AN AUSTRIAN CAPTAIN ON THE RUSSIAN NAVY.

Manawatu Standard, Volume IX, Issue 123, 29 April 1885, Page 2

AN AUSTRIAN CAPTAIN ON THE RUSSIAN NAVY.

HE , RIDICULES THE RUSSIAN FLEET. Daring the visit of the Mayor and Aldermen of Sydney to the Austrian man-of-war Saida, now Ijing at Sydney, the conversation with her commander not unnaturally turned upon the somewhat " parlous times" in which we are living, and the regnlt of what Captain Fayenz said must have a decidedly diminishing rather than magnifying tendency npon any apprehensions at present entertained of a visit to Australia by. Russian cruisers . The Evening News says : — " In the firstplace, as to this powerful Russianfleet reported in various places, from the Gape of Good Hope to Cape Howe, with a misty appearance at Backstairs Passage, Captain Fayenz simply laughed consumedly at the notion of there being anything to fear about it. The vessels comprising it are small, and old-fashioned (he saw them himself at the Cape), and the Nelson alone could blow the whole lot out of the water* ' and even,' said the captain, ( if the gentlemen of the Nelson happened not to be in Port Jackson, and the Russians run the gauntlet of your batteries, and got into your harbour (which they might do at night), they would be very useful to you afterwards for commercial or other purposes, for they would never get out again.' The captain evidently thinks that, despite our batteries, there should be no great difficulty in any steamer dodging them so fur as to get inside them ; but, as he says, that would be all the worse for the steamer. But on the Anglo-Russian question Captain Fayenz and several of his officers went even further than this, and said plainly that they did not think Russia meant fighting in the long run, but was merely bullying as far as she conld go, knowing that a constitutionally governed nation like Britain will always make peace even at the last moment if her enemy gives indications of a fair desire for peace.