The Sun.
London, England, 1869-07-14 00:00:00

THE ABYSSIA lAN INQUIRY.

The select committee of the House of Commons
appointed to inquire into the causes of the large expendi-
ture in connection with the Abyssinian War continued its
sittings on Tuesday, Mr. Candlish in the chair. The other
members present were Sir Stafford Northcote, Sir John
ITay, Mr. Seely, Major Anson, Mr. White, Mr. Baxter,
Sir James Elphinstone, Colonel Barttelott, Captain Beau-
mont, and Sir Patrick O'Brien.
Mr. Turner, who was formerly a second-class clerk in
the Admiralty, stated that in Ncvember 1867 he was sent
out to Bombay to co-operate with the officers of the
Indian Government in arranging the accounts of the
Abyssinian expedition. The witness produced pertain
accounts, spewing the rates of payment of the transpoit-
ships and the price of coals. He stated that the coal sent
to Aden cost from £3 to £5 per ton, but in one
instance coal bought in Annesley Bay cost £l2. Before
he returned from Bombay in April last he had passed
accounts of a grcss charge of £7,460,006. The news of the
taking of Magdala reached Bombay about 12 days after that
event. No more stores were purchased subsequently. Witness
had no special instructions to prepare estimates, but he
(lid prepare some voluntarily. The first estimate he pre-
pared was on the 14th of July, 1868, and that was for the
amount of £5,350,531 up to the end of April. This
estimate was qualified by a footnote to the
effect that the transports were not being discharged so
rapidly as he had anticipated. There were at that time
150 transports in the service of the Government, for which
they were paying per month 2200,000. He sent home
some estimates because he believed that the Treasury
would require some information to guide them ; but he
could not call to mind now if he communicated this
officially, or in any other way, to the home
Government. Early in January 1868 he was
convinced that the cost of the expedition, so far
as India alone was concerned, would exceed five
millions. He mentioned this opinion in ordinary conver-
sation with the officials at Bombay, but made no official
or private communication with the view of influencing the
Government.

The Chairman : How do you account for the costs of
the expedition in India alone being as much as one
milieu and a half in excess of the 'estimate which you
made in July ?

The witness replied that the cost was much increased
by the transports being kept longer than was anticipated,
Still he considered that everything was done that could
he done to facilitate the discharge of the stores from the
transports at Bombay, but the south-west monsoon some-
times prevented boats being sent out for three days at a
time. The transports lying at that time at Bombay
contained stores of all sorts. He could not say that it
would have been wiser and cheaper to have abandoned the
stores in Annesley Bay ; for the transports were bound
by charter to return to Calcutta or Bombay to discharge.
Many of the stores had never been discharged at An-
nesley Bay. When £l2 per ton was given
for coals it was absolutely necessary to buy
them. The reporting of cases of extravagance
formed no part of his duty. Ills duty was really to
scrutinise the accounts, and some of them were very unsatis-
factory. The officers of the transport train seemed to have
no idea of accounts. The actual sum paid for the hire of
transports in India was R 2,701,097. There were also
charges for pilotage and other matters in addition.
The committee again adjourned.

EX-PRESIDENT JOHNSON'S OPINION OF PRESI-
DENT GRANT.—The correspondent of the New York Herald
lately had an interview with ex-President Johnson,
who expressed himself thus with regard to President
Grant :—" I know Grant thoroughly," said Mr.
Johnson ; " I had ample opportunity to study
him when was President, and I am convinced he is
the greatest farce that was ever thrust on a people. Why
the little fellow—excuse me for using the expression, but I
can't help pitying him—the little fellow has nothing in him.
He is mendacious, cunning, and treacherous. He hasn't a
single idea. He has no policy, no conception of what the
country requires. He lied to me flagrantly. He is nothing
more than a bundle of petty spites, jealousies, and resent-
ments ; an upstart, a mere accident of the war, a creature
without the ability to comprehend the philosophy of a single
great question. Physically and mentally and morally he is
a nonentity. His soul is so small that you could put it
into the periphery of a hazel nutshell, and it might float
about a thousand years without knocking against the walls
of the shell. That's the size of his soul. He is a mean,
avaricious, cunning, spiteful man, a complete bundle of
petty jealousies, spites, and lies. He has no courage"—
and so on through a column and a half of the Herald,
which informs us that the ex-President said a great
many other things spicy and intmOing, which me not
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