STEAM COMMUNICATION WITH NORTHERN EUROPE AND THE EAST. [From the " Watchman," April 2.]

New Zealander, Volume 7, Issue 558, 20 August 1851, Page 4

STEAM COMMUNICATION WITH NORTHERN EUROPE AND THE EAST. [From the " Watchman," April 2.]

An association recently incorporated under the title of the Noithern Steampacket Company, has just commenced its operation* on a line of ocean navigation between Lowestoft in Suffolk, and Hjerting and Ballum in Denmark, the first trip having been made by tLe Prince, of 000 tons burden and 200 hor^e powir, which left the former poit on Saturday afternoon. The principal traffic on the line is expected to consist of passengers and catlle, Iljerting and Ballum being the nparest shipping places to tbe cattle districts of Denmark and Zetland. The voyage from those ports to Lowestoft will not average, it is supposed, above 24 j (o '26 hours ; afier which, when refreshed at the lattci place, the cattle will be conveyed in peifeetly good | condition by rail to tbe London or provincial markets. Tie Danish and other northern governments kaye manifested the greatest interest in the undertaking, as it will open up to them a direct and certain communication with England, totally independent of Germany. The mails for Northern Europe will be transferred to this route, arrangements having been made for despatching the first bag to be thus convpyed from London at b o'clock next Saturday afternoon, which will reach Iljerting about one o'clock on Monday morning, and Copenhagen on the following day. Besides the advantages which this line will doubtless confer ou the commercial wo lid, a field almost untrodden huheito is opened up by it to the tout Ist. It is a significant fact that our steamers ar» covering the ocean in all directions where unrestricted and independent enterprise is permitted to devolve its resoutces; whilst in those cases where red-tapetsm comes into play, the most crying wants of the empire for steam communication, both postal and goods and passenger traffic, are wholly unattended to. For years the appeals of our Australian colonies on this subject have been vainly waited to the ears of tbe government, and as vainly echoed by the voice of the country at homo. Last session the colonists, sick of official immobility and the systematic f.iNificilion o( oificial promises, lequested Lord Naas to move an addiess of the House of Commons to Her Majesty, praying lor the conferment on those important settlements of the longdfhiied benefits of steam communication with tbe mother country. On the assuiance of the Chancellor of the Exchequer that no time should be loat in perfecting and carrying out such a scheme, the motion was not piessod ; and now, fifter the lapse of twelve months, we aie apparently as far as ever from that devoutly wislied-for consummation. 'Ibe Committee of inquiry obtained by Loid Jocelyn on Thursday night, will doubtless elicit much va'uable inforin.itioH on the subject of a Hue connecting England, India, Australia, and New Zealand ; but the very fact of such a committpe having been appointed shelves the question, as regaids any ptactical step by the government, for the remainder ol the session; and tbe information obtained, will be entombed in a ponderous blue book, until tbe prc-sine from without shall compel tbe drowsy officials of Whitehall to disinter it and render it pioductive. We do not venture to assert with which department rests the blame, the Treasury, the Admiralty, the Colonial office, or the Post-office. Perhaps they combine their energies to act as a (hag in this respect on the wheel of the state coach. Be that as it may, should the present do-notbing system be p. j rseve>ed in, [Ministers will find that there is a point at winch forbeaiance must cease, and that the work which they will not do will be taken out of their hands by the public, and entrubted to the care of otheis.