FRENCH DESIGNS UPON MEXICO.

Lyttelton Times, Volume III, Issue 122, 7 May 1853, Page 5

FRENCH DESIGNS UPON MEXICO.

The latest American papers are full of speculations respecting the probable results of a bold, and, so far, successful movement on the part of one Count Boulbon, who in the fogs of November, at the head of 500 armed French, emigrants from California, had seized the silver mines of Alraedal, midway between Guayamas and Hermosilia, in the large and wealthy province of Sonora, which is a member of the Mexican Confederation, to the south of California. This adventurer had defeated General Blanco and his army of 2000 Mexicans, and had declared Sonora and Sinoloa (the adjacent province) to be annexed to France!

It is probable that this adventurer will be disavowed by the French Government; but it is also possible that Louis Napoleon may see in this matter a fair opening for the enterprise and valour of the French soldiery, without- risking the consequences of a war in Europe. And this view of the case seems to be countenanced by the tone of the French press within the last few months.

The New York Herald, 13th December, remarks, that these articles, taken in connexion with the recent seizure of the Peninsula of Samana (in Hayti) and the reputed annexation move in Sonora, " unmistakably demonstrate the new line of policy -which it would seem France has resolved to adopt in relation to this republic, and to avoid complications in Europe. The despots of the Old World see, with intense alarm, the tendency which our republican institutions have to overspread this continent, and they dread the influence which our increasing power would give us in the affairs of Europe, '-fhis is confessedly the motive which has urgedl, France to send her squadron to the Peninsula; of Samaua, aud to prosecute the colonisation scheme of Sonora. The United

States are to be prevented, at every hazard, from increasing her territory by the absorption of the weak republic of Mexico into the Union. And the mode resolved on to carry out this policy is to send French colonists into Sonora, under the leadership of a ci-devant officer of Algeria."