Tae despatch of Sir R. Morier, the British Ambassador at St. Petersburg, which we give to-day, created great interest during the week before last mail left home. For the last year or 80 occasional references to the enterprise in which Capt. Wiggins and some north country adventurers were engaged have appeared in some of the English newspapers. The Phenix Company were said be realising large profits on the voyage of their steamer up the Yenisei, and all people who admire courage, both in navigation and in commercial enterprise, were pleased therewith. The particulars of the voyage of the Phenix which Sir R. Morier gives, do not extend to the profit made by the Tyne Company, but we may take it for granted that the partners therein were satisfied. Sir R. ne has obtained for the com-Fases of merchandise lasting for five ly privilege of free entry for certain years on the Yenisei and one year on the Obi. But the right of internal trade navigation on the river has been limited to one year, and the Phenix Company hope that Russian merchants will afterwards undertake that part of the work. If so, regular markets will be established at some place near the mouth of the river which will render it unnecessary for the British ships to proceed further. It is evident that navigation of the Yenisei will be accompanied by greet risks for some years to come. Even the sea voyage to the mouth of the river will be attended with some danger as the failure of five British and one Russian ships to reach the coast in 1880 proves. "The extraordinary perseverance and faith in his ideas and project which Captain Wiggins has shown, and the success which has attended his exertions will make his name famous in the long list of navigators and merchant adventurers which Great Britain has to show. To have conceived the idea that there was a navigable channel through the Kara Straits or Gate and.to have proved his theory to be correct fourteen years ago, to have waited until means were forthcoming—his own having been exhausted—and again to have' proved the feasibility of navigating the Yenisei for two thousand miles are great achievements. It is not to the credit of Eng lish merchants than they did not sup. port him years ago, but it is all the more to his credit that he was not then discer As might have been expected thé-inbeosrpie of the Yenisei districts welcomed. the opportunity for opening w trade which was presented te them the arrival among them of the Phenix. The mineral resources of the country want development, improved machinery is a necessity to this, and the mine owners still more require cheaper and more rapid means of communication. Hitherto the Siberian trade has been carried on by land, and has almost necessarily been restricted in its outlets to other parts of the Russian Empire. The new route will permit of the productions of the country through which the Yenisei flows being sent to other parts of Europe. Unfortunately the navigation of the river is only open for about two and.a half months in-the year, August, Septeniber, and part of October. Among minerals, gold, silver, graphite, iron and coal exist in great richness; M. de Lesseps says that no country in the world is richer in minerals than the vast Asiatic region which is popularly considered to be the abode of perpetual snow and frost. This is trae of the Northern or Arctic part, but in the South there are lands covered with vineyards, and regions eminently suited to the production of vast quantities of cereals, Among the articles which Captain Wiggins expects to form part of the trade which he is opening up are, fossil ivory from the teeth of extinct mammoths, timber,—there are great forests—furs, wool, tallow and meat. Prices: are cheap in. those regions; at Yenisei a ship's mast 60 feet long and 18 inches in diameter at top can be bought for a sovereign; beef is two pence-halfpenny a pound, and a ton of wheat sells in the Tomsk region for twenty shillings. On the other hand a ton of salt which costs fifteen shillings in Liverpool can be sold in the Yenisei districts for as many pounds sterling. Black lead, of fine quality, is so plentiful that Captain Wiggins ballasted his ship with it. The Russian Government has in late years done everything possible to increase the population of Siberia, which has been growing at the rate of 40,000 persons annually, and it is no doubt in furtherance of their policy to do every thing possible for the development of the country that the trading privileges were granted to the Phenix Company. At first the Government looked on Captain Wiggins' project with great jealensy if not with hostility, and it is' probable that the failure of Mr. Siberiakow's efforts in the same direction; and the disappointment caused by the fruitlessness of the efforts made in 1880, led to another and more liberal policy being adopted. Steam navigation on the Yenisei was first attempted in 1863,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.