The Sun.
London, England, 1854-08-22 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON, TUESDAY EVENING, AUGUST 22, 1854,

" Yes; why not ?" But the Doncaster masons knoW
well the homely old proverb, that " What's sauce
for the goose is sauce for the gander ;" and surely
the "rubble wallers " may as reasonably ask,
" If we can sell the masters' skill sufficient. for
their work, and at a price they are willing to pay,
and we to take, who ought to hinder us ? Why
should not our skill find its market value ? If, as
you say, it will cheapen work, the masters and
the public have as much right to the cheapest
work as you have to the cheapest. bread." There
is lib refutation of this reasoning. Trade com-
binations are as manifestly social tyranny as corn
laws were legislative tyranny. If a man, or a
body of men, refuse to work more than a certain
number of hours for a certain amount of pay,—
that resolves itself, of course, into the simple
question of how much one shall give and the
other get for his money ; though it is seldom set-
tled by strikes without oppression of workmen by
their fellow-workmen. But the other demand,
and the greater one, strikes at the root of all
freedom of trade. No demand more foolish than
this was made at Preston. We trust the masters
will not concede it, and that the men will conde-
scend to see its unreasonableness and inconsis-
tency. Landlords shrunk at last from the odium
(,f tyrannising over other classes ; we hope the
time is at hand when workmen will be yet more
ashamed of odious Union laws against their own
class.

The greatest and, of all men, the most formi-
dable among the individual assailants of the Aus-
trian Empire—M. LOUIS KOSSUTH, some time
Liberator of the Magyars and Dictator of Hun-
gary—has again, from his honourable exile in this
country, directed his flaming thunderbolts of in-
vective against the Vienna Government. The
words of KOSSUTH do not pass idly by, as the wind.
He is no stump-orator. He is great among the
greatest patriots, as he is illustrious among the most
distinguished orators of our generation. What
he says will be remembered. His speeches, not
less than his deeds, will live in history. For he
speaks with the authority of a master-mind of the
age—no matter whether his orations are delivered
from the bosom of a nation in arms, at the height
and plenitude of power—or from the comparative
obscurity and privacy of his remote insular
scene of banishment. A complete and splendid
justification of what we have here remarked (not
by any means for the first time) will be found in
the noteable harangue given in another part of
the impression of our journal of this evening.
It will there be observed that M. KOSSUTH en-
forced on the 21st of August, at Hanley, the
bold argument which he took occasion to unfold
on the 12th of June, at Nottingham. During the
two months which have intervened between the time
of those orations, events have transpired which
have tended to corroborate at Hanley what the
illustrious exile declared plainly and explicitly
enough at Nottingham. In reference, that is to
say, to the perverse duplicity and systematic per-
fidy of the Austrian Government.' As elucidatory
of the evil policy of the Cabinet of Vienna
from first to last, as the secret ally of Rus-
sia and as the vast clog upon the Western
Powers, embarrassing every movement of
the allied French and English Governments—the
oration delivered yesterday by M. KOSSUTH, at
the Hanley Potteries, commands the especial
regard of the really thinking portion of the Eng-
lish multitude.

GUN-BOATS.

HOW TO SUBDUE SMOKE.

In our examination of the class of anti-smoke
contrivances requiring occasional motion to be
given to them, we give precedence to Prideaux',
more because of the pretentious character it has
assumed than for any practical reason. This in-
vention constitutes the paiel and occupies the
chief portion of the furnace door. It is formed
intetnUlly of three series of thin plates of iron,
placed vertically, with fixed and narrow air spaces
between the plates, and with wider spaces between
the respective series, the whole protruding several
inches into the furnace. Externally it is made of
moveable horizontal plates, set like the laths of a
Venetian blind. The stoker, when he shuts the
door after supplying the furnace with coals, opens
these valves by raising a lever. They are then
gradually closed by an ingenious regulating appa-
ratus connected therewith. The intended effect is
the admission of heated air in the exact proportion
required by the process of combustion ; but, the
furnace having been already charged with air, and
the valves at once opened to their fullest extent,
whilst the combustion of the newly-added fuel is
necessarily at its lowest point, it is apparent that
there must be an excess of oxygen admitted to
the fire when the carbonaceous gases require it
the least, and, from the gradual closing of the
valves, a proportionately decreased supply of it
just when it becomes most wanted. It also ate;
pears evident to us, that to heat the air effectually
by such a process, the inner plates being described
as " red hot," must be to render the apparatus
very liable to destruction. Aud equally clear it
is that the temperature of the air admitted must
vary very considerably ; and that the heat
only increasing as the supply of air diminishes,
must be at the lowest point when the largest
quantity enters ; or, if the inventor's theory be
correct, precisely when the intensity of heat im-
parted to the air ought to be the greatest. Now,
although the experiment at Portsmouth dock-
yard was said to be conclusive in its favour, we
have seen no official report to that effect ; in-
deed, we are told that it remained a very short
time in operation at that establishment. At the
Panopticon, however, it has been in use for many
months ; but, often as we have seen it there, it
has never been with any other than Welch coals,
a description which, with the exception of anthra-
cite, produces the least smoke, and, for the pre-
sent at least, is supposed to be available in ordi-
nary furnaces without violating the laws for the
suppression of smoke ? On the other hand, at
Goding and Co.'s brewery, used with bitu-
minous coals, the invention has not given
such satisfaction as to induce its retention.
Nevertheless it has had, and we dare say will still
have, its advocates and patrons. The next we
shall consider, that of Bristow and Attwood, is
distinguished from most, if not all, of its
competitors by ombining the operations of smoke-
producing and smoke-consuming, by absolutely
manufacturing smoke in one furnace, and burn-
ing it (as well as it can be burnt) in another !
Hence two furnaces, of like power and size,
placed in juxtaposition with each other, are re-
quired
.to produce the effect designed. These
furnaces are alternately fed with fuel ; and, by a
peculiar system of connecting flues and dampers,
the passage of smoke into the boiler tube or flue
beyond the fire-place, and not less so the passage
of heat, is shut off from the furnace into which the
coals are thrown, and the smoke allowed to pass
into the other furnace, at the front, and from
thence over the bright and incandescent fire therein,
so as to be materially decomposed. As a matter
of course, during such operation, the direct action
of one furnace is suspended ; and the fire in the
other is, at the same time, employed in destroying
what not merely does not afford a particle of ad-
ditional heat, by increased combustion, but posi-
tively diverts from its proper function part of tho
pre-existing heats which is thus absorbed in a
destructive and not a producing process. Nor is
this all ; for the carbonic acid gas carried into
the bright fire furnace with the smoke from the
other, must act as a chemical damper of that
fire in no inconsiderable degree. We can-
not,
therefore, feel surprised that the proprie-
tors of the City Flour Mills, who, having wearied
of the use of Juckes's furnaces, and superseded
them with those of Bristow and Attwood (then,
and, we assume remaining, in their employment
respectively as mill-manager and engineer), have
at length come to the determination to give up
the use of the latter also. Yet the large outlay
thus incurred by White, Ponsford, and Co. will
not have been uselessly made, if the lesson be in-
structively applied by others ; and if, in prefer-
ence to adopting some simple mode of smoke pre-
vention, as a last resource, they should for awhile
resort to the ordinary construction of furnace,
and adopt Welch coal as the medium of
combustion, no one can reasonably blame
them for being actuated by what, under these
very peculiar circumstances, may not be inappro-
priately defined as the prudence of discourage-
ment. In fairness we should add, that, where
steam production or economy of fuel may be of
secondary consideration, and where two or more
boilers can be conveniently connected and worked
together, concurrently with cautious attention in
the opening and closing of the dampers and doors
to avoid risk in the operation, Bristow and At-
wood's invention should be held to conform
with the legal requirements as regards sub-
duing the smoke nuisance, and in which,
at all events, it has our preference over
the Prideaux furnace door. Chanter's move-
able fire-bars, although not strictly speaking
narsblbe
yd
smoke-preventive in their application, are
extensively used with and without appliances
for subduing smoke ; in the former manner suc-
cessfully so with the ,Lee Stevens's apparatus,
adopted by us with nothing more than the com-
mon fixed fire-bars. Motion is given to Chanter's
tohand-levers,
s working which the stoker is
P the fire without exposing
e heat consequent upon his
Lars
e
himself
performing that operation with the furnace-door
open. These three contrivances of the intermit-
tingly moveable class have hitherto attracted
most attention, on which account, as well as be-
cause of their dissimilarity of action, we have be-
stowed upon them more consideration than our
space will afford to others of the same kind ; of
which last referred to we may mention Whi Ay's,
Carter's, and Galloway's, each depending more or
less on arrangements of valves or dampers, the merits
of which have yet to undergo the ordeal of Brea

experience,
discuss at a future opportunity.
and which we -may very probably
We shall previously, and in continuation of
these notices, describe the class of furnaces that,
containing no moveable parts whatever, are
naturally the easiest of construction.

LATEST NEWS.

THE WAR.

RECONNAISSANCE OF THE DOBRITD-
SCHA—RAVAGES AMONG THE TROOPS
BY CHOLERA.
The following is from the letter of the special
correspondent of a contemporary :
VARNA, Aug. 9.—On Sunday morning, the 6th
of this month, 5,000 or 6,000 men of the Zouaves
and Light Division returned from Kustendje, in
Dobrudscha, to Varna, by sea, and on the same
day the great mass of the French expedition, which
had come by land, encamped in the neighbourhood
of the town. They had been absent on their re-
connaissance exactly 12 days, and perhaps in the
annals of modern warfare it would be impossible
to name another expedition of the kind in which
sickness had committed such ravages in so short
a space of time. It is no exaggeration to say that
cholera and typhus literally decimated then. Of
the whole force of 33,000 men, they have lost,
including Bashi-Bazouks, upwards of 4,000 in the
space of 12 days.
Those who came by sea were principally the in-
valids, and men too delicate to. bear the fatigues
of marchins, back. The former alone numbered up-
wards of 800.' I went down to see them disembark,
and I thought I never saw troops in a worse condi-
tion ; they were the ghosts of their former selves
—sun-burnt and haggard, fatigued and dispirited;
and even the most hardy and robust spoke of the
climate and malaria which existed in the Dobrud-
scha as being such as would destroy Europeans.
As your readers will see, the Russians appear to
have lost, in their five or six months' occupation
of this coentry, upwards of 40,000 men. After the
troops had landed the sick were got ashore. There
was an awful train of them, and arobas and am-
bulances full were passing and repassing to the
French hospital during the whole day. Most of
these were cases of typhus and dysentery. Many
were landed dead, and many died upon their arri-
val at the hospital. On the same evening, I am
informed, 130 were buried.
During the time the expedition was absent it tra-
versed the greater part of the Dobrudscha, from
south to north, without meeting scarcely a human
being. The whole country, which the French say
seems remarkably fertile, is as desolate as Sahara.
Most of the villages were deserted, and to all ap-
pearance had been so for some time. In most in-
stances no attempts had been made to sow the
land, and the few crops which they found were
standing and choked with weeds. About 10,000
of the French remained a little to the north of
Hadschlogli-Basar, while the main body pushed,
forward for Karasu and Kustendje, with the Bashi-
Bazouks, Chasseurs d'Afrique, and light infantry
in advance.. The army was decidedly sickly when
it commenced its march, and cholera and typhus
had manifested themselves, though not very ex•
tensively until the second and third day of the
advance, when an alarming number were attacked
by both diseases. From that time until their re-
turn on Sunday the sickness spread, and literally
ravaged the camp ; of the French nearly 1700
died in about eight days, and almost as large a
number were sick, and rendered for the time
unfit for duty. But the loss which fell on our
brave allies was nothing to that which visited the
Bashi-Bazouks, under the command of General
Yusuf. Everything about these unfortunate
wretches predisposed them towards taking the
diseases in their worst forms. Their dirty habits,
and fashion of sleeping uncovered in the open,
damp night air, induced fever ; their irregular
meals, composed almost entirely of fruit and
vegetables, brought on cholera • and the mor-
tality from both causes was doubled, owing to
their peculiar belief in fatalism, which led them in
most cases to refuse all offers of medical assistance.
Typhus and cholera, therefore, raged in their
ranks unchecked, and literally destroyed them.
Your rea lers will scarcely credit it, but it is a po-
sitive fact, that of the 2,600 Bashi-Bazouks who
started with the French, upwards of two thousand
perished within ten days. Ido not suppose there
ever was an instance of such a rate of mortality.
occurring among such a number of men in the
same space of time. The French have now no
Bashi-Bazouks, for of the 200 or 300 I,vhieli have
returned, nearly all are invalids or wounded.
Notwithstanding the sickness which desolated
their ranks, the e-ich gallantry continued their
march, and er
arrived in the neighbourhood of Kus-
teuje about the lst of August. There, for the first
time, they fell in with the enemy, who, having got
notice of their approach, were falling back, driving
before them an immense flock of sheep and oxen,
arid having previously destroyed all the standing
crops round the town. Only the left flank of the
advanced French guard came up with the Rus-
sians, who numbered about 8,000 infantry, four re-
giments of Cossacks, and two regiments of regular
cavalry. Against this superior t; wee the (Masseurs
d'Afrique and Zouaves instantly made a dash, and
a slight skirmish ensued ; the enemy all the while
continuing their retreat under cover of their
cavalry, with such precipitation as might be justly
termed a flight. The Chasseurs d'Afrique over-
took the Cossacks and broke their ranks at the
first onset, killing and wounding about 60, and
making a small number prisoners. The whole of
the enemy's cavalry then took to flight, leaving a
large portion of their cattle in the hands of the
French, who only sustained a loss of three men
killed and 18 wounded.
The French encamped round Kustendje, while
the Russians fell back with all haste upon Hirsova,
where it is said they crossed the Danube, thusfree-
ing the Dobrudscha of their preseence for this year,
at least. There were very few inhabitants remaining
in Kustendje ; the town, in fact, was deserted.
The country round it was covered with a number
of high earth mounds, which the villagers, in reply
to questions from the French, said were the places
where the Russians had interred their dead. From
the size of these mounds they appear to cover pits
containing 100 bodies, and there are scores and
scores of such melancholy memorials in all direction.
If what the inhabitants say be true, and as it is
confirmed from other sources there is no reason to
doubt it, the Russians have lost at the lowest com-
putation 40,000 men since they first occupied the
Dobrudscha. The principal cause of the awful
mortality was typhus, though latterly the cholera
committed extensive ravages.
The French remained at Kustendje until infor-
mation had been received that the enemy had
crossed the Danube, when, as the mortality in
their ranks was increasing, they commenced their
march for this place and arrived, as I have said,
by sea and land, on Sunday and Monday morning.
The officers say that during the whole time they
were absent they found it impossible to procure
anything but their rations: It was rarely that they
saw villagers, and when they did they had nothing
to sell, being scarcely able to procure food for them-
selves, which they earned by working for the
Russians. The Dobrudscha was at all times the
most unhealthy and least civilised part of Turkey,
yet it is no exaggeration to say that the Russian
occupation of six months has thrown it back half
a century. Whatever has become of the inhabitants
—whether they have retired with the Russians, or
been extirpated by them—Heaven only knows ;
one thing, however, is certain, they no longer exist
in the country. The few who remained when the
French came up say, truly or untruly, that the
Russians oppressed them with taskwork of the most
laborious kinds, and that the Cossacks ravaged all
the villages with a ferocity and relentlessness which
at length desolated the place. Yet these atrocities,
the accounts of which I fear are but too true oc-
curred within four days' march of an allied army
over 100,000 strong, which could not only have
prevented them, but inflicted fearful punishment
on the invaders, if " Aberdeen had made up his
mind," and given us permission.

THE BLACK SEA.
We make the following extracts from a private
letter, giving another account of the reconnaisance
of Sebastopol by the Fury
" Her Majesty's steam(); Fury, off Sebastopol,
July 27.—0 n the 25th July her Majesty's steamer
Fury was honoured by receiving on board Gen. Sir
George Brown, Rear Admiral Sir E. Lyons, Colonel
Lake of the Royal Artillery, and the French general
second in command (who, by the way, I under-
stand from good authority, has made his way to his
present grade from the ranks, and their respective
aides-de-camp, 13 in number. Off the Fury goes
at full speed for the harbour of Sebastopol ;
following in her wake was the Terrible, paddle-
frigate, and a French steamer. After running for
four hours she eased her speed and groped her way,
as it was a very dark night. About 3.45, on the
morn:na of the 26th, we observed our approach was
known by the enemy from seeing the flashes of
muskets for five or six miles along the coast, at
spaces of about 400 yards distant. Large fires were
immediately made in the background, and all on
shore was commotion. At 5 a.m. we were within
two miles and a half of the forts at the entrance of
the harbour, where we remained some few minutes
surveying the movements of the fleet. On a level
with the outside of the forts were two liners, two
steamers, and a frigate, which in ten minutes had
their sails loosed, and ran a long way inside, to the
no smalldisappointment of all on board. We counted
29 large ships ; but some of their hulls were not to
be seen, as they were laid up the different creeks.
We now gradually neared to within leas than a mile

of a good-sized battery. The engineers on board
were measuring distances by quadrant, arc. At
5.30 I was on the bridge, and I turned round to look
at the fort, when at the moment I saw a shot coin-
ing in a direct line for the ship, and said, Here's
a shot coming.' No sooner had the words passed
my lips, then bang it struck the ship about
three inches below the water-line, and went
through into the after-hold, having in its passage
destroyed two large jars of butter, and sundry
dozen of empty bottles belonging to the midship-
men. This wag followed in a few seconds by an-
other. While I was walking to •the other side of
the bridge where the captain stood, another passed
over my head in a direct line, and they kept this
up for ten minutes. We were hardly moving
through the water at the time. We must have
been quite riddled had all the shots that passed
over us struck ; but it is supposed that they must
have thought that their first shot, from having
struck the water, was too low, and, consequently,
elevated their guns a little too high. There was
not one that fell wide of us. The Terriele came
up, and they fired at her, but she did not approach
so near by about a mile as we did. One shot
struck and carried away some part of her main
rigging. Two shells burst the other side of us,
but not near enough to touch us. The admiral
would only allow us to return one shot, and
that carried away one of the yard-arms of a
ship in harbour. We fired this shot merely
to show them that it was not for the want of
being able to reach them that we (lid not fire.
We moved on easily, keeping about the same
distance from the land, taking observations as to
the best place for landing troops, Arc., but did not
encounter any more forts. There were women
bathing not four miles from where they were firing
at us—rather cool work, I fancy, on their parts.
They did not attempt to move as we passed them.
We saw encampments on each side of the town,
and swarms of troops drawn up in order of battle.
"The spot, I think, chosen for the disembarking
of the troops is a valley called Emptoria, about
20 miles to the north of Sebastopol. The military
men and Admiral Lyons were quite delighted to
find a place so well adapted for the ships to cover
the troops while landing.
"At 6.30 p.m. we again arrived abreast our old
friend in arms the fort, which had given us such
an unwelcome reception in the morning, and Ad-
miral Lyons intended giving them something fur
their pains at long range, but by this time Admiral
Dundas, with the fleet, was within signal distance.
Fury's recall was made, and we then ran alongside
the Britannia, where all the staff left and went on
board. A short time after the Agamemnon left
the fleet for Varna, with the generals on board, to
make arrangements for the immediate transport of
the troops to Sebastopol. Such is, I believe, the
programme.
"I suppose Admiral Dundas thought we had not
done a good day's work, for about ten p.m. Fury
was sent in again, and at eleven we found ourselves
very near the mouth of the harbour, the fleet lying
some distance in the offing. We lowered a cask full
of tar and pitch overboard, after setting it on fire,
firing a gun, burning a blue light, and firing a
rocket, by way of keeping the enemy on the qui
vive. Of course, there could be no particular ob-
ject in such manoeuvres ; no doubt they will be re-
peated often before our troops are disembarked, to
baffle the enemy a little. I wonder they did not
fire on us, as we were so near the two large forts at
the entrance, and they would have hal such an
excellent mark while the blue light and the rockets
were burning.
" We steered out and joined the fleet about three
a.m. of this day. The shot we received measured
71 inches in diameter. The ship made a great quan-
tity of water till the hole was plugged up to-day. We
have, in company with the fleet, coasted as far as
B tlaklava, a distance of 2U miles to the east, where
Fury was sent in to take soundings at the mouth of
a small valley, which turned out to be au excellent
spot for landing troops, and it is likely the marines
from the fleets will be landed as a sort of diversion to
attra..it the attention of the enemy, while the troops
effect a landing at the point to the northward of the
harbour. The marines will again embark. Such
is the contemplated plan of attack at present.