The Sun.
London, England, 1840-12-18 00:00:00

POST-OFFICE.

(From the Bombay Times.)
We are sorry to learn that the London Ng-office
has refused to furnish stamped covers for pre-paid India
letters ; and we confess we feel both astonished and disap-
pointed that any obstruction or delay should, of all
quarters in the world, have come from the authorities at
head-quarters at home. At present letters of half an
ounce and under, sent to or from England via South-
ampton, bear a postage of is., and letters sent,
via Marseilles of ,sluarter of an ounce and under, 2s. Gd.
the postages, in all cases, whether of transmission or re-
ceipt, being payable in England. This is in all cases of
letters sent from India a very irksome and annoying bu-
siness, from which no earthly advantage to any one but to
the lovers of antiquated form is derived ; and which not
only occasions numerous complaints from those at home
receiving letters, in whose contents they hardly feel
themselves interested to the extent of the postage charge
incurred, but cause numberless others to be kept back
altogether for fear of this ; while others are smuggled
by private parties, or sent round the Cape to the injury
of the Post Office to the extent of the revenue witheld
for them. In fact, the very same arguments used at
home for the pre-paid Stamp Cover System holds, but
holds with ten-told effect, in India. And all that we
desire is to have some half dozen of our leading Post
Offices, and of these only, supplied with Is. and
2s. Gd, Stamps for the Southampton and Mar-
seilles routes to satisfy all our requirements. The
Post Masters here arc entitled to no requital
or remuneration for the distribution of Stamp
Covers, as this would occasion scarcely any
additional trouble to them. In India there is no chance
of forgery, and a few ehousands could be scut out by the
London Post-dice from time to time, and the sales ac-
counted for and paid over half-yearly or quarterly. We
repeat, as stated above, that there must have been some
misapprehension on this subject, and an antiquated form
substituted for a reason, as a ground for the refusal of
our application for pre-payment Stamp Covers. This is
a matter of too much importance to the public of Eng-
land, as well as of India, to be overlooked, and as it is
not here that we can look for a remedy to so irrational
and useless au annoyance as that which the present sys-
tem entails upon us, we trust to have the matter agi-
tated before the community at home.

The chronometer which was in the Bounty at the
time of the mutiny, has at length been discovered, and
given up to Captain Herbert of her Mejesty'sship Calliope.
A few particulars relative thereto will, we are assured, be
not without its interest to our nautical friends. The chro-
nometer, marked Sarcum Keudal, London, A D. 1771,
fell into the hands of a Captain of an American, who
touched at Pitcairn's Wand, shortly after the mutiueers
had settled themselves there. It was stolen from the
American Captain on the ship's passage from Juan Fer-
nandez to Valparaiso ; and next made its appearance at
Conception, where it was purchased for three doubloons by
an old Spaniard of the name of Castillo, who kept it in his
possession till his death, which happened lately at Santi-
ago, when his family sent it to Captain Herbert to be con-
veyed to the British Museum : it appears, on being taken
to be repelled by Mr. Monet, of Valparaiso, that it was
in a complete state of preservation without the least
mark of wear in any part of it. The escapement palates
are rubies fixed to the verge of the balance by screw collets
—Mr. Monet speaks in high terms of the beauty of the
workmanship. The chronometer is five inches in diameter,
with three dials on its face, ono for hours, one for minutes,
and one for seconds; with an outer silver case, made as
the outer cases of pocket watches were sixty or seventy
years ago, so that its appearance is of a gigantic watch. In
winding it up, it was usual to pass the left arm through the
opening for the face in the upper valve of the outer case,
in the manner of placing the outer case of a pocket watch
on the left thumb when winding. A Chilian gentleman
coming in one day, and seeing the case thus suspended,
exclaimed" Que cosa para freer Huevos." It is now on board
the Calliope, and will, in all probability, return to the place
of its construction after an absence of so many years, and,
that too, without having circumnavigated the earth by only
the very small quantity of longitude beteen the most meri-
dian, reached by the Bounty in endeavouring to double
Cape Horn, and that of Santiago, the most eastern meridian
the chronometer reached in Cbili.—Dcvonport Telegraph.
FESTIVITIES AT MIDDLETON PAIIK.—The
e scat
oJersey
gavepast
Earl and Countess of Jersey have entertained Lord and
Lady Lyndhurst and the lion. Miss Copley, Sir Robert
and Lady Wilson, Hon. Henry and Miss Picrrcpoint, and
awedeisk.
attingouinsheFdrdeairyelnei,glit last the
Countessv
during
the above
a splendid soiree dansante to above 150 of the leading no-
billty and gentry of the neighbourhood.

THE WEATHER.—The thaw to which we al-
luded yesterday was, towards the afternoon, succeeded by
frost. At two o'clock the mercury bad gone down to 22
degrees, and at three o'clock it stood at 12 degrees below
the freezing point. The Serpentine does not bear yet,
and here, as well as in St. James's Park, the Humane So-
ciety's men are usefully employed in preventing the fool-
hardy from venturing on the ice. The pond in Kensing-
ton-gardens bears, but the snow renders skaiting there but
a sorry amusement. More snow fell last night in the me-
tropolis. The fall in the eastern districts, and particularly
in the higher
parts of Essex, has been very considerable,
in !nasty places having entirely put a stop to travelling.
The accumulation of snow-drifts has been great in the high
Forest, and betwixt Chelms-
roads leading through Epping
ford and Colchester. Nearer town there have been indi-
cations of a very sevete winter, and large flocks of wood-
cocks, with sums wild ducks, and a few wild geese, were
seen on Wednesday in the Hackney-marshes, and on the
Ezsex boundary of the river Lea. The sudden setting-
in of the severe weather produced a great alteration in the
supply of the vegetable markets yesterday. Every de_
seription of greens • d
was :mite in supply, and increased in
price, and there was a general rise in potatoes of 10s. per too,
The weather has been favourable to the cattle markets. and
' most of the prize beasts of the late show are now orna•
' meeting the fronts of the butchers shops, in the different
districts of the metropolis.
FRENCH CRIME.—We stated at the time that
on the 7th ult., a man, named Virioa, had barbarously
murdered an aged lady, named Touraille, and her servant,
I at Mirecourt, in the Vosges, because she would net lot
him off the payment of a small sum for which he was her
- debtor. The criminal has just been tried by the Cottrt of
Assizes at Epinal, and condemned to death.