,forrign unit Caudal.

POBTIIOAL.—The latest advices from Lisbon, which extend to the 19th instant, make it almost certain that the military-political insurrection headed by the Marshal Duke of Saldanha has already run its career. In Portugal the people generally are so politically apathetic, that any re-

volution must be primarily, if not wholly, a military movement. The plans of the Duke of Saldanha seem therefore to have been framed and founded solely on military strategy. If he could gain either of the great fortresses of Lisbon, Santarem, or Oporto, it was certain that his popular banner would draw a large portion of the army to his side : his hopes from all those fortresses have been dashed. Lisbon he did not expect to join him ; at Santarem he was forestalled by the loyalty of the Duke of Terceira and the activity of the King—" El Rey, the Commander-in- chief" ; and at Oporto he met an unexpected rebuff from the loyalty of the Conde do Casal, whom he expected to find on his side. His letter to the Duke of Terceira, at Santarem, explains the political case on which he justifies the insurrection. " Leiria, April 11, 1851. Sir—A general rising has long been prepared throughout the kingdom

against the prevarications, peculations, and continued infractions of the con- stitution committed by the Count of +homar. More than once have I pre- vented it by representing the possibility of ejecting that ill-omened man from the Ministry by legal means ; but the proceedings of the majorities is both Chambers convinced every one of its unpossibihty. The only thing I could do to avoid such rising, was to accept the invitation of many of our brave companions in arms, who,. horrified at the future which the pre. Bence of the Count of Thomar in the Ministry prepared for us, urged me to put myself at their head, and by a military demonstration obtain the result which the nation wishes, needs, and will infallibly obtain, Until this moment all the chiefs of the Popular party have remained quiet ; but your Excellency may rest assured that in the same instant in which they arc convinced that the military demonstration, at the head of which I resolved to place myself, is not sufficient to overthrow the extortioner who oppresses the nation, a movement will manifest itself in all the provinces, the end of which no human perspicacity can fore- see. I have just been told your Excellency has marched out of Lisbon at the head of some troops to support the peculating Minister—the man who unites in himself all the corruption and all the odium of the nation. I have the pleasing conviction that not one of those who accompany your Excellency will fail to participate in my ideas and in my wishes to de- liver the nation from the yoke which oppresses it. Duke of Terceira! if you forget that after our time there is an inexorable tribunal called history, in which the glorious pages to which your Excellency has an incontestable right will be completely neutralized by those in which you will appear as the champion of the corrupt man, the infamous extortioner, the known pre- varicator, remember,. at least, that your Excellency's conduct not only places the throne of her Majesty the Queen in imminent danger, but likewise causes her dynasty to run the greatest risk. Should your Excellency persist, to me the honour will be due of having done, for fourteen months, all that lay in

human power to avoid the evils of a revolution—to your Excellency the dis- grace of having rendered it necessary, indispensable. Let us remember, that if in heaven there is God's justice, the laws of morality are likewise not pro- hibited on earth. This insurrection will not be a struggle of parties; their interests will be foreign to it ; its object will be a graver one—that of proving to Europe that the Portuguese nation will not consent that a system of cor- ruption, of peculations, and uneonstitutionalisms, should be railed on high by means of the Government and political doctrine. The movement repre- sents purely and simply the resistance of the nation to the moral death which was prepared for it after prolonged agonies. The country, during the indifference with which the Government has considered its most urgent ne- cessities, and in the cry of anguish which it raises at this moment, limits it- self to beg forjustice and morality.

"Your Excellency can avert the evils which menace in, save the country from the horrors you are preparing for it by causing her Majesty the Queen to dismiss immediately this man, fatal in so many respects, and call.to the Ministry persons deserving the national confidence. Never has there rested upon your Excellency so grave a responsibility as at this moment- " Duke of SALDANNA." The Conde do Casal, from Oporto, replied thus, to a summons of like tenour-

" However great might be the affection and deference we feel for your Ex- cellency, I cannot, as a soldier, but fulfil, even at the sacrifice of my life, the duty which I owe to her Majesty the Queen ; maintaining intact the prero- gatives of the Crown, which I am determined to sustain with the brave and faithful garrison I command."

Thus unsuccessful in the great aims of his rising, the position of Mar- shal Saldanha became precariously isolated. One or two small bodies of troops which pronounced for him at distant points had set out to join the few hundreds of troops which he commanded in the North ; but, after much delay, caused by the King's well-founded distrust of the troops on his own side—who would not willingly march against Saldanha, any more than they would go over to him—these scattered insurrectionary bodies are now so rapidly followed up, that there is every prospect of their being cut off in detail before they can join the main body of insur- gents. This main body, amounting to little more than a thousand in- fantry and a hundred cavalry, stood at Montalvao—a point to the East of Abrantcs, affording him a ready retreat into Spain if disasters should thicken.

Spain, however, would be a bad alternative : for the Spanish Govern- ment, at the first report of the movement, sent to the Portuguese Govern- ment the most prompt offers of assistance ; stating that they would in- stantly concentrate a force on the frontier, and send two war-steamers to Lisbon, for friendly assurance.

FIIANCE.—The Paris papers of the week have contained little matter of interest. The Easter promenade of Longchamps was more numerously and gayly crowded this year than for five years past ; the Bois de Bou- logne regained more than ever its appearance at the most brilliant of its past days.

Of political events there is nothing to note but the movement of partite in relation to the coming Presidential election in 1852. The party of M. Guizot and M. Duchatel, which is now thoroughly Legitimist at heart, has submitted more formally than before to the possibility that the powers of President Napoleon shall be temporarily prolonged : in the Assemblde Nationale they declare, that if they " abandon the patriotic joy of see- ing France give to European nations the example of repose and order," and if they " accept the prolongation," it is because they prefer that policy to "two things which would be the greatest of all perils for Franoe —anarchy in the nation, and discord in the Monarchical party." On the other hand, General Cavaignac has at last been induced by his party to put himself forward in earnest as a candidate for election in 1852. At a meeting of the proprietors of the Siecle, a journal which enjoys an ex- tensive circulation among the Parisian bourgeoisie, it was resolved to place that journal under the direct personal control of the General; and be has engaged to assume a governing position in the management of the journal as the organ of his party. of Deputies at Turin has -voted by a large majority/or the ratification•of the treaties of commerce whieh -were some mouths -since concluded-between Sardinia and Great Britain. The Pro- teetienist party has its stronghold in the Lower House, so the success of the measure in the Upper House is certain. We explained the general nature of the treaty at the time it was concluded : the Allgemeine Zeitung repeats, with bitter . jealousy, that it " does away -with all -differential duties, equalizes all navigation dues, and in a word places the flags of either nation entirely on an equal footing, except of course as to the coasting trade " ; -and the journal is especially alarmed at the 11th article, which A‘ guarantees to goods imported from England the same modifica- tion of duties althea been conceded by Sardinia to Belgium in the treaty of the 24th of January!'

GRDAWY.—Austria has now definitively assented to the revival of the Diet of the old Confederation ; and it is said that all the German powers are so.agreed on the point, that they will shortly recall from Dresden their representatives at the effete Conferences.

From Vienna itself there comes the statement that Prince Metternioh

about to return-to the capital, which he quitted, as it was thought for ever, in 1848. It is supposed that his return may have considerable effect towards overthrowing the system of Prince Schwarzenberg, and of the Archduchess, who is the virtual Regent of the Empire. Schwarzen- berg is regarded by the aristocrats and the old bureaucracy as a political parveou; and this party hopes that Prince Metternich will regain his -ancient ,supremacy, and recall them to their ancient position round the throne.

The Austrian Coszettelms published the Imperial decree by which the Emperor lately established a Council of the Empire. The functions of the new-body seem to resemble the deliberative and advising functions of our own-Privy Council, as distinguished from the active functions of the -CabinetCouncil, which immediately conducts the affairs of Government.

Gnaaos —Athens journals to the 8th instant prove the statement re- ceived last week from Trieste, that the Chamber had been dissolved, to have been quite unfounded.

Barrow NORTH Attawea.—Montreal journals, extending to the 7th instant, state that the Post-office department had been transferred, on the 5th,-from the British to the Provincial authorities. The rates through- out-Canada would-be five cents. Papers from St. John's, New Bruns- wick, to the 11th instant, describe the opening of the Legislature at the -end of last month ; and report that the Governor had announced himself "prepared to introduce a responsible government into the colony in a modified form," also to surrender the disposal of the Crown revenues on " certain conditions."

The protracted struggle which our North American Colonies have made ,to procure from the Colonial Office an engagement that the Mother- country shall assist them by guaranteeing their credit for a loan of money, to construct the railway from Halifax to Quebec, is at last hap- pity. concluded. That magnificent project can -be realized, according to -the estimate, at the rate of 70001. a mile, or at a cost of 5,000,0001. for the --whole-&3g-miles. The Colonial Legislatures had already pledged them- selves to support any sound financial scheme for raising the necessary amount of capital ; and, at-laat, Earl Grey-has announced, (in a despatch to -the:Earl of Elgin, dated the 14th March 1851,) that he is prepared to recommend to Parliament -that the guarantee of the Imperial Govern- ment shall be given to the loans raised by the North American Provinces for the , contemplated _line. He has also, in a communication to Mr. Howe, the agent of Nova Scotia, announced that Government will apply for leave to guarantee a loan of 800,0001. as the quota of the 5,000,0001. to be raised by the province of Nova Scotia. The Halifax and Quebec Bailway,will avert the necessity of passing through the difficult and dan- gerous navigation of the Cape Breton seas and the Gulf of St. Lawrence ; and by placing Halifax, which is the finest port on the whole seaboard of North America, within a few hours of Quebec and Boston, will divert the ratite=.of passenger and emigration traffic between the Old and the New World to the British section of the American Continent. The distance from the port of Galway to Halifax is but 1800 miles of open sea, a distance that MR be easlly run in six days : within ten years, therefore, it is rea- tionahhi tO suppose, English emigrants may move from London to Quebec hi niue days ; and be placed in a position to choose allotments from the four million acres of good land in Nova Scotia, the eight million acres of etlitallygood land in New Brunswick, or the area, "as large as all France, of first-rate land" which lies unoccupied in the Canadas, "only wanting to be opened up."

Now ZR&LAWD.--Governor Grey, when the latest despatches were sent nff, .had proceeded on a visit to the Auckland Islands. He had left the New Zealand colonists some riddles to amuse them in his absence. Cer- tain mysterious expressions had led the folks at Auckland to suspect he intended to shift the seat of government to Cook's Straits ; and a request they made to him for an explicit declaration received a very enigmatical answer. He had also published a bill for establishing Provincial Coun- cils, which he intended to submit to his Council without waiting for in- structions from Downing Street. A public meeting at Wellington had condemned the measure : a meeting to take it into consideration was -to be heldott Nelsen on the 28th of December. Mr. Fox, who was about to leave -he colony for England, had been nominated political agent for the Wellington settlers, -who had invited the settlers at Nelson and Otago to concur in the appointment.