The official Reports on the damage and 22nd. of Police giver 621 deaths, 17 of which were of Europeans two steamers sunk; one, the Alaska badly 8 ships lost; 287 junks and sampans lost or stranded; besides great damage to telegraph posts, lamps, trees, the and personal property.
The Superintendent, however, remarks that the details he the ity, represents only half of many eases the junks have gone down with the board, who thus probably buried in their vessels.—The Registrar-General reports the registration of 813 deaths as resulting from the typhoon. Of these 796 wore Chinese, mong whom he thinks the actual loss of life may be roughly estimated at thrice the number recorded. The remaining 17 deaths were of Europeans, or other than Chinese, and 14 of them were from drowning, three from falling houses. The Surveyor-General's Report gives houses totally destroyed in the island, 273; partially, and requiring to be pulled down, -40—total, 1,013. number of build-unroofed or otherwise damaged, but not sufficiently so to entail their removal, is too large to be ascertained in time for this Report, but it is roughly estimated that only four per cent. of the houses in Victoria have escaped. In other words, from four to six thousand dwellings may be said to have suffered "more or less according to their exposed or sheltered positions." The Report gives 89 deaths from falling houses, and describes very gaol un Stonecutters' Island, founded by Sir Hercules Robinson, and' designed to accommodate a convict establishment of 600 persons, is now a heap of ruins. Many of the main walls are so cracked and so much out of plumb that they will have to be knocked down to prevent future accidents. The greater portion of the roof fell in, carrying away and crushing under it the long galleries which divided the lines of cells. The basement portion of the eastern wing, which was used as a powder magazine, was buried in debris, and the fall of the building entailed no inconsiderable risk of an explosion. The powder was, however, subsequently removed from under the ruins, and safely stored in the hulk which is anchored off the Island. 'The upper floors of Stone Cutters' Island Gaol were fortunately not tenanted. 'The Surveyor eral remarks that it is to be regretted no record should have been obtained of the pressure of the wind, ax the Meteorological Station connected with the Goverment Hospital was swept away when that building collapsed, and' no vestige was left of the Anemometrical register. That the Island, however, was not many miles distant from the focus of the cyclone is proved not only by the intensity of the wind, but by a feature known to exist only within such a focus, namely, the abrupt intervals of calm during the height of the gale. 'These lulls were instantaneous, often lasting as long as four or five minutes, and alternating with the most violent' gusts, equally the conjoint action of the two it were, that of a battering fam.
added shocks, continued for three hours, buildings finally succumbed, that would' have withstood the same pressure of the wind, had the latter been ant and steady. The lowest point of the barometer at the Central Police Station was 28.70, at afew minutes after 2am. In reviewing these returns, the Mail says they shew that the damages inflicted vy the typhoon were much heavier than even the worst accounts at the time made out, The logs of life must thousand, if it nine hundred bod picked up, in spite of the scouring tide Which, during the greatest fury of the typhoon, was sweeping through th Harbour. Tt estimates that at least twice fas many bodies were swept seawards have been recovered, Mr Pric i bution to the series of reports the original statement us to the unusual height of the tide, while it shows the destruction of house property to have been perfectly unexampled in the history of the Colony. The Mail is glad to observe that the Government of Macao has Li published official reports of ries inflicted, and these, which are put the loss of life in He istrict sone at 20,000. typhoon of 1874 will, in fact, lik predecessor of 1862, henceforth be an ora of reference in local history. Probably the only people who have benefitted by it are the building contractors, the carpenters, and similar artisans. Lb is said that over one hundred thousand dollars' worth of the way of repairs, has been agreed for in Hongkong, exclusive of Government buildings. In Macao, the damage to roofs and walls is roughly estimated at between thirty to forty thousand dollars, CHINA AND JAPAN, (Paria Cor. of Times.) don the 2st instant a letter from Shanghai, which called attention to the difficulties which have arisen between China and Japan and tothe Japanese Expediti to Formosa. It seems evident that the struggle between the two nations threatens to break out at any moment, and that it has been postponed only because the Chinese have hitherto been afraid of encountering an adversary who seems to borrow from European civilization its organization, its armaments, its strategy, and even its military The Japanese have of late years displayed such rare aptitude and so great a facility of assimilating a European education, that the apprehension of the Chinese s fully justified. While the latter still wish their country to be a sealed book to the rest of th world, the Japanese have set themselves the task of studying the civilized world, and of opening their country more and more to the legitimate investigation of Europe.
Tapanese, who are now tolerably nome 1
in Europe, exhibit a timidity of manner due to the' uneasiness with which they venture
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.