The Sun.
London, England, 1833-01-01 00:00:00

THE FUNDS.

This being New Year's Day, it is kept a strict holyday
at the Bank, Stock Exchange, and Foreign Markets, al-
though the jobbers and brokers are assembled at the house-
keeper's room, where they are transacting business.
Consols, which left off yesterday at 84 86 for Account,
have been done this morning at 86i. In Foreign Funds
nothing doing as yet.
We have no arrivals of the least importance. Great
anxiety prevails for information from Oporto.

HALF-PAST ONE.

A vessel has arrived from Vigo, left the 22d ult. She
brings a confirmation of the sortie made by the troops of
Don Pedro, on the 17th in the morning, to the number of
2,000 men ; when the accounts left they were busy at
Villa Nova shipping off the wine for Oporto ; it is also
stated, Miguel's troops are touch discontented, and the
militia are deserting to their homes; the lower part of
Oporto still experiences bombardment from the Miguelites.

ROYAL EXCHANGE.

Since the morning several brokers and jobbers are
assembled on the Exchange, and doing business in Con-
sols, which are at present 86k to for Account. In
Foreign Securities, Dutch Stock to the amount of four
hundred thousand has been sold. Still all Northern Se-
curities have improved.

THREE 0' CL 0 CK.
Consols for the Account, 861.

WONDERS OF PHILOSOPHY.—The polypus,
like the fabled hydra, receives new life from the knife
which is lifted to destroy it. The fly-spider lays an egg as
large as itself. There are four thousand and forty-one
muscles in a caterpillar. How discovered fourteen thou..
sand mirrors in the eye of a drone; and to effect the respi-
ration of a carp, thirteen thousand three hundred arteries,
vessels, veins, and bones, Lee., are necessary. The body
of every spider contains four little masses pierced with a
multitude of imperceptible holes, each hole permitting the
passage of a single thread; all the threads, to the amount
of a thousand to each mass, join together, when they
come out and make the single thread with which the
spider spins its web; so that what we call a spider's thread
consists of more than four thousand united. LENVENHOEK,
by means of microscopes, observed spiders no bigger than
a grain of sand, who spun threads so fine that it took four
thousand of them to equal in magnitude a single hair.
The following is a specimen of Irish logic :
" His landlady was what was termed a general dealer,'
and, among other things, sold bread and whisky. A cus-
tomer entered her shop and inquired if she had any thing
to eat and drink ? To be sure,' she replied, I have
got a thimble-full of the cratur, my darling, that comes
only to twopence ; and this big little loaf you may have for
the same money I' Both twopence ? Both the same, as I'm
a Christian woman, and worth double the sum.' Fill the
whisky, if you plase.' She did so, and he drank it; then
rejoined, It comes to twopence, my jewel; Fin not
hungry, take back the loaf,' tendering it. Yes, bony,
but what pays for the whisky?' Why the loaf to be
sure !" But you haven't paid for the loaf.' Why you
weuldn't have a man pay for a thing he hasn't eat ?' A
friend going by was called in by the landlady to decide the
difficulty, who gave it against her ; and, from deficiency
in her powers of calculation, she permitted the rogue to
escape."..-Bernard's Retrospections.

MAGAZINE DAY.

BLACKW O OD; S MA GAZIN.E.

The ability which has long distinguished this
stout champion of the Tories, has not deserted it
in this its hour of need, although certainly as
regards politics, it is tamer than has been its
wont at the close of a general election. Per-
haps the grand fire is to come next month,
and the articles before us are mere avant
couriers of what is to come. The first
bears the still taking title of the " Portu-
guese War," but is merely written for the
sake of the moral a t the end, which sets
forth the wickedness of Englishmen going to
fight on either side in Portugal, clearly showing
that it is only committing murder for two
shillings per day. We suspect we should have
heard very little of the wickedness of English-
men fighting in Portugal " on either side," if
they had not all happened to go to one side—
a fact, by the way, of itself, sufficient to dis-
prove the calumny of the gentlemen who have
gone out to assist Don PEDRO, being merely
influenced by love of lucre. Will Blackwood
venture to assert that Don Miguel could find
a hundred Englishmen with sufficient brazen
baseness to fight for any pay under the banners
of Miguel ? The thing himself does not ex-
pect it, or no doubt he would have been ready
enough to have bought their assistance. " Tom
Cringlc's Log" is continued in this number,
with as much ability as ever. There is a
magnificent description of a hurricane in the
West Indies, which its length only prevents us
from extracting. The Reverend writer of the
Ctsars has closed his romantic account of
Caligula, Claudius, and Nero, with an excellent
dissertation on the state of corruption prevailing
at Rome under the first Caesars. The only
other articles we can notice in any detail are
" Ireland No 1.," and the " Future Balance of
Parties." The first is an old song to an old
tune, " Persecute, persecute, persecute." It
is wonderful ; but Tories who are always re-
ferring to experience, and pretend to take their
lessons from it, never read the lessons it teaches
aright. See the conclusion arrived at in the
article upon Ireland :
" The result of experience, therefore, is complete in all
its parts. Thrice during the last two hundred years have
conciliatory measures been tried on the largest scale, and
with the most beneficent intention ; and thrice have the
concessions to the Catholics been followed by a violent and
intoleralh: outbreak of savage ferocity. The two first re-
bellions were followed by a firm and severe system of
coercive government; as long as they continued in force,
Ireland was comparatively tranquil, and their relaxation
was the signal for the commencement of a state of insubor-
dination which rapidly led to anarchy and revolt. The
present revolutionary spirit has been met by a different
system. Every thing has been conceded to the dema-
gogues ; their demands have been granted, their assemblies
allowed, their advice followed, their leaders promoted ;
and the country in conseqence has arrived at a state o:
anarchy unparalleled in any Christian state."

Good God ! what tranquillity is here praised i
The tranquillity of death ; the tranquillity that

results, not from good government, but from the
extreme of oppression. If concession does not

now produce its proper effect; if the offer of jus-
tice does not produce respect for the laws, it is
because they come too late ;that they are distrusted.
We must still do what is right, for the sake of

right, and any coercive measures afterwards,
should they be necessary, which, God forbid,
will but be the more justifiable. The " Fu-

ture Balance of Parties" is a kind of pat
on the back to the good young men who
have stood forward as Conservative candidates in
different parts of the country, only to be beaten.
It praises them, forsooth, for not running away
from their colours and country, as the French

Nobles did after the French revolution had

made some progress, as if the cases were at

all parallel.

We can easily foresee the

triumphant tone which will be adopted by
,he Tories, when they find in a year or
that all the calamities they have

prophesied from the Reform Bill have not

ensued. The cry will be, "It has been our
patriotism, talent, and courage which has saved
the State ; we have acted as a drag on the
wheels of revolution, and saved from convulsion

and bloodshed the infatuated multitude which

urged it on." Be it so ; there is no utility in
arguing with savages, that it is not their beating
a brass pan which prevents the world from being
destroyed by an eclipse, for behold, is not the

world preserved ? The conclusion is un-

answerable.