The Express.
London, England, 1847-12-20 00:00:00

ght erpreoo.

MAIM
The oevised mails for Gibraltar, Mahe, Orme; the lonian Island.,
V.ftept, Aden, Ceylon, India, lions-Keep, and Chine. Ma Southampton,
will be male up on the morning of the 20th Deeetaber.
She overland dosed Mahe, ern Marseilles, to Me Mediterraneaa
,irec.. Aden. Ceylon, India, Hongwill homed. np on tb,
"mune of the 24th De:ember.
The malls foe Vigo, Oporto, Lisbon, Madeira, Cadiz, and Glbralta,
will be made up on the moral= of the 77th December.
The malls for New South Watts, Van Diemen's lend, and New
Zealand will be made up on the evening of the Slit December.
Ihe made far British North Amerben, Bermuda, and the finite,
• taus, will be made uponthe evening of the 21st December.
The Westlndia 21., ezeheibig Bermuda, Mamma, Havanna,
}fondness, New Orleans, Vera Crux, Tampico. and Porto Rim, and
including those for Madeira, Jame, Carthagena, Santa Martha,
Chimes., Parsuna, West Coast of South America, and M. Juan-de-
Nicaragua, will be made op on the morning of the 2nd January.
mails for the Brazils, the atm Plate, Monte Video, k 'enam-
el:oN Bald., Wedelns, and Buenos Ayres, will be made np on Os
t vesting of the 4th January.

TO COPIIESIPONDENTL
Advertisements latasded Ire " The Ewan." Imam amain , mast
ago., dou.e. and., lay Tare delay& ea tat day et on

EMI! WATER AT LONDON 'moor.
0."-01Iming, mt. 'AN 0 ; Altarseoe.,3 00.1.4
To-Noasoß-2100004 2u. past I Afterneou. 2 ;AAA pan L

LONDON, MONDA Y, DEC. 20.

SOME ten days ago we directed attention to the
unequal pressure of the stamp duty upon news-
papers, and showed how unfairly favourable the
operation of the act was to the Times, and how
pn judicial to its London competitors, and to the
provincial press in general. The act has, indeed,
all the appearance of having been framed to
suit the purposes of the Tones. When it came
into operation, the first supplement of the Times,
which contains a superficial extent of letter-
press immediately within the maximum fixed
by the act, was perfectly symmetrical. The first
supplement of the Morning Chronicle, on the con-
trary, in the preposterous width of its margin bore
token of the trouble it had cost it to bring the letter-
press within the statutory size of a halfpenny stamp
supplement. Any person acquainted with the prac-
tical working of a printing office, will sec at once
the embarrassment and expense which must be
entailed on a newspaper whose superficial inches
of letter-press a little exceed the statutory size
is order to bring its supplement within the maxi-
mum allowed by the act for one halfpenny. But the
case of a new journal is still worse. More than one
half of the Times' sheet is on an average filled with
advertisements—with matter, in short, which is paid
for. A new journal cannot expect for many years
to be able to fill a sheet of such magnitude with
advertisements, in proportion to its news, of real
importance and interest. If it adopts a sheet
of the size of the statutory halfpenny supple-
ment (about half the size of the Times) or less,
it pays double the duty that the Times does; and
although it is thus enabled to escape the expense
of a supplement stamp on extraordinary occasions
by printing on a double sheet, more eestly machinery
and engines are required to enable it to accomplish
the occasional increase of size. And if ita news and
advertisements require a sheet containing one square
inch more than 763 inches of letter-press on a side it
cannot publish a double sheet, nor can it publish a
supplement within the statutory maximum except by
adopting arrangements in making up and machining
its contents which entail upon it serious additional
trouble and expense. These are grave obstacles in
the way of those who undertake to establish a new
and cheap journal; and the experience of the luck-
less Chronicle might almost tempt the uncharitable
to surmise that the SOLONS of Printing-house-square
had had some band in the piece of newspaper legis-
lition which occasions them.

There is another act of the legislature which, in a
less glaring manner, but still with considerable effect,
tends to repress that free trade in the production of
newspapers which would be the best secu-
rity to the public for cheap newspapers, and for news-
papers really compelled to regard the public
interest, in contradistinction to newspapers exclu-
sively devoted to the interests of a proprietary.
Advertisements are the mainstay of a newspaper.
The nines is paid about 250/. for every supplemental
sheet it publishes. Now, a disproportionately heavy
tax upon advertisements, by increasing the charge
for their insertion, diminishes their numbur. The tax
on advertisements ie an iniquitously unequal tax. The
duty on an advertisement of three lines for the reco-
vering a lost reticule is the same in amount, as the
duty on the long advertisement of our greatest and
wealthiest railway company announcing its business
arrangements for the next six months. This ine-
quality of taxation not only affects lejuriously that
class of advertisers who haunt the top of the second
column in the Times, pathetically Raking "Why does
Frederic come no more to St. John's-wood ? '—it wrongs
a much more valuable class of the community.
Every newspaper reader is aware of the space occu-1
pied in the columns of the Times by the advertise-
ments of servants out of place. The wealthiest
insurance company in the empire is taxed no more for
the publication of its long and tempting advertise-
ment. than the poor cook or housemaid for her notice
that she wants a neer place. This advertising system
must be found advantageous, for, in despite of the dis-
couraging influence of a heavy tax, it is extensively
resorted to. Such advertisements average, one day with
another, fully an advertising column of the Times: on
Wednesday last they extended nearly to four columns,
and we have known them as high as six—with 362
advertisements. By the operation of this duty these
362 individuals, anxious to earn their livelihood by
honest industry, but lost in the crowd to the view of
any who might give them employment, are com-
pelled to pay a tax, exceeding on an average 100 or
120 per cent, on the newspaper charge, for their pre-
sumption in seeking to make their wishes known.
Advertising is also mach resorted to by teachers and
governesses, and would be to a greater extent but for
the expense, of which, in such short advertisements,
the duty is a principal item. The tax upon
advertisements increases the expense to adver-
tisers of humble means, and by discouraging the
practice limits the number of newspars, tends
to keep them high-priced and articles pe
of luxury for
the wealthier classes, and thus in turn diminishes the
number of channels for efficient advertising. The
newspaper is cramped in the sphere of its utility by
the advertisement duty, as at present imposed, to an
extent which only the honest and industrious of the
poorer classes, who would fain work, but who, lost
among the crowd of our dense population, are over-
looked by employers, can alone appreciate..
Turn our eyes to what Rage of our registers of tax-
ation we may, we find fiscal influences at work to
discourage the enterprise of the press generally, and
of the newspaper press in particular. The excise
upon paper, for example, less by the amount of duty
which it compels paper-makers to pay, than by the
ignorant and vexatious surveillance of government
officials which it compels them to work under, keeps
up the price of one of our principal raw materials, and
prevents the exercise of ingenuity in devising new
kinds and qualities fitter for our purpose.

We should not have courage to recur again and
again to this subject—as we have done and intend
to do—did we not feel that is pleading our own
cause we plead the cause of a large and varied com-
munity. The Times-begotten regulations of the
S tamp Duty Act affect most injuriously the daily newe-
-1 paper press, though every journal in the empire feels
their influence more or -less. The advertisement
duty is felt to be most oppressive by the whole of the
provincial press, as has been ably shown on different
occasions by the Leeds Times ; and we have
pointed out its unjust and oppressive character
as regards menial servants, and all head-workers
and hand-workers, whose only capital is their
ability and willingness to work. The excise duty on
paper presses unequally and harassingly upon all
manufacturers of paper, for whatever purpose ; on all
tradesmen who use paper for packing; on all publishers,
and on all authors. And the worst of these taxes is,
that their original object has in many instances—
sometimes avowedly—been to repress literary ac-
tivity, and above all, the newspaper branch of literary
activity. Governments—the beet of them—are shy
and jealous of newspapers, even when using some of
them for their own ends. They fear the influence of
the daily visiter which is welcomed every morning as
bringing alike the serious news and gossip of the pre-
ceding day with comments grave or gay upon it, and
as enabling those who want employers, and those
who want workmen, to recognise each other
in the jostling and bewildering crowd of our
swarming land. In crowded communities like
ours—in free communities like ours—the news-
paper is a necessary of life. It is not merely
in a rhetorical or figurative sense a necessary of life.
The shopkeeper requires the information he finds
in the newspaper to enable him to regulate his pur-

.G, DECEMBER 20, 1847.

chases. The farmer needs it to keep him informed of
the state of markets. Its advertising columns are the
only means by which those who need employment and
those who have it to give can find each other out in
the crowd. Apart altogether from its political im-
portance, from its literary or gossipping interest, the
newspaper is literally a necessary of life. And the
depressing influence of the fiscal restrictions we have
adverted to, by narrowing the sphere of its circula-
tion, prevents the full development of its capability
to be useful.

The Paris journals of Saturday contain little do-
mestic news of interest. The Union Monarch ique
gives the following curious statement respecting the
diplomatic note lately received by M. Guizot from the
federal government of Switzerland :
Without doubt yon already know that the letter which
accompanied the reply to the notification of the French go-
' vernment to the Diet contained these words at the end :
tt M. Guizot is re quested to be kind enough for the future
ant to communicate with the Swiss government through any
other person than its charge d'affaires at Paris." It was in
consequence of this that the recall of M. Bois to Comte was
resolved on. But what you do not know, ptrhnps, is, that
the Syria; chary d'affaires residing at Paris has received
from his government orders to obtain by all means a retrae-
tation from the Journal des Ddmts of the different article+
which it has published on the affairs of Switzerland, and
particularly these concerning the brief hostilities. A letter
of the Swiss charge d'affeires will be, in the Sent place, ad-
dressed to the Alper, and, if that dues not procure sativfac-
Lion, an application will be made to the tribunals to compel
the Debars to afford it. I can, in conclusion, affirm to you
that the views of the Diet are /seemly well known to the
English ambassalor, who approves of them, an who will set
in perfect harmony with the Swiss government.
The Minister of Finance, M. Demon, is reported
to be prepared with the coming budget, and to have
signified his willingness to adopt some measure of
postal reform, and a reduction of the salt tax.
—The Marquis de Boissy was married to the Countess
Guiccioli in the chapel of the Chamber of Peers at the
Luxembourg on Thursday.—We read in the Patric
of Friday evening—" At the general meeting of the
refugee Poles on the 29th ult., at the Salle Valentino,
M. Bakunio, a refugee, made a speech against the
Emperor of Russia. M. Guizot has just caused to be
given to M. Bakunin, by the prefect of police, an
order to quit Paris in 24 hours, and France without
the least delay."
M. Pacheco, ex-president of the council of ministers
in Spain, and ex-ambassador of the Queen at Rome,
arrived at Marseilles on the 13th, from Italy.
It is expected that the Bank of France will reduce
its rate of discount to 41 per cent. early in January.
L' Union Monarchiee affirms that the Due de
Broglie is about to resign the London embassy, and
is to be succeeded by the Duke of Montebello, now
Minister of Marine.

The Madrid mails of the 13th have arrived. A

despatel;Ofthe Captain-General of Catalonia, announc-
ing the dispersion of various bands of Carlists, ap-
pears in the Gazette. The debate on the address was
continued in the senate. Nothing of interest occurred
in the chamber. The approaching arrival of General
E partero was generally spoken of, and was expected
early in January.

Letters have been received from Naples to the Bth,
which in some degree remove the obscurity of the pre-
vious reports of the events alleged to have taken place
there and in Sicily. The modifications of the cabinet,
which we reported long since, are confirmed. M.
Sal Angelo, Minister of the Interior, has retired, and
hie office is resolved into three, those of the Interior
properly so called, of Public Works, and of Commerce
and Public Instruction, to which respectively MM.
d'Urso, and Spinelli have been nominated.
These three appointments are eminently popular. M.
Parisi was lately intendant of rtlessina, where rejoic-
ings have taken place on the occasion of his elevation
to his new and important office. The same occasion
called forth expressions of loud and general re-
probation of his successor at Messina, General
L cedi, rendered notorious by his proclamation offering
honours and pecuniary rewards for assassination. The
hope which was entertained that Delcarretto, the
odious minister of police, would be dismissed, is for
the present at least disappointed. That functionary
retains hie poet.
On the arrival of the Sicilian steam-boat Vesuvio,
from Palermo, at Naples, the King, wishing to obtain
the most authentic information of the circumstances

attending the recent demonstrations and tumults, sent I
for the captain, and obtained from him a full narra-
tive of the affair : immediately afterwards a cabinet
council was convoked. A Roman journal, the Co-
temporaneo, says that the King of Naples had written
to the Queen of England to entreat her to order that
no English ships shall cruizo off the coast of Naples
or Sicily.
Letters from Palermo report that several arrests
had been made there, in consequence of the late
popular manifestations, and by orders received from
Naples.
Since the above was written we have received the
Nourelliste, of Marseilles, of the 16th, which contains
a letter from Naples, of the Bth, eying various details
of considerable interest. We select the following :
The same distrust prevails between the government and.
the population. The system of terror inaugurated by Del-
Carretto has not for one instant ceased to weigh down the Two
Sicilies. At present, as before, the prisons are over full; not
only no political prisoner has been set at liberty, but many
other guests have been conducted to the dungeons of this
modern inquisition. Numerous and menacing troops sur-
round the royal palace at Naples by night and by day. At
Palermo, all the popular chiefs who were conspicuous in the
late manifmtations have been cast into prison, notwith-
'tending the exemplary moderation which was the character
of this movement. The people, disconcerted, murmur ;
the arrest of their chiefs has created great distrust towards
those nobles a d the bourgeoise, who had just been, appa-
rently, acting in concert with them, and had, in some mea-
sure, directed their demonstrations. If they were to take up
arms a second time, it would be impossible to restrain them.
I informed you in my last that the King had held a council
of his ministers. In this 'juin', which was exceed-
ingly long, the honourable President of the Council,
M. Pietracatella, spoke for three hours, before the King and
his fellow ministers, is the most eloquent manner, to demon-
strate the necessity, of adopting, as soon as possible, a more
liberal policy. It is painful to say that these wise counsels,
dictated by a pure feeling of patriotism, met with little echo
in the assembly. In the evening, it is said, the Prince de Sa-
lerno, and the Queen-mother, besought the King to listen to
the wishes of his subjects, and to place more confidence in
the wise and enlightened advice of his first minister. But
Ferdinand, inflexible, declared that he would prefer to go
and take up service in Russia, as a private soldier, than
consent to have his royal prerogatives diminished. The
police of Naples having been appris d that a popular
manifestation was to take place on the bth in the
royal garden, a body of twelve hundred gene-
damns was stationed in this walk. As this demonstra-
tion was rendered impossible on this occasion, the police
imagined it was put off till the Bth, to be held in the court of
the palace. In consequence, the posts have been all doubled,
and the guard of the palace, which is already so formidable,
has been increased. Such is the political situation in which
the country is now suffering. A tact has just occurred at
Messina, which, though unimportant in itself, tends to de-
monstrate the profound aversion of the Sicilians for what-
' ever can remind them of the yoke which the government of
Naples now inflicts upon them. You know the cordial wel-
-1 come which foreigners ever receive in the festivi-
ties of Italy, and the proverbial tolerance a stranger
meets with in their flies, which have so much
charm for us. The Casino of Messina gave a bail
in honour of the Intendant Pariel, called to Naples to occupy
the place of Minister of the Interior. A numerous crowd
of the most distinguished persons of the town had assem-
bled in the brilliant saloons, where some officers were pre-
terit. Bat at the commencement of the donee several of
these officers, having invited some ladies, met with a humi-
liating refund, and were obliged to leave the Casino, from
whence they were accompanied by the beatings of the gusts.
The following day, dogs and other animals were sent into the
streets with Gm-similes of the famous medal affixed to their
ears and tail. I have been greatly surprised on reading in
the Italian and other journals that ?d. Code has left the
' palace, and that the King has another confessor. The
worthy prelate is as far from falling into disgrace as
Delearretto. Ile confesses more than ever. The Neapolitans
know it to their cost.
Letters from Home 'mention some disturbances

which had taken place among the working classes in
the Transtavere, in consequence of foreign labourers
being employed in competition with native opera-'
tives. The movement had no political character, and
was quickly repressed.
The Patria of Florence announces that the question
of Pontremoli is for the present settled. It is to conti-
nue annexed to Tuscany until the Duke of Lucca shall
succeed to Parma. In that contingency the treaty of
Vienna would transfer it to Parma, but nothing is
said of that for the present.

The provisional government of the Valais have
pronounced decrees expelling the Jesuits from the
canton, convoking a constituent grand council, and
imposing a contribution of 8,0001. on the parties who
were the chief instigators in the late war against
the federal government. Among these the most pro-
minent are, the monks of the Great St. Bernard, the
Abbey of St. Maurice, and the Bishop and Chapter of
Sion.
The question of the revision of the pact is discussed
in several of the Swiss
_journals with much modera-
tion and good sense. The impolicy of the Diet en-

gaging in such a measure precipitately is urged. The
necessity, or at least the desirableness, of unanimity
among the cantons is pleaded, as welt as a matter of
legality as of prudence, in relation to the dis-
positions of foreign powers. To win over the lesser
cantons to such a new arrangementby presentmeasares
of conciliation is suggested, but in any event the
postponement of the question until all irritation has
been calmed down, vindictive feeling subdued by
time, the sentiments of the new cantonal government
expressed in their respective councils and the new
federal deputies elected. In short, there is every
reason to hope that this question of revision will be
dealt with in a manner to afford no pretext for foreign
interference, to which the population of the confede-
ration is in the mass strongly opposed.
Letters and journals from Berne, of the 14th, have
been received. Since the arrival of Sir Stratford
Canning, and the intelligence of the declaration of
Lord Palmerston against interference, England ha,
become highly popular there. The ambassador had
visited Gen. Dufour and all the membeis of the Diet
present at Berne. The disbanding of the federal
troops was taking place gradually, but it was under-
stood that a certain force would be maintained in a
full state of efficiency until the cantons of the late
league had liquidated the pecuniary indemnities de-
creed against them, and until all apprehension of
armed interference by Austria and France should be
removed. It is : ecnarkable that foreign interference
was no where more decidedly unpopular than in the
cantons of Friburg and Lucerne.
A correspondent of La Presse, writing from Berne
on the 14th, says:
The troops are returning by degrees to th, it homes, every
one resumes his weal avocations, the public mind recovers
its wonted calm, trade ream arc, and justice is about to re-
open her sanctnary. The menace of an intervention in the
midst of such perfect tranquillity is something so very ridi-
culous, that the moat simple shrug their shoulders when the
journal, mention it. This is not a fancy pieture, but a
faithful representation of the actual situation of the country.
The government of the principality of Neufchatel
has ratified the consent given by its deputy in the
Diet, and has agreed to pay the fine imposed on it for
failing to supply its military contingent.
The expenses of the late war to be levied on the
cantons of the League is five millions of franca, or about
300,0001. It is to be distributed in the following pro-
portions, and paid up by the 3rd January :
Fr. nap.
Uri ... 70.524- 8
Simla
Zig
Lamm ..... .......... ........ 1,171,499 -71
Mom
rile

Total: Pr.... ........... 3 011,00 a— „

AFRICA.—WEST COAST.—ASCENSION.—The Nau-
tilus, transport, arrived on Friday at Portsmouth, from
the Falkland Islands and Ascension : the latter place
she left on the Gth of November. The island had been
peculiarly healthy of late ; there was abundance of
water, and the amount of cultivated land bed been
on the increue. The squadron (with the exception of
the Siren, which had lost Lieut. Probart and nine ,nen at
the Bahama Islands) had been very healthy. The slave trade
is curied on with increased vigour by the slave agents; fifty
vesicle have been taken during the last 12 mouths. None
but the hest-sailing craft should be sent on the station, es
frequently the slavers get away by superior tailing—three
steam slave vessels having escaped with lull cargoes from the
southern part of the station in September.—The F.,lklands
were in the greatest state of diatreas in August, when the
Nautilus left. She lay at the islands three weeks before she
could get a bullock. All the improvements c•mtempated for
giving &character and employment to the plays wire sopped,
the government not having hands, or anything for them.
the islands, in short, were in a fair way of being deserted.
—Letters doted Oat. 10 havo been received from the Styx,
steauasloop, Commander Chads, cruising on the coast of
Africa. She had been again successful in capturing three
more alive vessels, which had been sent inm put. In the
course of her second cruise she hod made five prises ore the
:ouch part of the coast. The crew were in goal health. It
exp..cted the Styx will be home early in the spring.

I'OLONIAL.