The Sun.
London, England, 1861-02-21 00:00:00

AMERICA.

LIVERPOOL, WEDNESDAY..
The Cunard screw steamship Etna, which touched
at Queenstown yesterday, has arrived.
In the Senate, on the 6th, a committee of con-
ference was appointed on the Deficiency Bill with
the house amendments. The usual number of
memorials and petitions in reference to the pending
issues were presented. Mr. Douglas made an in-
effectual attempt to reconsider the vote by which
the:bill to organise the Government of the territory
of Colorado passed. The President's Message
coming up, Mr. Johnson, of Tennessee, resumed his
remarks. A committee of conference on the Loan
Bill was appointed in reply to the request of the
house. After Mr. Johnson had concluded his speech
for the Union, the Senate adjourned. On the 7th
there was a brief debate in reference to the resolu-
tions of the Legislature of New Jersey. Mr. Col-
lamer, in presenting a petition from citizens of
Vermont in favour of the Border State propositions
as amendments to the Constitution, declared that
Congress cannot pass such amendments, but must
present them to the States as the request of several
States. Mr. Wigfall responded to the speech of
Mr. Johnson, from Tennessee, and, with some noisy
interruptions, occupied the floor until the adjourn-
ment. On the Bth the Loan Bill was reported by
the committee of conference, who said that they
had agreed to an amendment to the effect that the
amount accruing from the former loan shall be
applied to the redemption of the outstanding Trea-
sury notes, and to no other purpose. Pending the
consideration of the Tariffßill the Senate adjourned.
In the House of Representatives, on the 6th., the
Senate amendments to the Loan Bill were taken
up—the one to repeal the act of June 1, 1860, au-
thorising a loan and providing for the redemption
of the Treasury notes, was rejected ; a committee
of conference was ordered. The bill in reference
to the postal revenue was debated and passed-131
against 26. It provides that whenever, in the
opinion of the Postmaster-General, the postal ser-
vice cannot be safely continued, or the Post-office
revenues collected, or the postal laws maintained,
or the contents of the mails preserved inviolate till
delivered to the proper address, on any post-route,
by reason of any insurrection or resistance to the
laws of the United States, the Postmaster-General
is hereby authorised to discontinue the postal ser-
vice on such route, or any part thereof, and at any
post-office thereon, till the same can be safely
restored. The report of the Committee of Thirty-
three was further debated by Messrs. Humphrey

(New York), Harris (Virginia), Maynard (Ten
nessee), and Wells (New York). On the 7th,
after a consideration of the patent laws, the debate
on the report of the Committee of Thirty-three
was resumed, Mr. Davis (Maryland) making
remarks which caused confusion in the galleries
and exciting comments on the floor. He also
stated that Maryland did not recognise the right
of secession, and that he would vote for the report
of the majority of the committee. He was fol-
lowed by Mr. Sedgwick (New York), who opposed
all compromise, because " the complaints were as
utterly groundless as the remedy was puerile."
Mr. Vallandingham (Ohio) offered propositions to
amend the Constitution by dividing up the United
States into four sections. Mr. Sickles gave notice
that he would introduce a resolution calling on the
Secretary to the Treasury for information as to
whether the duties on imports continued to be
collected in the ports of South Carolina, Georgia,
Louisiana, and Florida. On the Bth a Message
was received from the President, enclosing the cor-
respondence between himself and Colonel Hayne,
of South Carolina ;—ordered to be referred to a
select committee of five, and to be printed. The
report of the Committee of Thirty-three was re-
sumed, and speeches were made by Messrs. Hatton
(Tennessee), Kellogg (Illinois), and Smith (North
Carolina).
The President having refused to comply with
the demand of Colonel Hayne, of South Carolina,
to surrender Fort Sumter, the latter had left
Washington, after sending the President an im-
pertinent letter, which was returned;
Ex-President Tyler, Chairman of the Peace
Convention at Washington, on taking the chair,
made the following remarks :
" Gentlemen,—l fear you have committed a great
error in appointing me to the honourable position
you have assigned me. A long separation from all
deliberate bodies has rendered the rules of their
proceedings unfamiliar to me, while I should find
in my own state of health, variable and fickle as it
is, sufficient reason to decline the honour of being
your presiding officer ; but, in times like these, one
has but little option left him, personal considera-
tions should weigh but lightly in the balance. The
country is in danger—it is enough—one must take
the place assigned him in the great work of recon-
ciliation and adjustment. The voice of Virginia
has invited her co• States to meet her in council.
In the initiation of this Government that same voice
was heard and complied with, and the results of
70 odd years have fully attested the wisdom of the
decisions then adopted. Is the urgency of her call
now less great than it was then ? Our godlike.
fathers created,—we have to preserve. They built
up, through their wisdom and• patriotism,
_u
_o
monu-
ments which have eternalized their names. Y
have before you, gentlemen, a task equalli grand,
immor-
equally sublime, quite as full of glory an
eat and
tality. You have to snatch from ruin a
glorious Confederation, to preserve the grGovern-
ment, and to renew and invigorate the
Constitution.
If you reach the height of this great occasion, your
children's Phildren will rise up and call you blessed.
I confess myself ambitious of sharing in the glory
of accomplishing this grand 444 magnificent result.

tion, and who wrote that letter to -JohnVTaylor
which has been enshrined in the hearts of his
countrymen. Massachusetts is not here (some
member said She is coming')—l hope so (said Mr
Tyler) and that she will bring with her her daugh
ter Maine. I did not believe it could well be that
the voice which, in other times, was so familiar to
her ears has been addressed to her in vain. Con-
necticut is here, and she comes, I doubt not, in the
spirit of Roger Sherman, whose name with our
very children has become a household word, and
who was in life the embodiment of that practical
sense which befits the great lawgivers and con-
structors of Governments. Rhode Island, the land
of Roger Williams, is here, one of the two last
States in her jealousy of the public liberty to give
in her adhesion to the Constitution, and among the
earliest to hasten to its rescue. The great empire
State of New York—represented thus far but by
one—delegates to-day a fuller force to join in thv
great work of healing the discontents of the
and restoring the reign of fraternal feeling. New
Jersey is also here, with the memories of the past
covering her all over. Trenton and'Princeton live
immortal in story—the plains Of the 4st encrim-
soned with the heart's blood of Virginias sons.
Among her delegation I rejoice to recognize a gal-
lant son of a signer of the immortal Declaration,'
which announced to the world that 13 provinces
had become 13 independent and sovereign States.
And here, too, is Delaware, the land of the Bayards
and the Rodneys, whose soil at Brandywine was
moistened by the blood of Virginia's youthful Mon-
roe. Here is Maryland, whose massive columns
wheeled into line with those of Virginia in the
contest for glory, and whose State House at Anna-
polis was the theatre of a spectacle of a successful
commander, who, after liberating his country, gladly
ungirthed his sword and laid it down upon the altar
of that country. Then comes Pennsylvania ; rich
in revolutionary lore, bringing with her the death-
less names of Franklin and Morris ; and I trust
ready to renew from the belfry of Independence
Hall the chimes of the old bell which announced
freedom and independence in former days. All
hail to North Carolina! with her Mecklenburg de-
claration in her hand, standing erect on the ground
of her own probity and firmness in the cause of
public liberty, and represented in her attribttes by
her Macon, and in this assembly by her distin-
guished son, at no great distance from me. Four
daughters of Virginia also cluster around the
council board, on the invitation of their ancient
mother, the eldest Kentucky, whose sons, under
that intrepid warrior, Anthony Wayne, gave free-
dom of settlement to the territory of her sister
Ohio, and extending his hand daily and hourly
across La Belle Riviera to grasp the hand of some
one of kindred blood of the noble States of Indiana
and Illinois and Ohio, who have grown up into
powerful States already grand, potent, and almost
Imperial. Tennessee is not here, but is coming—
prevented from being here only by the floods which
have swollen her rivers. When she arrives she will
wear the badges on her warrior crest of victories
won, in company with the great West, on many an
ensanguined plain, and standards torn from the
hands of the conquerors at Waterloo. Missouri,
and lowa, and Michigan, Wisconsin, and Minne-
sota, still linger
areing witherbe ushin in the w
behind, but it may w
bee
have
dtethat
their hearts do.
The eyes of the whole country are turned to this
hall and to this assembly in expectation and hope.
I trust, gentlemen, that you may prove yourselves
worthy of the great occasion. Our ancestors pro-
bably committed a blunder in not having fixed upon
every fifth decade for a call of a general Convention
to amend and reform the Constitution. On the con-
trary, they have made the difficulty next to insur-
mountable to accomplish amendments to an instru-
ment which was perfect for 5,000,000 of people, but
not wholly so as to 30,000,000. Your patriotism
will surmount the difficulties, however great, if you
will but accomplish one triumph in advance, and
that is triumph ovary party. What is party when
compared to the task of rescuing one's country from
danger ? Do that, and one long, loud shout of joy
and gladness will resound throughout the land. '
The proposed increase in the tariff was beginning
to excite considerable attention, as will be seen by
the following extract from the New York Shipping
List :

" New York merchants pay about five-eighths of
the entire Federal revenue, and when the General
Government is in need of a loan or other relief from
a financial difficulty it is the New York bankers
and capitalists that usually come to the rescue.
When a proposition is started in Congress to un-
settle the present tariff system and to substitute for
the present schedules rates of duties which will
operate at once upon the commercial and financial
interests of the port, the New York merchants,
bankers, and capitalists, in equity, have a right to
be heard. In the exercise of this right the Cham-
ber of Commerce on Thursday adopted a memorial
indicating the most objectionable features of the
proposed bill, showing how prejudicial must be their
effect upon the commerce of the country, and
earnestly remonstrating against their adoption.
The memorialists set forth that the 29th section

virtually abolishes the warehousing system. As it
passed the House of Representatives it cuts down
the time within which foreign goods entered for
warehousing may be withdrawn for domestic con-
consumption, from three years to 30 days, leaving
the right to export unrestricted as to time. As
modified by the Committee of the Senate, the duty
on all goods warehoused must be paid within 90
days from the time of deposit, and unless they are
exported within six months thereafter the duties
will not be refunded. If either of these propositions
shall be adopted, the memorialists say the object
for which the warehousing system was adopted
must be defeated, and its usefulness destroyed. The
first excludes warehoused goods from the market
after 30 days ; the second, in effect, expels them
from warehouse after 90 days, because it requires
the payment of duties within that time, and it ab-
solutely excludes them from the foreign market
after nine months by depriving them of the right of
drawback. Double duties is another objection
urged against the Another will be the vexa-
tious delay to which the importer will be sub-
jected. in passing his goods, owing to the in-
creased number of weighers, measurers, ap-
praisers, and clerks that will be required under
the new system. The duties, as prescribed by
the bill, as it passed the House, the memoria-
lists say further, are so high as to amount
almost to prohibition. On blanhoto, pilot cloths,
cassimeres, broadcloths, cotton fabrics, and many
other articles the rates of duty, as compounded of
the specific and ad valorem charges, range from 20
per cent. to rising 100 per cent. The modifications
proposed by the Senate bring these extremes nearer
together, by a moderate reduction of the higher
rates; but en many articles they remain so high
that they amount to a virtual prohibition. If it
becomes a law it can scarcely fail to exercise a
depressive influence on our foreign commerce, and
thus impair the source of public revenue. The
memorial further remonstrates against the passage
of the bill, on the ground that to pass it at a time
when a portion of the Southern States are not
represented in Congress could scarcely fail to widen
the existing breach, and present a new and serious
_
obstacle to reconciliation ; as also that, instead of
increasing, it will decrease the revenue at a
when there is a pressing necessity forraugnt augmenting
e. The
the financial strength of the
Gotvhee nmmemorial to
committee appointed to convey
Washington are Messrs. OpdYo
_, Duer, Mali, J. J.
arshall. it may not be out of
Phelps, and C. H. mso tar as we are able to
place to say here that,i
t the new
bill, on the
observe, the feeling spns
part of the mercantile interest here, is wholly unin-
fluenced by partisan feeling or political bias. A
striking confirmation of this fact is that the author
of the remonstrance from the Chamber is attached
to the dominant party in Congress, who propose to
make these alterations in the tariff. Another is the
strong opposition to it from at least one of the most
influential organs of the same party in this city.
This view of the case, if nothing else, ought to have
some weight at Washington.

GOVERNMENT EMIGRATION. --Her Majesty's
Emigration Commissioners chartered on Monday last the
John Masterman, of 608 tons, belonging to Messrs. John
Lidgett and Sons, of London, to sail from the Thames on
the 23d March for Sydney, Now South Wales, at £l7 19s.
ad, per statute adult.

Yesterday evening a number of gentlemen con-
nected officially or commercially with our Indian
Empire entertained Colonel' Sir Arthur Cotton -at
a banquet, as a public recognition of the great ser-
vices which have been rendered by that officer by
his extension of the means of irrigation and canal
navigation towards the financial and social pros
gre,ss of that vast dependency. The dinner was
'given at Willis's-rooms, nearly 200 gentlemen
being present. The Earl of Shaftesbury presided,
and among others there were also at the table Lord
Lyveden, Lord Harris, Sir James Elphinstone, Mr.
Justice Haliburton, M.P.,
Major-General Hay, &c.The customary toasts of The Royal Family,"
"The Army and Navy," " The Houses of Lords and
Commons,"—to the last two of which Lord Harris
and Mr. Haliburton briefly replied,—having been
drunk, the noble Chairman gave the toast of the
evening—" The health of Sir Arthur Cotton." His
lordship said they were not there to wish God
speed to any servant in public affairs going for the
first time to the scene of his operations, nor were
they there to close with public honour the career of
a veteran worn out in the public service; they were
assembled to celebrate 40 years of unparalleled ser-
vice to our Indian Empire, and to meet and see the
man who had earned a noble retirement, but who
was ready to go forth again to resume those labours
which had so great and so good an object in view.
Colonel Cotton possessed in perfection those rare
combinations of talents which were seen nowhere
in such completeness as in our Indian service—the
combination of the soldier and the-civilian, of men
who came home from the field to their desks,
and quitted their desks to enter the field
again. Colonel Cotton had been. the first to
see the waste of nature's benefits in the want of
a proper system of irrigation and canal navigation,
and kow the streams flowing idly to the sea might
be diverted to great and good purposes. (Hear,
hear.) He saw what many others could not see,
that if nature was only slightly aided by the simplest
means, a short time would be sufficient to produce
'SP' /St important and lasting benefit.
wt. ;net there to discuss the comparative
b 4)antages of canals and railways, but to thank
Calonel Cotton for accomplished results—results
which had increased the price of the land, inc'ef;aoed
the cultivation of the soil and the eon bt those
'who lived by it, and-which werebritirrisrhundreds
of thousands of acres of land under theplough which
had hitherto lain a mere wilderness, He trusted
that for years to come Sir Arthur Cotton would be
spared to receive the thanks of his country, and,
deeply and from his heart, he called upon them to
do justice to the toast. In reply to his health, which
was drunk with the utmost enthusiasm, Sir Arthur
Cotton said that, except during the campaigns in
Burmah, he had been employed during 40 years in
the Irrigating Department in India. In 1828 he
was sent to Tanjore, a district in which irrigation
was most sadly needed. At that time the revenue
of Tanjore was only £300,000. At the present time,
since a proper means of supplying the crops with
water had been adopted, and a canal navigation
opened up, the revenue was £600,000. The
average revenue of all the 130 districts of India
was £250,000. Tanjore was the smallest district,
and its revenue was £600,000, which was six
times the revenue of Kartah, though the
latter in a productive point of view pos-
sessed infinitely greater advantages. The only
reason for this increase in Tanjore was that the
water had been turned to good account, and there
was no part of India in which the value of land
was now to be compared to Tanjore, and all the
population there were incomparably better off than
elsewhere. It might be said that this system was
not capable of application to all parts of the coun-
try, but he thought there was none where the con-
dition of the people was not capable of immense
improvement by attention being bestowed on the
means of irrigation and navigation. In 1844 he
went to Rajahmundry to see what could be done
for the improvement of the Delta there, and by a
weir which had been erected in the river, and which
commanded, as it were, 1,100,000 acres, all but
400,000 were already irrigated. What had been
the result ? The revenue, which previously had
been £196,000, was,now upwards of £300,000, and
the imports and exports of the district, which had
previously been almost nominal, had risen the ex-
ports to £390,000, and the imports to £70,000. In
the first year after opening the canal in this district
700 boats passed; now it was used annually by
13,000 boats of nearly double the tonnage of the
previous ones. It had been said that the Ganges
Canal did not equal the expectations entertained of
its profitable results, but that was entirely due to
the fact that its branches for purposes of irrigating
the surrounding country had never been completed.
Otherwise it ought and would yield 15 or 20
per cent. to the Government. Unfortunately,
this want of completeness was the case with
nearly. all the hydraulic works of the Govern-
ment in the country, the Godavery, the Kinlar
works, and many others which were stopped from
want of funds. On the Upper Godavery he believed
that the best cotton fields out of America were to
be found; but to make the produce of cotton pro-
ductive in India the Government would have to
bestow care upon the means of emigration and canal
communication. The work, however, should be
taken up by the Government at once, and on a
system, and carried out thoroughly wherever it was
needed. (Hear.) Other toasts, such as " Peace and.
Prosperity to India," followed the toast of the even-
ing, the last being, as usual, " The Health of the
noble Chairman." The dinner was served a la .Russe,
and was one which did infinite credit to the cuisine
and arrangements of Messrs. Willis.

MR. LA} ARD, M.P., A 7 THE METRO-
POLITAN TABERNACLE.

Last evening Mr. Layard, M.P., delivered a lec-
ture in aid of the funds of the Metropolitan Taber-
nacle, in that edifice. The immense building was
pretty well filled.

The Rev. C. H. SPURGEON, who occupied the
chair, introduced the hon. member, alluding to the
jests which that humorous individual, Mr. Punch,
had perpetrated upon him, and expressing a desire
that he would fulfil them. Mr. Layard, how-
ever, was now not only the member for Nineveh,
but the member for Southwark—(cheers)—and he
earnestly hoped that for many yoars he might
continue so. (Cheers.) May he be strong in health,
still earnest in working for his country's good, and
in every respect have the blessing of God resting
upon him. Mr. Layard had served the Church
right well in a recent struggle, when a certain
school declared that many scriptural personages
were myths, and that they were to look at the cha-
racters described as " logical inventions." Mr.
Layard's great bulls and winged lions had crushed
whole herds of these pretenders. (Laughter,) No
one could now doubt that there was such a place as
Nineveh, and that it was really so singularly
punished. He had vindicated most entirely the
credibility and consistency of Holy Writ by the
discoveries which he had made. At Nineveh Mr.
Layard found nothing contrary to the Written
Ward, and gave them abundant, cogent, and solid
reasons for its maintenance, so that they might
contentedly base their belief that the Word of God
was true, and historically, and consequently infe-
rentially, true throughout, because the history was
so interwoven with the doctrine that if the one was
true the other could not be false. With these ob-
servations he begged to introduce the lecturer.
(Loud cheers.)
was
stha
He believed that they were met
Mr. LAYARD, who was received with loudaap-
plause in opening his lecture, said that
pleasant duty to do something in the cause it
of
that evening for a
good purpose, which was to enable,
he t
his f • friend
Mr. Spurgeon to make up, 'ls f
the debt owing for the constructionaras of h was ale,
be
great
building in which they sat. It was one which had.
been raised by the free offerings of the free people
of England.
He The money had been collected
not so much from tne wealthy as the poor and.
humble. (Cheers.) Nearly £30,000, he believed,
had been raised by small subscriptions, given by
nearly 2,000,000 of persons. The lecture he was
going to deliver to them they were not to receive
t a
hl ne eym how,lino
ptehde
ev
net r
proceededv
omightu ld
p nr
oo
vt
te
oh a
instructive v e s
delivere
as new, since the facts of it were all embodied in
Theh
s
ah nisd bho tOOO
nkt
ge soleni
lecture on his Assyrian researches, Which lasted for
thanks to the Chairman terminated the
nearly twote of hours.
A
proceedings.

DEATH FROM STARVATION,_ Yesterday Mr. Ser-
geant Payne held an inquest at the Fountain, Fore-street,
Cripplegate, on the body of John 'Westmoreland, aged 7S,
who had died of starvation. It appeared }hat the deceased
had formerly been a master tailor it a large way of busi-
ness, having had shops at Charing-cross, Chelsea, and the
New North-road, but had lately lost the whole of his pro-
perty. lie occupied one room at No. 73, Milton-street,
CriPplegate, and not making his appearance on Monday the
door was forced open, when the old man was found cm the
floor, quite dead. There was no bed in the room, and only
a bundle of rags for him to lie down upon. Tbtre was not
a particle of food, clothing, or furniture in the place, and all
the money that was found was one-half-penny. Dr. Timo-
thy had made a post .mortem examination of the body, and
he found that the deceased died of ossification of the heart,
accelerated by the want of nourishment and the common
necessaries of life. It was stated that if tho deceased. haed.
made his circumstances known the parochial autholol_tif%!
St. Gilee, C'ripplegate, would at once have rehav ddineld
of
The jury returned a verdict, " That the deceased
ossification of the heart, accelcratoci b; I,Dewant of the
conawa ileceaarie of life.".
•,• r... 1 •

p ROYAL ENGLISI-1 OPERA,
COVENT-GARDEN.
Under the Management of Miss Louisa Pyne and Mr. W.
Frarrison, Sole Lessees.
THIS EVENING, the First Act of BIANCA, THE
BRAVO'S BRIDE: Mr. W. Harrison, dr,c.
Followed by Auber's LE DOMINO NOIR. Miss Louisa
Fyne, Miss Thirlwall, Miss Leffler ; Messrs. H. Haigh, H.
Corri, A. St. Albyn, and Horncastle.
To conclude with a Divertissement.
Conductor—Mr. Alfred Mellon. Commence at Seven.

THEATRE-ROYAL, HAYMARKET.
Lome, Mr. J. R Bnokstone.
- -

THIS EVENINO, the pertornisuleen will ammonite with
the Comedy of THE BARES IN THE WOOD. Messrs. E.
Villiers, Buckstone, W. Farren, Mrs. Wilkins, and Miss F.
Stirling.
After which, a new Pantomime, QUEEN LADYBIRD
AND HER CHILDREN. The Pantomimists by the un-
rivalled Leelercqs, Herr Cole, and Fanny Wright.