STRAWS FROM THE GOLD COAST. {From a Correspondent of ehe Polynesian.) No. 1.

New Zealander, Volume 5, Issue 372, 7 November 1849, Page 3

STRAWS FROM THE GOLD COAST. {From a Correspondent of ehe Polynesian.) No. 1.

Promissory — San Francisco— Puzzling Weather— Gambling — Gambler* — Hortatory — Vice, wide spread— Rapid changes — Pilgrims coming— Divers Immigrants— Government in prospect— SlaTery ' no go'— Finis San Francisco, June 26, 1849. My Dear Por. r—l r — I dislike to write on stilts. Let me speak out — free as vra'er — with no cramping freezing, stiffening for courtesy* lake -but warm, fresh, and light-hearted, as if for your own moit secret ear, not the huge engulphing auricular cornbasket of the public ; leave me to soliloquize, to dream aloud, on paper, and I will write you now and then, from this re-diicovcred Ophir— die real Ophir, tome have thought it— and let you know the status in quo of the grand tnorernentt here — moral, religious, social, political, and aurific, at well ai movements horrific, impolitic, uncivil, and immoral. % Here's San Francisco — the oddent little square mile of land hills and shrub oaks, tent houses and tabernacle stores, Yankeei, Chinese, Dutch, Africans, French, and Kanakas, the sun ever strove to look down upon through flying banks of Nora Zembla fog driven furiously inland by Polar huiricanes. In fact, a meteorological paradox— scft and summer-liks in winter, raw and wintar-like in summer— a maiden city, vitting in the dust, with teeth chattering and limbs shivering, locks streaming in the wind, and eyes (eyes red with dust and brandy) weeping fosth cold salt tprty from " morn till dewy eve." Such a place, my dear Po!., so unique and sui generis you might hunt the world over to find. Nor less an enigma is it morally und civilly, than physically. Walk a ound the public square- Portsmouth-square they call it,— see those cloth house?, half timber, half ranvas ; those mushroom tenements of wood, shut up at night, with billiard an 1 card tables and all the ma« chinery and appliances of gambling in full blast, and with a group— motley as mosaic— of all colours, coats and classes, gloating over piles of silver and gold, like crows over carrion— hot and reeking with liquor, wild with unnatural mirth and frenzy, and belching volcano like, huge, sweltering, terrific streams of blasphemous profanity , see them in those hells,— so fitly christened— bent on mutual robbery, lost to decency, glorying in their shame, and say if you don't think rum and gold a death mixture, potent hell-broth, woithy the witches' cauldron or the alchemy of Pluto ? .Those few half bold, half timid youths— whence came they f From Vic ksburg ? From Natchez ? Ah, — with their Yankee air and accent,— never. The maternal eye that wept iad fond tears, as they took leave of their New England thresholds, does not see them } now. The heart that with love unalterable swells to heaven for heaven's benison on the son far away, feels not the agony that would be felt were the truth realixed. Oh, shame on those sons, recreant to the glory and fame of their birth-Lnd, oblivioui of home i sympathies of mother, father, sister, wife, of the sweet, holy influences chat ennoble man, and illustrate the virtues of which his uutura is capable. Oh, parent, parent ! send no sou to California except he be rocksolid adanidut to all vice. Be her mountains pure gold, let them stand ; send no kith or kin of thine to dig them, nor thyself turn towards them, unless armed like an old knight, cap-a-pie, 'or a desperate conflict, not with revolver and bowie knife,— lead and steel are of smill wor.h,— bui with manly principle, a moral coat of mail, light and easy, but impervious. But is San Francisco a sinner above all the rest of the laud? So ry lain to say she is only "primus inter pares." I wouldn't slander her. The lust of gain is everywhere ; money is flash. The brutd in man fears little of law; not ltughs order to scorn; and all over the territory, with no sheriff to growl, vise holds up his head with the assurance of strict honesty, and men do things which they would hardly publish on a sign* post, much lets chronicle tot the eye of parent or wife at home. But perhaps you want netrs—not houilies. Shall I tell you of the hundred fine vessels in the harbour ? of the thousand pas-engers that land weekly ? the scores of houses ond stores rising with eveiy seven days circuit — the mountains of goods landing— the revolutions going on— chaugfs taking place— men rushing to and fro— steamers arriv.ng and departing — speculations on stilti — schemes, excitements, humbugs and disappointments—the tbree different murdes m town last week —the rjws and fights— et id omne genus. I cannot do it. Our wh' el buzz. s so swittly, you can't count the spokes- Better dauguerreotypc: a lightning flash, or drop a flitting meteor with a rfle, than attempt <o portray California* What was yet>terday, to-day is not, and to-day is no index of to moi row. We read papers and letters— learn that people at home are crazed— that town and (omitry, seaboard, upland, and backwoods are alike infected, and rushing, crusade-like, to rescue the golden city— the new piomised Und— from the Saracen grasp of old mother earth. What a world of ships,— three hundred and over,— perhaps 500, now tossing on the deep. What an immense armada of gold hunters, armed to the teeth with bowie knife and pistol, pick, shovel, and pan, brd, bread, and bacon. Our eyes stand out wwh wonder ; we only half believe what we know. It njads imagination— and not much either— to see a mighty state sp ing up here, full grown, like Minerva from Juve's ciamum. Yet so it is to be. You see the Yankee throng here, and think of bees around a honeycomb, or vultures around a carcass. Who is not coining ? Here's my couiin Nathan, and sister-in-law's cousin Ichabod, and Squire B'.uffum from lilulfumtown, York State, and Paasou Jones from Hickoryville, Four Corners, and Doctor Panacea from Saint NebuchaJnezzar Hospital; and every other body's cousins, Hist, second, and on to the sixteenth ; and every other trade and profession from law-malting to law-breaking, aod from pocket-picking and hard swearing to honest men, and true speakers of EnglUh. We are to have a state constitution, at least a go* vernme nt. The word has gone forth ; General Riley, quasi Governor of California, names August Ist for the day to vote, and vote we shall, and set up the timbers of a staunch Government. Congress may dose till doomsday, or lit all night quarrelling over slaveiy — like dons o\er a bone— if she likes. Our tub can stand on its own bottom ; and we will not only govern ourielvei, but decide the slavery question to boot. Congress may as well open her eyes, and own she has been nodding. Her Rip Van Winkle gaping betrays her ; she's a d»y too late for California. Sober men here laugh at the idea of permitting slavery, or of iv • troducing it. Plant a rose, will you, on the top of Manui L^a, or drive a clay pipe stem into a block of adamant, or make ilavery fl mrish in the Old Bay State, or change the leopard's spo s or the negro's skin. Do these things, will you ? Yea ! you will, ere Congress, or President, or South or North will establish slavery this side the Sierra Ntveda. There is too much Puritan blood here ; too many free bands, and free heads, and free hearts. There* too much gold here too. If one or two hundred dollars a month will not keep sailors on shipboard, or the terrors of military laws and punishments keep soldier* U aftug at thsir

barracks, will toiling for nought, think you, attract and bind a slave to his condition ? Those five hundred Georgian!, valiant with divert weapons and five hundred to two thousand ilaves, don't stand ia their way. Wtiit till they corar, and next day see them blacking their own boots and roasting their own ba« con, Oh, no ; this soft sunny territory— this fresh, invigorating, breath-imparting land— this mother of beef and gold, is not for the cloven hoof of bondage to tread on. Life, art, knowledge, freedom, virtue and faith—all that nurtures power, goodnets, and glory* uiusi ultimately prevail here, and a potent state spring up, to enlighten, move, and bless the world, in spite of gold and of all gold's hireling myrmidons— 'in spite of ilaveiy and of all her In rd- hearted hard reasoning champions. But how soon.' »' Quien sabe ?" Who knows ? as the natives sty. Dear Pol.» you'll want to rest your eyes, and I must attend to a client, or lose my fee ; to good bye for this time. Have patience, aud I'll talk of gold soon. Panorama •

France.— Not only the composition tif the French Government, but the behaviour of the men who guide the majority of the Assembly, indicates that the Government and its supporter* are crti eying on a decided attempt at reaction. H ying hold of ilw majority, the Government scarcely d sguises its purpose. Having triumphed over a partial and premature manifestation of revolt, it accounts its posi ion certain, and affects the language of a power whose decrees are final. It annuls the recent Constitution, bit by bit; braving censure by going to war without leave, suppressing newspapei s, prohibiting clubs for a year, permitting assemblages for the purpose of election, but declaring that any departuie Irom that purpose will draw down the Executive upon the asse.nbled electors— in other /vords, declaring- that the electors shall meet if the Government pleases. All the-e are dictatorial acts ; a dictatorship originally assumed without legislative authority, and only sanction d by the votes or party cries of the majorry, ex post facto. The change towards this condition of affairs was apparent hst week, ami in strictness we should have noted Ihe triumph over the Red Republicans; but in truth we regard the new phase as superficial, and were nor then considering the mere pacing humours of the moment. A contemporary reni nds us also that General Caraignac had offered to support order, which is true ; but he had not revoked his protest against the conduct of the Government. The immediate aspect of the danger which beseu Franoe has sonic! what altered ; but not for the better. 'Ihe minority appeals to " the Constitution ;" an idle appeal, fur the Constitution is a nullity now that power has passed from its authors' and it is virtually abandoned by Prince Louis Na« poleon Bonaparte, nephew of " my uncle,*' and has coalesced Imperialist, Monarchist, and Legitimist Minuter?. It is nonsense to refer to itai a substantive authority. A recent constitution is no more than the writen programme for regulating the operations of a tictory ; this ore was a compact in terms dictated by the victor* — victois no longer, but defeated and frus trated on all sides, «uperseded by the coalesced reactionaries. If those reactionaries retain power the constitution must become what they eh ose to make it. But can they ret -in power? Thty are taking stcp^ to defeat their open foe in the streets, but hardly to consolidate their own power. The same financial insolvency to which M. de Tocquevi le pointed as tae destruction of Louis Philippe's, but aggravated, hang over Louis Napoleon's Government, from which M. de Tocqueville has not yet publicly withdrawn. Tint Government has been continuing attempts at re« trenchmeuts ; but it hag entered into immense militaryexpenses 5 and to exasp rate the difficulty, it has employed its military outlay chiefly in an expedition hateful to the nation. The insolvency must be consummated, to the destruction of the Government ; or i must be met by new taxes and letrenchments— recall of disbanded armies, to swell the mob in the streets of Paris, at once hurting the pride of the French and supplying forces for revolt against an odious govern^ ment and its new taxes. There is a third course before either > f the oilier two can be comsummated a new revolution. At present that alternative may seem the remoter to the view, but ii is not the less a real peril; though the Ministers appear to forget it. While defying every dictate of prudence in tbeir policy, they have forgot or they slight and conreain. the people. Tney setin to regard Fiance ac they mi4ht a ho.se whoke fit of kicking is over, and to thinU that now they can put on the uuuiess and apply the wh>p at leisure. They caunot go far in this course without the people's discovering that its government is '» oppressive," "tyrannical," •' arbitrary," m *hort, open to all the epithets apph able to the old regimes. One reason is, that the I'nnce President's councils are now possessed by men bred to the o'.d bureaucratic habi's of France, which are of a kind more suited to a police force than to the government staff of a " free* rountry. But the principal reason is the deliberate attempt of the combined leactionuries to bring busk the government of the country to the monarchical model.

Rome.— One of the greatest national crimes ever recorded teems to be upo i the point of consutnation— the French taking of Rome. No change has occurred in the position of the parties, except that General Oudiaot has made his approches by slow degrees, and et the date of the latest account* was about; to commence .he storming of that place. Th?n comes the. contest in rhe barricaded streets. The Pope is said to feel the cruel position of Rome to severely that he haa offered ta give the French an excuse for withdrawing by abdicating his temporal sovereignty. But the Pope cannot retrieve the real disgrace of France ; some truly wise and virtuous Frenchman alone could do that.