INDIAN NEWS. [From the Melbourne Argus, March 25.]

New Zealand Spectator and Cook's Strait Guardian, Volume IX, Issue 805, 20 April 1853, Page 3

INDIAN NEWS. [From the Melbourne Argus, March 25.]

We have received a few copies of the Calcutta Englishman, to the 3rd of January last.

They furnish a few further scraps of intelligence in reference to the Burmese war. On the 20 1 1) of December, ft proclamation annexing Pegu, was reaJ oo board H. M. S. Fox, and on shore the next morning. The The Governor-General was about to proceed to Rangoon, and the Englishman, concludes that be intends to visit Ava in her, and to invite the King to take his passage back in the yacht, to the apartment! which will be made ready to receive him in Fort William. As the annexation of * kingdom it not an every day occurrence, even by the British, we think it right to give a short account of the rew acquisition. Pegu was formerly independent, and was one of the most flourishing kingdoms in Farther India. It comprises the whole Delta of the Jrrawadi, the only river connecting the Burmese Empire with the ocean. The chief towns are Rangoon, Banain, and Henzada. Pegn, its former Capital, at one time contained 150,000 inhabitants, but the trade having been removed to Rangoon, it is now an inconsiderable village. The kingdom of Pegu was conquered by the Burmese in 1757. It is rich in natural resources. It has splendid forests of the finest teak timber, which forma its staple export. I| exports likewise catechu, wax, lac, ivory, cotton, gold, gems, pomes ; and even under the present wretched Government, the trade amount* in value to about £600,000.

We call upon the sportsmen in Calcutta, to come to the assistance of the inhabitants in the rural districts of the 24-Pergunnahf, and drive out from them an enemy whose inroads are really becoming dangerous. It vrill hardly be credited perhaps, yet it is strictly true, that tigers are more numerous, bolder, and more destructive to life and property in Bengal in this year of our Lord 1853, when the country is under British rule, and when British sportsmen are to be found in every station, than it was nearly two hundred years ago under the Emperor Akbar. We have letters from several parts of Bengal proving this, but from Diamond Harbor up to Mud-point, and rouud by Belpokurreah, on the banks of the Shreerarapore khal, and in pergnnnahs of HuttiagurgU and Shapoor Maida, we are informed tbey are thronging and doing a vast deal of mischief. We are told that both men and cattle are being continually carried off, and that the villagers are so frightened as to have quite suspended all farm operations. We are told also that on the morning of the 28th December, Captain Abbott, the Superintendent of embaukinents in the 24th Pergunnabs, had a narrow escape whilst engaged in his official duties near Huttiagurb. A large tiger sprang out from a rice-field within twenty yards of his party ; but either not hungry enough, or frightened, be turned off and pasting along the foot of the inferior slope, crossed the embankment, and bounded into tbe jungle towards Sheerampore khal. At the Harah khal, Hoogly river, between Diamond Harbour and Culpee, a man was killed on the 29th, and the next day at Kalakhalee, a buffalo was killed- in broad daylight, and the laborera on the tmbankment* all took to their heels, declining to ifOrk with saeh a dangerous neighbour. We think that the Government, under the circumstances, ought to increase tbe head mdnay awarded for tigers killed in the districts they most infest. We have wildrelephants at Baraset, we may hear next of tigers at Garden Reach. If the English were driven out of Bengal, there would be Mahratta horsemen in tbe Burnt Bazaar of Calcutta, and tigers at Alipore, within four years of their exodus. — Calcutta Englishman, Jau.3.