The Sun.
London, England, 1868-07-13 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON, MONDAY EVENING, JULY 13, 1808.

ROMAN AFFAIRS.

(Front the Roman Correspondent of the Westminster Gazette)

ROME, July 4.

The booming cannon of St. Angelo and an
alinost tropical brilliance of sunshine ushered
in the feast of SS. Peter and PauL Always a
great feast here, its celebration seems to be
invested with additional lustre and interest
by last year's special solemnity. This year also
its importance was enhanced by the promul-
gation of the Bull announcing the assembly,
of the General Council. An erroneous im-
pression had got abroad that it would be
pronounced by the Holy Father himself at
the High Mass, and many who went expect-
ing some unusual and striking ceremonial were
doomed to disappointment. It was all gone
through before the Pope entered the church.
Mgr. Colombo (a descendant, by-the-by, of the
family of Christopher Columbus), Apostolic
protonotary, read it from a sort of estrade or
pulpit erected for the purpose to the left of
the great entrance-door of S. Peter's. He was
attended by a body of prelates, and the reading
was preceded by a flourish of trumpets, the
people standing round with uncovered heads.
Two copies of the Bull were then affixed to
the door, and the prelates proceeded to per-
form the same ceremony at S. John Lateran.
Two copies of the Bull were likewise affixed,
while trumpets sounded, to the doors of the
Cancelleria, and as well, I believe, but without
ceremony, to the doors of the other basilicas.
And thus the long-talked-of work is so far
accomplished, and the Bull, " 2Sterni Patris,"
convokes for the Bth of December, 1869, the
first Ecumenical Council that has ever held
its session at S. Peter's.

The Bull itself will have reached you in the
course of the week, and you will have observed
that it does not call any temporal princes to
the Assembly. Secular governments are only
mentioned in it in expressing a hope that they
will put no obstruction in the way of the jour-
ney of the bishops to Rome ; " seeing that," to
quote its language, "the Catholic religion is
the most sure foundation of civil society ;" a
truth too often lost sight of by the sovereigns
of the world; but it is because they have lost
sight of it that Pius IX. leaves them out of
the account so to speak. It is their boast to
have broken the ancient link which bound
the Church to the State, to have secularized
the State and to have shut up the Church in
her sanctuaries, and it is now her turn to say
—" You have sent me into the sacristy; to
use your own expression, you cannot complian.
I hold my assembly there and call you not, as
I was wont to call your predecessors, to take
part in my deliberations."
By fixing a date so far forward as .the Bth of
December, next year, ample time is allowed for
the bishops to arrange conveniently for the ad-
ministration of their dioceses during their ab-
sence, and for the Commissions which are pre-
paring the minutes of the Council, and whose
labours have not been interrupted by the heat
of a Roman July to complete their work.
The possible complications which might in-
terfere with the progress of the component
members no less than with their free delibera-
tions are, of course, not to be lost sight of ;
but we have one good ground at least for
thinking that the Italian Government has pro-
fited by the lesson of Mentana, and is not
anxious just yet, at all events, again to mea-
sure its strength against that of the defenders
of the Holy See. I have authentic information
that enrolments of Garibaldians are going on
along the frontier, that bounties of fifty to
eighty francs are being offered to induce idle
lads to enlist, and it is not the denial in the
official Florence papers that would lead one
to believe in the absence of governmental
countenance to their movements. The events
of last autumn, not to say every act of the
present reign, have taught us that no statement
from that quarter is worth the paper on which
it is printed. The guarantee to which I allude,
is this—that in spite of all its late blustering
and protesting, the Florence Government has
at last consented to liquidate its liabilities to-
wards the Papal debt, taking advantage, how-
-1 ever, of the permission to do so by instalments.
The first instalment of three millions is expected
here within the next few days. As there is no
reason to believe this due to any return to a
higher moral principle, it must, of course, be
ascribed to a sense of impotence and conse-
quent amenability to the representations of
France. This view leads to the conclusion
that there is neither means nor strength to
back up another invasion of Papal territory,
and if enlistments of mercenaries for the pur-
pose are not interfered with, it is partly be-
cause the Government is too weak to interfere,
and partly because it would rather see turbu-
lent revolutionary tendencies dashing them-
selves to pieces against the rock of St. Peter
than directing their efforts against its own
more shifting foundations. Moreover, week by
week the proportions of the Papal army con-
tinue to gather strength. In spite of the
relaxation of open efforts, the spirit which is
abroad in America refuses to be chilled, and
when General Carrol-Tavis returns in the
autumn, not many short of the thousand of
the original estimate will follow him. The
Poitiers Committee has just forwarded fifty
mules for the service of the Artillery, which
are well calculated fir use in this country ;
and among the latest recruits for the Zonaves
is Don Alfonso, a young nephew of the late
Don Carlos of Spain, a son of Don Juan de
Borbon. He enters as a simple private, though
he has a Spanish General in attendance on
him.

While on the subject of this gallant corps,
I cannot forbear a passing allusion to an ab-
surd report of disunion among its chiefs, to
which certain writers have been busy in giving
circulation. The avidity with which any
breath of suspicion of the defectibility even of
any of its members is gulped down, is a satis-
factory, and I might perhaps be allowed to
say amusing, testimony to the exceptional har-
mony and good conduct generally prevailing
among them. They are men after all, and
liable consequently to feelings of jealousy and
self-esteem ; to misunderstand each other's
expressions ; to miscalculate ; to act with im-
petuosity or imprudence, or to yield to any of
the similar little follies which perpetually ex-
ercise a disturbing influence over the best
ordered and most polished coteries ; and yet
it has never happened that the keenest glances
of adverse journalism has as yet alighted on a
blot.

Many Zouaves are absent on leave ; permis-
sions are the more readily accorded that last
autumn proved that the bugle-call was so
eagerly listened for by them ; that no one
missed its note; and the dearest interests of
home were powerless to delay, for a single day,
one on whose ears it had a claim, from flying
to answer its appeal. Among those who have
sought the invigorating influence of a higher
latitude during the summer has been Lieut.-
Colonel de Charette. This simple circumstance
has been tortured into a story, on which has
been founded an account implying something
like the break-up of the administrative force.
The brave French Baron is represented as
having been ignominiously dismissed under
circumstances which made it particularly diffi-
cult to fill up his place ; that the complication
placed other officers in so difficult a position
that many resignations, including some of
the bravest, might be expected, and the prestige
thus lost would destroy the character of the
regiment. _ _ _

It was a prettily-arranged plot of romance,
but fortunately it is a romance from beginning
to end. That difference of opinion as to the
arrangement of details have existed between
the Lieutenant-Colonel and the Colonel and
pro-Minister, is no secret ; that they have,
notwithstanding, pulled well together, is an
evidence that both talent and forbearance exist
among them. At the present moment, so far
from Colonel de Charette having quitted the
service, I am assured that both in France and
in England, where his private connections take
him, he is entrusted with work for the army
by the pro-Minster; and should the Garibal-
dian hordes be ill-advised enough to attempt

anobher raid, they and their writers-up will
probably find to their cost that none will be
quicker to the front than he.
The Pope sang the High Mass at St. Peter's
on Monday, and assisted pontifically at that
on the commemoration of St. Paul, next day
at S. Paolo fuor' le mura. He assisted also
at the first Vespers of the Feast on' Sunday
evening, and blessed the palliums. The double
illumination of St. Peter's took place the same
night, with its usual gorgeous effect.
The morning of St. Peter's day, which had
opened so bright, gave way to a dull and
lowering afternoon, and presently the rain
came down heavily. At four o'clock the ten
guns sounded, which was the signal to the city
that the Girandola is prevented by the weather ;
and the next day was also so showery, that
though the appointed three guns gave notice
that it would take place, the majority disbe-
lievedthe report, and the concourse round St.
Peter, in Montorio, where it was displayed, was
not so great as it would otherwise have been.
The exhibition was very much damaged by
the rain, causing a special disappointment in
regard to the chief tableau, which the talented
architect Vespiniani had been induced to de-
sign. He had chosen the 15th and 16th
Cantos of the Gerusalemme liberata for his
theme, and had had the happy and novel idea
of introducing the copious floods of water,
supplied by the acqua Paola, on the neighbour-
ing height.
Another event of this week has been the
Pope's visit to the Camp on Thursday. This
was of course an occasion full of interest for
all Rome, and the neighbouring villages, and
one calculated to rouse the enthusiasm of the
men to the uttermost, and great was the taste
and skill they had exercised in giving a festal
appearance to their martial abode, to do honour
to their exalted visitor. Triumphal arches of
evergreens and garlands of bright flowers
spanned the way, which was made gay with
trophies of arms and festoons of flags and
improvised gardens ; and the poor fellows were
duly gratified with the smiling approval of the
Holy Father, as he subsequently passed through
their lines, on the efforts with which they had
toiled in the burning sun over their scanty ap-
pliances.
The spot chosen for the camp is a high-
level plain, thought by some to be the crater
of an extinct volcano, situated amid the loftiest
peaks of the Alban Hills. The highest of these
is Monte Cave, and it is so rugged that its peak
but just affords room for the Passionist con-
vent and church, built there by Cardinal York,
of our own Royal House of Stewart, when
he was Bishop of Frascati. It covers the site
of the temple erected by Tarquin the Proud
in his desire to conciliate the Latin peoples
to Jupiter Latialis, as the guardian of Latium,
which it overlooks;—the spot where Juno stood
to watch the last general conflict between the
Trojans and the Latins. The magnificent
prospect on sea and land from this summit,
and the unaffected hospitality of the Passionist
fathers, have tempted many to climb its steep
ascent, which the bold pavement of Alexander
VII. has done much to facilitate. All who
have performed the pilgrimage have marked
the singular basin to which I have alluded,
and which has hitherto been useful chiefly in
affording a storehouse for the snow with which
Rome is so abundantly supplied in summer, in
place of ice. It is popularly called the Campi
di Annibale, because certain writers assigned
it for the place of that General's encampment
when he stood threatening Rome, but there is
no very great reason to believe this, and some
have even thought it to have served as the
quarters of the Roman army on the look out
for him, and in special guard of the temple
of Jupiter Latialis.
The place is well adapted for the purpose it
is now made to serve, its temperature being
perhaps healthier than that of any part of the
State at this season, and the very difficulties of
approach affording those lessons in readiness
of resource which are so important to soldiers.
The Pope went with his usual retinue to the
Station at 6.15 a.m., and travelled by special
train (the ordinary train giving it a quarter of
an hour's start) in the handsome and beauti-
fully-appointed carriage built for his use. The
precincts of the Station, as also those of Ciam-
pino and Frascati, and the engine of the Pon-
tifical train, were profusely decorated with
flowers and draperies, and white and yellow
flags. Only a select few were of course admitted
on to the platform until the special train had
started. Besides the prelates and members of
the Direction of the Railway Company in
special attendance on the Pope, I noticed
Princess Lancellotti and. Prince Massimo.
Arrived at Frascati, General Kanzler and
other officers were drawn up on the platform
to greet him, and carriages previously sent on
were in attendance to convey the Pontifical
party to Rocca de Papa ; here a number of
little girls dressed in white, with wreaths on
their heads, came out to scatter flowers ; and
over the little stage of steep, rugged road
he was car-
part of the
rib eetdw
iene na tchhea town
baena dr e
rt
sh. e c am
This,
way had the effect of a sort of triumph, for
crowds gathered round cheering. General
Zappi, who has the command of the camp, met
him at its entrance, and conducted him to the
tent where an altar had been prepared ; while
the band struck up, and the troops, several
thousand in number, infantry, artillery and
cavalry, drawn up in due order around, paid
people drowned the
,mapnedtsthine
a tumult of applause.
The Mass proceeded in due decorum and
mmaiustiaerayndhotnhoeutrrus
silence, broken only by the pealing of the can-
non, and by the loud word of command, and
the clanking of arms as the soldiers bent the
knee at the elevation. But just then the rain,
which had been threatening all the morning,
suddenly came down in torrents, giving an
appropriate image of the storms which often
burst on the soldiers' life in the midst of the
profoundest apparent peace, and demand that
he should be ever ready for action in the midst
of his gladdest and most pleasing occupations.
The wind raged round the tent as if seeking to
annihilate it in its fury, and again and again
extinguished the candles, so that they had at
last to be replaced by camp lanterns of the
most primitive device, and one attendant pre-
late had to hold the book, and another to pro.
tect the sacred vessels from being overturned
by the blast. Both the Pope and the troops
preserved throughout an imperturbable com-
posure, and the divine sacrifice was com-
pleted with as much devotion as when offered
up at the very shrine of the Apostles, amid the
repose of the noblest dome in Christendom.
After the Mass the Pope had coffee in an
officer's tent, with General Kanzler in attend-
ance, and then, finding that the various corps
had in the meantime been ranged round the
entrance, he went out and stood in the door
of the tent, and gave them his Apostolic Bene-
diction. His voice resounded through the
recesses of the classic valley loud, and calm,
and clear, above the hum of the multitude and
the surging of the wind, the roll of the drums
and the grumbling of the thunder ; and the
sturdiest soldier was bowed with irrepressible
emotion. Subsequently he drove through the
camp slowly in an open carriage, stopping every
now and then to take better notice of any par-
ticular incident. In returning to the village
he elected to go on foot instead of being carried
down. It is a narrow bit of road, tolerably
steep, and very muddy and slippery from the
late rains, so that he was forced occasionally
to lean on General Kanzler's arm, and even on
the guns of the soldiers drawn up on either
side. Once, when there was a very bad
piece, I heard him exclaim, playfully, "Questa,
non la facciamo davvero !" (we shall never
be able to get through this) • and at another I
" Sona bravo viilitare 1" (I do not make such I
a bad soldier, do I ?) At Rocca di Papa he I
assisted at Benediction, given by Mgr. Nardi,
and in the Sacristy, the clergy and many of
the people were admitted, al bacio del sacro
piede. He walked away down the street, which
was draped and festooned, and spanned by a
triumphal arch, and then drove to Grotta-
ferrata, which he reached about 12. Here he
stayed till 4 o'clock, and dined ini the Convent

of Basilian Monks. By she returned to Fras-
cati, and went into the church and knelt
through the Benediction service. Afterwards,
he walked across the piazza to the Seminary,
and• soon after appeared in the loggia, gaily
decorated with hangings, to the delight of the
assembled crowd ; the rain had passed away,
and the sun shining so powerfully again, that
one of the attendants had to hold up his red
hat to shade him from it ; the church clock
chimed out the hour just as the people were
looking up impatiently for his blessing, he
waved his hand as though to point the cause
of the delay, and then pronounced the solemn
formula, at the close of which a burst of cheer-
ing broke from the assembled crowd. Captain
D'Arcy's company (the first of the third
battalion of Zouaves) formed a guard of hon-
our. The town band had played their best at
intervals during the Pope's brief stay, and he
sent a hundred cigars to be distributed among
them. An elegant collation was prepared for
him by the Company in the station at Frascati,
and the special train left at quarter to seven.
As it passed through the tunnel it was illumi-
nated with a sudden play of electric light.
It was raining again when he got back to
Rome, but the route of the corthr, t, thr

ne cortege to .e
Vatican, was lined by the usual eager crowd.

THE CHIN ESE EMBASSY.

(From the Anglo-American Times.)

The approach of the Chinese mission to England
is exciting attention, and no small amount of sus-
picion, being headed as it is by an American. It
has been rumoured that the Mandarins, accompany-
ing Mr. BuRLINGAmE, are of little account in their
own country, and that the Government intends
through them to play a double game. A writer
to the Times takes exception to a sentence as re-
ported in Mr. BURLINGAME'S speech, in reference
to " a tyrannical policy, which would involve not
only China, but would involve you in bloody wars
with each other." According to the writer the
English are therein charged with enforcing a policy
of that order, and he replies that no grosser cari-
cature of the real facts could have been uttered. He
fears Mr. BURLINGAME'S seductive influence on
Lord STANLEY, and recommends the appointment
of a board to act as a buffer, but such persons are
always to be found to suggest doubts, and to thwart
the accomplishment of the most desirable ends. The
main doubt is, however, that the mission is designed
to postpone the settlement of an inconvenient
question about to be raised by the expiration
of the present treaties in force. As the
mission will soon be in London, we leave Mr.
BURLINGAME to make his own explanations. On
Saturday, the 20th June, the members of the
Chinese Embassy visited General Grant, -when they
met the Ministers of England, France, Russia, and
Prussia. Mr. Reverdy Johnson, the American
Minister to St. James's, was also there, Speaker Col-
fax and a number of the highest military officers, and
afterwards the Ambassadors, were the guests of
Chief Justice Chase. They then left Washington for
New York, and a grand dinner had been given to
them at Delmonico's, where Mr. Burlingame made
the speech which has attracted so much atten-
tion in F.ngland. Mayor Hoffmann, Governor
Fenton, and many of the most distinguished New
Yorkers were present. The Ministers of the
great Powers were invited, but those of France and
England declined on the plea that they ware unable
to absent themselves from their duties at 'Washing-
ton. One of the many rumours which have obtained
currency as to the object of the mission in Europe, is
that they desire to secure co-operation for the open-
ing of a ship canal through the Isthmus of Darien,
to which China is willing to contribute $15,000,000.
The despatch of such a mission shows an advance in
knowledge at Peking, which is difficult for Euro-
peans and Americans unacquainted with the coun-
try, to realize, and to more than any other man this
change is due to His Excellency Anson Burlingame.
lie laboure I long for this effect, in conjunction
withthe British Minister at Peking,the late Sir Frede-
rick Bruce. Mr. Burlingame uses the very argument
that must have been forcibly present in the mind of
Brigham Young when he took the contract to grade
a section of the Union Pacific line. He urged upon
the Celestial Government th It China must come
into relations with the civilization pressing all around
.her. She could no more fend it off than the Mor-
mons could, S 3 the Brother of the Mo ni took a
course not unlike that of the Prophet, and advanced
to meet it. The question was not whether it was
for the benefit of the Celestials ts be brought into
such communion, for it coul I no more loc. averted
than could the incoming tide of the ocean. Indeed
it is a question, and one of moat serious import to
China, whether the Tartar ruler has not already
delayed too long. The fairest provinces of the
empire have been desolated by rebels; his capital
has been captured by a foreign foe, and the inhabi-
tants of Peking have beheld the flames of the
palaces of their monarch lighting up the range of
hills, at whose base spread the wide gardens of the
Yuen-Ming-Yuen. With a strange infatuation the
father of the present Emperor courted the fate
which overtook him. The wisest of his Ministers
counselled peace with the advancing barbarians,
who had broken through and captured his defences
at Takoo. The simple-minded sovereign proposed
" a hunting-tour," which his counsellors, assembled
in multitudes, pronounced to be a flight from his
capital, and after long argument the term was
changed into " taking the field." " But," ex-
claimed the counsellors, " your Majesty's subjects
are not fools ; the enemy are to the South, and your
Majesty proposes to go North, leaving the capital
between you and the enemy instead of your Ma-
jesty between that enemy and the capital." These
barbarians, the counsellors declared, to be tame
savages, compared with those of olden times, and
the poor things were even dependent on their
Chinese assistants, who might be bribed and de-
tached from them. They dwelt on the fact that
they were a mere handful, and if the worst rime to
the worst, the desire of the barbarians' could be con-
ceded, who only wanted to trade. The E nperor, in
a panic and under an infatuation, fled to Jehol. It is
comparatively easy to go there, said the advisers,
but who will guarantee that you will ever get back ?
They predicted that he would never return alive,
nor did he return except to be buried, his death
following a few months after his flight. When the
British and French were rummaging the Summer
Palace, a package of documents, lately written, was
discovered and translated. It contained petitions
sent to his Majesty by the different boards, toge-
ther with a few from retired Ministers and self-
constituted advisers. The intention of the Empe-
ror to abandon the position being announced under
the plea of the hunting party, the Mandarins as-
sembled to discuss the "natter in their different
offices, and these curious papers were the result.
The President of the Board of Civil Olicea and his
twenty-three colleagues—a small number compared
with the signatures coming from other offices—used
this language _ _

" They admire the awe-inspiring demeanour
and the stragetic ability thus displayed, but the
common people are extremely slow of compre-
hension ; they easily suspect, and with difficulty
appreciate; and they will say that the barbarians
are to the south-eastward of the capital. The
change of plan from a hunting tour to taking the
field in person should induce your Majesty to re-
main at Tang-chow for the support of Sanko-lin-sin.
The taking up a post to the northward of the capi-
tal would be a desertion from the seat of war, and
accordingly what in name was campaigning was in
reality a hunting tour. The people's mind would
be perturbed, and the spirit of the troops would fail.
If defence and holding out in words are to mean
flight and dispersion in fact, your Ministers will
not urge your Majesty that the temples of your
ancestors, and the altars of the tutelary gods will
be abandoned—i.e., that the Empire will be lost.
These three questions prese❑t themselves—First,
What if your Majesty should find yourself in a place
without any retreat? Second, What if your MA-
jesty's departure should lead to commotion in the
capital ? Third, What if elsewhere your Majesty
should be in the midst of more serious dangers?
Your Majesty is well familiar with the maxim,
that a prince 13 bound to sacrifice himself for his
country."

The blow to the prestige of the monarch has
been damaging if not fatal, and it was shortly after
the death of the late Emperor that Mr. Burlingame
appeared on the scene. The last news from
China is that the rebels had inflicted a defeat on
the Imperialists and threatened to march on Peking.

If any step could save the empire and re-establish
the supremacy of the ruling family, it is that which
has been so strongly and successfully urged by Mr.
Burlingatne. Exclusion is a Tartar, not a Chinese,
policy. Naturally the Celestials are fond of trade,
willing to work hard for gain, and keen at barter,
though lying and unscrupulous traders. Supposing
that Mr. Burlingame makes his counsels felt by the
Imperial Government, and that that Government
retains the power of carrying into execution its re-
solves, the effect cannot fail to be prodigious. A
third of the human race acknowledge the Emperor's
sway, and to bring such a section into cordial com-
munication with the rest to work together for the
development of the earth is to accomplish a
revolution. In England, notwithstanding the
mistrust, the Ambassadors will be well received,
and every project calculatel to promote trade will
be forwarded to the utmost, and they will
be favourably impressed where they meet with
consideration and hospitality. In their mind's
eye they must compare the stagnation and
decay left by the thousands of years of civiliza-
tion in the mighty empire of which they are citi-
zens, with the wealth, the luxury, and conveniences
on both sides of the Atlantic. They will learn the
value of work, of good government, and of well-
directed education. They already know the force
with which the mighty countries of Christendom
can strike when necessary, and they will be com-
pelled to acknowledge in the council chambers of
the empire, through the official forms which only
have weight in that land of red tape, that the fierce
barbarians of their imagination are a mere myth,
and that the wisest policy is to follow Mr. Burlin-
game's counsel, and work in unison with the great
nations of the West.

MISCELLANEOUS NEWS.

(From the Aulo American 2 imes.)

Frank Leslie gives an amusing account of the
collapse of the Athenaeum Club in New York. The
projectors describe the feature of the Athenzeum to
be /Esthetic, and yet convivial, so irreproachable in
character that Christian mothers and wives would
be glad to know their sons and husbands were
within its influence, and at starting reverend men
offered prayers at weekly meetings, while the neigh-
bouring rooms were dedicated to pastimes and club
practices, without which members could not be got.
One does not deserve credit, says Frank, for great
foresight in predicting that a false pretence and a
hypocritical sham such as that could not survive
many years. The Club was started about nine
years ago on this principle to combine what our
illustrated contemporary describes good morals,
respectability, &c., with the petty vices and follies
of men of leisure and fashion, and although
it considers the discreditable collapse to be another
evidence that clubs are not indigenous to the Ameri-
can soil, yet it feels sure that such a hybrid insti-
tution would have failed anywhere. In London
Frank says clubs are the refuge and asylum of men
who through misfortune have no attractive homes,
and wanting sweethearts and wives, rightly enough
seek diversion and pleasure in indulgences which
may be practised with immunity in a club-house
among faithful friends. We wonder what the in-
dulgences alluded to are ? Better iced wines and
better cooked entrées, with a smoking-room and plenty
of newspapers, periodicals, and books are the only
indulgences we have seen in London clubs. As regards
" immunity" it consists in being pulled up.by the
committee, if feet are put on chairs, if servants are
rudely spoken to, if the smell of tobacco is detected
in any other place than that set apart for smoking,
or if a stranger, supposed to be the friend of a
member, is seen irregularly on the premises. In-
deed a man has been struck off a club list for wear-
ing slippers ; another for lending money at a high
rate of interest. This is all we know of the " im-
munity" for members of London clubs. We have
sometimes thought, says Frank, that the majority
of New York club members looked vastly like
jilted men, but we can assure Frank that the beauty
of a club is that one can sometimes escape from
one's wife, and she can then be relieved from the
society of a cross husband.

Those in England who saw Bierstadt's picture of
the Domes of the Yo Semite have some knowledge of
that wonderful valley. It was conveyed by the
General Government to the State of California, to
be reserved for ever as a pleasure ground for the
people. The Californian Legislature however granted
large tracts to two squatters, and the bill was vetoed
by the Governor. The Legislature passed the bill
over the veto, and it was referred to Congress. A
petition against any concession of the land to indi-
viduals is now being circulated for signature, and
the Valley is in the hands of a commission charged
with the duty of laying it out for public use. Bier-
stadt's picture has made it so well known in the
Eastern States that the job is not likely to be suc-
cessful, and it is thought that Congress will sup-
port the Governor's veto.
At one time rumours confidently asserted that
Butler and Grant had been reconciled through the
mediation of Mr. George Wilkes. The correspon-
dent of the Boston Advertiser gave a long account
of the negotiations, but the latest statement is that
Butler is not satisfied with the advances General
Grant has been persuaded to make. Considering
that Mr. George Wilkes, if report be true, is a very
heavy loser by the result of Impeachment, which he
naturally regarded from the sporting point of view,
he was acting, while smarting from this, the part
of the Good Samaritan in soothinc, the wounded
feeling of that " old Democrat," as Senator Fowler
calls B. F. Butler. A passage of arms had
occurred between Mr. Fowler and Butler, the
former having, in a speech in Tennessee, whilst
reflecting on the conduct of his brethren, Messrs.
Wade and Sumner alleged that the whole House of
Representatives was under the lead of those good
old Democrats, Butler and Logan. This remark
the Tribune declared " to be in wretched taste,"
which the Nation thus comments on. " A man
might be a very good fellow, and be disapproved of
by Chesterfield ;" but when the Tribune says his
language is in " wretched taste," women and child-
ren, and even decent men, ought to avoid his so •
ciety. Mr. Butler has retorted by showing that
Senator Fowler, in 186 G, travelled 500 miles to see
him athis home in Lowell, " to urge him vehemently
not to cease his efforts till Andrew Johnson was
impeached."

enators 111‘Donald and Rice, from Arkansas,
were sworn in on Tuesday, June 23, and Repre-
sentatives Bolles, Root, and Hind the next day.
The Representatives advanced to the bar of the
House and took the oaths of office. Mr. James
Brooks, of New York, presented a protest against
their admission, signed by the 45 Democratic Re-
presentatives, to which the House refused to listen.
The tone of this paper may be imagined from the
following extract :—" Some of the now so-called
bayonet Constitutions from the South propose ab-
surd and cruel tests—absurd as in Arkansas, where
is interwoven in the organic law a mere party test
between the Radical reconstructionists and the De-
mocratic Conservatives, such as would exclude from
voting, if living there, the thousands, the tens of
thousands, the hundreds of thousands of Democrats
iu the free States (Article 8, section 4) ; and cruel
as in Alabama, where no white man can vote who
will not forswear his own race and colour, and per-
jure himself by swearing, in defiance of the law of
God, that the negro is equal, and for ever to be his
equal, at the ballot box, in the jury box, with the
cartouche box, in the school, in the college, in the
house and home, and by the fireside—in short, in
every way, everywhere.

The Senate Committee on Foreign Affairs has
decided to report unfavourably upon the House
Ut, instructing the Pre3ident tc senl vessels of
war to di., Gulf of S,. Lawrence for the protection
of American fiihareaen. The Legislative Appro-
priation Bill was discassel in the Chamber on the
231 and 24th June, and Mr. Sumner, after a
sharp passage with I\lr. Conkling, who had called
him " the full orb of the State Department," se-
cured William Hunter in his appointment of Se-
cond Assistant Secretary of State. A sum of
$20,000 %vas appropriated for the bureau of educa-
cation, which had been struck out by the llou3e
who fancied the industrious head of the department.
Dr. Barnard was not working efficiently. The
Eight Hours Bill, as framed by the Representa-
tives, was passed in the Senate by a vote of 2G

to 11, the most idiotic measure ever adopted in an
assembly like the Senate by so large a majority.
Of course such men as Sumner and Fesseuden
opposed it, working as they do on principle and
unmoved as they are by clamour. Congress might
as well legislate to fix .the price of bread and
meat, as to control labour—yet this is the bill
which at once receives the signature of the Presi-
dent. Discussing Senator Sherman's Bill for keeping
the currency equally diffused, the Nation observes,
" a supplementary bill should be passed, forbid-
ding the accumulation, under any circumstances, of
more than a certain amount of currency in any one
State. This will be the way to get the better of
the greedy Wall-street men. We all know, too,
the great inconvenience which is occassioned, both
in domestic life and in agriculture, by the unwil-
lingness of water to run up-hill. Why not let us
have a short bill, before Congress adjourns, de-
priving water of this disagreeable quality, and
making it squirt and flow in all directions with
equal facility? The saving of labour this would
caue would be enormous."

Mr. Schenck's new Tax Bill, confined to whisky
and tobacco, was introduced oa the 20th June, and
for some days occupied the House. It proposed
to fix the whisky tax at GO cent;., but the Repre-
sentatives reduced it to 50. The object of many
members was clearly to kill the measure by delay,
a plan having been organised by the " whisky ring,''
who desired to continue the plunder and the
enemies of the Chicago nominees, who hoped that
their grand cause of complaint against the Re-
publican party (the corruption and frauds) might
not be removed before the campaign. We are
happy to say that the bill was passed by the Repre-
sentatives, and we trust will meet with no opposi-
tion either from the Senate or the President. Mr.
Schencks pointed out the tactics by which
the measure, the result of five manths hard
labour, had been defeated, as unp •eeedented in
Congressional annals. The Committee of Wapg
and Means only obtained a hearing after a
good deal of fillibustering. He considered that
had the House worked at the old bill it would have
got through the whisky and tobacco sections by the
22d June, and that nothing was gained in point of
time by the new bill. The loss to the Revenue by
throwing out the additions to the tax on banks and
the doubling of that on sales by wholesale dealers
will reduce the revenue below the expenditure.
William Longbridge, of lowa, introduced a resolu-
tion to report a bill as early as possible for funding
the Public Debt at a lower rate of interest, and, in
spite of an effort by the New England and New
York members to refer it to the Committee on
Ways and Means, it passed. General Butler voted
in favour of the resolution.

Humboldt Register, May 16.—The Monte-
zuma furnaces are in full blast. Mr. Likely, the
foreman, tells us that this season he will cord up a
mountain of bullion for the cars to haul to market.
There are 500 tons of ore on hand, while the mine,
to all appearance, is inexhaustible. There are inany
mines situated near the Humboldt river, and within
a short distance of the line of the railroad, that
will be worked by Mr. Nason's process of smelting.
The Arizona mine continues to improve in the
shaft being sunk from the main level. The shaft ie
now down 60 feet, exposing a ledge at that depth of
over three feet in thickness, of a very superior
quality of ore. Governor Fall is now working a
large force of hands on the mine and mill. Busi"
ness is improving and times look hopeful.
General Alfred T. Hartwell has been appointed
to the bench of the Supreme Court in the Sandwich
Islands. He graduated at Cambridge, Massachusetts, le
1838. The war found him a student in the law school,
when Le entered the service and reached the grade of
brigadier-general and the command of a Massachusetts
coloured regiment. He was returned to the Legislature
from Natick iu 1867, and has since practised law in Boston•
At the suggestion of ex-Governor Washburne of the
Cambridge law school he was appointed judge, and hay.'
ing accepted the post will shortly proceed to Hawaii.

Mr. Hooper declines to be a candidate for re-
election to Congress from the Boston and Cambridge
district.

The marriage of Senator Henderson to Miss
Foote, which took place at Washington on the 25th Jun°,
was a very grand affair. The Chamber had postponed its
meeting till two o'clock to enable the Senators to see the
ceremony. It was remarked by ono of the correspondent°
that numerous Radicals who had been loudest iu the de-
nunciation of the Senator, attributing to him all manner
of corrupt motives for his vote on impeachment, wore seen
tossing off his champagne, and congratulating him as if I,°
was the best of good company.
Dr. Marion Sims has received from the King of
Portugal the insignia of the Order of Christ.
George Francis Train, having nothing else to do,
in the Marshalsoa, has written reams upon reams, and the
American papers team with his productions. It astonishee
us that ho who writes so much should write so well, aua
in such spirits, considering the circumstances ; but he 10°
one inexhaustible theme of inspiration, and that is—him'
self.

General John A. APClernand and his wife were
thrown out of their carriage at Springfield, Illinois, an
severely but not dangerously injured.
The Hon. Daniel D. Pratt, of Logansport, Ill"
diana, who has been nominated for Congress by the Bo"
publicans of the English District of the Stats, is one of the
largest men in America. His height is about six feet SiS
inches, and his weight about four hundred pounds.
Senator Sprague, after bis re-election, gave
reception at Newport to both Houses of the Legislature. I
CHIEF JUSTICE CHASE.—It is reported on goOu'i
authority that Mr. Chase has written a letter, to be read
in the National Democratic Convention, placing himself
squarely on any platform that the Convention may deter'
mine, but urges on the members that negro suffrage "
recognized, and universal amnesty be demanded.— Trash
ington Express.
An American paper states that the Emperor 0f
Austria has forwarded a splendid silver dinner service t°
President Juarez in return for the body of Maximilian.
Mr. John H. Gilmor, of Richmond, Virginia'
has written a letter in favour of Chief-Justice Chase 1°
the Democratic candidate for the Presidency.
In Maine, the Democrats have nominated E. 17V:
Farley as candidate for Congress against James E. Elal7
for the Third District, and have put forward George, 1Y

Ladd for the Fourth District. -
The Thirteenth Annual International Conventi°/1,/
of Young Men's Christian Associations lately assemble
T.
at Detroit, more than 700 delegates being present. IL .
Miller of Cincinnati was unanimously re-elected presi-
dent ; while General lloward of Washington and Professor
Cyrus Northrop of New B.aven were among the vice-
presidents.
The Englishman, Captain Garrett, who was t°
sail from Chicago to Liverpool in a lifeboat of novel coil'
struction, has been drowned. The boat, the Little Western"
was smaller than the Red, White, and Blue. On Sundsl
afternoon, Captain Garrett, accompanied by a teacher in
ono of the public schools, a reporter for the Chicago Ti°
and a boy, mad© a trial trip in the little vessel. The 1)0%
was capsized, and the captain and the reporter Were
drowned. fie
The United States storesbip Supply, of the AsLa-f,
squadron, has arrived at Boston from China, having e
board the bodies of Admiral 801 l and Commodore Reed'
drowned in Japan, and Commodore Maenzie, killed "
Formosan pirates in those waters.
The settlement of Shakers in Alfred, Mailie;
numbers about 100 persons, who own some 2,000 tierce ~1
land, and are prosperous in worldly means, as is 0'1"
with the sect.
Rev. Henry Stackpole, of Woodstock, Vermont'
fell backward from a ladder iu a saw-mill upon a 60111°'
saw, which severed him from head to foot in an instant' a
Colonel F. Parker and two others have purchaseoo
the West Rutland marble quarries, Vermont, for 150
dollars.

Births. clo
irooD-7.-on. the 9th July, at St. Andrew's, Lady Aci'l

Hood, of a son. nacif
BOURNE—On the 10th July, at 14, King Henry's-4.-
NAV., Mrs. 11. Fox Bourne, of a son.
WAYDELIN—On the 10th July, the wife of Charles •
Waydelin, Thornton-heath, of a son.
Marriages.
,„40e1
COIVAN—GALDRAITR—On the 9th inst., atJohnstone
Iteufrewshire, Hugh Cowan, Esq., advocate, 6'l. of
Substitute of the county, to youngest daughte
Andrew Galbraith, Esq., merchant, Glasgow. igair
Buowx —HALL--On the 11th inst , at St. George's, ".cer
over-square, Mr. Brown, of 11 Prince's-street, 1.130°'
square, to Sophia, daughter of the late Mr. Hall, of
sumo street.

Deaths. 100'
BUTTERFIELD—On 1110 18th ult., at Bermuda, t.O I
Nathaniel T. Butterfield, in his 80th year. I, i did.
COOKE—On the 10th inst, at North Shields, aged 50, -"-
Cooke, Esq., late of London. 01°'
3.OIINSON—On the 10th inst., Henry Johnson, Esq., sA S°'
tor, late of No. 10, New-square, Lincoln's-inn, at'
2, Holland-park-terrace, Notting-hill, aged 48.
_.......e,

London : Printed and Published by WILLIAM 00,
'of No. 112, Strand, Printer, at Tan SUN 011 el rd°,./
Strand, in the Precinct of the Savoy, in the 0113'
MiddleSei.---Monday, July 13, 1868.