The Sun.
London, England, 1855-08-17 00:00:00

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1855.

[PRICE 4D.

STAMPED SD•

The total receipts for the half-year amount to 750,1601.,
including the balance from the previous half-year's accounts,
and the total expenses, interest and guaranteed dividends, to
542,136!. leaving available for dividen.l the sum of 208,0231.,
and the directors recommend that a dividend (less income-
tax) be declared, po,yable on the Ist day, of September
next, of 1/. 15s. upon each 100/. consolidated stock, being
at the rate of 3 per cent. per annum.

OS AYRES BONDHOLDERS.

The last mail from the River Plate has brought
copies of a correspondence carried on during the past
year regarding the claims of the Buenos Ayres bond-
holders between Mr. Frank Parish, the British Consul
in that country, and Don Portela, the Foreign Minister,
and the entire records even of Spanish America*
finance present nothing more disgraceful. Exactly a
twelvemonth back_Mr. Parish addressed Don Portela,
referring to the fact of Mr. Giro, who had arrived is
January, 1854, as the agent of the bondholders, baying
thus far been baffled in every attempt to induce the
Government of Buenos Ayres to make some arrange-
ment of the debt, although the resources of the country
were improving, and domestic creditors were being paid,
and concluding with an intimation that he had been
instructed, under the circumstances, to make a special
appeal to the honour and good faith of the State. For
four months, with that cool unscrupulousness which
only the most despicable Governments venture to
display, this communication was allowed to remain
without answer or acknowledgment of any kind.
Mr. Parish then made a demand for a reply, which,
after the lapse of another mouth, brought out an intima-
tion that the Government had no time to attend to it,
but that the subject had been that day referred to the
consideration of the Finance Minister. An additional
wo months having passed without any attention what-
ever having been given to the subject, Mr. Parish re-
newed his application, and at the same time took the op-
portunity of protesting against a decree just issued for
paying all claims for damages sustained by the citizens
of Buenos Ayres during the last civil conflict, while the
prior debt to the-foreign bondholders, contracted under
the express acts of the Legislature, continued to be
treated with disregard. In three months he was informed.
that the Government had not been able to attend to this
fresh letter, and that they now refused to entertain any
reclamations of an official character, since the debt to
file bondholders was purely of a private character, and
should be treated accordingly, no international steps be-
ing warranted unless there had been adenial ofjustice. In
proof that no such denial had occurred, Don Portals
pointed to the fact that the bondholders continued " re-
ligionsly.to receive" the 1,0001. per month granted sire°
1849, these remittances not having been interrupted
even by the revolutionary crisis through which the
country had passed. With regard to the payments for
damages to the citizens of Buenos Ayres, his sole at-
tempt at justification was comprised in the characteristic
taunt that the bondholders had voluntarily lent their
money and taken all risks, while the damages to the
citizens had been involuntarily sustained. To this Mr.
Parish promptly rejoined by an exposureiof the whole
course of the Government of Buenos Ayres in relation
to the affair, and by calling attention to the fact that
their continued refusal to offer any adequate arrange-
ment, and their boast of latterly remitting 1,0001. per
month on a debt of a million sterling, on which the in-
terest has been suspended for a quarter of a century, as
if it were something meritorious, amounted not only to
a denial of justice, but came little short of direct repu-
diation. Finally, under date of the 23d of June,
he announced that the British Government had ar-
rived at the conclusion that Buenos Ayres was deter-
mined to persist in her dishonest course, and that
although they have hitherto abstained from enforcing
the bondholders' claims this forbearance may have its
limits.

AUSTRALIAN POSTAL COMMUNI-
CATION.

The following letter addressed by the General
Association for the Australian Colonies to Sir W.
Molesworth has been forwarded to us for publica-
tion : •

" General Association for the Australian Colonies,
London, August 15.

" Sir,—As the Minister of the Crown, to whose care
the interests of the colonies are specially confided, I am
requested by the committee of this association to entreat
your attention at this juncture to the unsatisfactory po-
sition in which postal communication with the Austra-
lian colonies has so long been permitted to remain, and
.n doing so the committee take the opportunity of ex-'
pressing their high appreciation of the many services
you have already rendered to Australia, and the confi-
dence which your completeacquaintance with its position,
value, and resources, lead them to entertain that you
will mark your accession to office by no longer allowing
so viral a point on steam communication with the mo-
ther country to remain in abeyance.
"Since the month of November last our usual mail
steam service has been wholly suppressed, and letters
have, in consequence, during that period been conveyed
to their destination with all the irregularity and uncer-
tainty necessarily incident to the transit of sailing
packets. The colonists cannot admit that the exigencies
of the war, grave as they have been, were, at any time,
so urgent, as to call for their exclusion from the benefits
attending speedy and certain communication with the
mother country, especially as these continue to be en-
joyed to their full extent by other colonial possessions of
less commercial importance. You will not, therefore,
be surprised to learn that universal dissatisfaction pre-
vails throughout Australia on this most important sub-
ject_

" The earnest remonstrances which have reached this
country from the colonies are well known to your pre-
decessor in office, and will corroborate the accuracy of
our statement in this respect. Representations have
also been made by members of this association to the
Colonial-office, the Admiralty, the Post-office, as well as
to the Treasury, and from all those departments we have
received repeated assurances that the question was con-
sidered of the gravest importance, and would have 'early
attention. In both houses of Parliament these assur-
ances have been repeatedly renewed in reply to the
inquiries of individual members. It is consequently
with sincere regret and astonishment that at this ad-
vanced period of the year we find no arrangements
whatever have yet been made for the early reorganisa-
tion of an Australian postal steam-service.
" The uncertainty attending postal communication
effected through the medium of sailing vessels is so ob-
vious that we feel we need not insist upon it. At pre-
sent, it is true, our mails are carried by the fastest sail-
ing-vessels in the world, the owners contracting to de-
liver them in 65 days ; but this speed has only been
attained in one or two instances, while, in others, 80, 90,
or even 95 days have been occupied.by the voyage.
There is every reason to believe that by the overland
route and by steamers of a similar character to those
employed in other ocean postal steam lines, mails could
be delivered in 50 days ; and to such a service we con-
sider the Australian colonies, by their importance and
their propesed support of it, are fully entitled.
" You are doubtless aware that the matter has received
much attention from the different colonial Legislatures.
The colony of Victoria, as a mark of its ardent anxiety
for the resumption of postal steam communication, has
not only voted 50,0001. per annum for that object, but
has also psssed an act of Council charging that sum on
its genes el revenue, as well as pineing it at the uncon-
trolled disposal of the Governor. New South Wales and
the other Australian colonies are prepared to contribute
in the like liberal manner. We would submit, there-
fore. that these grants, with the assistance naturally ex-
pected from Great Britain, are on a scale of such magni-
tude as to warrant the immediate establishment of a
most efficient postal steam service.
" In conc'usion, permit me to hand you a list of the
members of this association, among whom yen will find
the names of several gentlemen who have recently occu-
' pied seats in the Legislatures of the colonies of Victoria
and New South Wales, and of others who have taken
a prominent part in the leading questions of public
interest in those colonies. The views, therefore, which
I have been requested by the committee to express, may
be said to give a faithful representation of the feelings
of the colonists on a question, the importance of which
to Australia it would be difficult, if not impossible, to
exaggerate. It is that importance which has induced
the committee to address you ir. the earnest terms of
this communication, and which now leads them to hope
that the subject will have your serious and early atten-
tion.—l have the honour to subscribe myself, sir, your
most obedient and humble servant,
"WILLIAM RUTLEDGE,
"Hon. Sec. of the General Association for the
Australian Colonies.
" To the Right Hon. Sir W. Molesworth, Bart., her
Majesty's Secretary of State for the Colonies."

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