The Sun.
London, England, 1854-01-04 00:00:00

LONDON, WEDNESDAY EVENING-, JANUARY 4, 1854.

THE CHINESE REBELLION.

:FROM THE BISHOP OF VICTORIA'S CHARGE, AT SHANGHAE,
OCT. 20, 1853.)

We have arrived at an important era of Protestant
missions in China. Unwilling to count our converts by
the doubtful measure of promiscuous baptisms, we have
in past times chosen rather to await the descent of God
the Holy Spirit upon our work than to build a spiritual
fabric on the rotten foundation of a barren formalism.
We were often asked—" Where are the proofs of suc-
cess or the signs of progress in Protestant missions ?
Rome with her fourteen bishops, her eighty-four Euro-
pem missionaries, her 135 native priests, her fourteen
colleges and seminaries, her 326 churches and chapels,
and her estimate of 315,000 baptised converts, counts
her children in every province. Where are those who
form the beginnings of the Protestant Christian Church
in China ?" We had a reply which, while it satisfied the
student of missionary records of the past, awakened no
sympathy in unfriendly minds. It has been a distin-
guishing principle of Protestant missions in China to
give a pre-eminent honour to the inspired word of God.
The translation and circulation of the Holy Scriptures
have from the commencement of the present century oc-
cupied a prominent place in the attention and labour of
Protestant missionary societies. Unable to point to
numerous instances of positive submission to the holy
restraints of the Gospel, we nevertheless.trusted in the
Divine promise, and patiently abided God's time. We
looked forward in faith to the results of a wide-spread
moral impression, assured that the seeds of scriptural
truth, sown widely and sinking deeply into the minds of
the people, would hereafter, under the vivNing power of
God's Holy Spirit, become pregnant with life, produce a
harvest of joy, and bring forth the fruits of a spiritual
influence in the hearts and lives of the people.
And now at length a sudden gleam of hope streaks the
horizon, and the dawn of a brighter day succeeds to our
lark and dreary night of depression. The Holy Scrip
and the Christian books distributed in past years
Along the coast—and especially in the province of Can:
ton—have at length, as messengers of mercy, winge4
their flight into the far interior, and given an impulse to
t movement which appears likely to issue in the most
remarkable revolution of modern times.

Numerous, doubtless, have been the unknown channels
through which a wide-extended moral impression has
been communicated to the distant localities of the inte-
rior. But at the present time, and in the absence of
,iiore intimate access to the insurgent army, the only
known facts refer to the circumstances under which the
insurgent chief arrived at his knowledge of Christiap
truth. Twenty years ago a native preacher who no*
survives, Leang Afa, distributed several thousand copies
of a Christian book composed by himself, and containing
lengthened extracts from the Bible in the form of Scrip-
ture lessons, interspersed with his own summary of Chris-
tian doctrine. In the journals of the late Dr. Morrison,
the first Protestant missionary to China, there occur no-
tices of this Christian native having disposed of largi)
numbers of this and other books among the crowds at-
tracted to the city of Canton on the occasion of the prO-
vincial examination for literary degrees. According to
information recently supplied by a relative of the insur-
gent chief who visited Hong Kong, it appears that in the
year 1834 one scholar, destined in all probability to fulfil
a conspicuous part in the history of the empire, received
from an aged man, whose evident description points tb
no other than Leang Afi, a copy of the above-men-
tioned work, entitled " Keuen She Leung Yen"—Good
Words for Exhorting the Age. He took with him to
his distant home these first elements of Christian truth,
and pondered over the important doctrines which they
contained. Seven years ago the same native returned
to Canton, and, as an inquirer after Christianity, becamb
for two months an inmate in the house of an American
missionary. Partially enlightened as to the Christian re,-
ligion, and before he was admitted to Christian baptism,
he retired to his native district in the interior. The dreame
of his excited brain during a period of sickness und&
which he laboured after his first acquaintance with Chris-
tianity, appear to have' been.mistaken for a personal re
velation from God. He communicates Christian doc-
trines to others ; and the number of Christian professors
multiplies. In the strength of awakening earnestness,
they decry and denounce the idolatry of their neighbours.
The sect attracts the notice of the magistrates. Perse-
cution essays its power ; resistance follows ; and at length
t collision ensues. What, at first, was a mere local
rising, in many of its adherents engendered perhaps
more by civil discontent than by religious fervour, growl 3
at length to a formidable rebellion. The infusion of a
religious element imparts an energy and vigour to the
inoeement for which the usual impossibility of the native
wind rendered us unprepared. The corruption and
weakness of the native Government and the popular
hatred of the dominant Manchow Tartars strengthen the
insurrection and lend wings to its progress. The pro-
ject is conceived of expelling and exterminating their
vlancliow oppressors, and of building up on the ruins of
the Tartar dynasty the Church of Christ and the king-
dom of God.

The political considerations arising from these events
I shall speedily leave. Whether Louis Napoleon at
the bidding of the French priesthood may interpose
the power of a foreign fleet and to seek to crush a rising
power, which in the first burst of iconoclastic zeal has
demolished alike Romish images and Buddhist idols,;
or whether the,Russian Czar may pour down from Sibe-
rian Tartary his hordes of fierce invaders to arrest the
ehariot-wheels of revolution and prop up the cause of
Chinese despotism ; or whether the downfall of the
Manchow Tartars may be arrested or delayed by intes-
tine divisions in the insurgent force, are contingencies of
the future, big with weighty results to the world, and
calculated to affect the whole history of missions in the
East. Anxious reflections are also sometimes awakened
in reference to the great commercial Powers of the West.
If Britain, inconvenienced by the diminution of the large
duties upon the import of tea, or alarmed at the more
permanent injury to her Indian revenue through the ex-
clusion of opium by the rival dynasty, should hereafter
he tempted to interpose her powerful arm, or if, bribed
by promises of extended privileges which the passing
away of their hour of danger would lead the faithless
Manchows, as heretofire, to evade and elude, she should
hereafter employ the resources of a joint foreign inter-
vention 'to restore the sinking fortunes of the Imperial-
ists—then it may confidently be predicted that the civili-
sation of this vast empire will be hopelessly postponed,
and the conversion of this people to Christianity will (to
ill human view) be indefinitely delayed. In such a de-
plorable event, this remarkable race—possessing within
their territory all the resources needful for. great strides
in material civilisation, and exhibiting in their national
character moral and intellectual traits capable of giving
them a leading place among Asiatic empires---will be
trampled hopelessly in the dust, and the pmans of Man-
chow triumph will be the melancholy dirge of a vast
nation having her liberties entombed amongst the dead,
and sinking into thelowest depths of political annihilation.
All present hope of China's elevation in the scale of
nations, morally, politically, and socially, appears to
centre around that little army of imperfectly-enlightened
religious warriors who now hold the ancient capital of
the empire, and before whose irresistible prowess the
forces of the former conquerors of China have been un-
able to stand in a single conflict of arms..
• With the religious aspect of this native movement we
are more intimately concerned. And here it is needful
to exercise a prudential caution, neither expecting too
touch of matured Christianity on the one hand, nor
identifying Protestant missions with it too indiscrimi-
natingly on the other. The rebel leaders are evidently
men in earnest. Their unsparing destruction of idols—
shocking the minds of the common people generally,
Ind, of the female population universally—would be im-
politic in men with less lofty aims than those of a re-
formation of the national religion, and strikingly exhibits
their own belief in their Divine mission to extirpate
image-worship and to propagate the knowledge of the
one true God. Their compulsory prohibition of opium
moking and their threatened exclusion of this contra-
band article from the country, preclude the supposition
of their being actuated by a selfish and calculating policy,
bringing them into danger of eventual collision with
foreigners, as well as pledging them to an onslaught on
the most cherished sensual habits of their countrymen.
They appear to be animated with all the religious fer-
vour which inspired Mahomet in his course of victory,
and to, be tinctured with the austere morality which
soured and incensed the Puritans against their dissolute
adversaries. To expect from men of whom we have as
yet no certain knowledge that any of them have been
baptized who have no spiritual teachers whose
knowledge of Christianity is derived more from the
Old Testament than the New—whose views of reli-
gious zeal and political propagandism appear to be
drawn rather from the warlike example of Joshua
at the head of the armies of Israel than from the writings
and sufferings of Paul, the apostle of Jesus Christ—to
expect from such a body of men a perfect exhibition of
the gentle, forgiving spirit of the Gospel, and a full
harvest of the fruits of the spirit of holiness, is to niea-
sure them prematurely by the standard of well-iustructed
Christians, and to apply to them the rule of long-estab-
lished Christian communities.
Amid all the error, the enthusiasm, the fanaticism,
and the intolerance which are perceptible among them,
they have given forth, in their public manifestoes to the
reading population of China, sentiments and views of
moral and religious truth such as have never before
sounded in the ears of this people.
It is a mark of no inconsiderable progress in this
people to find the former half of the book of Genesis, as
translated by the late Dr. Gutzlaff, republished in the
insurgent host and bearing the imprimatur of T'hae-
ping-wang as emperor : the words " Volume the First"
leading to the supposition that other portions of the
sacred record have been published or are in the course
of publication. It is no slight event in the history of
the world to find a Chinese claimant of imperial dignity
taking up the work of the British and Foreign Bible
Society and publishing the Holy Scriptures for his
followers.

The "" New Calendar of the T'hae-ping dynasty" pro-
claims to the people of China—hitherto the dupes of
necromancers or the slaves of good and evil omens,
and of lucky and unlucky days—that prayer for the
Divine blessing sanctifies every day as alike for-
tunate :

" Whoever truly venerates our heavenly Father, the
supreme Lord and great God, is under the protection of
Heaven and can engage in his duties whensover

thinks proper. Every season, therefore, may be con-
I sidered as prosperous and favourable.
During the season of drought we have of late wit-
nessed around this city propitiatory offerings to the
" Dragon-Prince of the Eastern Sea," sanctioned and
commanded by the rulers as a means of obtaining rain.
But the " Imperial declaration of T'hae-ping-wang," a
document said to be written by the leader of the rebel-
lion himself—thus assails the prevalent superstition :
" In later ages we have had unprincipled men falsely
declaring that the Dragon of the Eastern Sea can pro-
duce rain ; whereas this Dragon of the Eastern Sea is
nothing more than a transformation of the King of
Hades. This King of Hades is no other than the old
serpent, the Devil, who transforms himself in a variety
of ways, to deceive and entrap the souls of men."
In their published comment on the Ten Command-
ments, the thoughts and intents of the heart are recog-
nised as among the spiritual requirements of God's law.
" Lustful imaginations"—" amorous glances"—" libidi-
nous songs"—and their common incentive the "smoking
of foreign tobacco" (opium)—are among the enumerated
ways of transgressing the Seventh Commandment.
An acknowledgment of the universal prevalence of
sin seems to be shadowed forth in the following extract
from "the book of religious precepts of the T'hae-ping
dynasty:"
" Who has ever lived in the world without offending
against the commands of Heaven ? But until this time
no one has known how to obtain deliverance from sin.
Now, however, the great God has made a gracious com-
munication to man, and from henceforth whosoever re-
pents of his sins in the presence of the great God
(Shang-te), and avoids worshipping depraved spirits
(Shin), practising perverse things, or transgressing the
Divine commands, may ascend to heaven and enjoy hap-
piness for thousands and myriads of years in pleasure
and delight, with dignity and honour, world without
end."

Then, again, obscurely and inadequately as the Di-
vinity and Atonement of Christ are sometimes alluded
to throughout their writings, we may recognise in the
following passages a groundwork of essential truth, on
which the glorious superstructure of that doctrine in all
its full proportions and completeness may be )built
by the foreign missionary instructor. The " Ode for
Youth," intended to be committed to memory by every
child in the insurgent camp—and in the event of their
triumph, probably by the child of every official through-
out the empire—contains the following lines on—
" REVERENCE TO JESUS.
" Jesus, his first-born Son,
Was in former times sent by God ;
He willingly gave his life to redeem us from sin :
Of a truth his merits are pre-eminent.
His cross was hard to bear,
The sorrowing clouds obscured the sun ;
The adorable Son, the honoured of Heaven,
Died for you children of men.
After His resurrection, He ascended to Heaven,
Resplendent in glory, He wields authority supreme.
In Him we know that we may trust,
To secure salvation and ascend to Heaven."
Still more wonderful is the clear exhibition of the
way of salvation and redemption through Christ in the
following—" A prayer for a penitent sinner." Among
the multitude of those who have been familiarised from
infancy with the doctrine of Christianity, how largo a
portion would probably state their view of salvation less
clearly !
"I thine unworthy son (or daughter) kneeling down
upon the ground, with a true heart repent of my sins, and
pray thee the great God (Shang-te) our heavenly Father,
of thine infinite goodness and mercy, to forgive my former
ignorance and frequent transgressions of the Divine
commands ; earnestly beseeching Thee of thy great
favour, to pardon all my former sins, and enable me to
repent and l( ad a new life, so that my soul may ascend
to heaven. May I from henceforth sincerely repent and
forsake my evil ways, not worshipping corrupt spirits
(Shin) nor practising perverse things, but obeying Thy
divine commands. I also earnestly pray Thee, the great
God our heavenly Father, constantly to bestow on me
Thy Holy Spirit and change my wicked heart. Never
again allow me to be deceived by malignant demons ;
but perpetually regarding me with favour:for, ever deliver
me from the evil one. And every day bestowing on me
food and clothing, exempt me from calamity and woe,
granting me tranquility in the present world and the
enjoyment of endless happiness in heaven ; through the
merits of our Saviour and heavenly brother the Lord
Jesus, who redeemed us from sin. I also pray the great
God our Father who is in heaven, that His will may be
done on earth as it'is in heaven. That Thou wouldest
look down and grant this request, is my heart's sincere
desire."
In this extract from " the book of religious precepts
of the T'hae-ping-wang dynasty" we have a clear recog-
nition of the guilt of sin, the duty of repentance, the
atonement of Jesus Christ, the need of a new heart, and
the work of the Holy Spiri,, in renewing and purifying
the soul for heaven.
The Emperors of China have been remarkable for their
absurd claim of extravagant titles and relationships in
heaven. The rival Emperor declares that Wang (King)
and not Shing (Holy) nor Te (Emperor or Potentate)
belongs to him ; for the latter term belongs only to the
great Supreme Being (Shang-te) ;
" The great, He is God (Te). The monarchs of this
world may be called kings, and that is all." "The great
God (Shang Te), our heavenly Father and supremo
Lord, in omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent, the
Supreme over all. There is not an individual who is
not produced and cherished by Him. He is Shang
(Supreme). He is Te (Potentate). Besides the great
God (Shang-te) our heavenly Father and supreme Lord,
there is one who can be called Shang, and no one who
can be called Te. Therefore, from henceforth, all you
soldiers and officers may designate us your Lord, and
that is all. You must not call me Supreme, lest you
should encroach upon the designation of our heavenly
Father. Our heavenly Father is our holy Father, and
our celestial elder brother is our holy Lord the Saviour
of the world. Hence, our heavenly Father and our
celestial elder Brother alone are holy ; and from hence-
forth all you soldiers may designate us your Lord, and
that is all ; but you must not call me holy, lest you
encroach upon the designation of our heavenly Father
and celestial elder Brother."
In the plenitude of Imperial pride, the " Son of
Heaven" has from ancient times claimed alone as the
high priest of the nation the honour of making special
offerings to the One Supreme Being, and sacrificing at
the winter solstice at the round hillock. The chief of
the rival dynasty restores to the sons of Han their just
right, and gives to all the children of men equality in
the sight of God.
" Those whose minds have been deluded by the devil
object and say, that the great God is only to be wor-
shipped by sovereign princes. But we wish you to
know that the great God (Shange-te) is the universal
Father of all men throughout the world. Sovereigns
are those of his children whom He clothes with power,
but the good are those of his children who must re-
semble Him."
The national exclusiveness and pride of China has
hitherto debarred her from intercommunication with
foreign countries. On this point, again, we may per-
ceive the inculcation of sentiments, which, if prevailing
generally among this people, would speedily throw down
the barriers which have so long isolated them from
Christendom, and bring them into the great brotherhood
of Christian nations. Instead of terming foreigners
" barbarians," the pretender to the Imperial throne
enjoins his followers to recognise them as "brethren"
under the protection of the same true God.
"The great God is the universal Father of all men
throughout the world. China, which is near to us, is
overned and regulated by the same God ; foreign
nations, which are far awa__,
y are under the same rule.
Again—
" Foreign nations, though far removed, are protected
and cared for by the One great God ; and China, which
is so near, is under the same gracious care. There are
many men in the world, but they
are all our brethren ;
there are many women in the world, but they are all
our sisters."
The usual objection of the Chinese against Christianity
has been that it is the religion of foreigners. The in-
surgent edicts reply to this taunt by declaring that China
once acknowledged the ta
'3‘e of patriarchal tradition, and
that when the Chinese
"knew God, they glorified him,
not as God," nor " retained God in their knowledge."
(Romans i., 21-28.)
tg some also say, erroneously, that to worship the
great God (Shang-te) is to imitate foreigners ; not re-
membering that China has her histories, which are open
to investigation. From the time of Pwan-koo" (the first
man of whom the Chinese speak) "down to the period
of the three dynasties, both princes and people honoured
and. worshipped the great God (Shang-te).'
"The fact is, that according to the histories of both the
Chinese andforeien nations, the important duty of worship-
ping the great God, in the early ages of the world several
thousand years ago, was alike practised both by Chinese
I and foreigners. But the various foreign nations in the
west have practised this duty up to the present time,
I while the Chinese only practised it up to the Tsin and
Han dynasties ; since which time they have erroneously
followed the devil's ways, and allowed themselves to be
deceived by the sing of Hades. Now, however, the
great God, out of compassion to the children of men,
has displayed his great power and delivered men from
the machinations of the evil one, causing them to retrace
their steps, and again to practise the great duty which
I was performed of old.
But strange customs and superstitious rites have been
reported as observed by these imperfectly enlightened
men. Apparently borrowing the institution of She w-
bread from the Jewish tabernacle, or transferring to the
service of the true God their former Pagan modes of
honouring their false gods, they place triple offerings of
food before each of the Three Persons of the Trinity.
There occur in their published books statements of a per-
sonal communication with the Almighty, and claims of
a new and special revelation, which may render the fu-
ture course of their foreign missionary instructors one of
difficulty and danger. With all due abatements on ac-
count of the suspicious channel of hostile authorities
through which many of their excesses have been reported,
they nevertheless appear to pursue their Tartar oppres-
sors with all the sanguinary destruction which was
wreaked by the Israelites under Joshua of old, as the al)-
; pointed executioners of God's judicial wrath, upon the na-
tions of Canaan. The waters of the Yang-tze-kiang have

floated upon their bosom the scattered and drifted wreck of
thousands of broken idols. The temples have been demo-
lished, the emblems of superstition have been expelled, and
in cases ofresistance the priests have been put to the sword.
The first principles of civil and religious freedom and of
constitutional government have yet to be imbibed from
the same fountain source whence they gained their
knowledge of the more prominent truths of the Bible.
The national polygamy of China seems as yet to have
received no check; and like the Israelitish monarchs of
old, the insurgent chiefs appear to have a plurality of
wives. They make an external submission to Christi-
anity a condition of adherence to their cause ; and all
the evil consequences of such a compulsory profession
may be expected to prevail, in the hypocrisy or fanati-
cism of many among their multitude. The various styles
of writing observable in their books, and the extravagant
pretensions proclaimed in some of their edicts, lead to
the conclusion that probably two classes of Christian
professors are to be found in the movement—sincere en-
thusiasts, on the one hand, impelled by a conviction of
their divine mission to extirpate false religion from the
empire, and political adventurers, on the other hand,
less palpably under the influence of religious motives,
and willing to employ the arts of kingcraft or the pious
frauds of a middle-ago Christianity for overawing the
multitude and banishing treachery from the host. Many
facts, however, which have been ascertained respecting
them, exclude the supposition that such adherents as the
latter class form a general specimen of the religious
character of the insurgents. The lawless rabble of mem-
bers of the Triad Society—who have recently risen
against the local authorities and captured the cities of
Shanghae and Amoy, and whom we hase seen to be
addicted to the practice of idol worship and opium
smoking—are in no way to be confounded or identified
with the character and cause of Thae-ping-wang. They
have endeavoured to conciliate foreigners in this city by
hoisting the flag of T'hae-ping-wang, and by issuing a
copy of one of his religious proclamations. But it is a
mere device intended to excite foreign sympathy.
A recent visitor, an American medical missionary, relates
of the insurgent forces within the city ofChin-keang, that
among them the Sabbath was kept holy (although by an
astronomical error in their calendar, they kept as such
the seventh instead of the first day of the week)—public
religious services were regularly held—appointed offi-
cers, like Cromwell's generals of old, preached to the
troops—and the general signs of order, morality, and
decorum prevailed. At each dawn of day, the rebel
garrison assembled for prayer in the various military
guard-houses--and there, to the sound of native music,
they sang hymns, chants, and doxologies to the Trinity,
all kneeling devoutly in prayer to the Almighty. Could
we hope that even a small proportion of this vast mul-
titude operates as a leaven of religious sincerity, to give
a Christian character to the general mass, it would be a
spectacle partaking of the sublime, to witness tens of
thousands of native patriots banded together for a great
political and religious end ; and, where a little while ago
idolatry reigned uncontrolled, to hear doxologies of
praise and hymns of prayer ascending to the one true
God through the one Saviour of mankind.
Ere long the true character of this movement will be
o frompt on
bal cs sde rd vo inenwm. en It
an
atnh
de
amnetahnetni
tmi
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tw j e
de udge only
facts ;
and
such a mingled aspect leaves opposite impressions on
the mind—much that is hopeful combined with not a
little that is dubious and unsound. While there is much
that should render us indisposed to raise unduly the
hopes of the Christian Church at home—to sound the
notes of premature triumph—or to identify the continued
stability of Protestant missions with the fortunes of the
T'hae-ping dynasty, we may leave both sidesosaf the
picture—its lights and shadows—its bright colours and
its sombre hues—its hopeful features and its dangerous
aspects, to the careful, observing mind ; premising only
that it requires a more than human foresight —it be-
longs only to the secret counsels of Him whose over-
ruling providence will assuredly direct the result—to
know and to predict in which direction the religious
bearings of this question may terminate. The mere
political problem seems likely soon to be solved; and
the dynasty of the Manchow Tartars is apparently fall-
ing or fallen to rise no more.—The Record.

NAVAL INTELLIGENCE.

REAR-ADMIRAL CORRY'S SQUADRON.

A letter from Lisbon, dated the 28th December, says :
—"There has been an unfortunate affair here, of which I
will endeavour to give the leading particulars. On
Saturday (24th) the fleet, consisting of the Prince Re-
gent (flag), Duke of Wellington, St. Jean d'Acre, Im-
perieuse, Arrogant, Tribune, Desperate, Amphion,
Valorous, and Cruiser, started under sail alone for a
cruise, intending to go as far as Vigo. The wind was foul
and unsteady, and the tide ebbing. The St. Jean d'Acre
was outside, but, not being ready, was not to start at
the moment. Thinking herself in the way, she was
moving towards the south shorn to leave room for the
others. At this moment, with the tide and current
running like a mill-race (from the late heavy rains), the
wind failed ; the Cruiser missed her stays, and was only
saved by an anchor when within a hand's breadth of the
shore. The Desperate also missed stays, and was swept
down upon the St. Jean d'Acre in a moment, and im-
paled upon her bowsprit. I thought she would have
been turned over by the force of the tide under the St.
Jean d'Acre's stern. By great good fortune their
anchors held when they were close to the shore ;
these two and the Valorous got steam up, and,
with the Cruiser, at last extricated the un-
happy Desperate, with the loss of mainmast, and
all the superincumbent rigging, mizentop:nast, great in-
jury to topsides, upper deck beams, and various other
damages, but no harm done to the engine. ' While this
was going on the flag-ship nearly got on board one of the
frigates, lost an anchor (for which boats have been creep-
ing ever since), and got round only when her keel
touched (or did not, for it is a vigorously disputed point)
the ground. By this time the Duke of Wellington,
which works like a Cowes yacht, was well out, but the
Admiral made the recall and signalled to anchor, and the
cruise is deferred sine die. The Portuguese, as usual,
were most attentive in sending assistance and offering
the resources of their dockyards, but I doubt their find-
ing a spar, or the resources of the fleet being able to do
more than put the Desperate in a temporary state of
efficiency. A court of inquiry was held on board the
Duke of Wellington by the Commodore, Captains Wat-
son and Yelverton, and no blame was attached to any
one. Miraculously and mercifully, no one was killed.
A man fell from the mainyard of the Valorous, struck
the side, and fell overboard—killed ; he was buried on
shore. Next day (Christmas-day) a man fell down the
flag-ship's hatchway and was killed ; he was also buried
on shore. The Valorous and Desperate, being the last
manned, are the smartest ; the Duke of Wellington and
Imperieuse give promise of being in very good order.
The flag-ship has rather fallen off since she changed
her commander. The St. Jean d'Acre lost her jibboom
with other trifling damages, and has gone to-day on a
month's cruise by herself, at the end of which she will
call at Gibraltar for provisions and return here."

PORTSMOUTH, JAN. 3.

The Dauntless, 33, screw, Captain A. P. Ryder.—This
powerful screw frigate, " true to her name," went out of
harbour at 11 a.m., in the face of a gale of wind from
E.S.E., to prove her powers at the measured mile, hav-
ing Capt. the Hon. F. T. Pelham on board. It was
feared at first that, owing to the driving snow-storm it
would be utterly impossible to sight the marks at Stoke's
Bay. Keen eyes overcame this apparent difficulty, and
her runs were as follow :

With and against the Tide.
With ... ... 10.084 ~643
. Against ... . . ... 5.202 '
With and against the Tide.

With .11.285 ~,,7
Against ... 4.220 '
Thus showing that even with her old boilers, in the face
of a gale of wind, she is equal to nearly eight knots an
hour. We cou'cl have wished to have seen carried out
what we submitted many months since, that this power-
ful frigate should have new boilers to do her justice,
when we feel satisfied she would have accomplished 11.
However, patching up is the order of the day. The Daunt-
less's draft forward is 15 feet 10 inches, and aft, 17 feet
4 inches. Her steam would not enable her to go full
power.
First Step of Expansion.
Revolutions ... ... 29
Barometer ... 27
Steam ... 8 lb.

Fair Wind.

Revolutions ... ... 26
Barometer ... 27
Steam ... 8 lb.
Foul Wind.
No hot bearings. Very little priming.
Temperature.
Engine-room behind cylinder ... 68 deg.
Starting place ... 68 deg.
Stokehole forward ... ... 60 deg.
~ aft 64 deg.
The Dauntless returned into harbour at four p.m., with
every one on board drenched to the skin and glad to get
ashore.

The Conflict, 8, screw sloop, is ordered to sail to-mor-
row for Devonport, to join the steam reserve. Her
steam was got up to-day to try her engines.
Spithead has not been visible at any time during the
day, owing to a continuous fall of snow.
We are requested to state that the Medea, whose
narrow escape from total loss on the Lincolnshire coast
we lately described, was, at the time of her running
aground, in charge of the pilot, who will be brought to
a court-martial. The Medea is ordered round to Ports-
mouth to be docked.

PLYMOUTH, TUESDAY EVENING.
A very severe gale from east north east sprang up
last night, and has caused the total loss of two schooners
near Dawlish.
The Atalanta, of Exeter, coal-laden, was wrecked on
Exmouth Bar. Crew saved.
The Friends, of Exeter, with 110 tons of coal, from
Hartlepool, struck a sandbank called the Poles, and,
having sprung a leak, her master, Henry Dalley, with
the hope of saving the lives of the crew, ran her ashore
on a beach half-a-mile east of Dawlish about 7 o'clock
this morning, when the sea was very high and the tide
had two hours to rise. She lay about 40 yards from the