The Sun.
London, England, 1865-03-30 00:00:00

HAY MARKETS.

SMITHFIELD.—Meadow hay, £4 4s to £5 5s Od; clover,
£5 5s to £6 6s Od ; and straw, £1 7s to £1 14s per load.
Trade slow.

CIMIBERLAND.—Meadow hay, £4 43 to £5 5s Od ; clover,
£5 5s to £6 6s ; and straw, £1 8s to £1 14s per load.
Supply moderate.
WHITECRAPEL.—Meadow hay, £4 4s to £5 5s Od ; clove;
£5 5s to £6 6s Od ; and straw, £1 7s to £1 14s per load.
Trade inactive.

Lord and Lady Russell's dinner party this even-
ing is unavoidably postponed. _

The Earl of Ashburnham has been suffering from
indisposition for some time past, at his seat, Ashburnham
house, Battle. Ills lordship is still in a very weak state.

AMERICA.

(REUTER'S EXPRESS.)
(Per the Belgian.)
NEW YORK, March 1 (Evening).
The following message was received from the
President on the subject of the Exemption Bill :
" To the Senate and House of Representatives of the
Confederate States of America.

" I have now under consideration the Act, en-
titled 'An Act to diminish the number of exemp-
tions and details,' which has passed both Houses,
and was presented to me on Saturday, the 11th
instant.

" The act contains two provisions which would, in
practice, so impair the efficiency of the service as to
counterbalance, if not unweigh, the advantages that
would result from the other clauses contained in it.
" The third section exempts all skilled artisans and
mechanics in the employ of the Government from
all military service. A very important, and indeed
indispensable, portion of our local defence troops
consst of these mechanics and artisans. They amount

to many thousands in the Confederacy, and while

they are, and should remain, exempt from general
service, no good cause is perceived why they should
not, like all good citizens capable of bearing arms,
be organised for local defence, and be ready to
defend the localities in which they are respectively
employed against sudden raids and incursions. If
exempt from this local service, it will be necessary
to detach in many cases troops from the armies in
the field to guard the towns and workshops where
they are employed. It is believed that if this
provision became a law the gain of strength result-
ing from the repeal of other exemptions enacted by
the first section of the law would be more than
counterbalanced by the loss of this local force. The
second provision to which I refer is that which
revokes all details and exemptions heretofore
granted by the President and Secretary of War,
and prohibits the grant of such exemptions and
details hereafter.

" There is little hazard in saying that such a
provision could not be executed without so dis-
organising the public service as to produce very
injurious results. In every department of the
government, in every branch of the service through-
out the country, there are duties to be performed
which cannot be discharged except by men in-
structed and trained in their performance. Long
experience makes them experts. Their services be-
come in their peculiar sphere of duty worth to the
country greatly more than any they could possibly
render in the field. Some of them it would be im-
possible to immediately replace. The Treasury
expert who detects a forged note at a glance, the
accounting officer whose long experience makes him
a living repository of the rules and the precedents
which guard the Treasury from frauds, the super-
_ .

intendents of the manufacturing establislufient of
the Government which supply shoes, waggons,
harness, ambulances, &c., for the army, the em-
ployes who have been especially trained in the
distribution and sub-division of mail matter
among the various routes by which it is to reach
its destination, are among the daily instances
which are afforded in the experience of executive
officers. To withdraw from the public service at
once, and without any means of replacing them,
the very limited number of experts, believed to be
less than 100, who are affected by the bill, is to
throw the whole machinery of government into
confusion and disorder at a period when none
who are not engaged in executive duties can have
an adequate idea of the difficulties by which they
are already embarrassed.

" The desire of the Executive and Secretary of
War to obtain for the army the services of every
man available for the public defence can hardly be
doubted, and Congress may be assured that nothing
but imperative necessity could induce the exercise of
any discretion invested in them to regain men out of
the army. But no Government can be administered
without resting some discretion in the executive
officers in the application of general rules to classes
of the population. Individual exceptions exist to
all such rules ; these exceptions cannot be provided
for by legislation in advance. I earnestly hope that
Congress will pass an amendment to this Act now
under consideration in accordance with the fore-
going recommendation, so that I may be able, by
signing both the act and amendment, to secure un-
impaired benefit to the proposed legislation.
"JEFFERSON DAVIS,
" Executive-office, Richmond, March 13, 1865."
PHILADELPHIA, March 17.

The Bulletin:says the storm of last night was very
destructive in the interior of the State. The Sus-
quehanna River and all its tributaries were extra-
ordinarly high, and below the Middletown Railroad
is washed away.
In the oil regions also there have been great floods.
Oil City is submerged, and great quantities of oil
in barrels have been swept away.
EASTON, PA., March 17.

The Delawarr River is over 26 feet deep above
the low water mark, and is still rising, but little
damage has been done above this point yet. There
is about 22 feet rise in the Lehigh River. It is re-
ported that the canals have been materially damaged,
but there is nothing reliable as yet.
POUGHKEEPSIE, N.Y., March 1.

The gale yesterday seriously obstructed travel on
the Hudson River railroad. There have been no
down trains on that road to-day. Several hundred
feet of the track between Stuyvesant and Albany
are submerged, and the telegraph poles in that loca-
lity are washed away.