EUROPEAN ITEMS.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume IV, Issue 849, 23 January 1883, Page 2

EUROPEAN ITEMS.

London, Jan 10. Bismarck has proposed that the German 1 : Government shall expend the' sum of 600,000 marks in relieving the sufferers by the recent inundation. ■ It has been decided by the Suez Canal' Company to expend the sum of L20,000,000‘

in widening and otherwise improving the Canal. The works are to commence at once. The Czar of Russia has dismissed the Secret Society guard by which he has been surrounded, and has discontinued many • precautions which he has hitherto taken to frustrate the designs of the Nihilists. Sir O. Dilke, the new President of the Local Government Board, is at present at Nice, whither he has gone to attend the - second funeral of the late M. Gambetta, whose remains are to be finally interred there to-morrow. The Russian advance in Central Asia is ' still strenuously resented by the inhabitants, and it is now reported that the people Of Merv have murdered a Russian surveyor and three Cossacks in his employ. Sir S. Samuel, Agent-General of New South Wales, has been presented with a handsome souvenir by colonists and others resident in London, as a mark of their satisfaction at his recent elevation to knighthood. The produce of the French vintage of 1882- shows a decrease on that of the pre-vious-year of 3,000,000 hectolitres. Since the death of the late M. Gambetta dissensions have sprung up in the ranks of his followers, and it is believed that a general disruption of his party is likely to take place. It is reported that the French Government are about to dispatch reinforcements of troops to Natal, in view of the generally unsettled state of South Africa. A" Socialist agitation of an alarming character has sprung up in Rome, with ramifications throughout Italy. The Government have determined to take stringent measures fer the suppression of the organisation, and wholesale arrests are being made in consequence. The widow of the late General Chanzy has -been granted an annual pension of 12,000 francs by the French Government. A; number of laborers in Connaught have applied for Government aid to enable • them to emigrate to Queensland. The United States Congress has reversed the jdecLicn arrived at a short time ago in ' favor of the abolition of a portion of the protective daties previously in force.