une found it necessary to remove of pillar letter box which he lished at his Yamen gate to receive petitions. Various rumours are going about Canton as to the Judge's reason for removing the box. Some said mischievous people dropped in papers commenting rudely on foreigners, thus making H Lordship very angry.' Others, that parsimonious litigants, wishing to' save legal issued. when ho started the box), that expenses, disobeyed the Judge's notice,
plaintifis' petitions which defendants were to see and answer, were not to be dropped in this secret manner, but openly presented onthe regular Court' days, 3rd, 8th, 18th 23rd, and 28th of each month, We are unable to state ourselves why the Judge removed the box, as we do not know.
'A Proclamation has appeared, signed by the two District Magistrates of the City of Canton, threating with punishment all persons who shall print, or shall hawk about the streets, broad-sheets containing any news whatever about the acting of the Government or of the Officials in its employment, whether true or false; 80 that the minds of the people may not be disturbed by unfounded rumours. [This evidently does not refer to regular newspapers When the Smith and Cass returned to Formosa, a Committee of Management was formed for those two steamers under the presidency of Prefect Chang. The Governor of the Island has placed the war-vessels Fuh-po, Fei-stich, and Hai-king under the management of this Committee, which pays all salaries of officers, expenses of coalingetc., monthly. The free passazetickets formerly granted to offic from Formosa to China by these war~ vessels, will for the future not be issued.
'A letter from Haiphong says:—The French Resident here lately sent a letter to the insurgent chief, to inform him that the French Viceroy would soon arrive with an overwhelming force, against which it would be hopeless to continue to maintain the unequal struggle; and that he counselled him as a friend to submit while there was yet time. An Annamese military officer was sent to convey this missive, accompanied by a little Annamese boy carrying a betel-nut box. The insurgent chief had both the envoys beheaded, and their heads exposed on poles; and sent a man back with the original letter and box, the latter filled with gold and silver, to show that he was determined to hold out to the last.
Siam, a little sparsely-populated country in the distant South, for long refused alle-glance to our Great Land, like a praying mantis pushing back an advancing chariot with his little claws. But now for 200 years she has been submissive to the behests of him who sits on the Dragon Throne. In the eighth moon of this year anew ruler will be crowned as king, and take to consort a Queen, with dazzling pomp. A merchant of Ch'ao-chow Fu, Kuangtung, long a resident in Sian: and loaded with favours by the King, was lately commissioned to proceed to Canton to buy rosewood cabinets, silk embroideries, ete., to the value of over Tls. 10,000." This'Chinese merchant has presented the King with a couple of containing each 11 characters beautifully carved, praising the King as one of those virtuous' princes whom the Son of Heaven views with special favour,—Hu Pao, Hsueh Fu-ch'éng, the new Minister to and and France, having received his credentials from the Emperor at Peking, arrived about 30th June at Tientsin, and put up at the Chekiang Guild-house. After an i the Viceroy Li Hung-chang, the Minister left for Shanghai, mhente, having made a short visit to Weiaih, his native place, ho leaves for England in the 8th or 9th moon. {He arrived here yesterday by the Haean.} The exertions made by the authorities to protect the people from being poisoned with the oil expressed from cotton seeds, with which unprincipled dealers adulterate the bean-oil used for culinary purposes, have been already reported in our columns. Poppy-seed oil is another thing we must warn our readers against, It looks and tastes like linseed oil, but eaten with brinjals it is capable of causing death. Linseed oil, though dearer than bean-oil, a very popular accompaniment to the brin-jai, or egg-plant.
At the end of June Tsing Kuo-chuan, Viceroy of Kiangsu, Kiangst and Anhui, memorialised the Throne respecting the indemnity awarded to the victims of the riot at Chinkiang during the Ist_moon, Fifteen houses were damaged or destroyed, including the British Consulate, and the amount of the indemnity is Tls. 105,267. The Viceroy has written separately to the Board of Revenue and the Tsung-li Yamen on the subject. He fusgeste that the money should be paid by the Chinkiang Customs. The Emperor has referred the Viceroy's proposition to the Board of Revenue for consideration.—Shén Pao.
The Shen Pao gives the following scraps of news from Corea amal the desultory notes which a correspondent continues to send from that country An American whom the King sent to the Huang-hai and P'ing-yang provinces to report on gold mines has returned unsuecessful, having been set upon by the natives and very severely beaten.
Chinese who arrive in Corea must report themselves at the Chinese Consulate and receive a passport. There are three classes of passport, at $2, $1, and 50 cents. Great numbers of refugees are from distressed Shantung, about 100 by every steamer from Chefoo, and Yuan, the Chinese Resident, and the' Consul, Mr. Hung, have arranged to issue provisional passports to all such gratis, good for one month, until they can afford to pay the fee.
The King has borrowed $200,000 from France. The Seoul people lately have been as civil to foreigners as if they were manda-ins, and as rude to Chinese as if they were slaves, There has been severe fighting in Fukien, On29th June, telegrams were received bythe Viceroy at Foochow from both the Taotai of Yen-ping and K'ien-ning, and the Prefect of Yen-ping Fu, (REQ) stating that on 28th June they received despatches from General Liu describing an attack made by him a week previously on the rebels, whom they found, to the number of 600 or 700, in their boats at Fu T'un. He opened a fusillade and cannonade on them simultane ously at night and killed over 100, and they fled, after such a feeble attempt to return the fire that only six of General Liu's men were wounded. Our men then made a charge in pursuit; the rebels rallied and fought desperately, losing ten more men, including four chiefs. The prisoners made were sent to the Shun-ch'ang (It) climate of Formosa does not appear to suit the Chinese troops, About one in every five of the recruits raised in Wuhu last autumn for back-woods service in the Beautiful Island has already died of fever, and the rest are too feeble tobe of any use as fighting men. The General in command, by permission of the Governor of Formosa, shipped 500 of the survivors from Yun-kwa Kiang to Kelung por war-vessel Fei Tsiel, whence, after inspection, they continued their voyage in the same vessel to Chin-Kiang, where they were disbanded.—Shén "a0.
Ata place called Yao Wu, North of Tientsin River, there is a date-tree growing in the compound of a paper manufacturer old and deeply rooted in the ground, with branching foliage spreading like a fan, it is the admited of all beholders. After the 4th July when the rain ceased this old tree was found to have suddenly shifted its position about five feet, but was growing as healthily as ever. Great numbers of people came out to look at it, but none could explain the strange phenomenon, which we eave to students of natural history to explain as beat they can.—Bw Pao.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.