The Express.
London, England, 1866-09-14 00:00:00

L &TEST INTELLIGENCE.

NASSAU.

About forty members of the Upper and Lower
Chambers have held a meeting at Wiesbaden and
published a declaration in favour of annexation to
Prusais. With regard to the future provision for
the ducal house they say
If considerations of equity induce us to support • pro-
vision for the former reigning fansay,ecouotnical and politi-
cal reasons require that this should be made in the form of
money capital, or an annual money payment from the funds.
In thing the amount of this provision it should be borne in
mind that the ducal house, in losing the rank of sove-
reigns 1;31 not have to bear the cost of representatives
abroad. If the ducal house was left in possession of all
the State property, the greatest inconverience would
be occasioned to the population in an economical
point of view, and consequently to the state in
a political and financial point of view, inasmuch
as this property constitutes a ninth pact of
the entire landed property of the duchy. The
economical interests of the countiy require that
all the landed property of the State now let out in fin me
should be alienated and convert i "to free
soil propertiee—that the real v. Ihts attached
thereto, such as fiefs, rights of bats and
pasturage should be rzdeemed at an equitable price, that
game rights should be abolished, and an end put to the
alienation of mines, m;neral waters, And baths belonging
to the state domains."

It was decided that a deputation should be sent to
Berlin to protect the rights of the country.

THE INSURRECTION IN CRETE.

APPEAL TO THE UNITED STATES.

The Committee of Deputies in Crete have
agreed to the following address to the President of
the United States :
Mr. President,—The Greek island of Crete, the native
country of Jupiter and Minos, glorious in the ancient times
and happy, insignificant to-day and unhappy, sighs
before the Christian world under the hear! yoke of
the Mussulman. Taking up arms with the rest of
Greece in the glorious struggle of 1821 in order to
gain its liberty, it has suffered all the woes of the
history of that epoch, which is only a series of tra-
gedies. Our fathers had whitened the plains with their
bones during that nine years' struggle, and thousands of
women and children captured had been sold as slaves, even
the elder of whom had done their part in the pitiful drama.
We had by general good fortune gained all the country of
the island and one of the strongest fortresses, and wehoped
that the time had come for us, like our Greek brothers, the
happy hour of liberty ; but we were disappointed. Our
sacrifice not being considered sufficient, we mast suffer
new dispensations. Inexorable policy had delivered us
anew to the Ottoman yoke, first under the viceroy of Egypt
and then under the Sultan. The three great Powers, in
order to soften the injustice, promised us on the 10th of
February and Bth of August, 1830, in the protocols of Lon-
don, at least paternal government and assigned rights,
but unfortunately even these little benefits the
government would not grant us. Ti", action of
diplomacy was unjust and against the nature of
things, and showed how human work and that of
wise men come to nought, for from that time the island
has never been quiet to enjoy the blessings of pence,
but is always in convulsion, and sometimes struggles for its
only desire, its freedom, and sometimes for the perform_
ante of the promises made in the protocols. In 1833 there
was • revolution, which was drowned in blood. In 1841
another had the same fate. In 1853 we ask NI the resti-
tution of our rights, and the putting in cescution of the
Hatti Humayoun, but nothing was given except false pro-
mises. In 1861 part of the paople, on 110001111 i of the
oppressions and injustice of the governor, and by their
ignorance, fell for a moment into the traps of the catholic
propaganda, believing that by that means they would gain
their liberty. A long task, Mr. President, would
be the relating of our sufferings, in which every
right thinking observer must to mpathise. Heresy
taxes, and disproportionate to our poor gains, we pay
in different ways, and none of the benefits which the
subjects of steely well-governed kingdom obtain do we
have. Tribunals wo have only in name, and justice is a
thing unknown to us ; the government Is the arbitrary
will of the governor. Our children, from the lack of
schools, are reared in the darkness of ignorance ; in no
public position are we accepted ; our evidence before the
tribunals has not the same weight as that of the Ottomans.
The evil that the Mussulmsns do to us is seldom punished,
religious toleration which is so often proclaimed is per-
verted and made vain. We, ourselves, from the little
means we have, support our clergy, and, with little excep-
tion, our schools. Our language, which is the language of the
country with Christian and Ottoman, is not accepted at
the tribunals ; the government collects only the taxes
without rendering us any of the simplest benefits. Such is
in • few words our condition, the bettering of which we
have asked many times from our government. This yea-
in the month or May we asked of the Sultan in the peaceful
and respectful way which is fitting, relief from the heavy
loads, equal justice, the execution of some governmental
reforms, of those promised us by the protocols, and the
accomplishment of the published Hatti-Humayoun,
which many times have been promised to the
Christians, nothing being given. Unfortunately
the Sublime Porte thought fit to throw contempt
on our first petitions without examining them, but
to insult us, and threaten our chiefs that it would im-
prison them in the fortresses unless they have written
promises never again to make complaint to it, and sent
many soldiers and ships in order to injure us. Being in
such a desperate condition, we tuck up arms to sustain
ourselves against violence and maintain with our blood the
sacred rights which as reasonable creatures we have the
right to demand. The struggle which we have entered
on is great, as we are few and weak. We have before
us the colossal power of one of the empires, but
we have confidence in our tights, and commend the un-
equal struggle to the God who is the strength of the
powers of the old and new world, being ready to sacrifice
ourselves all for this. By origing and religion, by language
and tradition we belong to the Greek race, and our proper
place is a part of the kingdom of Greece. Such is the
statement of the case. And what does the Ottoman
empire gain by us! Being subject to it we &CCollls
plish nothing except continual and periodical disturbances
and collisious, while being united with our mother
race, besides the bettering of ourselves we wall complete
the fulness of that nation which by the absence of its
members is made unsound. Mr. President, if in-
justice in your mother land was set sight by the
sacred struggle which through the Divine blessing was
conducted to triumph by the ever-to-be-remembered
Washington, how is ours justified? We should be happy
if we had only the shadow of the benefits which your
country gained in that epoch. Being in such a condition
we, the respectfully undersigned representatives of the
Cretan Christian people, dare to ask, Mr. President, the
intercession of the great democracy over which you happily
preside, in order that our matters may obtain attention
from the cabinets of the teat European powers. Blessing
the Highest for the prosperity and strength of the glorious
democracy of the United States of America, we take the
liberty of subscribing ourselves the humble servants of your
Excellency, the representatives of the Cretan people.
[Here follow the Signatures].

A letter from Canes in the Levant Herald of the
sth says :—" The ferment is rapidly spreading
amongst all classes of the Christian population,
and has already grown in extent and importance
far beyond a mere fiscal quarrel between a
set of unwilling tax-payers and the Pacha. It
has in fact attained the proportions of an
overt rebellion against the sovereignty of the
Porte. It is reckoned here that about 20,000
insurgents are already under arms in the moun-
tains—the greater number near Apocorona—and it

would, I am convinced, need only the encourage-
ment of a first success in any brush with the troops
to double or even treble this number of rebel com-
batants." It is added that a "Cretan Committee"
at Athens, has already smuggled large quantities
of arms and ammunition into the island, and is
doing its best to drag the Greek government into
the quarrel. The Pacha has, in all, a miffed
Turkish and Egyptian force of about 30,000 boom
chiefly in the three garrison towns, into which last
large numbers of the Mussulmai population are
flocking for protection.