The Sun.
London, England, 1869-02-24 00:00:00

THE GOVERNMEIiT OF THE METROPOLIS.

Mr. BRUCE, in reply to Mr. C. Bentinck, said it was
not the intention of the Government to deal with so large
a subject as the local management of the metropolisduring
the present session.
THE CATTLE PLAGUE.

Sir J. ELPIIINSTONE inquired whether it was true
that there had been a fresh outbreak of cattle plague in
Germany.

Mr. FOSTER said the Government bad no intimation
to that effect, nor had they reason to believe it. (Hear,
hear.) Immediately after the notice was given last night
telegraphic communications at once took place to several
places in Germany, and he had received an answer from
the Hague which stated that no fresh outbreak had taken
place, and the circumstances that had given rise to the
rumour, no doubt was the steps that were being taken to
overcome the diseases which it was known existed in

" TIIE WILL 0' THE WISP."
Mr. HARDCASTLE inquired if it was true the Admi-
ralty subscription had been withdrawn from the paper
above mentioned ?
Mr. CHILDERS said he found that formerly ninety-
six copies each of Judy and the Will 0' the Wisp
had been take' for the use of the fleet,
nrat on the 14th of December an order was given discon-
tinuing the latter. • Ten days after the present Govern-
ment took office, and then it was for the first time that
he (the First Lord of the Admiralty) had stopped
the paper. (Laughter.) He believed the reason
given for recommending in the first instance the
order for the gaper being given was that it was likely to
exercise a beneficial influence over the crews of her Ma-
jesty's ships. (Laughter.) lie did not wish to hurt any-
body's feelings, and therefore he would not say why the
paper was stopped. (Laughter.)
THE FENIAN PRISONERS.
Mr. C. FORTESCUE said he could not say that
it was intended to give a free passage back to the Fenian
prisoners whom it had been determined to pardon, and
who were at present in Australia, that would depend en-
tirely depend upon circumstances.
ARREST FOR DEBT.

In reply to a question,
Mr. BRUCE said ho believed the arrest of the girl for
debt, which had been referred to in that house, had been
made unrler a mistake as to her age. He had, however,
made some inquiry on the subject, and he found that a
person under the ago of 13 could be arrested for debt, and
that persons could be outlawed under 12 years of age if
they were females. (Laughter.)
VACATING SEATS.

Viscount BURY moved for leave to introduce a bill
to repeal section 26 of the Gth of Queen Anne, chap. 7,
relating to the re-election of members accepting office
under the crown.
A discussion ensued, in which Mr. V.lTAlicounT opposed
the motion on the ground that to repeal the act would ba
to remove ono of the protections against parliamentary
intrigues, and ➢ir. GLADSTONE recommended the noble
lord to withdraw the motion.

The noble lord accepted the recommendation of the
right hon. gentleman and withdrew his motion.
Sir M. LOPES moved an address to the Queen that she
would be graciously pleased to issue a Royal Commission
to inquire into the present amount, incidence, and effect of
local taxation, with a view to a more equitable readjust-
ment of these burdens.

Mr. GOSOHEN objected to the proposal to appoint a
Royal Commission.

Mr. GLADSTONE also objected to the proposal, and
contended that there was no precedent for inquiring into
the incidence of local taxation by Royal Commission.

The motion was withdrawn.

The SOLICITOR-GENERAL was accorded permission
to bring in a measure to repeal certain tests and alter cer-
tain statutes affecting the constitution of the Universities
of Oxford and Cambridge.
The remaining business was rapidly disposed of, and
the house adjourned.

BRITISH EMIGRATION TO AMERICA.

No. VII.—KANSAS.
(Front the Anglo-American Times)

Kansas made history before a single settler was
located on its soil ; the battle with the Indian of
those forcing their way to Sante Fe, to Utah, and
to San Francisco—lands then so wholly unknown
to the world as to be styled the great American
desert—being but the prelude of the fight between
the slaveholder and the Free-soiler, which in it-
self was but the prelude to the great civil war.
From 1851, when the towns of Atchison and Lea-
venworth were founded till the entrance into the
Union of Kansas as a State, Jan. 29, 1861, it was
the scene of a ceaseless struggle. Actions were
fought on a small scale as during the rebellion on
a large ; towns were captured, prisoners made and
men executed, as if Missouri and the Kansas set-
tlers from New England had declared war, and
were engaged in a recognized strife. From these
events the State derived its prefix of " Bleeding,"
and it was amidst such scenes that John Brown
imbibed the fanaticism which eventually bore such
fatal fruits for him at Harper's Ferry. He had
captured in a fair fight Captain Clay Pate's com-
mand, horse, foot, and baggage, with all the spoils
of the Free-soil city of Palmyra, just plun-
dered by the Virginian leader, and perhaps Brown
could not appreciate the sin of seizing on a Southern
, arsenal in the Free-soil interest, when be had lately
seen the settlements of Kansas remorselessly plun-
dered and burnt by the slaveholders. The area of
over 52,000,000 acres occupies the western slope
of the Missouri Valley, half way up the Eastern
Cordilleras, and stands at a considerable elevation.
1t is the most perfect Prairie State of the Union,
being emphatically the land of the buffalo. In the
old maps it was represented by a buffalo, Nebraska
by an antelope, a bear for Utah, and a beaver for
lowa. It stretches from east to west from 344 to
408 miles, the irregularity being due to the course
of the Missouri, its eastern boundary, but its breadth
is uniform, 208 miles; Nebraska runs to the North,
the Indian Territory to the South, and Colorado
to the West. The whole is undulating, without
mountains or swamp, for it is so perfectly drained
that there is not a pond, the country rising from the
Missouri to the Rocky Mountains in a series of
ascending billows of easy, graceful, but enormous
sweep. The Eastern half is well wooded with
sycamore, ash, oak, hickory, walnut, hackberry,
sugar-maple, sumac, and willow, equal to any home
demand, but insufficient for the export of lumber.
The extreme western portion forms part of a sterile
belt running from the 47th parallel to New Mexico,
but between that and the more timbered East the
prairies are beautifully grassed and flowered, more
level, the undulations being more gradual. The land
is well irrigated, fine rivers flowing to the Missouri
or emptying into the Kansas. As the woods line
the streams some of the valleys are pictures of
beauty, with tall, graceful trees, and springs of pure
cold water gushing from the rocks. The bluffs ap-
pear like terraces, the one rising over the other
as if formed by the hand of man, attaining in
places to summits which, seen from a distance, look
like rising grounds crowned with forts. The soil is
everywhere of a rich heavy loam, divided into two
classes, the one the alluvial of the rivers and strips
of timber, often four to six feet in depth, of which
there are 10,000,000 acres, but for growing wheat
the other; the upland orrolling prairies are preferred.
There the soil averages two to three feet, with a sub-
soil of stiff clay, in localities mixed with gravel, lime
being an ingredient everywhere. The subterranean
stores of moisture are remarkable, producing abun-
dant and unfailing springs, and wells with a copious
supply of pure water, never deeper than 40 feet.
The climate is temperate and healthful, the air
being clear, dry, with gentle and healthful breezes.
So pure is the atmosphere that distant objects are
seen with th' wonderful distinctness peculiar to the
wide territory westward of the Missouri. Spring
commences in February ; the winters are mild,
though snow covers the ground, yet the cattle feed
in the prairies and river bottoms. The grass is very
luxuriant and nutritious, growing in the ravines from
four to six feet, and yielding even on the parched
' prairies two tons of hay per acre. Sixty to eighty
bushels of oats, thirty-five to forty-five of wheat,
were the average crops of 1866, but abundant in grain
, growing as is the power of the soil, away to the
West there is a dreaded scourge. In seasons the land
lis devastated by grasshoppers and locusts, a plague
which may disappear before cultivation. In 1860
the chief staples were Indian corn, hay, and
potatoes ; the horses had increased in seven
years since that census from 18,882 to 150,000;
mules, from 1,430 to 10,000 ; cattle, from 87,000
to 1,000,000; and sheep from 15,000 to 100,000 ;
the value of live stock having advanced from
$3,205,522 to $40,300,000. All other agricultural
product had risen in like proportion, and fruit and
garden crops even in a greater degree, the soil and
climate developing a capacity for such products, the
dry atmosphere imparting to the fruits juices of the
fines; flavour. Among the advantages which so
adapt Kansas for stock rearing are the salt springs
abounding above Fort Riley, in the valleys of the
Republican, Solomon, and the Saline Forks. Into
these rivers salt is thrown in such quantities as to
affect the water, rendering it healthful and agree-
able to the flocks and herds, and as the climate is
mild and equable, Kansas will become with Texas
the greatest of the live-stock rearing States. indeed
Nature has clearly indicated this, as the Smoky Hill
country is the home, if not the paradise of the buf-
falo. "In lines, in companies, in droves, in armies,"
said Hepworth Dixon when crossing this State,
" the black and shaggy beasts go thundering in our
front, sometimes from north to south, sometimes
from south to north, but always scudding in our
front and always across our line of march. The
plains are teaming with life, most of all with buf-
falo, balls and cows. For forty hours we have now
always had them iu our sight—thousands on thou-
sands, tens of thousands after tens of thousands, a
countless host of untamed animals, all of them
fit for human food." This is undeniable proof of
what we assert, and is the reason why the Indians
have, made their last great stand here to save the
hunting grounds they value so much. Coal covers
an extensive region, the upper stratum cropping out
in the eastern and middle counties. Veins have been
worked, and the quality is found to be superior, the
supply abundant. Inexhaustible beds of gypsum, and
inferior iron ore have been discovered, as well as pla-
tinum, sand rock, lime rock, and fine magnesian lime-
stone of beautiful colour. The manufactures in 1860
were represented by 334 establishments, with a
capital of $1,084,935, working raw materials to the
value of $1,444,975, at a cost of $880,346, yielding
1 $4,357,408, leaving a profit of $2,032,087, just 187
per cent. on the capital ! With such inducements
to manufacturers it will be readily believed that in-
dustrial interests since 1860 have rapidly increased.
Leavenworth, on the right bank of the Missouri, is
the largest town, containing over 40,000 inhabitants;
Lawrence, about 45 miles up the Kansas, is a beau-
tiful city, beautifully situated, of some 15,000 in-
habitants. It was founded by the Free-soilers in 1854,
' and soon the hundred Yankees were attacked by the
sons of the South. But they held their settlement
through all vicissitudes, and it is now a charming
place, with the cleanliness, brightness, and order of
a New England town. Atchison, called after a
Senator of Missouri, has a population of 12,000, and
is the principal station for the trade to Salt Lake
City, California, and Santa Fe. Fort Scott has
some three or four thousand, and Topeka, the State
capital, on the right bank of Kansas, 25 miles above
Lawrence, contains about 5,000 inhabitants.

We have taken this S; ate as the centre of the
Union ; indeed some writers affirm that Fort Riley
or Junction City will one day be the capital of the
United States, so completely is that the central point
of the Continent. Kansas City is in lat. 39, long.
94 35 ; to New York the distance by one route is
1,357, but another 1,389, and via Chicago and

New York State 1,470. To Philadelphia the
shortest way givcs 1,282 miles. Galveston is, hose
ever, the nearest seaport, the road being almost due
south, through a country of unsurpassed fertility
and beauty 600 miles. A railroad is projected, and
for a short distance finished to connect the port,
with this State, and another is now being discussed
in Congress to run the Union Pacific Kansas line
from Pond Creek Station by Albuquerque, crossing
the Colorado river at Arizona City, where it almost
touches the head of the Gulf of California on its way
to San Jose, a Californian port on the Pacific. An();
ther proposal is to cross Arizona into California abut
the parallel of Albuquerque, not far from Santa Fe'
crossing the Colorado at Fort Mohave, maintaining
the 35th parallel. The eastern division of the Union
Pacific was commenced in 1863, and early last year
there were about 350 miles completed. The advav
tages this southern road would have over the Union
Pacific from Omaha are a milder climate, a ni°re
fertile and practicable country. Much of the region
through which the trunk line to the Pacific pcs
abs'
is sterile to the last degree, and perhaps liable to
be interrupted by snow-drifts, while the land
through which the other will pass is rich 1°
soil and minerals, and the climate equable'
Till lately, Kansas was afflicted with a ter:
rible scourge—the Indians of the Plains. The Silt
and the Solomon valleys were the scenes of the la"'
outrages, which have now cost those tribes so ,dear‘
Never before were the Indians pursued through
;
a winter campaign, although it is at this seasn
only that they furnish points for attack. At otber
times the prairie feeds their cattle, and the buffalo
o
furnishes their larder. But they are compelled 10
store as a provision for winter when these resource,
are not open ; and the war now waged was directed
against their supplies with so crushing an effect 6.0
we will probably hear little of Indian depredationslo
the future. The seasons are peculiar, the wince f
being dry, rain beginning towards the latter part o
March and continuing into June, falling in 10.0"
showers, a drizzling day being unknown in Kansas'
At midsummer the sun is powerful, but the drhJ'
0
clear heat is mitigated by constant breezes, and t 0
weather is bright, warm, and dry till the rain agt
begins, though in the months of January, Februarys
and part of March the winds are often hie,
cold sharp and severe, more especially duriqeit
"norther." In 1860 a drought was severely
110,
by the farmers, but there has since been no rec,
rence of such a season. The most fertile traci:o
the Neosho Valley, the largest is that of I',bo
Kansas. Junction City is so situated as to ben
°'
e'',,
by both these lovely territories, as it commas
the more extensive valley of the RePublier
river, being at the end of the one and the e°,.e,
mencement of the other. In the State of Kansas
oshovalleyextends about 200 miles, with a consider,
breadth, Humboldt, 100 miles south of
rence, being its chief town, which is now flouro,ls
ins, though early burnt during the late war. tot
Valley is held by good judges to be the
wheat laud in the United States. In 1866 M foe, r: of
not far from Fort Riley, stored 820 bushels et
wheat, the produce of 16 acres, and another f3rio
in the mine valley took 1,600 bushels from 40 s'eres,
.
This productiveness is attributable to the wasiogs
ntho
of the immense deposits of gypsum existing at.ep
head waters of the stream. There is au ogrl c
tbe
tural college as well as a university in Kansas'itil
first session of the latter being held in 1866. r
a handsome stone building on an eminence °c eol
cb
looking the beautiful city of Lawrence. The 6 here
system is good, and in addition to free schoollitgo,
are three academies and institutes, nine cn'
6e tbe
with other seminaries. At the close of 186 a 70,
State liabilities were $660,896, resources sss' .00
leaving a deficit of $104,182. But there were cl°lthe
likely to be allowed for property destroyed 17; to
Confederate General Price in 1864, amonntlijo IS
half a million. The eastern portion of ICallitecl
a favourite field for settlement in the u rest
States. In 1866 immigration received a g
eas
impetus, and the fine valleys to which sce, est
alluded are now rapidly filling. In one 01 00
early articles on British emigration we alluded to
large colony of Swedes from Illinois, NO° 04
bought a tract in Kansas, on which to settleoi.
spring. The reason may not be obvious why f
lies should leave a rich and advanced State like 00
nois to settle in a new country, but it is the s de•
in the States as in England, only in a much 1055 the
gree. The Swedes could get for a very small 611ra all
choicest land of Kansas, on which they ccinvisol°
settle in a body, while the choicest land of
ettle,
is already occupied, a few years in priority ofssesci
inept, making all the difference. The he
gives the State a water communication Nyith t Cilia'
sea ; numerous lines of railway connect 1, cool'
the Atlantic ports ; it will soon have a directoo
munication of its own with the Pacific, and j°' nod
Union Pacific line by a branch of the r°3claiscl'
forming to Denver, and it has the geographic
vantage of being the centre of the Union' ant
have selected these States to describe, not fro foto
predilection for them, but simply because thelwest'
the most northern, most southern, most eastern' s itS
ern, and central States of the Republic. --acli w
thirty
•
marked characteristics ; and we would find
tor
be the case if we went through the whole cliO'
seven. It but remains for us now, however,
el
tiod lot
cuss the most eastern of the Union as a fi