NEWS OF THE WEEK.
TEE French forces directed against Antwerp—for they cannot be said to be directed against Holland—have arrived within sight of the citadel. On Tuesday, Marshal GERARD made his first recon- naissance of the works. The besieging army, when the whole of them have arrived, will fall little short of 50,000 men. They are amply provided with all things requisite and convenient. Their equipment is perfect; their discipline admirable. In the town of AntWerp, every thing has been prepared for the worst. A great number of fire-engines and firemen have been assembled, to guard against the contfagration'of the houses, should CHASSE fire on them: there are military also to keep order,—among the firemen we suppose, for the inhabitants have mostly withdrawn, leaving CrikssE bare walls on which to exercise his valour. The fur- niture is lodged in the cellars, which are closely shut up. CHASSE has isStledri•grand order of the day, in which he tells his soldiers that the eyes of Europe are placed upon them,' and that they must adopt the resolutiodte defend themselves to the last extremity-. General DE EERENS, the head of the war department at Breda, has issuel an order, conceived in the same lofty style; and lastly, King WILLIAM has called out the Sehuitery? We were inclined to.beefieve that the bouncing of General CHASSE might end, on the present occasion, as his bouncing on former occasions had ended; we did not very much fear even the order of the day of the great General DE EERENS ; but We.must Confess our hearts began to fail us, when we heard of the Schuttery being called out. It is plain now, that the Dutch King is in earnest. It is for no light pur- peso that so terrible a remedy is invoked. A peaceful termi- nation to the 'contest can hardly be looked for when the &hut- tery. is about to be put in motion. Our contemporary the Courier is magnificent on this subject; and well he may—it is no every- day one. The Prussians, we are told, will have an army of 100,000 men on the Meuse, if the quarrel—which is, in all points of view, a very pretty quarrel—continue for three weeks ; and no doubt they can if they will. The merchants of Rotterdam have received the consignment addressed to them by the gentletwn who met Bishopsgate Street the. other day; and they have transmitted by the steam-boat that conveyed the sympathy of their British brethren, a rich freightage of thanks in return. But neither armed men nor peaceful, Prussians nor merchants, would have deeply moved us, had they been unbacked by the Schuttery. The Tories were proud men before. They had reason. They had King41CHIEL, and Czar NICHOL, and FREDERICK WILLIAM, and WILLIAM FREDERICK, and the Duke of CUMBERLAND, and Mr. O'CoN'zista,; for their supporters. But what were all these, crowned 'and' uncrowned, kings and commons, compared with their new Schuttery!
