The Sun.
London, England, 1858-09-07 00:00:00

The West Coast of America is exciting the
greatest attention. Panama has become a great
packet port. It is the Southampton of the Pacific.
The Straits of Magellan are likely to be a consider-
able thoroughfare ; English and American fleets
are stationed on the coast. By the last accounts a
portion of the former was moving down on Peru,
to protect English interests there ; another portion
was moving up to British Columbia, with naval
stores ; and a third portion was about proceeding
to other parts of the coast, collecting specie. United
States troops are passing over the Isthmus of
Panama on their way to Oregon and California ;
the English military engineers are crossing the
Isthmus on their way to Vancouver's Island. A
considerable European emigration, chiefly from Ger-
many, has been going on for years to Southern
Chili. The richest silver mines in the world are on
the:south-western coast of America, and the richest
gold mines in the world are on the north-western
coast. On the western coast also are the most
valuable manure deposits to be found on the globe.
Newspapers in the English language are now pub-
lished in Chili, Peru, Panama, Mexico, California,
and Vancouver's Island. Mail steamers will most
probably soon cross the Pacific to and from Panama.
Everything indicates increased trade and a vast
increase of the population of the American coast
bordering on the Pacific Ocean. Already there is
a considerable trading intercourse between Australia
and South Western America ; an extensive emigra-
tion is going on from China to the Chinchas and San
Francisco, and the South Sea whale fishery is an
important and extensive branch of commerce.
At the present time there is a line of British mail
packets running from Panama to Valparaiso twice
a month, and calling at fifteen ports. The distance
of their mail route is 2,718 miles, and the annual
subsidy is £25,000. There is also an'American line
of mail packets running fortnightly between
Panama and San Francisco. They touch at eleven
ports. The length of their mail route is 4,200'
miles, and the subsidy is about £70,000 per annum.
The postage derived from this line of mail packets
is already upwards of £40,000 a year. This line of
steamers has conveyed 175,000 passengers to Cali-
fornia, and brought 200,000,000 dols. worth of gold
thence to Panama. For four years this company
have paid a dividend of 12 per cent., and they. pay
Vanderbilt, the leviathan shipowner of America, a
large sum every year to prevent his placing oppo-
sition steamers on their line. There is also a line of
mail packets running between Panama and Central
America.
It is unfortunate that there are so few convenient
means of getting from the Atlantic to the Pacific.
A railroad from cast to west through the United
States, or through our own North American pro-
vinces, which would be the nearest way to British
Columbia, will not be accomplished for many years
to come. The Straits of Magellan are too far south
to be of very great service in reaching the northern
coast of America or for crossing the Pacific.' The
route' by them to Vanconver's Island is only 1,500
miles nearer than that by Cape Horn, The most
northerly of the Central American routes to the
Pacific, the Tehuantepec, will never be a favourite
one, in consequence of the dangerous northern
winds so often met with in the Mexican Gulf. The
Nicaraguan route is not at present used, because of
the disturbed state of the district and the disputes
with the Government who own the territory in
which the Nicaragua Lake is situated. The only
useful route now is the railway across the Isth-
mus of Panama, and although not so near a route
to the gold diggings in British North America
by many hundreds of miles as a more northern
passage across Central America, it perhaps forms
the shortest cut of any to Australia. From the
statements of Sir E. Lytton to the deputation about
the Australian mail service, from the fact that the
directors of the Royal Mail Company have had an
interview with the Colonial Secretary about estab-
lishing a mail communication to Vancouver's Island
and Australia from Panama, and from the inade-
quacy of the present line of American steamers from
Panama to San Francisco to accommodate the tide
of emigration now flowing to Frazer's River, it is
probable that a line of British mail packets will
run along the northern coast of the Pacific to Bri-
tish Columbia, and also across the great ocean to
New Zealand and Australia. Such lines will not
only be of incalculable service to British North
America and our Australasian colonies; but they
will immensely promote British interests 'in the
Pacific. France has obtained a footing in Tahiti,
and the United States at the Sandwich Islands.
The South Sea whale fishing employs at present a
greater amount of American than English shipping,
yet the great South Sea has an abiding interest for
England. The mighty and tranquil ocean that
rolls lrtwcea Aale...ica and New Holland has
scarcely yet been properly explored. It has always
been a favourite field for English missionary and
maritime enterprise. The beautiful isles of the
Pacific would perhaps furnish many products of the
vegetable kingdom which could be transplanted
and become useful for manufactures or for human
food. Owyhee,Erromanga, and Pitcairn are classic
spots with Englishmen. At the first place our
greatest navigator Nook, met his death. At the
second, Williams met with his martyrdom. The
third spot is associated with the most romantic
mutiny and adventure in the history of navigation,
and was connected with an attempt to transplant
the bread-fruit tree of the South Sea islands to our
West India colonies.
The great difficulty in establishing a steam packet
communication with our distant gold fields has
been, and will continue to be, the high price of coal
and seamen's wages. This may be considered more
than anything else the real secret of the failure
of all our attempts to carry mails to Australis.
One of these defects could be remedied by an ex-
tensive employment of Lascars in manning the mail
steamers on the eastern route between India and
Australia, and of natives of the South Seas, such as
the New Zealanders, in manning the mail packets
on the western route between Australia and Pa-
nama. The cost of fuel would be immensely re-
duced if in screw steamers the propeller could be
lifted. with facility. How to do so in large steamers
is, at the present time, one of the most important
problems in shipbuilding and practical mechanics.
The screw steamer at presentloscs one-half its value
simply because its propeller in monster ships can-
not be lifted or feathered, and it consequently has
to be continually at work, no matter how favour-
able the wind is for sails, consuming a vast amount
of fuel unnecessarily, for if not in motion it acts as
an enormous drag on the speed of the ship.
Should the Royal Mail Company undertake the
establishment of a monthly mail packet communi-
cation. to Australia and 'Vancouver's Island, the
whole length of their mail routes will be about
50,000 miles, with about 50 stopping places, and
their ships will run over every year upwards of
a million nautical miles.

Jr-RECK OF THE BARQUE A
NORTH SHIELDS.

LICE 0.

BOMBAY, AUGUST 4.
11The barque Alice, Captain Pearson, of North
Shields, which left Aden on the 4th of July for
Bombay, with a large consignment of ordnance
stores for Government, consisting of gunpowder and
ammunition, got aground on the coast, near the
village of Coorla, about eight miles south of Ali-
baugh, on the night of Thursday, July 15. The
only passengers on board were Sergt. Macdonald,
of the Ordnance Department, with his wife and
four children, and a foreigner, a medical man by
_profession. The ship was approaching the harbour,
and it appears that the captain mistook a landmark
on the Coast for the Colaba Lighthouse, towards
which he accordingly steered., The
weather
was
very hazy, which rendered the land quite invisible,
and the captain was not aware of the danger until
the ship struck. On seeing how matters stood he
immediately secured the ship and cast anchor,
intending to move out to sea in the morning, On
the approach of dawn a furious gale set in, which
rendered it impossible to extricate the ship from
her perilous position, and it was accordingly
resolved to land the passengers. A boat was pre-
pared, and the European passengers, with the
native lascars on board, were placed in her, and
rowed ashoresby four of the crew. This was accom-
plished without any misadventure, and Sergeant
Macdonald, leaving his family at the spot, made
the best of his way to Bombay to procure assistance
and report the circumstance to the authorities.
Arter a wearisome journey to Mandwa, on the oppo-
site side of the harbour, where he arrived in a
famished condition, he embarked in the Government
boat that plies from there daily, and reached Bombay
on the 18th. Captain Pearson had in the mean-
time, after securing the ship as much as possible,
come on shore with the despatches for Government,
and arrived in Bombay late the same evening. The
ship having gone to pieces, the crew, with Mrs.
Macdonald and family, returned to Bombay on the
21st July, having lost all they possessed.