DESTRUCTION OF PIRATES BY A DUTCH WAR STEAMER.

New Zealander, Volume 3, Issue 183, 1 March 1848, Page 3

DESTRUCTION OF PIRATES BY A DUTCH WAR STEAMER.

The following account of t brilliant and successful attack by H. N. M. war tteamer Vesuvius upon some pirates in the ica« near Sumbawa, his been obligingly communicated to us : — " After a cruiie in the seas of Celebes and Florcs, in company with H. M. schooners Dolphin and Cameleon, and having deitroyed four piratical prahus on the island of Kalao Tua, which had been left by their crews at the approach of the ships, H. N. M. steamer Vesuvius, commanded by Lieutenant Baron de Con«tant Rebecque, on her voyage jo Java, made a careful but fruitless research for pirates among the Postiion Iblandn, " Continuing her voyage she passed within a short distance of Fulo Selondo and Fulo Majo, and approached close to the west coait of the latter island to examine the bay where the year before some piialical prahus h ( d beca destroyed by ft, M, /schooner

" At 1-30 p. m. of the Uth October, a long onemasted prahu, painted black, and shortly afterwards four others (among which one two-masted) were seen at anchor to the southward of a reef close in ihore near a large fire, which afterwards proved to be a burning 1 prahu. " The steamer ran along the outer edge of the reef, In search of a channel leading bttwixt it, but the pirates immediately weighing and shaping their course inside of the reefs towards the straits of Sullee, the steamer ran with full speed (8± knots) for the S. W. point of Majo. and thus succeeded in cutting off their retreat. " Two of the prahui finding it impossible to escape by that way, pulled in shore to the N. E. and took shelter behind the reefs in the northern part of the bay on the west coast of Majo ; a short time afterwards the three others, fast losing ground, ran in shore for the southern part of the bay. " Although without a pilot on board, the steamer followed immediately in chase, and soon brought them within shot. At the second shot of the steamer, the crews of two prahus threw themselves into the sea and swam to the shore, hiding themselves in the forest. Some of the captives being seen bound in the prahus, and some others appearing near the beach who made signals to cease .Griog, the boats were manned, to take possession of the prahus or to burn them. The day being already far spent, they were set on fire, and the boats with the liberated prisoners, 6 guns, and some other weapons, returned to the steamer, which had kept her position by steaming forward and backward, the rocks beins now and then visible below the ship in soundings of 24 fathoms, suddenly deepening to 40 fathoms, no bottom. " At 3h. JJm. r. M. she made with full speed for the three prahus on the northern shore which had moored together along the shore, with their guns towards the sea-siile. " Although the Djuru Bahussa of Sumbawa, who was a passenger on board , and two of the liberated slaves, who were well acquainted with the coait, asserted that the uteamer could not possibly pa<s between the reek, the gallant commander, not wishing, without necessity, to attack three well-armed and goodmanned prahus, with his boats and only thirty men, without being able to protect them with bis guns, continued to *teer amongst the reefs, avoiding them at eyesight, and brought the ship within 201) yards of the prahus, notwithstanding their well directed gun and musket fire, many balls coming upon and in the ihip, and one of these passing between him and the purser, who was standing ,00 the paddle-box, was lodged in the funnel. " Then opening her fire, the 'steamer soon obliged the pirates to take shelter in the forest, from where they continued a heavy fire of mu9quetry on the boats, which had been sent to destroy the prahm, and executed it in a most gallant style under the command of the first officer Mr. Nieuwenhuizen, the steamer continuing her fire on either side of the boat. We have to deplore the losi of one sailor who was badly wounded in the boat. " At 5 p. m. the prahus being nearly burnt to the bottom, H. M. steamer Vesuvius left her most dangerous position, tnd extricated from among the reefs by her skilful commander, reached the same night the roads of Sumbawa. •'The prisoners -a ho have been liberated from the pirates to the number of eleven, state that their prahu belonging to Macassar, had been taken the same morning, after a fight of two hours and a half, three of them having been killed and three badly wounded; their prahu wai still burning when the steamer came in sight. Two of the prahus which have been destroyed were manned by forty men or upwards, and the ollierß by twenty-five to thirty men each, together carrying about forty guns and lellas, among which were several six pounders. Five of the poor fellow* who have been liberated arc wouuded, one of them very badly. " The next day, when the steamer left Sumbawa, the Sultan of that place was gathering his subjects to pursue the pirates on the island of Majo."— Singapore Free Press.

Making Much of Jcnnv Lind. — Not satisfied with making ,£G,3JO in four nights out of Jenny Lind, the Manchester speculators have put the following advertisement into the Manchester Guardian ,— 'JENNY LIND.— IMMENSE ATTRACTION" — The bed on which Jenny Lind elept in La Somnambula, is now on riew and on sale, at No. — , &c.' To those who happen to know, ai we do, something about the manner in which stage-bedsteads are manufactured, the one upon which Jenny Lind sleeps — that is to say falls, in La Somnambula, will be pictured to the mind'i eye as a true curiosity. Almost every sage bed with which it has been our misfortune to become acquainted, has been made up of that dead swindle a ''mossy bank," which is nothing more nor Jess than a hollow piece of frame-work with a piece of canvas panted gieen, stretched over it. Every seat on the stage, like every seat «n the House of Commons, require* canvassing, by the bye, before it can be taken possession of. The bed on which Jenny Lind slept in La Somnambula, at Manchester, was bo doubt one of the old stock property rustic mouuds with a counterpane thrown over it, and adapting it at once to the smothering of Desdemona, the retirement to rest of Zarlina, in Fra Diavolo, or the somnambulistic vagaries ol Amina, in the opera already spoken of. We can imagine the astonishment with which the Manchester people who have flocked to see the bed on which Jenny Lind slept — as if she had passed the night oa the stage— will start back at seeing nothing but a sort of elaborate stool, covered in and painted to resemble the turf, with perhaps a bag of gallery checks for a pillow, and a sack full of old play-bills for a feather bed. We should like to know the price of admission to view the bed, and the sum asked (or the purchase of the precious relic. We understand that the owner of a pitent Hansom's cab is driving about town, declaring; his is the vehicle into wh'ch Jenny Lin4 first gotjon her arrival in London, and he is tacking on an extra sixpence to his tare wherever he goes, in consideration of ths privilege enjoyed by the passenger who rides in the tame cab that Jenny Lind once occupied. Th»» beats the Bonaparte mania, when fifty pounds were asked or offered-— we don't remember which — for the shell of the identical egg Napoleon was eating when a shell of another description fell into the egg-cup, and he exclaimed— (< Ha, ha! thatisagoodsi^n — the yolk is broken! and thus will we break the yoke of oppression !" We understand that every sovereign changed by Jenny Lind at once commands two, and that every meal she takes, I the knives, forks, spoons, plates, &c , &c, command I such a high piice, that the landlord of one of the Manchester hotels has got rid of an entire service of the old willow pattern at a guinea lor the dinner plates, half a guinea fqr the desserts, live shillings for the J cheeses, with tureens and butter-boats in proportion. |

Pate of Pope's Skull. — Mr. Howitt, in his " Homes and Haunts of the British Poets," lays that the skull of Pope now ornaments the private collection of a phrenologist. Fifty pounds were paid to manage the transaction with the sexton of the Church in. which the deceased Poet was buried.— lb,