The Sun.
London, England, 1852-10-04 00:00:00

THE LA PLATA STEAMER.

This magnificent vessel made her first signal of
arrival from the West Indies in Southampton Water,
at 9, P.M., on Wednesday. At 10, P.M., boats with
persons from Southampton were alongside. On
stepping aboard they found the saloon brilliantly
lighted up, and a band of musicians playing sprightly
airs to beguile the time of the passengers. At 11, P.M.,
the mails were landed, and the Admiralty agent and
captain of the ship were ashore. The La Plata left
St. Thomas on the 16th September. Her consump-
tion of coal on her homeward voyage averaged 93 tons
per clay, and her average steaming was about 280
miles daily. On her outward voyage her consump-
tion of coals was ninety-four tons per day, and her
speed was about 290 miles daily. The slight supe-
riority of her outward voyage, as compared with her
homeward one, was owing to the very favourable
winds she experienced going out. No long time can
elapse before Australia must be reached by the
shortest route and by the quickest means. That
route is undoubtedly the western one, via Panama,
and those
,means are paddle-box steamers. The
long sea space of 4,488 miles, between Pa-
nama and Tahiti, has hitherto been considered the
great obstacle to a rapid voyage to Australia, because
of the difficulty which was believed to exist of paddle-
box steamers carrying fuel sufficient to go such a
distance. The performances of the La Plata enable us
to judge of the practicability of a paddle-box steamer
traversing this sea-space. It is now proved that tbat
steamer can carry 1,400 tons of coals, and travels 290
miles daily, at an expense of 94 tons. She could thus
carry fuel sufficient for 15 days' consumption, and she
could traverse during that period about 4,300 miles,
which is within 200 miles of the sea-space between
Panama and Tahiti. There is not tha slightest
doubt that she could be made to carry sufficient
for a voyage of 4,500 miles, and to travel nearly
300 miles daily. The great difficulty in reanoing
Australia by the quickest possible means is there-
fore overcome, and it will be no longer considered
that the voyage to our Australian colonies can only
be reached by sailing-vessels or screw-
steamers. We are now independent of the wind
in reaching the antipodes. The performance
of the La Plata will mark an epoch in
the history of ocean navigation. She can
go hundreds of miles farther with one sup-
ply of fuel and at a greater speed than any vessel
ever built. One such vessel placed at Southampton,
another at Panama, and another at Tahiti, fully
ccailed and ready to start at a moment's notice, and a
communication could be made from Southampton to
Sydney in about seven weeks. It is now, therefore,
Practicable to literally traverse a straight line on two
oneans, which measure together 12,000 miles in length,
or over one-half the circumference of the globe, by
water in less than two months. Of all the triumphs
of the intellect of man, this is one of the greatest, and
will turn out the most useful.

THE EXPERIENCE OF A PROFES-

SIONAL TRAMP.
" Yer see," he deigned to explain to me, after he
had dispatched his supper, " I likes change. I SLM,
tilers in the country and winters in London. There's
refuges and ressipockles' " (by which I presume he
meant receptacles), "in winter time, and lots of
coves as gives yer grub. Then comes spring time;
I get passed to my parish,—the further off the
better,—and I gets a penny a mile. When I gets
there I goes cross country, on quite another track.
I knows every union in England. In some they
gives you bread and cheese, and in some broth, and in
some skillygolee. In some they gives you breakfast
in the morning, and in some they does'nt. You have
to work your bed out. Here, Kingston way, you
wheels barrows ; at Guildford you pumps ; at
Richmond you breaks stones - at Farnham you picks
oakum ; at Wandsworth they makes you grind
corn in a handmill till your fingers almost drop off at
yer wristes. At Brighton, now, they're a good sort,
kind only makes you chop up firewood ; but Ports-
mouth'a the place. You're a young un," he pursued,
benignantly, " and green. Now,
It(.'l:llkigngiveatyon3e
you
a wrinkle. If you're a going to
Portsmouth you manage to get there on a Satur-
day night, for they keeps you all day Sunday,
and they won't let you do no work, and they
Rives you the jolliest blow-out of beef and
taters as ever passed your breastbone. The
taters is like dollops o' meal. " Why
don't you chuck them ere shoeses off," asked my
:friend as we plodded along. "'they wouldn't fetch
mothing to sell, and they're only a bother to walk in,
unless you was to put some wet grass in 'ern. Look
at my trotters," he continued, pointing to his feet,
and tapping the sole of one of them with the blade of
his knife, " they'se as hard as bricks, they is. Go
buff-stoppered, that's the game." Some remnant of
Master Somebody's pride in his neat Bluchers musi
have lingered about me, for I declined the invitation to
walk barefoot. " When shoes is shoes," pursued the
tramp, argumentatively, " they're good for those as
likes 'em, which I don't ; but when they're crab-
Adis, and leaky and gummy in the soles, and lark-
heeled, the sooner you get shut of them the better.
The re'i
togs, too," he pursued, looking with proper
his own attire, "the sooner you peels off them
clothilr:de at
kicksies the better. There ain't no wear in
'.131 and they se no good, if you ain't on
thc 'flash lay.
My jacket's Guildford Gaol ; my Iron-
sal s is Dartford Union ; and my flannel shirt is the
'poi no longer, alive like, I tears up.
Society for the 'Ouseless Poor. When I can't patch
Di) you know what tearing up is ? A course you
don't. Well, I goes to a union a night, and I rips up
and they gets all
into bits every mortal bit I has upon me. Then
they comes in the morning, and they puts me into a
sack, and they puts me in a cart and takes me afore
the beak. Tearing up is 21 days, and quod meals,
which is mind ye reglar, is good for a cove, sod freshens
him up." Here he sat down on a milestone ; and'
pt wincing a remarkably neat housewife case, pro-
ceeded to overhaul all parts of his apparel with as
m uch care and circumspection as if they had been of
pt mple and fine linen, catching up any stray renis and
" Jacob's ladders," with a grave and deliberate coun-
ts nance.—Dickens's Household Words.

COMMITTAL of a NOTORIOUS BURGLAR
4t notorious burglar, named 51,?ggs, one of a gang of
des perste ruffians who have long infested the neighbour-
hoc )d of Frome, and who, after eluding justice for a long
per iod, was recently captured through the activity of
No\ vport, one of the Frome constables, has been fully
cow mitted for trial by the Frome magistrates on two
dist inct charges. On the premise.s of the prisoner being
scar ched there were found on them no less than seven
bags of skeleton keys, containing 130 altogether. They
were concealed in a floor under the loft, and lying by

LONDnN,

them was a pair of knitted socks, such as housebreakers
wear over their shoes to prevent noise; they were wet,
and the fresh grass upon them clearly showed that they
had been recently worn. The occurrence created con-
siderable excitement in the town of Frame, and the
streets were lined with people, in the same manner as
when the prisoner with his companions Hurd and Spar-
row were in custody on suspicion of being the mur-
derers of the girl Watts at Keyford. The prisoner ap-
peared much dejected. The evidence given against him
was similar to that upon which Sparrow and Hurd have
already been transported. In the case of the robbary of
Mr. Plaister's warehouse it was proved that a man
named White, who was watching his garden to prevent
depredations on the night of the 12th of June last, saw
the prisoner and Sparrow get over a wall and go to the
door of the warehouse. White ran and got the assistance
of three other men, and on returning caught the prisoner
Maggs and Sparrow coming out laden with a bag con-
taining cheese; a struggle ensued, but though the goods
were captured the thieves succeeded in getting away.
Two caps belonging to the prisoner and Sparrow were
also found; they were so made as to form a disguise for
the face. The prisoner was fully committed for trial,
and this formidable gang is now broken up.