The Express.
London, England, 1867-01-05 00:00:00

THE EXPRESS, SATURDAY EVENING, JANUARY 5, 1867.

The necessity for expenditure in preparation
during peace is, then, reduced to the two latter
departments. And in neither will the Liberal
party be disposed to offer opposition, pro-
vided that security be given fur a due
return for expenditure. Let us have the beat
rifles, the best guns, and the best ammunition that
Healey can purchase, if only we can be sure that
we get the best when we pay for it. But above
all let us try to do something to get us a better
class of officers. It is here that lies our real de-
ficiency and our real danger. Wu have enough
of them to suffice fur an army double the strength
it is at present, according to the proportion be-
tween officers and men in continental systems.
But they have for the must part no military instruc-
tion. Our szientific services—the Engineers and
.Irtilkry—are as well educated as any in the
world. But the officers of the infantry and
cavalry of the line, and the Guards, know, as a
rule, very little more than the drill of the parade-
ground. What is almost worse, the tone of the
sera ice is so unprofessional that few among them
care to learn more. They enter to peas a few
years of youth, or to buy their way up to rank,
or trusting to interest to obtain for them further
'advancement and lucrative occupation. They
do not enter for love of the profession of arms,
and they do not study its principles. Hence the
'prevalent indifference and almost universal lucent-
11,cience—indifferenee and incompetence for which
the country pays dearly when war comes, but
which it cannot avert by raising more battalions
while we are still at peace.
What the Liberal party will insist for, then, is
not augmentation of number', but increase of
efficiency in our army. It will grudge no sums
necessary for that end. It will readily vote the
amount, heavy though it be, required for the
abrogation of the purchase system, knowing well
that services given gratuitously cannot, as a rule,
be worth much, and determined that when an
officer's pay is made a fair reward for ser-
vice, due competence to perform the service shall
be exacted. Whatever also is needed to promote
the comfort and health of the soldier will be
cheerfully acceded to. But it will not allow
these essential reforms to be put out of
sight by the alarmists who call for more
men. It will rather answer, that part
of the cost of making our army more efficient may
be recovered by hereafter reducing its numbers.
It will refuse to see occasion for keeping 70,000
men in the United Kingdom merely on the pre-
tence that we may wish to send out an expedition
of 50,000 to some point of the Continent. It
will require that our fleet be made our sufficient
security against invasion. It will insist that our
colonies shall be gradually, but rapidly, trained to
rely on their own strength for protection from
invaders, that India shall maintain a separate army
for itself, and that thus the necessity for a great
body of troops at home to supply reliefs for
abroad shall be removed. To effect these changes
is indeed the work at once of time and of prudence.
But our object must be to lay the foundation for
them, by making the upper branches of the service
so really affective that our present force will be
enhanced in strength, while we shall be able at
brief notice to doable or treble its numbers when
the occasion at last arrives. And we cannot afford
to be turned from this needful work of improve-
ment by the demand for more men, in order that
the present evil system may be perpetuated and
extended.

OUR CONTEMPORARIES.
(THIS DAY.)

The Ti mr+, discussing Italian affairs, expresses
its belief that whatever intemperate members of the ex-
treme opposition may say, no Italian statesman would
ever think either of a repudiation of the public debt or of
the reduction of its interest from 5 to 3 per cent.
The chi 4 fault which the Tiny:finds in Mr. Neato's speech
is his laudation of the high tone of morality which he con-
siders characterises the public life of Mr. Bright—our
contemporary instancing Mr. Bright's treatment of Mr.
Lowe as one of the facts which lead it to protest against
the upholding of the hon. member as an exemplar of
political life.
Mr. Howell, the surveyor to the vestry of St. James's,
Writes a long letter to the Tina with a view of proving the
impossibility of procuring the means to remove the snow
from the streets at the short notice usually given. The
Tutus will not believe a word of it, and taxes the vestries
with never having seriously thought how to set about their
work.

Noticing some of the unfriendly criticisms which have
been paned on Baron RinseWs letter upon the reciprocity
of freedom between Church and State, the Daily Pears
remarks that that statesman is perfectly aware that his
interpretation of a free church in a free state is incom-
patible with the pretensions of a temporal sovereignty.
The sole purpose of the letter was to make an appeal to
the public opinion of free nations, and there is no reason
to doubt that this purpose was attained.
The extraordinary state of things now exhibited in
Spain is described by the Daily Neal as exhibiting the
monarchical principle of government working in its
simplest form. It is well that we who at home see the
system of which the present rigorous measures are the
natural fruit at work, under influences which modify its
character as well as restrain its operation, should now
and then look abroad, and remark how it works in coon.
tries where it flourishes without check or hindrance.

Rejoicing in Mr. Lowe's reply to Mr. Gucdalla the
Herald says the Reform League are unfortunate in their
policy and in their leaders. The first has aroused the
aversion of the upper and middle classes—the second
exposes them to public obloquy and contempt whenever
they unluckily succeed in crossing swords with a gentle.

appliances failed to save his bou6c, which was on fire,
consoled himself by saying, "Perhaps It will go out of
itself." Our vestries, in like manner, except that they
have not even attempted any other expedient, comfort us
with the assurance that the snow, by which we are now
made prisoners, must certainly, sooner or later, melt of

The .s).ierlaks• finds some amusement in the dithyrambics
composed by many of our contemporaries for New Year
Even the Standard, which sometimes mimics " The
Gaily Bellowgraph " so well, became lyrical itself, and did
the trick commonly known on the stage*" tears in the
voice," or in a writer, "tears in the ink." "Not
all," it said, "at the commencement of 11417 have
expiated the crimes or the follies of 1 The
great connecting force of the moral life of the
human race weds these atoms of eternity together, and
makes them, after all, one for us—though we may scratch
upon the surface figures, and dates, and reminiscent
lines." A reminiscent line scratched on the surface of en
atom of eternity ! How much is that ? Dues it mean a
Letts' diary with the memorandum pages filled up ?
" Books neatly prepared for scratching lines on atoms of
eternity," would certainly be a most telling advertisement
for Mr. Letts. The TelegrapA, however, is greater stilL
The man who called the meteors the other day " baby
stars perishing of teething," and who a year or
so ago spoke thus of some stables, Aegean we
think—" though the rack might be of beaten gold,
and the corn of diamond dust, there was certainly to be
found somewhere a loose-box in which was tethered a pale
Horse whose name was Death," has been put on to " the
New Virtr," and has produced this :—" Or wo may say
that the commencing year is like a volume of events to be,
with leaves uncut—with leaves indeed, to which Old
Time's scythe alone can act as paper-knife." What a free,
dashing spirit that man has ! with what a master hand
ho dashes together the grand and the familiar. Putnam
Smif, with his " Every alligator basking in his slime is in
himself an epic self-contained," is nothing to this man—a
mere " baby star who died of teething" in the com-
parison.

the Erfurt.

OSBORNE, JAN. 4.

The Queen drove out in a sledge yesterday
morning, accompanied by Princess Christian, and spin in
the afternoon with Princess Louise.

Her Majesty wilted and drove this morning with Prin-
oeu Christian. The other members of the royal family
went out also.

The Right Hen. Colborne Hardy left Osborne yester-
day for London.
Mr. Arthur Helps and Miu Helps arrived yesterday.
The Hon. Flora Macdonald has succeeded the Hon.
Caroline Cavendish as maid of honour.

A committee of the Lords of her Majesty's Most Honour-
able Privy Council sat yesterday at Whitehall on the
subject of quarantine.
A deputation consisting of Lord Eleho, M.P., Hon. A.
Kinnard, 11. P., Mr. Charles Neste, M.P., Mr. Alexander
McDonald (President of Miners' National Association),
Mr. J. Normansall (Society of Miners, South Yorkshire),
and Mr. W. Pickard (Secretary of Miners, Wigan), had
an interview with the Right Hon. Spencer Walpole, at the
Home-office, yesterday, to request the appointment of a
commission to inquire into the PLUMS of the recent colliery
nocidenta at Barnsley and Hardcastle.

THE PRINCE AND PRINCESS OF WALES. —Their
Rlyal Highnesses the Prince and Princess of Wsles and
the Duke of Edinburgh are expected to leave Holkham-
hall, the seat of the Earl and Countess of Leicester, to-
day (Saturday). Although the inclemency of the weather
has experienced no abatement, • very large quantity of
game has been shot by the Prince of Wales, the Duke of
Edinburgh, the Duke of Sutherland, the Earl of Kimber-
ley, Lord Suffield, the Earl of Dunmore, Viscount Powers-
court, &c. The shooting parties have confined their ope-
rations to the park, which Is of very great extent, and the
adjacent marshes, the latter abounding in wildfowl. So
considerable has been the destruction effected among the
hares, pheasants, rabbits, on the estate, that on one
day this week 2 tons 19 cwt. of game were forwarded from
the Wells station of the Great Eastern Railway to Lead.
enhall-market. The stay of the Prince and Prinoeu of
Wales at Sandringham-house, to which they will return
on leaving Holkham, is not expected to extend beyond the
pre.ent month.

The Right Hon. Sir John Pakington, Bart.,
M.P., and Lady Pakington entertained the following com.
pany at dinner last evening, at the Admiralty, Whitehall:
—The Hon. Reginald Abbot, Sir Charice and Lady
Wyndham, Admiral and Mn. Seymour, Admiral and
Mn. Dunlop, Mr. and Lady Diana Pakington, Commodore
Vicker, Captain Stuart, Mao Temple, Mr. and Mm.
Romaine, Mr. Bennett, &c. A select party assembled
after dinner.

Among the English families resorting to Cannes
for the winter are the Earl and Counter of Mount-Edg-
cumbe, Viscountess Jocelyn and Hon. Mrs Jocelyn and
Lady Florence Cowper, Lord Henry Percy, M.P., Colonel
the Hon. W. P. Talbot and Lady Emma Talbot, Viscount
and Viscountess Cast!erase and Lady Alice Kerr, &c.
Lord Brougham is in the enjoyment of most remarkable
health.

On Thursday the marriage of the Hon. Caroline
Stapleton Cotton, eldest daughter of Viscount Comber-
mere, with Lieutenant-Colonel the Hon. Cecil Lennox
Peel, of the Scots Fusilier Guards, youngest 11011 of Mr.
Laurence Peel and Lady Jane Peel, took place at Wren-
bury, on the Cheshire border of Shropshire.

A letter from Rome of the 21st ult. says :
Although the season is by no means ► full one this year
Christmas pieties have commenced in society as well as
in public. Mr. Hooker, Secretary of the United States
Legation, gave his annual reception at the Bonaparte
Palace on Christmas-eve, and gratified some hundreds of
distinguished guests with the beautiful Christmas church
music of the classic composers Basil', Cuglielml, and
others, admirably performed by professional vocalists as
at St. Peter's and the Sistine Chapel. Among the British
guests were the Duke and Duchess of Argyll, the Marquis
of Lorn and' Lady Edith Campbell, Right lion. W. E.
and Mrs. Gladstone and family, Right Hon. S. and Mrs.
Cardwell, Mr. Ode Russell, and Sir J. and Lady Har-
rington. The Americans were in great force, comprising
General and Mrs. King, Hou. Amos Kendall, Bishop
Bedell, of Ohio, and other transatlantic celebrities."

Another token of regard emanating from tho war
has just been conferred by the King of Prussia upon Colo-
nel Walker, the military member of the British embassy.
On the Christmas-eve the King addressed him an auto-
graph letter, thanking him for having shared the dangers
and fatigues of the campaign with the Crown Prince, and
regretting that the rules of the British service did not
permit of his accepting a Prussian order of knighthood as •
fitting and well-merited acknowledgment. Atthe same time
the royal writer availed himself of the German custom of
giving Christmas presents to offer to the colonel a mag-
nifioent letter-weight, having the names of the various
battles at which he saaisted inscribed on it, and the Grand
Cross of the Red Eagle inserted in Its centre.

The coming series of Mr. Dickens's readings is
to commence in London on the 15th, with " Barbox
Brothen," and " The Roy at Mugby."

- -
The members of the Scholastic Registration As-
sociation will hold their first annual general meeting on
Tuesday, the Ath of January, at 3 p.m., at the rooms of
the Society of Arts.

Mr. Thomas Purnell is succeeded as assistant
secretary to the Royal Archeological Institute by Mr. A.
R. Lodge.

The election for associates of the Royal Academy
takes place on the 31M of this month; there are two
caoancies only.

The Canard Company, in view of the expiration
of their contract for conveyance of the North American
mails, have applied for extended dock accommodation at
Liverpool, to meet the anticipated increase of the met,
eantile portion of their business with Halifax, Boston, and
New York.

Orchestral concerts, three a week in number, are
announced at Her Majesty's Theatre, to be conducted by
Signor Arditi.

Didlle. Tietjeus is advertised as about to sing at
Vienna. Antwnne, with Mendelssohn's choruses, will
shortly be given there.

Rossini, having entirely recovered from his fall,
received company on Saturday evening for the first time
since his accident.

Several richly attired Arabian chiefs, who have
lately arrived in Paris, were on Thursday the observed of
all observers in the galleries of the l'alaia Soya/.

LATEST INTELLIGENCE.

ROYAL PROSPECTS FOR 1867.

We find the following language attributed to
Victor Emmanuel in reply to the recent address of
the Italian Chambers :

For some days past I have been bearing a good deal
about economy. Doubtless economy is very necessary,
but we must take care not to introduce it where it would
be fatal—for example in the army. 111-considered
economy in the war budget might probably disorganise
the army. Now it might happen from one moment to
another that the army may be celled on not only to defend
the frontiers but to acquire new glory on other fields of
battle.

The King of Prussia gave a grand dinner on
the occasion of the sixtieth anniversary of his entry
into the army, at which were present Generals de
Moltke, de Falkenstein, Herworth, Bfanteulfel, do
Boon, Steinmetz, and Count Bismarck. His
Majesty proposed the following toast :
In the midst of all of you I salute the new year and the
end of ono the most memorable for Frauds. The fol-
lowing years ought to produce the harvest of the
sanguinary seed time we have passed. For that we shall
want all our forces, and then that blessing will not fail us
which was so visibly with us during the past year. As a
testimony of a solemn act, I have collected the heroes of
an army in which I entered sixty years ago. Following
the example of my father, I have led the army so cared
for by hint and my late brother to the victories which you,
devoting your blood and your lives, have carried off. I
thank you all. Long live the nation which has produced
such an army' _ _ .

The same day tho King gave the names of Bis-
marck, Roon, do Moltke, and Herworth to four
streets in Berlin.

AMERICA.
(BY ATLANTIC TELEGRAPH.)
NEW YORK, Jas. 4.
The public debt of the United States amounted
on the let inst. to 2,675,000,000 dollars.

Gold, 134 f. Sterling Exchange on London,
1091; 5.20 United States Bonds, 107# ; Illinois,
1211; Erie, 67. Cotton, Middling Upland, 36c.

WEATHER REPORT.-(THIS DAY.)

SATURDAY, JANUARY 5, 8 MC

ID. ft! W. ILI ~-,les---...., W. IH. let
I a ir. D.
I - 1..-..-..., a
N 011787. .. 30.14 11 S.W. 1 1 B.W.[ 'bl - 2
Aherdmer 20.1414' W. 1 2 N.W. bm - 1
Leith 30.12 AI 9. 1 1 N. f - 1
Ardrosean.. i30.04 26 E.N.R 8 3 E. 4i - 2
Greencastle 29.961. I.E. 4 6 W. is 0.01 3
Holyhead .92 31 E.S.E. 2 1 Ell.E. eb - I
lie
Penance.- 29.09 415 B.E. .10 9 72.8. L ai -. 8
Brat 06530 I.E. 7 6 R 8.2. n 0.12 5
Loden' 19.7336' Z. 11 7 E.N.E. a 0.47 6
Plymouth .8227 E. 8 2 E.N.E. co - 5
Weymouth .429.91 RE. 9, 4 N.E. eo --7
Portsmouth :39.00 SO E.S.L 3! 2 i E.N.E. ,cm - 2
London .. 80.0919' S.R 1 3 ; W. 'tem - -
Yansath., 130.12 341 B.E. 7, 8 . N.W. o - 6
Bcsrborough 180.12 32, ti. 1 2 N.N.W. Ise 0.11 2
Melds 20.13 2i S.W. 2 3 N.W. 1o - -

TELEGRAPHIC COMMUNICATION WITH

INDIA.

Now that the Eastern question is assuming a
very threatening aspect it is only prudent to con-
sider the position in which this country would be
placed with regard to her telegraphic conununica-
tion with India if Turkey were convulsed with war.
It is nothing but the fear of being punished by the
Turkish government which prevents the wild Arab
front destroying the telegraph wires which at pre-
sent carry our messages from England to Bombay,
and the first appearance of weakness or disorgani-
sation in Turkey would put an end to the Indian
telegraph. That in all probability would occur
precisely at the moment when rapid communication
might be of inestimable value both to the govern-
ment and to the merchants. How many lives
might have been preserved, and how much
money might have been saved, if the telenra„ ph
had existed when the Indian mutiny broke
out! Unfortunately our government never looks
to the future; its maxim is, "enough for the
day is the evil thereof," and the future is left to
take care of itself. Even now, in a time of pmoe,
the telegraphic communication by way of Turkey
and Russia is so irregular as to be of comparatively
little public utility. Sometimes messages are
eight or ten days, and even longer, in transmission,
and are frequently received so altered as not to
be intelligible, nor can we expect any great im-
provement even if tranquillity be maintained, for
when messages pass through so many hands, moat
of whom are entirely ignorant of the language
they are telegraphing, many mistakes must fre-
quently occur, and these mistakes must often lead
to disastrous consequences. It doeatherefore appear
absolutely necessary that a reliable telegraphic com-
munication should be established between England
and Indiawithout delay; and fortunately that can be
done at, for such an object, a very moderate ex-
pense—for there is now telegraphic communi-
cation as far as Alexandria and Suez. Men of the
greatest experience and trust assure us that a sub-'
marine cable can be laid from Suez to Aden, and
then to Bombay, with as great certainty of success
as across any other sea.
It is true that government has already made the
attempt, and failed ; but telegraphy has made great
progress since that time, and the arrangement
then made for laying the cable was not the best for
securing permanent success. The attempt to lay
the Atlantic cable was not successful at first, but
all difficulties were overcome by skill and perse-
verance, and there can be no doubt that a sub-
marine telegraphic cable could be laid with much
greater ease in the calm sea of the East than in the
stormy Atlantic. But whether it be difficult or
easy, no time should be loot in making the attempt
during a time of peace, for it would be a more dif-
ficult and more expensive undertaking if war had
once broken out.

The Westminster Gazette (the new Roman catholic
paper) believes it to be a fact that the government do
not intend to bring in a reform bill this session, " though
they are willing to meet the question by resolutions of the
house, or by appointing a commission." The late splits in
the cabinet " were purely on questions of finance. A dis-
solution before resignation is one of the courses resolved
on, in order to appeal from the House of Commons to the
country."
THE DISCUSSION BETWEEN PROFESSOR Be. is
AND Ma. EItNEHT Jol!Ea.—We learn by electric telegraph
that Mr. Ernest Jones delivered bis address in reply to
Professor Mckie, and in favour of democracy, last night.
He was loudly applauded by the audience with which the
room was filled, there being a few occasional hisses. •
vote of thanks to Mr. Jones was adopted on the motion of Mr.
M'foren, M.P.

Lord Redesdale writes to the Times:—" I say delibe-
rately that if parliament enacts what is asked by the Lon-
don, Chath am, and Dover Company, andallows such lini ited
liability bankrupts to fleece their mortgagees in order that
they may retain and improve their own property, while it
leaves the law unaltered which compels °then to sur-
render everything to their creditors, it will legislate un-
justly, and lay the foundation of very evil consequences."

The temperature at Southampton on Thursday
night in the open air was only 4 deg. above zero. This is
colder in that town than it has been known within living
memory. Several gentlemen have been driving sledges
through the streets of Southampton. On the chalk hills
near Buingstoke the temperature is intensely cold, and
railway travellers find a much warmer climate when they
approach Winchester.
To give an idea of the frost which has prevailed
since the let of the month at Dublin, the Freeman's
Journal mentions that at noon on Thursday the Liffey
was completely frozen over at Essex's-bridge, and at the
fall of the tide groat gabs of ice were borne down the
stream. The rising generation are enjoying the skating
and sliding with the greatest enthusiasm in Phenix-park
and wherever ice is to be found about the city.
Sr. JAMEN'h PALACE, JAN. I.—The Queen has
been pleased to appoint the Reverend William Henry
Brookfield, honorary chaplain in ordinary to her Majesty,
to be one of the chaplains in ordinary to her Majesty, in
the room of the Ve7 Rev. Edward Meyrick Goulburn,
D.D., Dean of Norwieb.-:Ga:efte. _ _

Ini•ar Pourren.—Mr. George Bryan, M.P., and
Sir John Gray have made speeches to their constituents in
Kilkonny,in which Irish questions have been discussed.
The former thinks there is a better security against Fe-
niannon than a military occupation--a " good land bill."
LITERARY AND SCIRNTIFIC MEETING.; FOR THR
ENKCING WEF.R.—Blontlay--Asintic, at t, " Vedas of the
Hindus, and Vedas of ' the German School,' " Professor
Goldstucker. Entomological, at 7. Tuesday—Royal In-
stitution, at 3, "Chemistry of Gases" (adapted to a
Jnvenile Auditory), Professor Frankland. Engineers, at 8,
" Intercommunication in Trains in Motion," Mr. l'reece.
Ethnological, at 8 : " Wild Tribes, Central India." Lieu-
tenant-Colonel Dalton and Dr. Mouatt ; "Cultivated
Plants and Ethnology," Mr. Crawfurd. Wednesday—
Geological, at 8, " Age of Lower Brick Earths, Thames
Valley," Mr. Boyd Dawkins ; " Consolidated Stock., Drift
of Suffolk," Mr. Maw ; "Jurassic Fauna and Flora, South
Africa," Mr. Tate. Microscopical, at 8. Thunsisy—Syro-
Egyptian, at 7i. Royal, at 81. Zoological, at 84, " Birds
of Veiagua," Mr. Salvin ; " Hyalonema Mirable, Gray,"
Dr. Bowerbank ; " Lepidopterous Insects of Bengal," Mr.
Moore. Antiquaries, at 84.—Atheno use.
WHAT THE REFORM BILL MUST —Unques-
tionably, it must be a liberal bill. There is no blinking
the fact. And if they are wise in their generation they
will pass it with a good grace. They have always resisted
every improvement to the uttermost, doggedly. And
then, when it became inevitable, they hays turned round
and carried it. They resisted the Catholic Emancipation
Rill, and carried it. They resisted the abolition of the corn
laws, and carried it. They resisted the admission of the
Jews into parliament, and admitted them. They have
resisted reform, a liberal reform, with equal pertinacity—
let them be true to their antecedents, and carry a liberal
Reform Bill. The time seems ripe that they should. It
seems absolutely impossible that they can hope any
longer in a policy of delay. Is it not then better, we do
not say from our point of view, but from theirs, that they
should carry a genuinely liberal Reform hill, and get all
that credit for it, of which at this moment their party
stands in so much need in the eyes of the country?
Besides, is it not one of their boasts that they, the true
conservatives, are also the true liberals ; that they do not
fear the people : that they trust the working classes, and
that the working classes knit them? Let them clench
their professions by enfranchising the working man, and
not at the same time betray their dread of him by giving
the landowners additional powers to keep him in order.
We know there is a class of men who, without professing
the divine right of an aristocracy, or the divine wisdom of
landowners, are haunted by the idea of the working man
as a unionist, and they dread his admission into parlia-
ment, when, as they say, from land's end to land's end,
labour is in open insurrection against capital, and every
servant's bands against his master. Even if this were
strictly true, it would be the crying reason above all
others, for admitting the working classes to a share, a
large share, in the open, public, and recognised debates
of the country at large. This is a ground, above all
others, which must have weight with the conservatives.
They must, above all other men, desire that questions so
vitalais those of labour and capital, master and servant,
should rather be fought out in parliament than settled
secretly with closed doors in the teeth of parliament by
unrecognised societies. Thous who maintain, as Mr.
Lowe maintains, that ours is the very beat parliament, in
the very best country, forget that no parliament is a good
parliament which leaves half the country unrepresented.
And we are not here advocating—we are opposed to man-
hood maker. We only want labour to be represented in
the same sense as land u represented, and in that sense it
is not represented at all. This is one defect which Mr.
Lowe's principles will not cover. Neither will they oover
the sins of omission of the present parliament. :gland
is uneducated, England is the most pattper.ridden, the
most crime-ridden country in the civilised world ; and
these three cardinal curses—we might go into further de-
tails, but let this mace—we lay distinctly and with con-
viction at the door of a parliament from which the work-
ing classes are excluded.—British QuarGrly &cute,
January number.