The Sun.
London, England, 1855-12-25 00:00:00

THE UNITED STATES.

(From the Times Correspondent.)

NEW YoßK,'Dec. 12.—Another week has passed
away without an organisation of the House or a
Message from the President, and the public must
wait for the official announcement of the views of
the Administration upon the questions pending be-
tween thin Cabinet and the British Government
until the Speaker can be chosen. To tell the truth,
the public care very little about the question, and
would wait as long as Congress pleased without
grumbling, if that were all the trouble occasioned
by the delay. It is impossible to say when this
controversy for the Speaker's chair will end. The
Fusionists have been able to carry their vote as
high as 107, the Administration vote remaining
steady at 74 or 75, and the remaining vote being
divided among enough independent candidates to
prevent any one from receiving a majority. Each
day the telegraph has promised a union that will
elect a Northern Fusion Speaker, and each night
has falsified the predictions of the morning. One
writing from New York cannot follow all the shift-
ing scenes of Washington politics—cannot judge
whether such predictions were well justified when
made, nor why they have failed of fulfilment. I
can only chronicle the end when it shall come.
Until the organisation is effected everything must
stand still in Washington, for all the attention of
that idle and excitable metropolis is absorbed in the
solution of the question of whether the north or
the south shall have the formation of the commit-
tees of the House. Meanwhile, the Message is
kept most commendably secret, and even the gossip-
ing correspondents of the journals do not venture
to speculate upon its contents. In fact, until de-
livered, it is an unshaped as well as unborn child,
and its author holds pen in hand to cor-
rect, alter, or modify from day to day as
circumstances may direct. So far as British poli-
tics are concerned I am told that it will be mode-
rate ii tone. I hear of nothing new in relation to
what is now called here the Crampton question.
The discussion into which the British Government
have entered in regard to the violations of the neu-
trality laws of this country is not exactly satisfac-
tory to the Cabinet at Washington. It is regarded,
I am told, as evading the true issue by a sort of
special pleading, instead of coming at once to
the point, and making some sort of amende. The
Washington Union, however, ceases to direct the
vials of its wrath at the head of the British lion.
Instead of that it now aims them at the Times and
Lord Palmerston. In its issue of the Bth it closes
a long article of unusually strong language with
the following more peaceful strain :
" It was in England, as well as in the United States,
the all but unanimously-expressed conviction that the
British Government had committed a grievous error in
its attempts, whether lay infraction or evasion of the
law, to levy troops in the United States ; that if, in the
face of obstinate perseverance in those attempts by Bri-
tish agents, the American Government, while striving
in good faith to maintain our national neutrality, had
been forced into something of peremptoriness of act or
language, it was not for the British Government to com-
plain of that consequence of its own wrongfulness ; that
there exists no cause of hostility between the two coun-
tries emanating from the American Government ; that
the interests of both nations are identical, and dictate
peaceful relations ; and that the time has come in the
history of the United States when the British Govern-
ment, and Lord Palmerston especially, must cease to
imagine that England alone has the right to be great,
arid must perceive, and act upon the perception, that
the British race in the United States has irrepressible
destinies of greatness before it which should be honoured
and admired, not envied or fretted, by the British race
in Europe. We therefore augur from what has occurr,d
the best results. We in the United States, everybody
knows, appreciate the value of a friendly intercourse
with Great Britain. If in the present war we have
seemed to be a little repelled from her, it is because, not
content with tellin; us in words that the object of her
alliance with France is, after humbling Russia,' then
to loox to the United States, she has dining the last
three years gratuitously interrneddled with our affairs
at every turn —first in reference to Cuba, then in the
Bonin Islands, in the Saudwich Islands, in the Ayes
Islamis, off the Falkland Islands, in Dominica, in Ecua-
dor, above all, in Central America. Her diplomatic
agents have acted as if they had circular instructions in
blank to obstruct any cr all enterprises of the United
States, right or wrong. We trust and believe that no-
thing is necessary but to have the British people dis-
tinctly perceive and understand the vicious and mis-
ohievous spirit which, from th e day of the sack of Wash-
ington to the present time, Lord Palmerston has mani-
fested towards the United States. We think it needs
only this to insure the most cordial relations between
Great Britain and the United States."

As soon as the Message is delivered we shall
know whether, and how far, these aro the views of
the Government ; and until it is delivered it is not
easy to tell what those views are, for, unfortunately,
the Cabinet at Washington, like all Cabinets, is
composed of diverse elements, which are not always
capable of immediate solution, and will not al wny.
stay in solution when that desirable state of things
is once brought about.
As I have before said, both in this letter and in
every one which I have written since these difficul-

ties assumed their present shape, there is no popu-
lar opinion in America that there will be any
trouble. The speculators in stocks have used the
rumour to depress tho " fancies" on the faith that
even the rumour of a possibility of a discussion of
differences between the two Governments (to put
the contingency as remote as possible) would affect
such a delicate thing as a fancy stock in a heavy
gambling transaction. But beyond this I am unable
to learn that the slightest effect has been produced.
Even the troubles in Central America, fraught, as
they are, with future difficulties, do not excite
anxiety or create alarm.
The difficulties in Kansas, which appeared so
alarming, as reported by the telegraph a week since,
fade into much less magnitude as we get detailed
reports. You will receive by this mail the proclama-
tion of Governor Shannon, calling on the militia,
which will give you the impression that actual civil
war rages on the borders. But, on the other hand,
all the free State accounts of the matter speak of it
as of little importance, and represent Lawrence as
being perfectly quiet. We have not yet the mate-
rials to judge where lies the right in this contro-
versy ; but I am inclined to think that it will turn
out that the "difficulty" has been exaggerated, and
that both parties have been disposed to make the
most of it to influence the election of Speaker now
going on at Washington. But there is great danger
in calling so excited a population to arms, and the
issue is watched with great anxiety.
Money remains much as when I last wrote. There
will be a heavy shipment of gold by the Atlantic ;
but many suppose that the shipment must really
be made at a loss. There is no reason for any
stringency in our market, except the response to
the London market, and until the rates fall there
we can hardly expect ease here.
The shipments of breadstuff continue. The
canals were closed the day before yesterday, not
before winter was on us and made it necessary.

Before closing most of the produce shipped in them
had been got through to tide water. The railroads
now have the entire carrying of the western pro-
duce to the Atlantic until the opening of naviga-
tion next year.
Mr: Griswold has resigned the presidency of the
Illinois Central, and Mr. W. H. Osborne has been

appointed in his place, and has gone to Illinois to
enter upoa the active discharge of his duties. The
laud sales for the month of November amount to
nearly $1,200,000 ; and for the year 1855 they will
reach, as oflicialy reported, to the enormous sum of
$5,300,000. From this should be deducted the sales
of preemption rights. The directors' estimate is
far exceeded when that is made.
The Northern Light, just arrived from California,
brings $326,000 in gold, and San Francisco dates
to the 20th ult. The Walker-Kinney Government
on the Isthmus had concluded a treaty with the
United States' Minister there, and had despatched
one of the leading Fillibusters to Washington ac-
credited as Minister, to secure its ratification here.
They had also issued proposals to colonists from
the United States to settle, offering, as inducement,
the gift of a tract of land. The new Ambassador
also holds out a further tempting inducement in
the form of a lump of gold, which he says is the
product of the country. If we can trust their own
account of themselves they are getting on swim-
mingly.

DISGI7STING BARBARITY.---It is not often that in the
quiet little town of Accrington we have to record such
duty disgracefultolay pbreofocreeedtihneg
spnas
tlitch,osaendwilwilich
is
on
nowd our
Sunday last. On that day, early in
.1 the forenoon, hun-
dreds of persons might be seen hastening towards Ham-
bleton, t '
o witness a wrestling match between two young
men, Richard Riley, Plantation Mill-square, and James
Hacking, Warner-street, Accrington, theformer betting
30s. to 20s. In due time all the preliminaries were ar-
ranged, there being hundreds of spectators. Hacking
stripped himself naked, with the exception of his stock-
ings, and to work they went, pulling each other about, as
a tiger would his prey, for about an hour and five
minutes, when they both gave up, neither being victo-
rious. Hacking's body presented a frightful spectacle ;
the blood running down in several places ; and to many
places the flesh was torn from his bones, and hung like
meat on butcher's hooks, the crowd, while this barbarous
work was going on, shouting at times and urging on the
combatants, During all the time this was going on not
a policeman was present ; and it does appear somewhat
strange that such disgusting scenes as the one above de-
scribed can take place, and our police, of whom we so
much boast, not hear one word about it. After the
wrestling was over, many of the crowd began playing at
pitch and toss, and this work was carried on nearly the
whole day, and is carried on in the outskirts of Accrington
every Sunday to a great extent.—Preston Ougraian.