The Sun.
London, England, 1862-02-18 00:00:00

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The Prussian Ga,c:to liflq published the text of
the note addressed by the Pru.siax Minister at
Vienna to Count Itechberg. jdentical notes Lave
been despatched to, the different German Courts
which had participated in the course pursued .by
the Austrian GO•iernment. The note is to the
following effect : -

STAMPED ....sd.

BAIL WAY INTELLIGENCE

" Vienna, Feb. 14, 1862.

LONDON AND SOUTH-WESTERN.

" The _undersigned,___Envoy Extraordinary and
Minister Plenipotentiary of his Majesty the King
of-Prussia, is charged to reply, in the following
manner to the note which the Imperial Envoy,
Count Karolyi, has addressed, under date of thb 2ti
February, to th© Minister of Foreign Affairs, Count -
Bernstorff.

The report of the directors 'state that the net re-
venue for the half-year ending December 31,
1861, after deducting interest on loans and other.
other preferential charges, amounts to £198,261,
to which is added £757, making the balance avail-
able for dividend £199,018. Out of this sum the
directors recommend that a dividend be declared at
the rate of £slos. per cent. per annum, payable on
the 27th inst., amounting on £7,200,256 of capital
paid up to £198,007, leasing to be carried over to
the current half-year £l,Oll. The gross earnings
of the company for the half-year exceed those of
the corresponding period in 1860 by
£39,242, the
additional [mileage open being only 51 miles—
namely, the Exeter and Topsham branch. The total
receipts for the past half-year, ending Dec. 31,
amounted, on 400/ miles of railway, to £606,139 ;
the working expenses to £260,008 ; the taxation to
£27,277; and the net revenue to £318,853, against
£566,897, the receipts on 3941 miles of railway,
£241,049 the working expenses, £28,010 the taxa-
tion, and £297,838 the net revenue, for the corre-
sponding half of 1860, showing an increase of
£39,242 in the total receipts, £18,959 in the work-
ing expenses, a decrease in the taxation of £733,
and an increase in the net revenue of £21,015. The
relaying of the permanent way on the main line
and on some of the branches has been steadily pro-
ceeded with during the past half-year, and the sum
of £lO,OOO has been charged to revenue on that
account. The renewals on the main line are now
nearly completed, and the permanent way is
throughout in good working order. The doubling
of the remainder of the Southampton and Dorches-
ter line between Wimborne and Dorchester is also
in progress under the order of the Board of Trade,
and will be charged against capital. On the Exeter
Extension line 34 miles out of 50 (the entire length
from Yeovil to Exeter) have now been doubled and
opened for traffic. The works on the Exeter junc-
tion line are completed, and the narrow gauge rails
having been laid down on the Exeter and Crediton
line, there is now an unbroken communication from
London and all parts of the South-Western Cora-
pany's system to Crediton. The works on the
Kingston-bridge line are in progress. The whole
of the 41 per cent. preference stock has now
been taken up. The average rate of interest
on the company's debenture debt is 4.23 per
cent. The report explains that the endeavour of
the Great Western Company to obtain access over
the Andover and Redbridge line to Southampton
has compelled the South-Western Company to pro-
mote a bill in Parliament for obtaining power to
make a railway through North Somersetshire to
Bristol.

" The observations which the said Minister had
been charged to recommend, by the note in ques-
tion, to the examination of the royal Government
have reference to the views expressed by Prussia
to the Saxon Government in relation to the safest
mode of effecting a reform of the Confederation,
subsequent to the examination made of the pro-
posals for reform by Baron Beust.
" These views were really in substance to the
effect that every attempt to transform the entire
Confederation, in a federative sense, by means of
the creation of an effective executive power, with a
national zepresentation and a common legislation,
must necessarily create'a serious danger to the ex-
istence of the Confederation, whilst on the contrary
its existence was exposed to no danger if, whilst
continuing to respect the international foundations
of the whole edifice, the path of a free arrangement
should be entered into to bind together more
closely its parts in the province of internal political
right, and if there should be founded,,; within the
limits thus restricted, institutions proposed for the
entire body, namely, an executive power (a supreme
military command and one system of diplomatic re-
presentation in foreign countries), a national repre-
sentation, and a common legislature.
" The Imperial Government has experienced the
necessity of declaring, 'with reference to this view,
as submitted by Prussia to the Saxon Government,
that, to its great regret, its duties, not less than its
convictions, prevented it from assenting to similar
views. The Royal Prussian Government might,
on receiving this declaration, which .8
imply tended
to confirm facts already known, have confined itself
to expressing the assurance that it shared these
regrets. But as the imperial Government has gone
a step further, and deems itself called upon, with
a view to the general interests of Germany,' as
well as from the point of ' positive law,' and, whilst
pointing out the fatal consequences to which the
refOrming tendencies of Prussia would have led at
an earlier epoch, to protest formally -against the
Prussian modelof looking at the question, the royal
Government, on its side, cannot disguise the belief
that, in its opinion, their neither exists any well-
founded motive, nor any justification whatever, for
such a protest.
" This step, which is the more strange from its
having been just taken in consequence of an'agree-
ment come to by identical notes from several con-
federated Governments, corresponds so little to the
character of an exchange of the views proposed by
the Saxon Government with reference to the reform
.f which the necessity and the urgency are every-
whereii recognised, and the royal Government does
not justified in entering into any discus- .
n whatever
nfh em
the opposite views set forth in the
n
tphererial Envoy.
, hand, the significance of these
w
already been fully appreciated at the
vsoeo tce o feels o
has tht eI o itself
of ju
fitting time by Prussia. However, as regards the
fatal consequences said to have been occasioned at
that epoch by similar tendencies, we must call to
mind that these consequences were due not to the
efforts of Prussia in favour of a reform of the Fede-
ral Constitution, but on the contrary, to the attitude
of those very Governments whose opposition caused
the Prussian efforts to come to nought.

The report of Mr. J. Beattie, the engineer, states
that every section of the work in the locomotive
department has been conducted with the strictest
economy, efficiency and durability being kept cot-
stantly in view. A considerable saving has been
effected in the quantity and cost of fuel used. Dur-
ing the past half-year 22.91 b. of coal and coke were
consumed per train mile, at a cost of 2.041 d, and for
the corresponding half of 1860 25.31 b. of coal and
coke were consumed per train mile, at a cost of
2•413c1 ; so that, with an increase of 122,139 miles,
the total cost of fuel has been £2,259 less. The
received,
ld7and £
account showed
thatds6d, leaving
eXxlple,Bn4dBe,444had been a
balance of £122,688.

"It is to the latter Governments that Germany
owes the entire restoration of the ancient Federal
Constitution, and through it, the lasting germ of
complications of the same kind.

" The Prussian Government does not lag behind
any other of the Confederate States in the desire
conscientiously to perform its Federal duties, to
defend interests that are truly German, in efforts
to do justice to legitimate national aspirations, and
to get them accepted by the other Confederate Go-
vernments. But it has not availed itself of these
duties, thus religiously accomplished, to consider
itself authorised to take a step liko that taken by
the Governments which have signed the identical
notes towards Prusssia.

"In the realisation of the ideas of reform indi-
cated at the close of the said note, and tending to
create, for the whole Confederation, a constitution,
with an effective executive power, a common legis-
lation and representation, and which was not
without a relation to the aspirations of a vaster
political consolidation,' for the extra German
territories, as appears already from the Aus-
trian despatch of sth November, the royal
Government would behold a danger much
more serious to the existence of the Confederation
than in the reforms to be effected according to the
ideas put forth in the Prussian despatch of the
20th of December.

"Nevertheless, the royal Government is far from.
opposing a protest to a simple exposition of views
relating to the basis of reform. It thinks, on the
contrary, that it ought to reserve its definitive judg-
ment until there shall be offored to i t such a settled
plan of reform as may furnish the opportunity of
coming to an understanding with the imperial
Government. At present the royal Government
considers, as established beyond all doubt, the prac-
ticali
impossibility of a reform n accordance with
the present general indications—these being radi-
cally opposed to its own point of view, and it must,
therefore, necessarily pronounce as impracticable
the opening of a conference on a reform to be
attempted on these bases.

"The undersigned seizes the opportunity, &c.
(Signed) " VON WERTHER.
" To his Excellency Count von Rechberg."

THE UNDERGROUND RAlLwAY.—During the last
few days, in consequence of the completion of the tunnel
under Coppioe-row, a large number of navvies have been
employed in excavating the ground between that part of
the line and the intended terminus and station at the foot of
Holborn-hill, and in this work considerable progress has
been made. Many of the shores which supported the
workhouse and the other houses adjoining have been re-
moved, and there is now no complaint about the insecurity
of the buildings.
FIRE NEAR k
EXTENSIVEOXFORDi
night, shortly before , a fire broke out n the cSTREET.LatIt
10 o'clock,
pre-
mises belonging to Mr. Myrtil Brunswick, a cabinet
manu-
facturer, situate at 3, Newman-passage, Newman-street,
Oxford-street. The engines belonging to Meux's brewery,
the parish, and those of the brigade were
but the flames were not entirely extin g uishFrned untilenellthe spot,
the pre-
mises of Mr. Brunswick were for the greater part, including
his valuable stock, destroyed,
Bellchambers, gasfitter, adjoining,seriously injured by
fire
and water. The • •
principal loss will fall upon the Atlas Fire
Office.

BIRTHS.
DuiccomitE.---On the 14th inst., at 20, Grosvenor-square,
• the Hon. Mrs. Buncombe, of a son.
HL ME.—On the 15th inst., at 16, trilton-street, the wife of
Colonel Hume, C. 8., late of the Grenadier Guards, of a
daughter.
PORTMAN,—On the 15th inst., the Hon. Mrs. Portman, of
a daughter, stillborn.