The Sun.
London, England, 1869-06-05 00:00:00

AFFAIRS IN NEW ZEALAND.

At the opening of the Wellington Provincial Council,
on March 18, the Superintendent, Dr. Featherston, made
a speech on the native rebellion. He expressed the opinion
that never before had the colony been placed in such a
critical position. " Without discussing the wisdom of
ttse policy of confiscation adopted in 1863, or whether it
would not have been infinitely more prudent to have
substituted for it the principle of cession, it will be
admitted that confiscation necessarily implied the power
to hold and occupy the lands. IHas the colony ever had, or
has it now, this power ? No sooner had it adopted a
policy which could only be carried out and maintained
by force, and long before the confiscated lands were fully
occupied and settled, than it insists upon the Imperial
Government withdrawing all its troops by whom these
lands had been conquered without making any provision
to supply their place, or rather in the full knowledge that
the troops could not and would not be replaced by any
adequate local force. The colony challenges a large portion
of the native race, almost invites them into rebellion,
and at the same time disarms itself— strips itself of all
means of defence—places itself at the mercy of a half-
civilised people, keenly smarting under the loss of their
lands. The course thus pursued appears still more unin-
telligible when it is remembered that the colony might have
retained for an indefinite period three or four thousand
troops, whose very presence would in all probability have pre-
vented any fresh outbreak, at an infinitelyless expense than
the present colonial force costs. My own opinion is, that if
this island is to be rescued from almost utter destruction,
there must be an almost entire reversal of the past policy,
and an immediate application for the Imperial troops
on the terms offered by the Imperial authorities. The
retention by them of the 18th Regiment in the colony
is a sufficient proof that such an appeal would not be made

in vain,"

Mr. J. Cowen, M.P. for Newcastle-on-Tyne, writes
to say that the statement of a local journal that he intends
to resign his seat is incorrect. Mr. Cowen says, "I have
no intention whatever of resigning my seat."

Pending the discussion on the new Bankruptcy
Bill, and in compliance with the request of the Liverpool
Law Society, the Lord Chancellor has appointed Mr.
Registrar Thring to succeed the late Mr. Commissioner
Perry.

THE CLOSE OF THE HORSE SHOW. —The Horse
Show at the Agricultural Hall, Islington, has been
brought to a close. The success of the exhibition has been
of a very marked character, about 80,000 persons having
been admitted to the show
THE OPENING OF THE SUEZ CANAL.—Le Nord
states that, in order to make known most widely the
benefits of the Suez Canal, the Viceroy of Egypt intends
to address invitations, to be present at the inauguration,
to the principal French, English, German, Belgian,
Italian, Spanish, &c., journals, and to provide for the
conveyance, lodging, and all the expenses of their repre-
sentatives. After the fetes they will make a journey into
Upper Egypt ; and Le Nord estimates the expenses of two
hundred journalists thus exployed at more than £40,000,
the sum which his Highness destines to this purpose.
STATE PURCHASE OF THE TELEGRAPHS.—
Me uncertainty concerning the intentions of the Govern-
ment as to the carrying out of the arrangement effected by
the bill of last session for the acquisition by the State of
the telegraphs of this country, is likely soon to be set at
rest, as Mr. Ward Hunt intends on Monday next to ask the
Chancellor of the Exchequer "what progress has been
made in settling with the various telegraph and railway
companies for the purchase of their interests in telegraphic
lines, and whether he intends to introduce a bill this
session to provide ways and means for carrying out the
measure of last session upon the subject."

THE AGRICULTURAL HALL, ISLINGTON. The
directors of this spacious hall have let the whole of the
area for the summer season, for the purpose of velocipe-
dian practice. The hall will be newly floored, expressly
for the occasion. The promoters have fixed the entrance
fee at a low rate, and velocipedes can be hired at a reason-
able charge. Among the advantages to persons who are
limited as to spare time will be that, whatever the weather,
they will always be under cover, and that the Hall
will be open as early as seven o'clock in the morning.
The promoters intend to devote certain days during
the summer to athletic contests and feats of physical
endurance.

SHOEBURYNESS EXPERIMENTs.—Various experi-
ments were made on Friday at Shoeburyness. The first
series upon an iron and asphalte concrete backing for iron
shields, proposed by Colonel Inglis, the results obtained
not being adequate to an accurate determination of
its value. A new Firth's steel shell, of the same exter-
nal form as the service 9-inch Palliser chilled shell,
but carrying a very much larger bursting charge,
and hardened only in the head, for penetration of armour,
the body of the shell being of more tenacious metal, so as
to permit of its passing unbroken completely through the
target before bursting. The hit took place near the
joint of the armour face plates ; but the result, so far as
can be stated under this circumstance, appeared
to be highly satisfactory. The effect of the
burst was exceedingly severe ; it took place
as designed, completely in the rear. The large
-amour - plate, 12ft. by Bft., designed to cover
entire the face of an iron shield—the rolling of which
t Sir J. Brown and Co.'s works at Sheffield we recorded
some mouths ago—WAD flied at -with t] 7 ;....3. .-iciva
gun for proof. The plate was perforated with a 91b.
charge ; the passage of the projectile, according to this
ordinary test for 5-inch thick plates, should have been
restrained by the plate. The shot-hole was perfectly
round, and there was no starring or cracks of any kind.
CAPTURING WHALES BY ELECTRICITY.—A g ood
deal used to be talked about applying explosive bombs in
the whale fishery, but actual trials have shewn the plan to
be a failure. The explosion of a bomb, if attached to the
harpoon, simply destroys the flesh in its neighbourhood,
and hence also the hold on the fish, which is often thus
lost and uselessly killed. From various causes, amongst
which are, no doubt, the general use of gas for
lighting and the discovery of petroleum, the whale
fishery has rather languished of late years, and
it probably requires a stimulus such as would
be afforded by diminishing its well-known dangers.
Whether this object would be obtained by a curious pro.
posal submitted to the Society of Civil and Mechanical
Engineers, by Mr. 11. J. Rogers, only actual trial could
shew ; but we understand that the project is partly
with r
two
insulated
wires
a
s
powerful brought forward by practical whale fishers. A gal-
vanic battery is placed in the whaling boat
furt n
il na ls inductiono f
thec battery
oil
incommunication.
ptloiete
pass as conductors, through a line of the size
size
ordinarily used to the harpoon, which is made le
with two
heads, separated from each other, each insulated wire
passing through the harpoon to the
pointswhere they
terminate. 'the handle of the harpoon
is of course
insulated. In this harpoon the circuit would
complete when it struck the whale.
to another plan, one insulated wire
t erminal through the rope to the end Passes
from
one
having one point only, the other insulatedof a harpoon
wire hanging
in the water, and acting as a means for the return

1 current. The experiments have been tried on eels and
other small fish without perforating the skin. The two

,! wires from the poles of the battery being simply directed
I:j close proximity to each other towards the fish, or one
mire at the head and the other at the tail, and the effect
in been to produce rigidity and complete temporary
largvsis, the eel and other fish appearing perfectly life-
va do ring, and even after, the period of contact,—The

THE EARL OF SHREWSBURY ON THE
HOUSE OF LORDS.

At the recent dinner of the North Staffordshire Consti-
tutional Association, the Earl of Shrewsbury, in
responding to the toast of " The House of Lords," said
that House ought to be recognised more by the Liberal
papers as -a part of the Constitution. The Queen
was recognised as one part, the House of Commons
as another, but as to the House of Lords, the Times coolly
advised that that assembly should sit down, and do as
they were bid by the House of Commons. It would be
wrong for the House of Lords to put itself in strong,
determined, and repeated opposition to the opinion of
the country; but he maintained that on the question
of the Irish Church the opinion of the country had not
been sufficiently expressed. The divisions on the ques-
tion in the House of Commons had not shewn that a
majority of English members were in favour of the bill,
but they bad shewn that the Irish and Welsh members
were opposed to that Church. He held that the bill was
a different article to wLat it was represented to the
country that it would be. He thought that it was the
duty of members of the Upper House. to deal carefully
with the bill.