The Universal Gazette publishes the following information which has since been confirmed and supplemented by official dispatches received by the local mandarins from Peking and Nanking:—Marshal Ssu is expected to return from the South and arrive at Nanking by the end of December next. Arrived there he will at once he invested with the title of Imperial High Commissioner and Generalissimo of the forces of the Nanyang Administr also the Admi zo, Huang, and Li, Prov man ier-in-Chief of forces. mand. will number 15,000 battalions, 7,000 of whom will consist of his Kuangsi troops who served under him in the Franco-Chinese War in Tongking and won for hint the battle of Liangshar—The Nanking Ordnance Bureau, with its large stores of firearms, artillery and ammunition, has been turned over to the officers of Marshal Ssu, who know enough of the value of modern weapons to select only Mauser magazine rifles and carbines with the ammunition fitted for then, Only 8,000 of these rifles and carbines have, however, been found fit for service, but contracts have already been signed by Marshal Ssu for 10,000 more with accompanying ammunition which are expected to arrive at Nanking by" the end of November next. These arms are intended for the newly-raised regiments of the Nanyang who are to make part of Marshal Su's special Army Corps, 7,000 men to be brought up from Ch'ing chou and Kuangsi being already provided with Mausers, and they, after seer years' acquaintance with them, are said to perfectly understand their' weapons and to use them effectively.—Although Marshal Ssu is to be given the chief command of the Nanyang forces, it that the Empress Doway quently issue x decree tua fluate to Jung Lu, Peiyang and Chihli forces, in ordi put the whole under a single organisation.—A Peking dispatch states that, in consideration of the critical condition of the political situation, a decree will be issued in a few days commanding Marshal Ssu to come up to Nanking as soon as he has finished the delimitation of the French leased" territory at Kuangchou Bay and not_go to Ch'ingchou or Ruaugsi as at first decided upon. He is, as soon as practicable, to send one or twr of his most trusted generals to the places to bring up the battalions aire selected by him, so that by the fir reaches Nanking to receive his gre of Office, he will find his specie already organised and equipped a Army for active service whenever As already stated in these colt required.—us Marshal Su's headquarters will be at on the Grand Canal, but Tsingkiangpa, forces will garrison the a part of his ty of Liuhd and one or two important po" tae River, in the vicinity vints near the Yang—y of Chinkiang.—An official estimate of the Nanyang forces, not including Marshal Su's special Army Jorps, is placed at 64,000 men, a third or, perhaps, one-half of whom are well-armed and tially drilled after the foreign style. The rest may be termed a rabble, unless taken in hand by Marshal Ssu and reorganised on a practical basis. This, it is stated, will be a part of his duty and ready the troops under the Couimander-in-Chief of this province have begun drilling after the new model in which Marshal Su's men have been drilled in Kuangtung and Kuangsi, namely, part English, part G man, and part French, As for the clit artillery of the new Army Corps, Marshal Ssu has alrendy had handed over to his Ordnance Board by the Nanking Burewu something like sixty Armstrong type guns and forty mountain guns. These, however, will be added to by the spring of next your from abroad.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.