The Sun.
London, England, 1863-10-16 00:00:00

LATEST INTELLIGENCE•

The Indian Royal Mail Company's steamer Prince
Alfred brings Auckland papers to the 11th August,
being a week later than previous advises.
Rain having set in,
with every appearance of a
continuance, military operations have been almost
superseded, in so far, at least, as any aggressive
movement of the troops is concerned.
The New Zealander thus summarises the news
since the 4th inst, :
since the issue of our regular monthly summary, the
most important military event has been the movement of
General Cameron against the native encampment at Papa-
rata, a place distant about 15 miles from the Queen's re-
doubt at Pokeno. The oflioial account of this affair will be
found underneath.
The experience which the Maories have gained at Kati-
kara and at liehiroa of the value of rifle pits, will probably
put that style of defence out of fashion, and may be some
time before they will again venture within reach of the
bayonet in an open fight.
The work of completing our inner line of defence from
Wairoa to Drury and Waiuku has proceeded actively. The
weather has of late been very bad ; the rain heavy and fre-
quent, yet our newly-enrolled Volunteers and Militia have
laboured cheerfully at the work of building the redoubts,
under circumstances of personal discomfort and hardship
which would have severely taxed the endurance of regular
troops. Young men inthese corps, wholly unused to manual
labour, have taken their turn at the spade and pick in
trenches where the wet tenacious clay has speedily torn to
pieces the boots in which they started for a week's service
at the front, and some have been obliged to do patrol and
escort duty barefooted, or nearly so, and without greatcoats.
William Thompson has announced in terms the most pre-
cise and savage his determination to take up arms against
us, and to slay and spare not,' armed and unarmed alike,
In consequence of a warning communication addressed by
him to the Yen. Areheacon Brown at Tauronga, the mis-
sionaries and settlers of that district felt that their safety
depended upon flight,
and nearly all of them have come up
to Auckland with the Archdeacon.
Rumours of the intention of the natives to make an at-
tack upon the town have been current, and have had the
good effect of producing a greater degree of watchfulness—
but no plan of action in which all might take their part in
case of a surprise appears yet to have been matured by
those to whom the local duties of defence' are entrusted.
One thing has, however, become perfectly clear, and that
is, that it will need a larger force than is at present avail-
able to provide for the defence of the settlements, and at
the same time to crush the spirit of violence in Waikato
with the rapidity which is so much to be desired.
An expedition, under the command of the Provincial
Treasurer, was despatched to the Wairoa and the Thames,

in the steamer Auckland, on the night of Wednesday. The
balance of success is not yet brought to account,
Two divisions of the Auckland Rifles, who, for the last
three weeks, have been rendering good service to their
country in the hour of need, marched into the Albert bar-
racks on the afternoon of the 7th inst. The first division,
commanded by Capt. Derrom, and numbering some 90 rifles,
were the first to make their appearance. They came from
Papakura, and arrived about half-past 4 o'clock. The second
division, under the command of Lieut. Heaphy, numbered
between 30 and 40, and came from Burton's. Their arrival
was somewhat unexpected, otherwise we have little doubt
there would have been a much larger turn out to greet them
after their recent realisation of some of the discomforts re-
sulting from war. The campaigners looked jaded and travel-
stained, after the severe exposure of the past bitter week,
Head-quarters, Queen's Redoubt, Aug. 3, 1863.

To his Excellency Sir George Grey, K.C,8., &c.
Sir, —I have the honour to inform your Excellency that
on the night of the Ist inst., I left the Queen's Redoubt
with a farce of about 700 men, including a party of seamen
and marines of H.M.S. Harrier, for the purpose of recon-
noitring the villages of Paparoa and Paparata, where I had
reason to believe that a large body of rebels had collected.
Capt. Sullivan, commanding H.M.S. Harrier, accompanied
the force.

After a fatiguing night march, the last mile of which was
through very high and thick scrub, we reached Paparoa about
daybreak, and found it entirely deserted, though it had evi-
dently been recently occupied, and I have little doubt that
the natives had received some notice of our movements.

After reaching this village we proceeded along a bush
track, which I was afterwards informed led to Haurake,
having missed the track to Paparata. Some natives con-
cealed so far within the bush on our right as to be perfectly
invisible, opened firo on the leading files, and wounded a
soldier of the 12th Regiment. We replied to their fire for
some time, but as, from the character of the bush and scrub
near it, it was impossible to get within reach of them, and I
did not consider it advisable to lose time in searching for a
track, I withdrew the force leisurely, without any attempt
on the part of the natives to follow us.
When we had reached the open ground a large body of
natives came down from the ranges, and joining the party
in the bush, commenced a rapid and continuous fire of mus-
ketry in the most absurd manner, as though they had been
closely engaged with the enemy, although at that time we
must have been fully a mile and a half from them.
The troops returned to the Queen's Redoubt about 3
o'clock in the afternoon, having been under arms since halt-
past 7 the previous evening, and having marched nearly 30
miles.

I have every reason to be satisfied with the cheerful man-
ner in which this arduous duty was performed by the troop.,
and with the conduct of all the officers and men composing
the force, particularly of the detachment of the 12th Regi-
ment, under Major Miller, for the bold and intelligent man-
ner in which they covered the advance over difficult ground.
—I have the honour to be, Sir, your most obedient humble
servant,

D. A. CAMERON, Lieut.- General.
The Drury correspondent of the .New Zealanier writes :
Monday. Aug. 10.

The natives never now make an appearance in this neigh-
bourhood, and nothing is known as to what has become of
them. There may be a few hundreds in the bush, but be-
fore parties can conjure up thousands they must calculate
what each day's provisions for thousands of Maories would
amount to.

The general has not been down. I believe the corps of
bushrangers goes on very prosperously in its formation.
There is great anxiety in the public mind for some
speedy demonstration; but patience, a little better weather,
and a few more troops, and the thing will be done Much
more effectively. Few casual observers can tell the various
difficulties which both our military and militia authorities
have to contend with.

From a private source, the Any Zealander learns that
Papihana, of the Nagatihikiro tribe, is again abroad, and his
avowed intentions are not to fight, but to burn and destroy
in the neighbourhood of Auckland. Raglan, it was rumoured,
was to be attacked by4he island tribes. From Kawhia we
learn that some of the natives had joined the King move-
ment, and that others were about to do so.

The same paper, of the 11th inst., says :—lt affords us
very much pleasure to apprise our readers and the inhabi-
tants of Auckland in general that Col. Carey, of the 18th
Royal Irish, has been appointed to command the garrison
of this city. The gallant cJlonel yesterday took over the
posts and paid a visit of inspection to the various block-
houses. This is, indeed, a step in the right direction.
The little Avon, it appears, is not to be allowed to ply
peacefully on the waters of the Waikato. The natives have
discovered, no doubt, by this time that she is a very awk-
ward impediment to the passage of their canoes, and have
therefore made their first essay in trying the effect of leaden
bullets on iron plates. On the morning of Thursday last the
Avon left the Bluff on a reconnoitring expedition, and after
proceeding about eight miles up the river, a force supposed
to number about 1,000 natives was seen on the left bank.
The natives immediately opened fire, delivering a succession
of volleys at the steamer, and their bullets flattened on the
sides of the vessel harmlessly enough of course. This hos-
tile demonstration by the rebels was responded to from the
Armstrongs on board, and, in the words of our correspon-
dent, "it is supposed that the enemy must have suffered
very considerably, while on cur side there were no casual-
ties." The Avon made another trip up the river on the
following morning, but no natives were seen.
The following is a list of casualties in the recent engage-
ments with the natives :

Casualties-2d Battalion 14th, Lieutenant-Colonel Aus-
ten severely wounded; privates—Wm Smith, dead; Moses
Burden, Robert Williamson, Alfred Picton, slightly
wounded; John Ingram, Henry Clarke, severely; James
Gilligan, Patrick Markey, James Tancred, William Mur-
phy, William Cavanagh.
Royal Irish.—No. 1 Company, 925, private John E wins,
killed ; No. 1 Company, 805, private John Hamilton,
wounded severely; No 7 Company, 324, private Thomas
Dunbar, wounded slightly; No. 7 Company, private Con-
roy, wounded slightly.

The officers engaged on this occasion were Lieutenant
Wray, Ensign Jackson, and Ensign Butts, whose assistance,
coupled with the steadiness of the men, merits unqualified
approbation,

French Recognition of the Southern
Confederacy.

(From the New York Times.)

A nice question to settle between the French and
the Confederates, prior to recognition, is that of
slavery. Nearly all the French official and semi-
official writers (which means all the writers in France)
who urge recognition, urge it on the ground that the
Emperor will be able to make the abolition or modi-
fication of slavery a consequent concomitant or con-
dition of the favour of recognition. Even M. Cheva-
lier, who has taken the boldest stand of any man in
France in favour of recognition, declares that
France will use her influence to bring about the
gradual emancipation of the slaves ; that the eman-
cipation of the blackamoors, the complete abolition
of slavery, will be the work of peace and time, and
that the European Power which shall be the first to
recognise the Confederate States will have the right
to obtain on behalf of the blacks far more than would
the Federal States ; and one of his strongest points
against the North is, that the men of the North, if
victorious, would not cut into the quick of the slavery
question, for they would value too highly the cotton
culture. All this is very cool in the French friends
of the rebels—to propose to knock out and smash
up the corner atone of the celebrated Southern Con-
federacy before acknowledging its existence as a
durable and respectable political edifice.
The rebels have heard the news, and make wry
faces at it. Recognition with abolition as a condi-
tion-precedent is the most horrible thing they have
heard of up to this time. The Richmond Dispatch,
speaking of the matter, says—!! It is as well to put
a stop to all calculations of this character at once.
If Napoleon means to interfere with the question of
slavery in any way whatever, or to ask anything
else in consideration of recognition, we can have
nothing to do with him." And the Richmond
Enquirer (which lately denied our statement that
it was Jeff. Davis's private organ) is equally explicit
in its remonstrances with M. Chevalier and the
Emperor. It says—" This (rebel) Government not
only will not, but cannot, give or offer any sort of
engagemeut to France or any other Power to make
concessions in favour of the negroes. The whole
subject of the negroes belongs exclusively to the
States, and is outside the power and functions of
the Confederate Government. President Davis and
his ministers not only cannot give any guaranty
on the matter, but cannot so much as listen to one
word about it from any quarter. Now, if the Em-
peror does not know that the negotiation here sug-
gested is impossible, then it was Mr. Slidell's duty
to inform him. It seems as if there were a conspi-
racy against us somewhere—a deliberate design to
place ns in the position not only of suppliants, but of
suppliants so beaten, and reduced to such extremity,
that we are now willing to place the very question
of our social and industrial system (which we would
not suffer our own former Federal Government to
touch) under the feet of a foreign potentate, if he
will only step forward in mercy and save us from
those terrible Yankees. Nothing will serve our
agents in Europe but to invite foreign powers to
sit in judgment upon our domestic institutions, our
social system, and the whole way of life, and to
pronounce what is to be our walk and conversation
for the future. This will not do. We are not fallen

so low. The Confederacy owes nothing to the
Emperor of the French just yet."

We commend these views to the consideration of
the Emperor and M. Chevalier, If the Confederacy
had its independence to-morrow, and were in
alliance with France, we venture to say there would
at once spring up a bitterer controversy on the
" everlasting negro" question than ever existed be-
tween North and South, and that it would soon
lead to a disruption of the alliance, or to a bloody
war between the allies.