The Express.
London, England, 1865-08-24 00:00:00

Sbe an n.

NEITHER wind nor rain could mar the happy
meeting of the fleets at Cherbourg. Indeed, it is
pleasant to record that the sun shone bravely forth
at last, and that the British Admiral stood out
again to sea under an unclouded sky. The cor-
respondent of the Moniker accept' the double
augury of storm and calm as a sign from
Heaven of the departing " winter of our dimoott-
-4' tent, made glorious summer by the sun " of the
alliance ;
And all the clouds that lowered upon our house
In the deep bosom of the ocean buried.
Now are our brows bound with victorious wreaths;
Oar Millie." arms bang up tor monumooto ;
Our stern alarm:is Omega to merry msetinp ;
Our dreadful marches to delightful madonna.
Our gallant neighbours, who, thanks to their!
own greatest poet and his son, hays made SHAKE-
SPEARE their own, will, we are persuaded, adopt
these stirring lines all the more heartily that, as
they often remind us, it was SH•IIESPEASE
who called France the soldat de Div?. Nothing,
indeed, could be better in taste sndfeeling than the
conduct of all the proceedings at Cherbourg : no-
thing
more honourable to host and guest than the,
interchange of courtesies between our Lords of the
Admiralty and the Minister of Marine, between
our Admiral from Portsmouth and the Maritime
Prefect, between the Commander-in-Chief of our
Channel Fleet and the Commander-in-Chief of the
Cherbourg Division, between our Surveyor of the!
Navy and the French Chief Constructor—and so',
on throughout the naval and dockyard hierarchies
on both sides. Our neighbours have splendidly
sustained their reputation for the most graceful and ,
chivalrous hospitality ; they have done the honours
of their ports and of their sea service with admirable
spontaneity and tact ; their Minister of Marine
has toasted her sLt.reery and her MAJESTY'S
Navy in • speech which we recommend to'
the study of public orators at Portsmouth next
week as • model of discretion, cordiality, and sim-
plicity. The FIL,T LORD of the ADMIRALTY and
Admiral DACRES, however, have not been unequal;
to the occasion ; the former in doing homage to the
great nation and their chosen Sovereign, the latter
in bearing witness, with generous ardour, to the
noble qualities of the French Navy, the conspicuous
daring of its officers in war, their constancy and
fidelity as allies, their high professional attainments ;
and skill. There was that genuine ring of reci- I
procal respect and good fellowship in these!
characteristic speeches which should not peas away
from the memories of the hearers as mere idle !
convivial compliments of the hour. Their true ;
significance is to be found in the response
which the public voice of the two countries
gave to them with one accord. The Ministers and ,
the Admirals spoke in broad and general terms of
the cessation of old enmities, and the present and
future generous and fruitful rivalry of compeers and II
competitors in all the benefioent and disinterested
enterprises of industry and commerce. The union
of the two flags is a pledge of peace, and of the
tranquil progress of civilization ; for, while
the English alliance has been • source of strength
to the Imperial dynasty, Liberal France has
felt that of all possible alliances the English
must be the moat propitious to liberal ideas and to
the cause of free institutions. If the friendship
of the two Powers has not achieved or prevented I
all that enthusiasts might have hoped or expected,
it is certain that the interests of European civilize-
tion have gained or lost in confidence and security
in proportion as that friendship has seemed to
draw closer or to grow cool. Perhaps the full i
value of such a friendship as the union of the two
squadrons in the French and English waters ex-
hibits consists rather in its negative than in its
positive quantity and quality. It is the
tsegation of such enormous possibilities of ruin
and confusion to mankind I It excludes such in-
finite capabilities of calamity and disaster ! Look-
ing upon those sombre and sinister monuments of
destructive energy and invention—the Achilles
and the Magenta—the Black Prince and the Sol-
ferino—and listening to the thunder of their bat-
teries, who did not thank Heaven that he lived in an
age when "the war drum throbs no longer" be-
tween two such awful combatants, and when
those portentous messengers of death are content
to boom greetings of goodwill, and to summon
innocent populations to festivals of welcome ?
Some future generation, it may be, of Frenchmen
and Englishmen, will be able to smile compas-
sionately at our nineteenth century masqueradings
of peace and amity armed to the teeth, and hos-
tile panoplies wreathed in flowers. But, taking
our own age as we find it, we are constrained to
doubt whether the proclamation of a mutual dis-
armament would be half so efficacious in preserv-
ing peace as this suggestive spectacle of the cost-
liest and completeat engines of war.
But if we might venture to address a word of
caution to honest writers on either side of the
Channel who desire to improve the occasion of
the meeting of the Fleets, we should entreat them
to follow the example of the speakers at the Cher-
bourg banquet, and to stick to general reflections,
without attempting to lend a forced and unreal
semblance of mystery and profundity to a simple
exchange of hospitable good offices and • friendly
gathering of comrades and neighbours. There will
always be plenty of wiseacres and quidnunc* to see
much deeper into • millstone than ordinary mortals,
and to assume, for instance, with an air of unfathom-

- -
THE ROSENAU, COBURG, Ammer 21.
Duko Ernest of Wurtemburg (her Majesty's
amain) visited the Queen cm Saturday.
The Duchess of Saire•Coburg dined with her Majesty in
the evening.
Her Majesty and their Royal Highnesses Prisons Helena
and Priapus Louise 'Weeded divine service yesterday
morning.
11se Gime& Superintendent Meyer performed the
servlos.
Prins Alfred, who had gone to Reinhardtabrann for
•
few days with the Duke of Goberg, returned yesterday
morning, and visited her Majesty is the afternoon.

The Prince and Primus" of Wales visited Queen
Augusta of Prussia at Coblents thews or four days back.
The Duke of Somerset is expected to arrive st
hie official residence at the Admiralty, Whitehall, to-mor-
row or Saturday, from Brest.
The Earl and Countess Russell and Lady
Georgians Russell have left Pembroke Lodge, Richnsood
Park, on a visit to L,rd and Lady Stanley of Alderley, NA
Alderley Park, Cheshire.
The Earl and Countess of Westmoreland have
'Woad the party visiting Lard and Lady Loodwiborough, at
Orisiston Park, near Tadeaster, for the York races
The Earl of Sandwich and Ladies Montagu have
met Viscount sad Viscosotees Sydney on the Oontiaent.
and will, later in the season, go on a tour is Italy.
I Count and Countess de Flahault (Baroness
Keith and Heinle) and Hon. Miss Elphinstose de Flattault
have arrived at their seat in Scotland.
Admiral Sir Rodney Mundy has left town to
speed a few weeks ia Scotland.
An Ostend letter says :—" King Leopold appears
to enjoy his sojourn at this place. His !dainty takes Ire.
quest drives io a half.open carriage slows the beach at low
water. The Duke and Duchess de Brabant, with their
child es, are also frequently seen on the beach. The
duchess has made several excursions into the country
round O►tesd in a carriage drawn by ponies, which she
drives herself."

NAVY DOCKYARD ACCOUNTS.

A return has been issued to-day conaisting of a
espy of a report from the Aczoontant•General of the Navy
to the Lords Commimieuers of the Admiralty, dated the
27th da► of June, 1865, explanatory of the measures which
have been adopted, and the arrangements that have been
made, for the improvement of the system of the record and
preparation of the accounts of dock and victualling yard
expenditure on ships, services, and conversions frum the
year 1858-59 to the present time, with appendices. After
giving a history of various changes made with a view to
improvement, the report concludes as follows :
"With the view of comparing the cost of manufactures
in her Majesty's dockyards with that of productions in
private trade, sad also of investigating the differsooe in
the cost of similar produce in the several dockyards, their
lordships, by their order of the :Xrth January, 1865.
appointed a committee of practical officers to undertake
the asesseary inquiries. The report of the committee,
with reviled instructions for keeping the conversion
amounts, is forwarded herewith. Their lordships,
by their order of the 28th March, 1865, in approval of
the director of works' submission of the 17th of that month,
direct the necessary steps to be taken for the valuation of
the plant of the dock and victualling yards oa the Ist
April, 1865. It in intended to prevent with the future
expense and conversion accounts of the dockyards, the
three following balanoevbeets :-1. Plant account, value
of land, buildings and premises, additions thereto, interest,
repairs, replacements, and 'heretical. 2. Stock valuation
account, value of remains of stock of timber and stores on
hand, and cf receipts and issues in the year, and depre-
ciation or enhancement of value of stock. 3. General
belanosvheet, or expenditure and production ac-
count for ships, services, and cinversioes. The re-
sults of the changes and improvements progressively
adopted since the year 1859 may be thus generally indi-
cted :—L The Controller of the Navy will (000curreutly
with the performance of the several services) be kept is-
' formed of the outlay incurred thereat both in the expendi-
' ture of stores and the employment of lemur at the several
dockyards. This information, exhibiting the gr►dual ab.
Isorption of the 'parliamentary grants for labour, the relation
Iwhich the expense of particular works beers he the esti-
mates for them, and the connection of their oat with their
Progress, secures a most important and necessary check over
the whole of the operations as they are carried on.
2. Means of comparison will be afforded of the cost of
articles produced at the several yards, with that of similar
articles manufactured in the private trade. These means
taws been ensured by the measures adopted for the simpli-
fication and uniformity of the accounts rendered from the
dockyards, conducing to the institution of periodical coin-
perithos of all analogous dockyarl work ; and with respect
to productions in the private trade, to comparisons of east
as full and precise as similarity of quality and
construction may permit. 3. The results of the
separate m►nufacture* and of the combined works
of the dockyards, will alike be presented In the ordi-
nsry form of commercial balance sheets. nue, in future,
will be shown the extent and value of the works executed,
and the amount of the asperses with which they should be
charged, in accordance with the principles of account ob-
served in the commercial world."

Qtrzz EMMA AT WINCHMSTER.—This youthful
widowed sovereign visited Winchester for a short time on
Monday. The bells of the cathedral rear peels of welcome
during her stay, and the Marchioness of lintiogr, Lady
Franklin, Miss Crayeroft, aid Colonel Wilbraham &nom-
ponied her.
DEVON AND CORNWALL LIFEBOAT BAZAAR.—
, This bazaar, which was under blob patronage, sou held a
,fans days ego at Teignmouth. Lady Palk sod other Milne-
' tie' ladies in the county took charge of stalls, which were
I filled with needlework 11131 ao ezteesive selection of ores-
mental articles. The proceeds of the two dare sale yielded
batmen 5001. and 600/ , including subscriptions sod dons-
tiers. The National Lifeboat Institution has expended
between 5,0201. sod 0,0001. on its fourteen establishments
on the Devon end Cornwall coast, and all the lifeboats on
them shores belong to that society. Much credit is due to
Mr. Rowell, of Teignmouth, for the zealous end admirable
mariner io which he organised this bazaar, which has Fielded
such a handsome sum in aid of the funds of the institution.
SUBMARINE CABLES.—In Europe, Asia, Africa,
and Australia there arc 52 submarine cables, which are of
the aggregate length of 5,625 miles, and the insulated wires
of which menu° 9,783 miles. The longest of these is
1,550 fathoms, and the shortest 1. fathom. There are 95
submarine cables in the United States and British North
America which measure 68 miles, and their insulated wires
133 miles. The overland telegraph line between New York
and the west coast of Ireland, through British Columbia,
Noethern Asia, and Roasts, will be 20.479 miles long,
12,740 miles of which are completed. It has at length been
resolved that this lin shall erns from Amilriela to Asia at
the nutting point of Norton Boned, oe the American side
to St. Lawrence Island, and from Oman to Cape Therleus
an the Asiatic continent. Two submarine cabin will be
required for this, one 135 miles lensed the other 2:00 miles
long. Cape Thadeue is 1,702 miles from the month of the
Amon river.
ANLTHEIL STRIPE.—On Tuesday some of the men
employed by the firms of Mears. George Smith and Taylor
—formerly Kelk and Co.--ao4 also of Memos. Trollops sod
moss. Amok for an edema°, of engem. Each of these firms
employs Dome thonmens of atm.