MEMORANDA OF THE MONTH.

New Zealander, Volume XVIII, Issue 1719, 30 August 1862, Page 4

MEMORANDA OF THE MONTH.

(From the “ Spectator, 1 ')

The Commissioners ordered, after the expolits of the Merrimac, to report for the second timo on th« necessity for fortifications, have completed their tusk. They decide in favour of forts. Shot they say have pierced the Warrior, and guns may he made to pierce any conceivable weight of armour which can be placed on a ship. These guns will be too heavy for vessels, and consequently they must be mounted on forts. This conclusion derives now force from the recent American news. Fort Darling has driven off, with heavy slaughter, a whole fleet of iron clad vessels, and the public who so readily accepted the fight in the James River as decisive will probably veer round as rupidily to the other side. The final result in all probability will be a compromise, fortifications to defend the dockyards alone. The advocates of economy must restrict their efforts to insisting on the most efficient and cheapest form of work. The Commission declare iron almost as cheap as granite, but there is one defence which Armstrong bolts will certainly never penetrate, and that is earth. The Master of the Rolls has given judgment in the ease of the trustees to whom real property was left for the propagation of the views of Joanna Southcotc. The devise was contested on two grounds: first, that it otherwise ligitimate it would-, as real property, be voided by the statute of mortmain; secondly, that it was for an illigitimate and immoral object, and therefor in itself null and void. Sir John Romilly dealt with the last matter first. He had perused, he said, the works ;f this prophetess, and did not find them fundamentally immoral. She believed that she should become the medium of a miraculous conception, but the mere anticipation could scarcely be called subversive of morality; nor did her writings contain much on this delusive anticipation. For the rest they were pious and weak. The Master of the Rolls could not have declined on the score of immorality to affirm the devise. On the second ground, however, he conceived the devise to bo null and void by the statutes of mortmain as it was given out of real property. The prophetess is justified; Imt her sect, if there still be one, are not the less the losers by the decision. A curious literary deception has, it is said, been practised in a London College on the learned professors of that institution. A student discovered suddenly a now autograph of Banyan's. It was a letter addressed to a customer, a Mr. Oldham, concerning some kettle that Banyan had undertook to mend for him. The autograph win prepared with coffee and other devices to make the writing look old. It was received with enthusiasm, connoisseurs remarking that hitherto Bunyan’s tinkering had rested on insecure popular rumour, and on no adequate evidence. One learned professor even wrote a monograph on the Mr. Oldham to whom the letter was addressed. Such is history. The youth himself, who has the merit of the discovery, conscious of the coffee and the very moderate amount of intellect to which he is indebted for this curious antiquity, trembles doubtless at the greatness of his success. On Wednesday (June 4) Caractacus won the Derby, to the disgust of thousands who believe that public opinion can even give a horse thews. The winner was an outsider, scarcely noted by prophets, and quoted in betting lists at only forty to one. The owner, it is said, gave the jockey who rode a hundred a year for life—a stableboy thus earning, in 2 minutes 45 seconds, the equivalent of a perpetual curacy. The Japanese Ambassadors, who have seen everything, saw the Derby also, and, for the first timo in Europe, looked as if under certain excitement they might, by possibility, take an interest in something they saw. A report on the strength of the Frencli navy and army has been presented to Barliamcnt, which gives the following results for the steam navy:—

Of which Afloat. Building. Total, there are in Commission. Ships of the line 30 •••• 1 37 14 t'rigates, iron-plated 6 .... K) .... 16 4 screw 24 •••■ 5 .... 29 .... 14 paddle lit Corvettes, screw 7 .... paddle !)•••• Avisos,screw 35 ■... 1 36 •••• 26 paddle 1)5.. 8.-->93">>- 53 Iron-plated floating batteries 12 2 14 .... Gunboats 53 5 50 15 Transports 34 .... 9 .... 43 •••• 26 Total 319 41 ....S'iO •••• 172 —Of iron-plated ships there are, it will bo seen, ten building, (each of 36 guns and 901) horse-power) and two floating batteries, eacli of 14 guns and 150 horsepower; besides the six frigatei and twelve floating batteries now complete. The number of men provided for, is 26,195 in the vessels in commission, and 4,746 in vessels of reserve, with a second supplementary estimate, bringing the force up to 35,000 men. The combined naval estimates, ordinary and extraordinary, for 1863, amount to £7,748,242 sterling. The British naval strength is nearly as follows: Alloa'. Building, Ships of the line (screw) 57 4 Screw frigates 37 2 Paddle 9 5 Screw, block ships 9 Iron cased screws 4 11 Corvettes 20 4 Sloops, screw 41 > _ paddle 33 / *

Small vessel* 19 4 Gun 31 4 boats 185 13 Mortar ships 4 Screw floating batteries ■••• 7 Tenders 49 Troop ships 15 2 Vachts 5 525 55 which would scout to give us a naval steam power afloat in the proportion of five to three to that of France, there or thereabouts. It will bo observed, however, that the building seems to bo going on faster in France than hero; and in iron-plated ships the proportion is probably not so great. On the other hand, our force of men is 76,000, with a reserve of 10,000, —more than double that of France. Finally, wp are paying £11,794,000 against their £7, 745,000. The gathering of the priests in Rome has for us one pleasant side. It demonstrates that there are still in this age of material civilization things stronger than physical force. Pius the Ninth, stripped of his dominions, hated by his people, threatened by the strongest of military powers, still summons from every Christian country an assemblage such as has not been witnessed since the days of the Council of Trent. Their resolves arc as important as those Of Parliament, and his speeches to them may still aid in convulsing Europe. They have assembled to create impossible deities, and sign an address containing an impossible assertion, and demanding an impossible change, they arc in open conflict with the age, and the men who direct it must yet in their own despite tread the ec--1 clesiastics down; but the meeting itself, the agitation of the Catholic world, the visible tremour of aU potentates, ttre, an fif them, much peqnire(\ proofs th(U

thought Is still stronger than steel. It is ill for the world that the Papacy should be strong, but it is Well than an old man without a soldier should show himself the equal foe of an Emperor who’can more a million of men. .'' . ■ » .;. Mr. Gold win Smith has rovive4 the, question of Canada. Ho says its retention involves a desperate and gratuitous war, and would let the colony go. It is, he says, British connection which now endangers Canada, and Canadian connection which now endangers England, and ho would terminate both dangers by amicable separation. His letter is better worthy of his genius than any ho has yet published, but he still leaves unanswered the question which lies at the root of the matter. What right have we to cast off the Englishmen settled in Canada while they still acknowledge and desire our government? Why are we to give up our own because Americans threaten to steal it? And finally, where is the proof of the fact which Mr. Goldwin Smith assumes—that Canada once divided from England would not be liable to be invaded and overrun ? The Americans have published a statement of their national debt, which, on the 29th May, amounted to 491,448,984 dollars, or, say, £100,000,000, This debt bears an average interest of less than 5 per cent., and includes .the certificates of indebtedness, the United States’ bank notes, and the Treasury bonds. The only liabilities excluded arc the unsettled contractors’ bills, of which no account is offered, but which can hardly exceed thirty millions more. This is far the most favourable statement yet issued, and, if correct, is within the means of the people to pay without excessive taxation. The real difficulty will be to pay it, plus the ordinary expenditure, plus the large army which the Federal Government must for some years maintain. The Senate, we note, has passed the tax bill, but with amendments, to which the House of Rcpresentatives has still to agree. Several absurd duties have been struck out, and one export duty added of a cent, a pound on cotton. The City seems lost in surprise at the way in which the Northern Americans postpone their financial ruin, hut forgets two elements in the question. Every country can bear a certain quantity of paper money so long as it is limited in amount, and America, with its vast distances and vivid commercial life, can consume an unusual quantity. So long as the country has not greatly exceeded its borrowing power, the paper will keep afloat, and the borrowing power has been much increased by the stoppage of ordinary means of investment. The real difficulty, under such circumstances, is not the currency, but the state of taxation, and Americans firmly believe that the interest on the debt will be paid to the full. The time must come before long, when there is no more money to lend, and then the crash will be exceedingly rapid, but that time has not yet arrived. On the wildest calculation, the States are not spending above 200 millions a year, and it will be two years yet before they reach the limits of our national debt. By that time we suspect the creditors will be strong (enough to made their debtors keep faith. The Government of Russia, with an administration to reconstruct, a nation of slaves to emancipate, a new conscription loan to establish, and a financial crisis to tide over, has this week to encounter a new and terrible enemy'. The peasantry' and the educated class arc alike impatient of the delays in the way of improvement, and finding petitions useless, they have resorted to fire. The Bank, the Ministry of the Interior, the Ministry of Education, the Corps des Pages, several mansions, three great markets, the wood stores, and many hundreds of private dwellings, have all been burnt to the ground under circumstances which leave no doubt of incendiarism. The fires have been predicted on flying sheets hours before they occurred, and though every one new of the sheets the officials were were never informed. This is the old and desperate remedy of an Oriental population, and the Government sits bewildered. Fierce orders are issued to execute at once all incendiaries, but to no purpose, and the avowed object, to drive the people into insurrection, may yet be, to all appearance, attained. So great is the alarm of the middle class that merchants countermanded goods shipped for St. Petersburg from the impossibility of securing safe storage. The true way to put a stop to this system is to make the quarter pay for the private losses, but it reveals at once savage discontent and secret combination. The plan, if really dictated by the constitutional leaders, is unworthy of them, while a simple refusal to drink brandy will at any moment place the Government in the power of the people. The monthly' returns show pauperism to be on the increase. At Ashton-under-Lync, 385 per cent.; in Blackburn, 29! percent,; in Preston, 273 percent.; in Stockport, 272 per cent.; in Rochdale, 118 per cent.; in Manchester, 115 per cent.; in Salford, 74 per cent.; in Liverpool, 33 per cent.; in Birmingham, 23 per cent.; in Stoke, 9 per cent.; in Leeds, 7 per cent, over last year for May. In Bolton, Chorlton, Chorley, Wigan, Nottingham, Sheffield, and Coventry, there was a decrease of pauperism as compared with May last.