The Sun.
London, England, 1863-09-18 00:00:00

AUSTRALIA

(REUTER'S TELEGRAMS.)

SOUTHAMPTON, SEPT. 18.
The Peninsular and Oriental Company's steam-
ship Pera, Captain Jamieson, with the heavy
portion of the Calcutta, China, and Australian
mails arrived this morning. She brings 86 passen-
gers, four packages specie, value £19,140, 10
packages valuables, value £53,880, also 880 packages
general cargo, including 665 bales raw silk, value
£60,000.
The Pera spoke off Lisbon on the 14th, the Royal
Mail Company's steamer Magdalena, bound for the
Brazils, and off Cape Roca the English yacht
Columbine, steering northward, and, on the 17th,
off the Start, spoke the American ship Constel-

lotion, steering west.
Her Majesty's ships Pyscbe, Queen, and Hiber-
nia were at Malta, and at Gibraltar the Procris,
Redpole, the American frigate Constellation, and
the Italian corvettes Valarosa, Eurydice frigate, and

Re Galantuomo,
The Spanish Government have ordered for the
eventualities of the service the assembling in the
pert of Malaga f)t the war steamers Bucnoventina,
Alerts, Lepanto, and Ceres, and the Alava and
Santa Teresa at Alicante, on account of the recent
occurrences at Melilla.
The Spanish frigate Esperanza and sloop Con-
cordia arrived at Cadiz on the 9th.
The Spanish screw-frigate Petronila, 34 guns,
was wrecked on the Bth ult. while entering the
port of Mariel in the waters of the Havanah. The
crew succeeded in taking out the guns and stores,
but the hull and machinery was expected to be lost.
Her Majesty's troop-ship Orontes left Gibraltar
on the 9th with the 2d battalion of 7th Fusiliers
for Malta.

The effects of the short supply of rain last season
was beginning to be severely felt in the country
about Tangier, where nearly all the wells and
springs are dried up.
Intelligence from Malaga says that the Spanish
Government intends sending a division of 5,000
men to Mellila in order to effect a settlement of the
boundary question, and keep the Ruffians in check.
Three Spanish war steamers were at Malaga, and
others were expected there, to convey the troops.
It was also stated that the Spanish Government
had demanded from the Emperor of Morocco the
presence of a body of Moorish troops at Melilla to
chastise the Riffians for their recent aggression,
and to prevent the Spanish garrison being molested
in its occupation of the new limits. A Malaga
letter says that the late attack was in con-
sequence of tho Riff tribe not having
received from the Sultan the promised in-
demnity for the ceded lands. The Gibraltar
Cdronzole adds: If this were so, one can hardly
blame the Riffians. They were clearly entitled to
receive the stipulated price before they allowed
the Spaniards to enter upon the permanent occu-
pation of their lands, and might well demur to
exchange the material guarantee for his Sheriffiaß
Majesty's I. 0. U.
The Madrid Constitutional says : The engage-
ment with the Moors appears to have originated in
the reluctance with which the tribes viewed their
lands transferred to the Spaniards. Parties of con-
victs had been for some time employed in filling up
the ditches and levelling old Moorish works in the
newly ceded district, and cutting down the prickly
pear hedges. The Riffians viewed these proceed-
ings with an unfriendly eye, and continue to
call the soil theirs after it had been ceded to
Spain, assembled in great numbers, and attacked
the convict guard, the governor sent for reinforce-
ments and upon some companies of the Vergara
and Fijo de Centa Regiments coming upon the
ground, the Moors were driven back. Desultory
firing between the Moors and Spanish troops was
kept up till sunset, when the latter withdrew to the
fort. The 94 Moorish prisoners turn out to have
been Moors who were inside the walls of Melilla
for the purpose of trading when the attack was
made outside, and who were detained as a measure
of precaution.

GIBRALTAR, SEPT. 13.

The following British ships has e arrived here
since the last mail :—steamer Ripon, 5 days from
Southampton ; steamer Windermere, 71 days from
Cardiff; schooner Grape, 12 days from Liverpool;
brigantine Mary Herbert, 21 days from Newport;
schooner Marwood, 18 days from Liverpool;
schooner Carria Bell, 17 days from Liverpool.
Exchange on London-90 days' date is 49t- to ;
Paris, sf. 29c.; Marseilles, sf. 28e. to 29c.; Genoa,
sf. 29c.; Madrid, 8 days' sight, par; Cadiz, par;
Seville, par toy dis.; Malaga, par to prem.; Bar-
celona, y prem.; Almeira, y die.; Valencia, par ;
Alicant, par. Freight unchanged.

ORIGIN OF THE STNIBOLS OF NUMBERS AND
MEASURES.—Ten, as the radix of numerical compu-
tation, has been raised to the dignity it now holds by the
circumstance of its expressing the number of man's fingers.
A digit is a finger's breadth ; an inch, the length of the
thumb ; a nail, from the tip of the middle joint of the longest
finger; a palm, the breadth of four fingers; a hand, the
fist, with the thumb uppermost ; a span, the space between
tips of thumb and fingers extended to the utmost; a foot,
that of a man ; a cubit, from the elbow to the end of the
longest finger ; a yard, girth of a man's body ; a step, when
each foot advances alternately ; apace, two steps ; a fathom,
width to which a man's arms and hands can extend.
WORKING MEN'S CLUB AND INSTITUTE, ST.
MARTIN-IN-THE-FIELDS.—On Monday, July 20,
1863, a pubic meeting was held at St. Martin's Hall, the
Hon. Sir Frederick Grey, K.C.8., in the chair, at which
it was resolved that a club and institute should be formed
in the parish of St. Martin-in-the-Fields, tor the purpose
of providing rooms for social conversation, newspapers,
library, classes, popular lectures, readings, entertainments,
games, and refreshments for the working classes. It is
hoped that the club will be opened by Michaelmas.
NEW WINDSOR REGISTRATION...—. The revision
of the lists of voters for this borough took place
at the Guildhall, Windsor, on Wednesday, before Henry
Blencowe Churchill, Esq , the barrister appointed to hold
he same. Messrs. C. S. Vouls, G. H. Long, and C. T.
Phillips, appeared for the Conservatives, and the Liberals
were represented by Mr. B. C. Durant. In the parish of
;lever the Conservatives made six claims, of which three
were allowed, and three failed ; the Liberals made and sus-
tained three claims. In the same parish, the Conservatives
made four objections, all of which were sustained, and the
Liberals made 12 objections, of which 5 were successful and
7 failed. In the parish of New Windsor, the Conservatives
made 14 claims, of which 12 were al:owed and two failed ;
and the Liberals made 2 claims, of which 1 was successful
and the other failed. The objections made by the Conser-
vatives in New Windsor parish were 10 in number, of
which 9 were sustained and 1 failed. The Liberals made

12 objections in that parish, of which 7 were successful and
5 failed. The result of the revision is therefore as follows :
—Conservative claims allowed—Clever 3, New 'Windsor
12, total 15. Liberal clairus allowed—Clewer 3, New
Windsor 1, total 4 ; Conservative gain on claims, 11.
Conservative objections allowed—Clever 4, New Windsor
9, total 13. Liberal objections allowed—Clewer 5, New
Windsor 7, total 12; Conservative gain on objections, 1;
total Conservative gain, 12.

M. LEON FOUCAULT, of Paris, has succeeded in
measuring the absolute velocity of light by means
of the "turning mirror "—an experimental determination
of no little interest and significance. He concludes that it
cannot differ much from two hundred and ninty-eight
millions of French metres per seoond, or 13:5,170 English
miles, which is a notable diminution upon the velocity pre.
viously derived from astronomical data alone. The time
which light requires to travel from the sun to the earth is
known with great precision; at tha mesa distance of the
latter it is rather less than Bmin. 18sec., and if this number
be combined with M. Foucault's measure of the velocity it
will be evident that the received distance is too great by
about one thirtieth part—that light, in fact, has not so far
to travel before it reaches the earth as genes ally supposed.
I3ADEN-BADEN has seldom been so full of visitors
as during the present year, the number last week in the
city being 31,000,