The Daily Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1861-01-09 00:00:00

nified, and in tone and spirit the address of King
William I. is alike worthy of the nation and of the
monarch who has INin called to reign over it.
Regarding the present position of matters at
Gaeta, and the policy of the Emperor of the
French with respect to Francis 11. and his defence
of that fortress, it is now stated that the French
Government has offered to Sardinia to recal Ad-
miral de Tinan's squadron, provided the Italian
army will consent to suspend their fire till the
19th instant. It is supposed likely that the
Government of MHO. will assent to these terms,
if, as is supposed is the case; the Piedmontese
admiral, in the event of the failure of negotia-
tions, is to be at full liberty at the expiration of
that time to pursue the steps necessary-for the
reduction of the place, and to support with the
utmost vigour the operations of General Cialdini.
One French ship only will remain off Gaeta to
guarantee the execution of the armistice. It is
whispered in Switzerland that Sardinia has
offered to guarantee Venetia against Garibaldi
on condition of the Great Powers opposing no
obstacles to her obtaining possession of and keep-
ing Gaeta. It is just possible this supposition
may be a correct one, but its accuracy is not to be
guaranteed.
The mercantile community of the United States
continue to express great surprise and no small
satisfaction that people on this side have hitherto
viewed the critical position of affairs in the Union
with so much absence Of alarm; for the impression
in, America was that every department of general
business Wottld be seriously affected. We are in-
clined to apprehend that the accounts which go
out by next mail will tell a very different tale.
Among other evidences, how much property in
the Southern States especially has already been
depreciated in value in consequence of the present
attitude of the South towards the North, and of
the general feeling of.uneasiness which prevails
throughout the United States; may be adduced a
statement in orie of the Virginia pap'ets; which in
lamenting the decline in the value of slaves, quotes
the sale of a skilled mechanic at £l6O, who would
at the same time last year readily have brought
£3OO, and the New Fork Tinzes considers it safe
to estimate " that, if the involuntary labour of
the South was worth £240,000,000 twelve months
ago, it is now worth less than £160,000,000—a
sudden depreciation for which the capital of no
country in the world has ever, perhaps, furnished
a precedent." To which we would take leave to
add, that no country calling itself Christian " has
ever, perhaps, furnished a precedent" for the
holding of so enormous an amount of capital of
that particular description.
It appears from a statement of the financial
condition of India, which is printed in another
column, that the present deficit of income, as
compared with expenditure, is not less than
£6,273,000, and it is understood that this un-
pleasant result does not represent the present
actual condition of Indian finance. It is peculiarly
unfortunate, also, that the measures which have
been proposed for meeting the deficiency and
restoring the financial equilibrium of our Indian
possessions, are not only extremely ill-advised
and unpopular in themselves, but are subject to
the direction and control of so unfortunate and
unpopular a financier as Sir Charles Wood.

It is announced that the Delhi and Lucknow
prize money is likely to be " shortly distributed."
We collect from a statement which we have else-
where given on this subject, that the cause of the
unpardonable and unjustifiable delay which has
taken place in the allocation of this recompense,
so nobly won by the gallantry of our heroic
troops, has arisen in a
,great measure from a
difference of opinion among the committee and
the Treasury, as to the principle on which the
money ought to be distributed. It is far from
certain that there will not be considerable dis-
satisfaction when all is done.

A large metropolitan central hotel, similar to
the Great Western Railway Hotel, Paddington,
the Victoria, Euston station, and the Westminster
Palace Hotel, is proposed to be established in the
neighbourhood of St. Clement's, in the Strand, and
close upon the spot now occupied by Danes-Inn.
It will have the effect of clearing away Holywell
and Wych-streets, and of widening the Strand at
that point, and so render that thoroughfare of one
uniform width from Charing-cross to Temple-bar,
in conjunction with the metropolitan improve-
ments. The proposed capital of the enterprise is
£600,000.

The War Department have entered into a con-
tract for the erection of a commodious building at
Fort Pitt Hospital, Chatham, to be used for the
purposes of a museum, in which will be deposited
the valuable collection of scientific and other
articles and specimens deposited now at Fort
Pitt. The site is in close proximity to the lecture
theatre, class-rooms, &c. of the young medical
officers composing the army medical school re-
cently established at Chatham.
The Directors of the Atlantic Roy 11 Mail Steam
Navigation Company have issued circulars stating
that the steamship Prince Albert will sail on the
23rd of February, and that their new fleet of
steamers will be ready to ply regularly every
fourteen days, according to contract, aftbr the
26th of March next.

It is painful to learn that the destitution at
present existing at Coventry, and the consequent
sufferings, are not limited to the working men,
properly so called, those who depend solely on
labour for the means of subsistence, but has
gradually crept upwards from them to a class
which may be said to represent capital as well
dta
isei
al :tea
machinery
t oaeuc r,
hspi
net
e:ri tie
eobnNyvs nwoe
which
of a
cr
hib ribbon
honemylargef pop
oesatv nrg
oof proportion of
beautifulo
which
andch
Coventry can boast are produced, the proprietors
of looms in private houses as contra-distinguished
from factories, as is the case in Nottingham.
This is a very melancholy picture, and a very
melancholy result of the operation of one of
the arrangements of the French Treaty. Lord
Leigh appears to be exerting himself with
an amount of energy and untiring exertion in
raising funds to mitigate the terrible sufferings
caused by this want of employment, and which
are, of course, greatly aggravated by the inclement
severity of the weather, that is in the highest
degree to be admired; and let us add, we hope
without offence, imitated, by the wealthy members
of our own community, who have at their own
doors at the present moment an amount of want,
destitution, and sickness which has very rarely
been exceeded in Liverpool. We have been ex-
pecting for some days past to learn that a public
meeting of the inhabitants would be held for the
purpose of devising means for dealing with such
a distressing state of matters, and providing funds
for its alleviation. Various remedial measures,
with a view to affording permanent relief, have
been actively discussed at Coventry, but of these
none seem to have attained a practical realisation,
with the exceptibn of an organisation for aiding
the ribbon weavers to " emigrate to the cotton-
spinning districts of this county. Mr. Brace-
bridge has joined Lord Leigh in contributing to
this object, and about 700 persons have already
been conveyed to different places of the county
through this agency. Altogether about 2,200
persons have left Coventry for the Lancashire
district, of ,whom it is estimated that 1,500 are
actually working in the trade, the remainder
being principally children under twelve years of
age.

THE " SACRED HONOUR" OF AMERICAN
SLAVE-OWNERS !

THE "sacred honour" of the slave-owners of
South Carolina has been once more ostentatiously
pledged before the world in support of their free,
sovereign, and independent right to load men
with chains, to whip them like dogs, and to sell
them from one estate-owner to another like any
domestic animal, or any beast of burden. Those
man-stealers,—those cold-blooded and systematic
traffickers in the lives and liberties of human
beings,--those men whose very breath seems
drawn from an atmosphere in which fiends and
evil spirits, who have set divine power at defiance,
could alone luxuriate and triumphantly hatch black
plots against human happiness,—do not blush to
offer an additional insult to heaven and earth by
blasphemously appealing to the Supreme Judge of
the world for the rectitude of their intentions,
and to Divine Providence for protection in the
pursuit of their unhallowed and accursed practices.
Such profanity must have sadly shocked the
feelings of every Englishman who has perused the
document we published yesterday, called the
declaration of causes, which are put forth as
justifying the secession of South Carolina from
the Federal Union, as reported by the committee