The Sun.
London, England, 1866-10-16 00:00:00

CORRESPONDENCE FROM PARIS.

(FROM OUR OWN CORRESPONDENT.)
PARIS, Monday Evening.
The Moniteur says that on the occasion of the
ratification of the treaty of peace concluded on the
3d instant between Austria and Italy, the iron

crown of the kingdom of Lombardy, which had been
in the possession of the Austrian Government, was

restored by Count de Mensdorff to General Mena-
brea, Plenipotentiary of the Italian Government.
On Saturday afternoon the Emperor, Empress,
and the Imperial Prince, accompanied by the Mar-
quis de la Valette, Minister of the Interior, and M.
I)uruy, Minister of Public Instruction, embarked on
board the Chamois, stationed at Bayonne, for a sea
trip. They went as far as Fontarabie, and were at
sea about four hours.

Monseigneur Darboy, Archbishop of Paris, has
issued a circular to the clergy of his diocese, in

which, after citing the noble example of the Em-
peror and Empress, he invites them to make a col-
lection among their parishioners for the relief of the
sufferers by the inundations.

A letter from Vienna states that exertions are
being made in Austria to effect a great development
of her relations with Italy. Several chambers of
commerce have drawn up documents having for
object modifications in the tariff of custom duties
upon the revision of the Convention signed on the
22d of November, 1851, between Austria and the
former kingdom of Sardinia. The silk manufac-
tures of Bohemia, which suffered much during the
late war, will no doubt be the first to profit by the
change, and it is hoped that fresh outlets will be
found for this article of industry in the north-east

of Italy, with which there is an easy communica-
tion by way of Vienna and Trieste. The Minister
of Foreign Affairs is engaged with arrangements
for the establishment of consuls in all the various
ports of the peninsula.
A commission was about to be sent to the fields
of battle in Bohemia to examine into the extent of
the injury caused there by the late war.
The Siecle, in a review of foreign affairs, says

" Holland is at this moment in a ery agitated state.
King William the Third is not satisfied with having
dissolved the Second Chamber of the States General.
In a proclamation just issued he interferes person-
ally with the rights of the electors by asking them to
choose a Chamber with a more settled policy." In
the course of this proclamation his Majesty says—
" The continual changes of our responsible Ministers
will end in injuring the moral and material interests
of the nation. They will paralyse the power of the

Government."
" A personal intervention of the Crown in al
countries is always a very threatening incident
Whatever may be the motives assigned to justify it
a Constitutional King should only use his preroga
tive in very extreme cases."
A decree has just been published fixing the duty
upon the importation of olive oil into France as
follows :—ln French vessels, 3f. per 4001 b. In
foreign vessels, 4f. per 4001bs.
Later accounts received in Paris contradict the
report of the total loss of the packet boat Vera
Cruz and the crew in the Gulf of Mexico. The
vessel foundered a short distance from the coast,
but happily the crew and all on board were saved.
The ship and cargo were totally lost.
Accounts from Port-au-Prince announce another
terrible disaster in that town. Early on the morn-
ing of the 12th of September the greater portion of
the houses which had been saved from the late fire
were destroyed by an explosion•of gunpowder and
shells which were in the Arsenal. The house of
the French Consul was totally destroyed. The
Consul-General and the Charge d'Affaires, Count
Mejan, and other individuals, exhibited great in-
trepidity. Ten persons were killed and about 30
injured. The cause of the explosion has not been
ascertained.
Among the amusements imagined by the visitors
to some of the French sea-bathing ports is a crab
race. The sportsmen, in the first instance, go to
the sea-shore and catch some of the largest and most
lively crabs they can find. They are kept in sea-
water until the day appointed for the race. Twenty,
or sometimes thirty,tof these crabs are placed in line
on the sea-shore, and kept from moving by a weight
upon the back. The ceremony is much the same as
at a horse-race. At a given signal each crab is re-
leased. The crabs are sure to make for the sea at a
slashing pace, and the judges are there to decide
which was first in the water. These crab steeple-
chases are described as highly amusing and exciting.
Of course each crab is named. At Roscoff, on the