neufchatel, and to set them at liberty with the reservation that they shall not be sent ouc of the Helvetic territory until the official conclusion of the arrangements: It is also proposed to suspend the armaments and to dismiss the troops, as Switzerland need no longer consider herself as in a state of war. The message further announced that the Ministers of Russia and Austria to the Government of Berne had communicated to the Federal Council note.{ con formable to those of France anti England, which engaged to obtain the consent of Prussia to the entire independence of Neufchatel. A telegraphic despatch of Thursday from Berlin announces that " the affair of Neufchatel is arranged." The New Prussian Gazette positively denies that Prussia has contracted any other engagement than that of entering into diplomatic negotiations on the affair of Neufchatel as soon as the prisoners shall have been set at liberty unconditionally. It adds that no great power has requested any other promise. A Russian circular on the question has been pub lished ; but, at this advanced stage of affairs, it is without any particular interest, except as expressing an opinion strongly in favour of Prussia. FRANCE. The protocols of the sittings of the Conference will not be published till after its notification to tl • powers. The Neufchatel question excites much discussion in the French papers, which have maintained that a peaceable solution would certainly be arrived at with out the invasion of the Helvetic territory by Prussia. M. Walewski had seut a despatch to the Federal Government, which contains the following pas sage : Ls France, des que les prisonniers auront etc mis en liberte, s'engage a faire tows res efforts po.ir amener un arrangement repondent ens vteux de la Suisse, eu assn. rant la complete independence de l'uncienne principaute de Nenfchatel, par la renonciation du Rol de Pausse aux droits que lni attribuent les traites de 181:5. Baron Brunnow, it is expected, leaves Paris very shortly for Berlin. Ferouk Khan, the Persian Ambassador, after many delays, has reached Marseilles, and is hourly expected in Paris. General d'Orgoni, the Bavarian Ambassador, re• mains yet in Paris, it is said, to conclude his missior. His suite have left on their return home. An investiture of the Order of the Bath is to be held at the British Embassy this day. The French officers designed for this honour, and who have not yet received it, will be then invested with the in. signia. After the ceremony a grand dinner will be given at the embassy. The trial of Verges is fixed for the 17th, but it is thought probable will be postponed. AUSTRIA. The Emperor of Austria is to be in Milan by the 20th. M. de Bach, Austrian Minister of the Inte rior, left Vienna on the 7th to join his Maje- , ty at Milan; M. de Bruck, Finance, was to leave the next evening ; and Count de Buol, President of the Council, in a few days. In addition to the amnesty already granted, says the Cologne Gazette, it is affirmed that on the occa sion of the visit of the Emperor of Austria to Milan, a certain number of persons condemned for political offences will be pardoned, and that in addition the Italian nobles will be assimilated in all respects to those of Austria. RUSSIA AND PERSIA. Letters from St. Petersburg speak of an intrigue in Teheran to depose the present Shan, and to put Monad Mirza in his place. The Russian troops have occupied many islands of the great and little bays of Balkan, and have established their head quarters on the island of Keftenoi. Other letters from St. Petersburg speak of the Shah's application to the Czar for aid, and of his intention to cede to Russia in exchange for assist • ance " all the territory comprised between the town of Bajazid, chief town of a paskalik, and Nachits chewan, which separates in Armenia the Russian possessions from those of Turkey." The Russian flotilla in the Caspian Sea is reported to have disembarked Russian troops on the S.E. coast, alleging as a pretext the ancient treaties be• tween Russia and Persia. _ _ The Russian Ambassador, Annikoff, has left Teheran for St. Petersburg, it is said, charged with a mission to demand assistance for Persia. An article in Le Nord of Wednesday enters at great length upon the subject of the Persian expe dition against Herat. The writer maintains the justice of Persia's cause, the absurdity of England attempting to insist upon a convention never ratified (Colonel Sheil's in 1853) being binding on the Persian Government, and attributes the origin of the war entirely to English intrigue. The article then proceeds with professions on the part of Russia of a desire to see an amicable settlement of this dispute, and of active inter'erenze towards a restoration of peace between the two powers. TURKEY AND THE EAST. The defeat of the Russians by the Circassians inia great battle near Bayuk is confirmed. The former have retreated, with a loss of nearly 2,000 men and several guns, out of an attacking corps of 8,000 strong. The Circessians were commanded by the son of Safer Intelligence from Constantinople states that the fleet under Lord Lyons had received news of its eventual departure, but Lord Lyons had also been informed he would have to stop in the Black Sea as long as the Austrians remained in the Principalities. Le Nord this week makes the following announce ment : Tbe Russian Government has already given orders to recal from the Isle of Serpents the lieutenant and the seven sailors by whom England and Austria were so much alarmed. News from Teheran of November 27 has been received by way of Trieste. At that date the Court of l'ersia had received no official declaration of war from the English Government, and appeared to reckon very much upon the presence of Ferouk Khan in Europe. A courier from the army had arrived in the capi tal. The Persian troops had occupied without oppo• sition the fortresses of Gourian Lach and Djouv veine. Operations were expected to be suspended at the end of November on account of the season. The British fleet in the Persian Gulf was reported to be hastening its operations. The Shah was making great preparations for de fence, notwithstanding the penury of his finances and the tear of revolt. AMERICA. Advices from Philadelphia to the Ist inst., and New York to the 31. it of December, have arrived. The Central American Treaty it was not antici pated would be ratified by Congress without much discussion. Those articles recognising the nation ality of the Mosquito Indians, and the right of com mon interference in the affairs of Nicaragua and Costa Rica, will, it is said, be warmly opposed. The Washington correspondent of the New York herald reports that the Supreme Court have de cided that Congress has no power over the question of slavery in the territories, and that the Missouri compromise is unconstitutional and therefore null and void. The conviction of Huntingdon the forger, and his sentence to four years and ten months' imprisonment, had given great satisfaction. Advices from Carthagena, Nov. 23, assert that the British blockade of the port of New Granada would come into effect soon after Admiral Bruce, with three vessels of war, had arrived at Panama, and it was said the British intended to establish a depot at that point, if practicable. Accounts from Costa Rica and Nicaragua confirm our previous intelligence as to the critical position of General Walker. INDIA. THE EXPEDITION TO CADVL. The India mails, with advices from Bombay, Dec. 17 ; Calcutta. k ; Madras, 13; and Ceylon, 17, have arrived. There is no news of the Persian Gulf expedition. The force under Brigadier Chamberlayne had nearly reached Cabul. The Bombay Times of Dec. 3 contained the following in reference to the advance of this force : An army of 5,000 men has for some time past been ad• yancing by the hills of Kohat in the direction of Cabal, so quietly that we hardly knew anything of the proceedings till a letter from an officer with the force made us aware that they had got within fifty miles of the capital of the Ameer, without knowing the object or destination of their despatch, Sir John Lawrence was about to proceed to meet Dost 3lahomed in person. This force, when last heard of, had marched through the Meeranzie Valley to Thull, sixty miles from Kohat and one hundred and eighty from Cabul. Moving onwards from Thull it crossed the river Koorum and entered the valley of that name, still keeping on the great road to Cabul. Court and taqion. Her Majesty the Queen remains at Windsor until the 10th of February, as at present arrange& wben the Court will return to town for her Majesty's accouchement, which is expected to take place in March. Earl Granville has been on • a visit to Bowood during the week. Viscount l'almerston remains at Broadlands.