The Express.
London, England, 1855-01-31 00:00:00

HOLLAND.

(MOM TEN COILTUPONDANT Or THE DAILY DEWS )
THE HAGUE, JAN 27.
Lieutenant-Captain G. Fabius, the commander of
the Dutch steamer Soembing, despatched some
months ago by the government to Japan, ham just
returned to Holland. According to the accounts
brought over by this officer, who had been accredited
iby this court to the court of Japan, in order to effect
an additional treaty between the two states, Japan
has given to Holland the assurance that she will cer-
tainly not be considered as a loss favoured nation
than any other state that seeks commercial inter-
course with Japan. In the meantime, measures have
been taken for the purpose of effecting a more defi-
nite arrangement of existing treaties. In addition
to the immemorial privilege accorded to llolland of
having a Dutch factory in the Japanese island of
Decims, the ports of Simoda and Hakodada will also
be thrown open to vowels sailing under the Dutch
flag. "It affords us much pleasure," says the official
Stoats- Courant, "to be able to add, that the Japanese
government has shown on this occasion proofs of its
esteem and amity towards the Netherlands. It has
also given to the chief of the Dutch factory at De-
cima, M. Donker Curtin, many flattering proof. of
its confidence and consideration, and the Emperor
received Lieutenant-Captain Fabius with more than
ordinary marks of distinction." According to the
Handel/Nod, this officer is about to depart on a second
embassy to Japan, charged with additional authority
from the Dutch government.
We sometimes in England bear of some remark-
able but unaccountable instance of belief in practical
witchcraft or magic, when the idea of its potency
takes such firm hold of the minds of communities
of certain less enlightened localities as to baffie every
attempt to eradicate it. A similar idiosyncrasy,
though somewhat more Pythagorean in character,
has for some time past prevailed among the
less enlightened inhabitants of this country, and,
piteously absurd as it is, is very generally
entertained in the northern and eastern provinces,
where even newspapers—but such newspapers!—
lend it credit and currency. The death of the late
king was a very private affair, no one but his phy-
sicians having been witness to his last struggle. A
short time before this event the good king, urged on
probably by the outward pressure of the revolution
in France, had compelled his ministers to prepare a
project of law—a new charter for his people. The
first William had abdicated in favour of his son on
account of his own inability to stem the torrent
which flowed from the success of the Belgian revolu-
tion; and it is now become a matter of faith with
thousands that the second William, fearful of a simi-
lar torrent setting in in consequence of his having
too freely used the whip of progress, in urging on his
slow and unwilling ministers, had availed himself of
the pretence of dying and being buried in order to
abdicate his crown, and to be able to retire from the
cares of royalty to the court of his brother-in-law
the Czar, whom he is now assisting in the Crimea in
the assumed character of Prince Mentchikoff! To
what " bus purposes" may English field marshals
eventually demoend!
As a set-off to this display of popular error, I must
mention an incident which took place last 'Sunday
in Rotterdam. A learned theologian, a D.D., the
pet of admiring ladies, the fashionable preacher, the
poetic orator allowed his private political feelings
to betray him in the pulpit into pious folly.
Whether be had in the course of the week been
listening to the after-dinner lucubration, of some who
were at the same time members of his congregation
and holders of Russian stock, or whether he had been
brought to the belief that the Mosaic injunctions,
"thou shalt not steal" nor "covet anything that is
thy neighbour's" might be modified or nullified occa-
sionally to accommodate a more powerful sovereign,
coveting the possessions of his neighbour, but
so it happened that Ibis learned divine thought
proper, before his usually) crowded congregation, to
commend to Heaven's special protection the Queen
Dowager of Holland—it was that royal and exem-
plary lady's birthday—and" the cause of her brother
the Czar in him conflict with the grasping ambition of
his enemies." To the first portion of the supplication
there was not a heart that would have failed to
respond; but the latter portion was considered •
reprehensible forgetfulness of tke sacredness of the
pulpit, to say nothing of the impolicy of intruding a
political opinion at such a time upon a number of
individuals, most of whom, he ought to have known,
had given all their sympathy to the very cause he so
deprecated. This incident excited quite a sensation,
the more so because it was generally thought the
rev. gentleman attacked too much dignity to his office
to make it the instrument of exciting among his
people the bitterness of party feeling. I am informed
that a high municipal authority felt it his duty the
following day to call upon this divine, for the purpose
of officially requesting him not again to enforce, in
these critical times, his political opinions upon the
attention and prayers of his congregation.

Tho Ptschnontese Gazette of the 213th announces
hat tlio dots of as Doke of Omar is koproviag.