The Sun.
London, England, 1860-02-13 00:00:00

AMERICA.

THE ,ITALIANt QUESTION:-
. ..
corresponcleite, of the gr'picl; writing
frovo,Ppris on the loth says :---- , .

"I am assured that Prince Metternich has this
day handed to M. Thouvenel the reply bf Count
Rechberg to theyreneh note of the 30th of Jan. ;
the reply is said to -be of no less extent than M.
Thouvenel's despatch. Count Rechberg, calmly
disousties, , article after article, the propositions
of England; .exposesi.that the principle of ncin-
intervention is violated by Piedmont in the
States of Central Italy; while, taking into.ao-
count the attempts made the French Gyvern-

.uol.)11

.Lit

QUEENSTOWN, SUNDAY.
The Royal Mail steam-ship Europa nrrived here
at 11 a.m., embarked mails, and proceeded at 6.30
p.m. for Halifax and Boston. All well.

The Royal Mail i,team-ship Africa, Capt. Shan-
non, with New York mails of the Ist of February
passed here at 2.30 p.m. to-day.

WEST COAST OF AFRICA.

LIVERPOOL, FEB. 11.
The screw steamer Cleopatra, Croft commander,
has arrived from the West Coast of Africa, &c.,
with the usual mails, 10 passengers, including
Commissary-General audet, 3,000 ounces of gold
dust, and a small cargo.
The screw steamer Armenian, hence, had arrived
at Cape Palmas, and the screw steamer Ethiope,
hence, at Madeira on the Ist of January, and left
the same evening for Teneriffe.
Her Majesty's ships Medusa and Buffalo were at
Lagos.
At Cameroons the river was healthy, but trade
dull.

The advices are of the most meagre description.
The African and Sierra Leone Weekly Adver-
tiser reports a religious revival in that colony, and
that vast numbers of people flocked to the house of
God twice every day.
The Vice-Admiralty Court at Sierra Leone had
condemned the brigantine El Rosarito, which had
been detained by her Majesty's screw steamer Arro-
gant, when near the line on her way to Ascension.
She is said to be a fine craft.

Lieut. A. C. Adams, of the Arrogant, died at
Sierra Leone on the 16th of January.
The Spanish screw steamer Palino, the first of a
monthly line of mail steamers from Cadiz, had ar-
rived at Fernando Po on the Ist of January.
Her Majesty's ship Plu to had captured on the
south coast the barque Orion, with between 500
and 600 slaves on board.

The palm oil trade on the rivers was steady, but
at Old Calabar a civil war between the Duke Town
and Creek Town people was feared.
The purser reports the gold trade as being very
dull.
The palm oil season had not commenced, but it
was expected to be a fair one.
Thu people in Cape Coast had been fighting
among themselves ; 15 were killed and 40 wounded.
The ringleader had been sent on board a man-of-
war to bo taken to Quittan as a prisoner for two
years. Some of the natives were very indignant,
and threatened to break out again.
In the interior of the Fantee country a district
called Abrah was again in a disturbed state, the
people of a town called Doonquah having expressed
their determination no longer to submit to the
Otoo King of the district.

The fine imposed on the Crabboes of 20,000 pots of
palm oil (the pot of nine gallons) had not been paid.
Crabboe is in the district of the Gold Coast settle.
ment. The fine was imposed by the British Go-
vernment on the Crabboes in November, 1858, to
pay the expenses of an expedition undertaken by
the Government against the Crabboes to enforce
obedience.

A movement was on foot to cultivate cotton.
Six bales had been shipped at Accra for England.
The chiefs of Accra were imprisoned on the 10th of
January for not having paid the amount of the in-
demnity decreed for the ravage made by the mob at
Accra on the French factory in that town in
January, 1868.

SHIPPING INTELLIGENCE.
Fernando Po.—The American gunboat Sumpter and the
French steamer Renaudin.

Cameroons.—Tho ships Montezuma and Elizabeth Emily.
Old Calabar.—Tho ships Rhodorick Dhu, Africa, and
Clan Grogor.

Bonny-.--The Mississippi, the Mary, the Woodman, and
the Fanny.
Grand Bonny.—The Pomona, the Mary Black, and the
Empress; and tho steamers Rainbow and Fideliter. The
Elizabeth had left for this port on the 28th of December.
Sierra Leone.—The William Bonham.

THE SUSPENSE OF .EUROPE ON TILE
QUESTIOX.

The following is M. Peyrat's article in the Presse,
for which that journal has received the warning
spoken of by our Paris correspondent :
The anxieties increase. Europe is experiencing
anew that vague disquiet which precedes political
crises ; already the Italian journals, especially the
Opi,nione, the semi-official paper of Turin, are pub-
lishing articles entitled " Probabilities of War."
Since the Ist of January, 1859, the public mind has
experienced such startling surprises, and undergone
such violent shocks, that it is instinctively led to
see a storm in the smallest cloud which appears on
the horizon. Now, it is evident it may be said
without metaphor that the aspect of the political
sky is not over and above reassuring. Europe, cer-
tainly, is•not in the position in which she found
herself a year ago, when Lord Cowley was going
to Vienna to try and make Austria listen to reason,
and Russia was cutting short partial negotiations,
by proposing the meeting of a congress. However,
after having read what was said on Tuesday in the
English Parliament, we must certainly acknow-
ledge that the differences between the Cabinets are
not less serious at this day than in the month of
April last, and that the complications which led to
the war in very great measure survive it.
There is even in the language of: public men and
free writers a sharpness, and, above all, an impa-
tience, very significant, which was not to be found
in it a year ago. In some way or other everybody
would have done with it ; and it seems that a mis-
chievous genius hovers over governments and
peoples to baffle all combinations and upset all cal-
culations. Before and since the war ten solutions
have been glanced at, proposed, accepted, and at
the. last moment all have vanished like phantoms.
There is not a party which has not been vainly
irritated and rejoiced, whose fears and hopes the
events of a few days afterwards have not deceived,
which has not had its day of enthusiasm and of
discouragement ; at this moment we do not know a
single one which. is completely satisfied.
This is a violent state of things, and one which
weighs on men's business as well as on their minds.
Lassitude is general, and stronger still than
anxiety. What caused passion a year ago to-day
only causes oppression. In the month of February,
1859, Europe had a fever ; in the month of Feb.,
1860, she has the vapours. She can do nothing bat
ponder on the questions of the day, and it is impos-
sible for her to think two days alike on the same
subject. After the interview of Villafranca she
was justified in believing that the two Emperors
had re-established between a couple of shakes of the
hand the alliance of Austria and France, by ruining
the hopes of the Italians and raising those of the
Archdukes. She knows now that the rights of the
Archdukes, formally recognised at Villafranca and
only reserved at Zurich, are altogether abandoned,
and that the relations between the Cabinets of
Vienna and Paris arc no better to-day than at the
moment when the famous epeech was addressed to
M. de Hubner.

After the letter of the Emperor of the French to
M. Fould, she thought that all difference with re-
gard to essential questions had ceased between
France and England, and that by the treaty of
commerce the alliance was established on inde-
structible bases. What can she think of it after
,the debates iu the House of Lords, especially when
she reflects that these violent recriminations and
this explosion of dissatisfaction took place on the
occasion of a secondary question, and one which
was not even officially brought forward.
And what is more remarkable is the fact that
the hubbub created by this question of Nice and
Savoy is no less great in Italy than in England.
In their language the Italians are more reticent
than the English, for which they have excellent
reasons, but in the main their sentiments are the
same. We are wrong, for the rest, to speak of the
question of Nice. For the Italians there is no
queatign of Nice; on this point they do not admit
that there, is any subject-matter for discussion. As
for Savoy, they are less absolute and less unani-
mous but the zerni.official press has come
forward very wildly in asserting that
the immense majority of the 'Savoyards de-
manded their annexation to France, and especially
by treating as insurgents those who recently
made a demonstration of loyal attachment to the
house of Savoy. Not only has this majority exhi-
bited itself nowhere, but tale separatist party is
losing ground every day. We see that it is repudi-
atedby- the most important acd influential men of
Savoy, men such as Fessiny, de Sonnaz, de Fa-
verges, de Savoireux, de Rolland, de Forax, do
Quincy! 4111i2t Saint-Oerguea, d'Arvillard, de
I -