The Dorset County Express and Agricultural Gazette.
Dorchester, Dorset, England, 1859-08-23 00:00:00

grntu anb Nab!.

The Impfriense, 51, screw' .'aptaL 11 in I. Slavin:,
left Spithead on Thur. Ably oder steam, by the west
. . . .

channel, for Portland.
A trial is about to be made it the camp of (lialons
with a new rifle.bull, ilnent...l by Captain Noisier, and
which the inventor asserts willcarry a aidtance of 1,5110

yards.
Signal was made to the ships at Spithead Wednesday
to fill up water soil prepare tor WA by the 'Mt inst. The
luiprieuse goes to Portland. The Mersey was to wake
her screw trial on Thursday should the weather be

favnurable.
Cosr or orn WARS.—Out tithe 167 years, interven-
ing between lfekt and 1855, 67 were devoted to war and
carnage. The aggregate cost of those 67 years of struggle
with our I arions foes on lanl and at sea, was just
4:1500,000.000 or on the avaage. rather more than
£22.000,000 a year—that is, about £B5 per minute during
that long period!
Since the publication of the Royal warrant authori-
zing the formation of a new branch of the service, to
be called the Army Hospital lbws: and directing the
present Medical Staff Corpo to !e disbanded, the volun-
teers from the deride and regiments of the Line have
been so numerous as lead to the expectation that by
the Ist of September, the day on winch the corps into
be organised, the whole number of non-commissioned
officers and men will have been obtained. The new
corps is to consist of exactly LOW non-counnis-ioned
officers and men, or considerably more than double tho
number of the 31edical Staff Corps. The pay of the
men will not, however, be so high as in the old corps,
the first class orderlies of which receive as much as 2.5.
per day, exclusive of rations, a rate of pay which has
given rise to some dissatisfaction in the other branches
of the service. The noncommissioned officers, moat of
whom are in receipt of pensions for service in other
corps, also receive a higher scale of pay than their
brethren or the Line. In the New Arnay Hoopital
Corps the rate of pay will be more assimilated. privates
receiving Is. per day clear. The number of inen at-
tached to the head-quarters of the Medical Staff Corps
at Chatham is about 140, out of which only about4o have
yet volunteered fur the hew corps, the remainder pre-
ferring to take their discharge, which will be granted
tlielll oil the Ist of September. The head-quarters of
the .trisay Hospital Corps will be at Chatham, but the
TIMMS of the officers appointed to the staff have not yet
been 1111110U1ICed.
Letters from Cutollainore, near Najd..., mention thud
the English fleet, consisting of five liners, under Vice-
Admiral FAUsdlaWe, was about to leave that anchorage
on the 11th of Angnst for Baja and Palermo. A few
days previous acts of mutiny bad been committed by a
number if the crew (not including officers or petty
officers) of Her Majesty's ship Marlborough, bearing the
.tulnuiral's flag. c tttttttt ended by Lord Frederick H. Kerr,
when solid shot were not merely rolled about the decks,
hut actually cast at one of the mates and imme of the
warrant officers, and it was not before the disaffected
were turned up and addressed by die gallant Ailtuiral
in person that tranquility was restored. He ordered
them to their respective mosses, to put in writing
their grievances, and we are informed that so many
and various are the allergial matters of complaint that
scarcely half a dozen hod a uniform character.
Some complaincal of interrupted rest, others of unneces-
sary duty, and
their fellows in the Hero and Liffey, whose misdeeds
seem to have been passed over too lightly—refusal of
leave. Sonic of the ringleauburc have been put in irons
l rlhl probably lie tried by court-martial at Ilaja.
'hue Euryahia hail left for Palermo. The Argus haul
arrived t Me- sinus front Anemia, where the squadron
hr !:ear..lilisiiral 11inely, from Alexanulria, was
Is-Iced for proleubly iii emit( to join .luhniunral Fanshowe
at Palermo. The t'achnues anivial at loifitern
relieve the Terrible. 'flue Loudon was cruising edf
Malta on the litth .tugivt. on which day tl:c Liffey,
(mini England, out 13 days ft eui I fibraltar, imil not yet
arrived. .t marine on boar I the Hibernia has been
tried by court-martial for an unnatural crime and con-
de ttttt ed to death.
ettennoritu: AND POWNADTIII. If we wanted a
proof of the French zeal in naval matters (and there are
a score forthcoming (coin any inquirer at once), it would
be afforded by the familiar instance of Cherbourg. There
we have, or rather they have, a kind of model modern
dockyard, free from the faults ef old ones, and rich in
all that ought to be found in the new. It is much
nearer to tut than older French arsenals' is built in the
smoothest part of the Channel, and on a scale suited to
the moat formidable preparations. Take Portsmouth
and Plymouth dockyards, and you find that there is a
great deal of time lost in consequence of the depart-
ments being separate from each other; whereas, rigging,
arming, and victualling all go .in at Cherbourg within
the saline walla. In our ports above named boats, light-
ers, buoys, keep endlessly moving through the yellow
water (at the risk of wetting and otherwise damaging
meals), while at Cherbourg everything is put on board
from the wharfs alonpide which the ship lies. Anil so,
of course, with coaling. Coal must be hoisted out .4 •
ship's hold, and thus taken on board—a tedious process
" hateful to the seamen," as • Naval Peer justly ob-
serves, instead of being moved (min the quays by machi-
nery, ashn the Norman port. Again, the Cherbourg
authorities don't "hulk' their seamen, as we do, in
narrow, dirty, old-fashioned hulks ; but march them
aboard comfortably front a kind of naval barracks.
Surely, all these are sensible business arrangements,
vastly superior to our old liappy-go-lucky way of manag-
ing %natters ; and ought to teach us to mend it. Dock-
yards are the "positions" on which fleets retreat for
refreshments and repair; and rapidity in and conveni-
ence for refitting a fleet would he half the battle in war
time. That the French are eminently business-like in
their way of doing work was shown at Genoa in the late
war. This general superiority, odoites arid of arrange-
ments about Cherbourg. and its nearness (only ret
to our coast, make l'herbourg an ugly neighbour. /noel('
ode it, you will say, as Collingwood did Toulon, an. per-
sistently. Nobody supposes that such traditions will
not be honestly acted on by our service. But blockades
hare been evaded before; and a Ideate fleet running
12 miles an hour would not be to easy to catch if mace •
feint had drawn the blockading force from before its
prison. Observe, too, as an instance of the organization
of Cherbourg, that French ships can enter Cherbourg
docks at all times of high water, and that our ships can
oily enter those of Portsmouth and Plymouth during
spring tides. The fortification of our dOCkyardli altd
arsenals involves a military But it is not
denied that Cherbourg is very otrong from that point of
view. nor that the improveauents which have been going
on at Portsmouth of late years still fall short of what is
wanted.
Itirt• VoturrEttt Pll ACTICE. —The following in the
report of Major-General Hay as to the practice made by
volunteers at the musketry School at Hythe :—" I have
the honour tit forward, for the infonnation of his Royal
H iihness the General t'ommateling-iii-Chief, the
enclosed return of the results of the performance in
shooting of the nohlimuen and gentlemen of the rifle
volunteer corps, who have just completed • course of
instruction at this establiohnient, and to report, in
reference to the method pursued, that the morning
was devoted to carryiug cut a detail of daily
work, so modified ar to meet the require-
'netts of a volunteer company, the members Of
which, it is presumed, will not be able to devote more
than two hours and a-haff daily to the musketry drill
awl practice. The desire, however, on the part of there
vniunteeni to beeoine fully acquainted with every detail
comiected with the cyst. in, and the method of working
it. was,ro great that the whole day was spent in acquiring
this information. Pnifidency in the several practices
being always messoureil b 7 • figure, I am enabled to draw
a comparison of tlie shooting of these volunteers with
that of parties id officers favers3flog iron, 40 to 4r° in
the lAA three courses. 'The result is in favour of the
volunteers, the highest Egure of the forms r being 46.94,
of the latter 47.07 p..ints. I hive centined the com-
parison to the shooting 4 the -Meer., es fnum thi ir
auperior intelligence they always (w hen subjected to the
sonic amount of preliminary drill beat the men. When
it is considered that thou volunteers were einsupiessul uuf
'widow n sod gentli men, most of whom had !weir fired
willi a rifle Imfore, welled nett a longer distance than
atieut 200 or 300 yards, aMt when the short period of six
days allotted tit the performance id the jr lit tt itt ary drille
is taken Into account, it not only affords the meet con-
vincing proof of the energy awl intelligence brought to
bear on the work in which the,: volunteers wen unwed.
but at the same tunic it :mints clearly b. the gnat ha nefit
the country will derive prom enlisting the services, of the

educated chows of the population in the movement
which is now in progress for the enrolment of volunteers
for ride companies Mid corps. Ido not hesitate to say
that, if the training of these volunteers is regulated
by a well detailed system, which will ensure a prelimi-
nary lin:pars before practice is allowed to take
place, in a few year* a most important reserve (com-
prising, as it will, • class of persons who never enter
the mauler army or militia, but silo, from their educa-
tion and intelligence, are eminently qualified to make
the very best ' marksmen ') will be at all times available,
and afford a smut valuable and permanent addition to
our national &femme. The interest taken by the noble-
men and gentlemen herein referred to in the practice
, convinces mu that rifle shouting, if properly conducted,
cannot fail to prove henceforth one of the inlet
intereeting of our national amusements. I feel it right
to observe, however, that unless ride training is con-
ducted on a proper (and I would venture to recommend
a uniform) aystem, utter failure will ensue. Wu shall
have ride corps in name, but not in reality."
IMPORTANT INTKNTIoN. Successful earriments
have been made on the Thames, near Woolwich Ihick•
yard, with some floating lights, the principal object of
which is to enable the crew of a boat or vessel to
obtain information am to time position of the fleet of an
enemy during a period of warfare. The chemical coin-
position which contains the elements of combustion is
encased in tin, which is provided with tubes, and
the tin cue is attached to a Boat of wood. Contact
with water causes ignition, and • strong light proceeds
from one of the tubes. The apparatus, being attached
to a boat or a vessel by means of • rope, will enable
those on board to see distinctly at a distance of half-6-
mile ; and as a test of durability one of the lights MAR
attached to the Fisgard flag-ship at half-past ten o'clock
on Monday night, and was found burning at live o'clock
neat morning.