THE AMERICAN INTERNAL STRUGGLE.

Lyttelton Times, Volume VI, Issue 389, 26 July 1856, Page 7

THE AMERICAN INTERNAL STRUGGLE.

(From fie Melbourne " Argus," May 9.)

The election of Mr. Banks to tbeSpeakership of the Rouse (^.Representatives is, as we stated yesterday, a great triumph for the anti-slavery party i» America. An intense degree of interest for the whole civilized world is now attaching itself to the progress of the really stupendous stmrgle between the two great parties which divide the American repticlic; and the final issue of it is awaited with the deepest anxietyby all intelligent observers on both sides of the Atlantic. Hence the vast importance of ihe result of that protracted contest in the Legislature—a contest unexampled in the annals of representative government —which has just, terminated. The President himself was deeply impressed with the magnitude of the crisis ; and hv sending his speech down to the house before the Speaker had been chosen, as well as by holding out the threat that he would, if the house did not speedily arrive .it a decision, employ all his auth 'lily to compel it lo do so, lie shuwcl his alarm at it. The result of it portends tie downfall of President Piece.

The question inure imineiliately involved in tlie struuule lu'tween the two p.n ies for the Speakeishin is the Nebraska or Kansas griev-

ance, which is but the latest from that ancient and inexorable evil, slavery. As many of our readers may not be acquainted with tlie precise merits of this Nebraska question, we shall detail them as we find them stated in a recent journal. The grievance may he briefly described as the defence, by the Abolitionists of Kansas, of their constitutional rights, against their pro-slavery neighbours of Missouri on the one hand, and the Federal Government on the other. As soon as Nebraska was constituted a " territory," or embryo " state," with the power of permitting' or prohibiting slavery within its own borders, energetic efforts were made in the North to people it with anti-slavery settlers. This movement was .sufficiently successful to give the anti-slavery men—or Free soilers, as they are designated in the vocabulary of American party —a decided majority at the first election. But that inaugural exercise of the franchise was interrupted by an irruption of fierce pro-slavery men from the adjoining State of Missouri. Incredible as it may appear to persons whose extremest experience of electioneering strategies extends only to the abduction or personation of individual voters, the invaders intimidated the returning officers into receiving their votes. The Free soilers were thus robbed of the they had done so much to secure, and the majority so unexpec t°dly returned voted Nebraska a slave state. The Governor, though appointed by President Pierces pro slavery cabinet, refused to acknowledge the act of a State Congress elected by the citizens of another State. But the President, recklessly beut upon gratifying the South, actually superseded his first nominee by ano« ther, instructed to recognise the Missouri vote. By this time, blo»l had been shed, and the new Governor even applied for United States troops to act against the Free soil colonists. The application was granted; but the probable refusal of the militia to obey the Governor,, and the resolute altitude of the Free soilers, now armed in self-defence, deterred him from carrying out his authority. He conceded to the demands of the bona fide settlers the removal of Missouri men from the offices they had usurped, and the recognition of the electoral rights conferred by actual residence. The latest accounts, however, show that the President has now gone the length of declaring himself openly on the side of the pro-slavery party (or '■ Border Ruffians," as they are termed l>y their oppom-iHs) : and, in a message to Congress, luts, to quote ihe language of the New York Tribune, " grossly assailed Governor lieeder, denounced the Emigration Aid Society, upheld the Border-Ruffiau Legislature and it's enactments, declared the Free Soil movement to be treasonable, and proposed that Congress should originate a movement for the organization of Kansas as a state under Border-.Ruffian auspices. Coincideutly with this message comes intelligence from Kansas that the hostilities between the Free Soil 'men and the Mi-sourians had become deadlier than ever. A fight had taken place, at which two at least were killed, and others wounded, and preparations for a regular pitched battle between the two parties were rapidly bein>r made. All was confusion, disorganization and alarm. It is not improbable "that the Anti-Pierce party in Congress, feeling the:n£selves now stronger than before, will arntgp the President or his ministers for a gn>s?_ outrage on the constitution, whifch: has led i^jfe actual" internecine warfare. .£ Mr. Banks was both a Freessoiler and a Know-nothing, and it was the 'union of these two parties that carried his election. But the old quarrel, so far from being healed by his election, is resumed. The South will have to defend all that it has recently gained; the North to recover all that it has lost, and vindicate all tluu it holds dear. There is no present question of the abolition of slavery, as an American institution :no present question of Cede.ul action against the usages of the South. The issue is shifted from the right of property in men, and the right of recovering a human chattel from the free soil to which he may have fled to the right of actual residents in a State to exercise the franchise in freedom from external dictation. In trying that issue, the citizens of Kansas will have the support oi all the North, and will now be opposed by the entire So.ith. No America!) citizen, save the filibusier, whom pro-slavery influences have fevered as well as tainted, can be indifierent to the preservation of rights kin- at the very foundation of political liberty; and many a slaveholder would prefer the instant dissolution

of the Union to its convulsion by the outbreak of civil war. It is ominous, that the President himself pronounces the hitherto avoided word " Disunion'1; warning tne North that that is the alternative of submission to the terms proposed by the South. Whatever the ultimate issue of this great struggle may be, it is impossible for any Englishman to contemplate it unmoved. A magnificent empire; the most powerful, splendid, and auspicious embodiment of pure democracy which the world has ever witnessed, is convulsed to its foundations by tbe monster evil of slavery. It is clear, we think, that to prevmt disruption, and secuie permanent consolidation, the United States must, by any means, get rid of this evil. But so complex is the problem, that the wisest beads in America are unable to discover a satisfactory solution.

Dr. Scoresby on the Magnetism of Iron Ships.—The Rev. Dr. Scoresbv, who, as it is known, came from England to Victoria, in the iron clipper Royal Charter, expressly to observe more closely the effect of magnetic attraction of tlie iron in iron ships on the compass, had delivered a lecture on the subject in Melbourne, treating it in a very full yet plain manner. Dr. Seore>by's conclusion is that the ordinary compass is affected so variously by tbe magnetic attraction of iron ships that, when sailing on the ocean, it cannot be relied upon, but that the variation may be detected by having a consulting compass placed aloft, on a wooden mast. Tbe principles causing variation are two, and niay be thus described:—Steel caw be permanently magnetised, but common iron cannot, unless under very peculiar circumstances. But common iron may lie so far magnetised as to retain the power for years, and therefore to retain it for a longer period than any voyage extends to. This may readily be effected by percussion or hammering. The effect is similar whether the hammering be done by the blacksmith's hammer, by the blow given by a great wave to a vessel, or by the blow of one ship striking against another. The percussion, or vibratory motion communicated, is the agent causing the change, in short. Ii the blow is struck while the iron is held in a position vertical to, or pointing towards the axis of magnetic force in the earth at the spot, the effect is greatest; if struck while the iron is exactly horizontal, or evenly poised with reference to that axis, no magnetic power is developed in the iron. Practically, Dr. Scoresbv says, the hammering of the rivets employed ii) joining together the plates of an iron ship, convert her into an enormous magnet; but from the pecularities of the polarities of the magnetic force or current, there will be always a certain part of the ship where the force created, gradually growing less as that part is approached, ceases altogether. The direction in which the ship's head lies as she is building will cause the polarity of the ship's magnetism to lie in a certain direction ; but if the ship, after she gets to sea, meets with rough weather, the continued blows of the waves, if they strike her her iv a different direction, will change her polarity, and magnetic force, and acting on the compass, will change its direction also. The magnetic force given by the original blows of tberiveUing liammers, acting with the ship's head iv one direction, has in fact been changed by a series of wave blows, given while the ship's head lay in another direction. The second causs of changes in the compass is the change in the dip of the needle as the vessels go from the northern hemisphere down towards the southern. Tims the dipping needle on hoard the Royal Charier, the n.irth pole of which dipped at an angie of nearly severity degrees on leaving Liverpool, became gradually m.'re horizontal, till at sixteen degrees no! th of the cquutur it was perfectly horizontal ; and IJkmj the south pule commenced dipping, so that sio.v, on the L-uust of Australia, the northern pole w.is elevated at iin at gle of nearly seventy decrees. BtU these causes operated on a voyages to Australia to jnuke the yniinary compass vary much. Dr. Scoresbv aays also that there is a change in the compass whenever an iron ship's course is permanently changed, hut lie does not in'ik'iiic- exactly which cause produces this result. He maintains, however, that iron ship? ; ;irc fully as sa/e as wooden ones, if the necessary jjre<:.-*Jil!G!!«; are taken, particularly the elevated f'f>n-;nl(Mrjr'c«»i!*;r! t 's;, which answered perfectly on 'mi.ml tua ihii/u' 1 Charter. It was placed fur v-i wit i'ai'ii n\ ti)^ c the deck, on y, «/uyden mav..— lsevj Zealand ,^t]^c^ or-

A Few Questions Rkquiking Answkr.— VI hen a reviewer or other writer has crammed himself to chokinsr with some particularly abstruse piece of information, why does he introduce it with the usual remark, that " every schoolboy knows" it? He did'nt know it himself last" week. Why is it indispensable that he should let off this introductory cracker among his readers? We have a vast number of extraordinary fictions in common use, but this' fiction of the schoolboy is the most unaccountable to me of all. It supposes the schoolboy to know everything. The schoolboy knows the exact distance to an men, from the moon to Uranus. The schoolboy knows every conceivable quotation from the Greek and Latin authors. The schoolboy is up v.t present, and has been these two years, in the remotest corners of the maps of llussia and Turkey, previously to which display of his geographical accomplishments, he had been on the 'most intimate terms with the whole of the sold regions of Australia. If there were a run asrainst the monetary system of the country totnorrow, we should find this prodigy of a schoolboy down upon us with the deepest mysteries of hanking and the currency. We have nearly got rid of the Irishman who stood by us so long, and did so much public service by enabling the narrators of facetious anecdotes to introduce them with "As the Irishman said.'' We have quite got rid of the Frenchman who was for many years in partnership with him. Are we never "on any terms to get rid of the schoolboy? If the Court Circular be a sacred institution for the edification of a free people, why is the most abhoned villain always invested, in right of that frightful distinction, with a Court Circular of his own? Why am I always to be told about the ruffian's pleasant manners, his easy ways, his agreeable smile, bis affable talk, the profound conviction of his innocence that he blandly wafts into the soft bosoms of guileless lambs of turnkeys, the orthodox air with which he comes and goes with his Bible and Prayer-book in his hand, along the yard, that I fervently hope may have no outlet for him but the gallows? Why am I to be closed and drenche 1 with these nanscms particulars,in the case of every wretch sufficiently atrocious to become their subject ? Why am I supposed never to know all about it beforehand, and never to have been pelted with similar mud in my life? Has not the -whole detestable programme been presented to me without variation 50 times ? Am I not familiar with every line of it, from its not being generally known that Sbarmerwas much respected in the county of Blanksbire, down to the virtuous heat of Bilkins, Sharmer's counsel, when,in his eloquent address he cautions the jurymen about laying their heads on their pillows, and is moved to pious wrath by thb wicked predisposition of human nature to object to the foulest murder that its faculties can imagine ? Why, why, why, must 1 have the Newgate Court Circular over and over again, as if the genuine Court Circular were not enough to make me modestly independent, proud, grateful and happy? When T overheard my friend Blackdash inquire of my friend Asterisk whether he knows Sir Giles Scroggins, why does Asterisk reply provisionally and with limitation, that he has met him? Asterisk knows as well as I do that he has no acquaintance with Sir Giles Scroggins; why does he hesitate to say so point blank ? A man may not even know Sir Giles Scroggins by sight, yet be a man for a' that. A man may distinguish himself, without the pu'vitv and aid of Sir Giles Scroggins. It is even supposed by some that a man may get to heaven without being introduced to Sir Giles Scroggins. Then why not come out with the bold declaration, "' I rt ally do not know Sir Giles Scroggins, and I have never found that eminent person in tho le-ist necessary to my existence?"— Household

Words

»•■ The Monsteii Gi tn. —This marvellous piece of ordnance, ilie greatest winder in weapons of modern warfare, is pro»'revsinij rapidly to completion. As soon as the huge mass left die hands of the fur<rers it was transferred to the laiheroom, and d-iily since lias b^cn iindergoiiisr the operaiion of turning. The fir^t eff>rt of the artizans was to fin the outside of the piece, and give it the ordinary appearance of a o.innon, which it now assumes. This, though it in not finished as regards the pulish to he given u> ii,pn>yed the sterling: qualities of the iron. Ttift exterior being completed, the operation of boring was commenced with a cut of II inches. As may be expected, from the great diameter of the bofo. the process was necessarily

slow. The success attending the forcing of this immense piece of iron at once disproves the statements which were made some time ago, that large bodies of iron could not be forged far ordnance without erystalizaiion. A finer and better material in every respect was never turned out of the hands of the artisan than this great body, which so far has been the admiration of every scientific in in who lias seen it.