NEWS BY THE MAIL.

Globe, Volume XX, Issue 1559, 17 February 1879, Page 4

NEWS BY THE MAIL.

[“ Home News.”] THU AFGHAN W A E. Thus, all along the line, not only have oar troops been successful, which was to have been expected, bub the border tribes, whose hostility we anticipated, have in the majority of instances declared for us, and are offering their services freely to our generals. They maybe be veiy usefully employed in constructing roads in rear of our advance posts, and the money thus employed, while outwardly no' having the appearance of a bribe, will, doubtless, cement the friendship now forming. Reconnaissances on the part of the three columns have revealed more than one road by which communications can be kept up. In the Khyber we have the Abkana connecting Lalpura with Miohni. In the Kurum valh-y we have the road up the river joining Bunnoo, our frontier station, with Thall. We have the Peiwar and the Spin Q-awi crossing the first main range of hills, and it is possible that General Roberts may, on his return march from Ali Khel, find an easier road down the bed of the river. The southern column has already used two, if not three routes through the southern spurs of the Suliman range as far as Dadur, and is in possession of two excellent passes over the Khoja Amran hills. But, while the troops and the tribes inhabiting these frontier districts are busying themselves in improving their communications with their immediate base of operations, it behoves the Indian Government to shake off the slot h and indifference to frontier matters under which it has lam so long, and to complete with energy the missing links’ between our main military posts and the Punjaub frontier. As yet there is but one good road crossing the Indus—namely, the Grand Trunk road to Peshawur. It is imperatively necessary for the safety of our Empire that all the roads to the foot of the large passes should be macadamised gun roads, and that these should be connected by an equally good military route running down the eastern base of the Suliman mountain. At present Kohat is counected with Rawul Pmdi by a sandy, unbridged track, impassible after heavy weather. Lahore and EJwardesabad and Lahore and Dera Ismail-khan are in a similar condition. The forty miles bßt *?® n Mooltan and Dera Ghazi-Khan present difficulties which in the hot season are absolutely insuperable to the quick despatch of troops}

while the frontier road from end to end is scarcely better than when we took it over from the Sikhs thirty years ago. General Hamley, in bis able lecture at the United Service Institution on Friday last, dwelt strongly on the importance of maintaining the most perfect and absolutely unbroken communications with our forces in front. How this is to be done, unless the Indian Government are prepared to sanction a large expenditure for road-making in the Punjaub and Scinde, we are at a loss to imagine. As Sir Edwin Johnson pertinently informed the audience at General Hamley’a lecture, the Indian Council had been thirty years debating on the best form of fort suilable for Peshawar, and had not yet decided the matter; so it appears they have been thirty years deliberating as to whether it is worth while to make military roads in the most important part of the Indian Empire. We trust their deliberations will shortly be concluded, and that we shall learn it has been decided to complete the railways to Peshawur and Dadur, to bridge the Indus, not only at Attock but at Kushulgarb, and to construct good macadamised roads to th* points wo have suggested. By this means i f - is more than probable wo shall give additional impetus to the Central Asian trade, which will doubtless also be encouraged by the fact that the main passes through the Suliman and Sufed-koh mountains are held by British troops, and the caravans spared the necessity either of paying blackmail or fight* ing their way through the hills. Subsequent news from the seat of war in India informs us that the British forces, under the command of Lieut.-Gen. Browne, entered Jellalabad on December 20th. He found the inhabitants friendly to the British, and was informed that the Ameer had taken to flight some days previously, leaving Sirdar Yakoob Khan in authority. Dissatisfaction and anarchy were announced as being in existence at Oabul, and the troops there were in a state of mutiny. A few days later the entry of Yakoob Khan into Jellalabad was announced, but this requires confirmation, and is not generally credited. On December 26th, General Roberts, in full durbar at the Kuram Fort, formally announced to the assembled chiefs the annexation of the valley by the British, and informed them that they were henceforth to look to the Empress of India as their Sovereign, for the rule of the Ameer had passed away for ever. Thus the plans foreshawed by Herbert Edwardos and Peter Lumsden a quarter of a century ago have become realised, and the Kuram district incorporated with the Indian Empire. THE DIBTEKS3 IK ENGLAND. The distress which now prevails from one end of England to the other is as severe as the climate itself up to yesterday has been. In the extreme north the railroads have been impassable from heavy snowdrifts; in the south traffic has been either stopped or checked in our streets and thoroughfares. Meanwhile, commercial failures have become a stereotyped feature in the columns of the daily newspapers. Mills and factories are closing more rapidly even than joint stock banks. In Lan cashire the suffering exceeds now the suffering in the year of the cotton famine—lß6l Want and misery are confined to no one class of our population. Clerks and skilled artisans are as much in need of work and food as agricultural laborers, Poor-law relief fails to im-et all the exigeuoies of the destitute; special local relief funds are being instituted in every great town. It is satisfactory to know that the money thus raised is being distributed in a manner the most calculated to ensure that it will effect a maximum of good. No cash is given to applicants before inquiries into their circumstances have been made, and the Poorlaw authorities are everywhere acting in conjunction with the Charity Organisation Society. As regards the present distress in different parts of the country, of which it may be hoped that the worst is now over, there are two things to be noticed. It is plain that the charity of the different localities affected is entirely adequate to the additional demand made upon it. Erom Manchester, Leeds, Birmingham—each of which places is the centre of the direst suffering—comes the news that the wealthier inhabitants of the town are doing all that is wanted. AFFAIBB ON THE CONTINENT. Bad as is the domestic plight of England at this present Christmas season, there is much on which we may, in comparison with our Continental neighbors, congratulate ourselves. Unless the European Press is particularly insincere, wo have abundant reason to be satisfied with the golden opinions that we have won from the Courts and Cabinets of the Continent. French, German, and especially Italian journalists, agree in saying that the influence of England as a Continental power is once more in the ascendant, while the “ Opinione,” a Roman print with traditional anti-British tendencies, admits that in the past twelve months England has stood forth as the champion of European liberties and rights. Having, through the utterances of Lord Beaconsfleld, identified ourselves in a special way with the preservation of the Treaty of Berlin, it is pleasant to know that the chances of this treaty are daily improving. If amongst any section of the Italian people there is still a lingering jealousy with England for the occupation of Cyprus, we may at least reflect with gratitude that, according to official accounts, the Cyprus experiment is a decided success. EUSSIA’S DIFFICULTIES. Independently of Nihilism, there is quite enough in the internal condition of Russia to make her unwilling just now to pledge herself to the active extension of her influence abroad at the risk of war. In Roumelia it is reasonable to suppose that Russia recognises for the first time the existence of a real understanding between Austria and Great Britain to execute and uphold the Treaty of Berlin. At home the Russian Exchequer is exhausted, and the loss of men in the late war is sorely felt. The attempt to float a new loan has failed. There have been serious and signifi. cant riots among the students of Kieff, leadii g to something very like a battle with the authorities, in the course of which eighty wete seriously hurt and killed. The Russian Tartars are in a state of insurrection at Kasan. In a word, the domestic horizon is growing far too overcast and threatening to cause the Russian Government to feel easy while the bulk of its army is absent in foreign parts. [“ Pall Mall Budget.”] FOOD AND FAMINE. There was probably never a period of distress in this country when articles of consumption were so cheap as now, and certainly wheat is at a point where it represents no profit to the farmers- How Utile the plentiful harvest bus benefited them so far as wheat is concerned appears from a calculation made in one of the papers specially devoted to the grain markets. According to this, although the British farmers have sold up to the present date 600,000 quarters more than they had disposed of up to this time last year, they have only realized £7,500,000 against £8 175 000 in 1877. The average price has < nly been 41s 6d a quarter instead of 54* 6d. In consequonc * of bad seasons and consequent want of money they are obliged to sell even at these low rates, and the market continues to turn in favour of the buyers. Thus nobody seems to be satisfied. The ironworkers and factory hands cannot many of them earn enough to buy even at the present low rates ; the well-to do are suffering from depreciated investments ; and the classes connected with the land, who are really better off than any, are themselves feeling a severe pressure. The worst of it is that until we have actually “touched bottom” each of these depressions must act and react upon one another. THE DUKE OF CUMBBELAND’S MAEEIAGB. The marriage of the Duke of Cumberland with the Princess Thyra was solemnised with great pomp in the chapel of the Royal Castle of Christiansborg last Saturday evening. A grand reception was afterwards held, followed by a banquet. At half-past eleven o’clock at night their Royal Highnesses drove through the town to the railway station, and went to the Castle of Friedensborg, the summer residence of the King of Denmark. The town was illuminated, and (here was a display of fireworks. From Berlin it is reported that an agitation has been set on foot in the Duchy of Brunswick, emanating from the National Liberal party, with the object of upsetting

tl e natural omor 01 »'»' ‘ - >ll preventing the Duke of Ci.mberland’s accession to the throne upon the demise of the present reigning Duke. The agitators, it is stated, do not desire their country to bo annexed to Prussia, but they hope to secure it a semiindependent status under the Emperor as chief of the federation, similar to the position now occupied by Alsace and Lorraine. The reigning Duke is altogether in favor of the Duke of Cumberland as his rightful heir, HABD WINTKBB. An enumeration of all tho severe winters in Europe during the lust ten centuries, made by the late M. Arago, and printed in tho 1 Paris Advertiser” of 1835, is of interest at the present season. In 806 tho Rhone was frozen over; the cold was from 18 to 20 centigrade degrees below zero. In 1133 the Po was frozen from Cremona to the sea; in 1234 loaded waggons crossed the Adriatic in front of Venice; in 1305 all the rivers of France were frozen over ; in 1324 it was possible to travel from Denmark to Lubeck and Dantzic on the ice. In 1334 all the rivers of Provence and Italy wore frozen; at Paris the frost lasted two months and twenty days. In 1468 it was necessary to break up the wine in Flanders with hatchets, in order to servo it out to tho soldiers. In 1544 the same became requisite in France. In 1594 tho sea was frozen from Marseilles to Venice, In 1657 the Seine was entirely frozen over. In 1767 the Seine was frozen for thirty-five successive days. In 1709 the Adriatic and the Mediterranean from Marseilles to Genoa were frozen. In 1717 shops were established on the Thames, and, finally, the Seine was entirely frozen over in 1742,1744,1766, 1788, and 1820. IBON SHIPS, The increase of iron-built ships in the merchant navy during the last seventeen years has been very remarkable. In 1860,181 iron vessels were built—a number which rose to 503 in 1864, when a check was experienced. For nine years the numbers fluctuated between 300 and 480; but in the last two or three years it has passed the previous maximum, and last year 545 iron vessels were built. The increase in the size is, however, most remarkable ; for, while the number of the vessels built has been multiplied threefold, the tonnage is six times as great. In 1860, the tonnage of iron vessels built was 64,699 ; in 1864 it was 283,169 ; in 1870 the 457 vessels built were of 272,320 tonnage; and last year the tonnage of 545 vessels was 390,953. To put it shortly, in the first half of the period under review 3103 vessels were built, and in the second 4264. But while the numerical increase in the second half over tho first was about 37 per cent., the increase in tonnage was 93 per cent. A grand national exhibition will be held at Moscow in 1880, which will probably be accompanied by great festivities., as it will coincide in point of time with the celebration of the 25th anniversary of the Emperor Alexander’s accession to the throne.