The Nelson Evening Mail. TUESDAY, MARCH 24, 1868. H.R.H. THE DUKE OF EDINBURGH.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume III, Issue 70, 24 March 1868, Page 2

The Nelson Evening Mail. TUESDAY, MARCH 24, 1868. H.R.H. THE DUKE OF EDINBURGH.

After an interval of intense excitement, the intelligence which reached us ou Saturday last, by the John Perm, with reference fco the alleged attempt upon the life of H.R.H. the Duke of Edinburgh by a Fenian in Sydney, has received corroboration by a telegram, which arrived from Christchurch late yesterday evening. The telegram, which we subjoin, and which emanated from the Lyttelton Times office, while it mainly confirms the statement made byjjour informants, happily, God be praised, assures us of the Prince's safety, and the relief which is thus afforded us is inexpressibly great. ' The Rangitoto has arrived at the Bluff. The report brought by the John Perm, to Nelson, is substantially correct. ' His Royal Highness the Duke of Edinburgh was shot at and wounded in the back by a Fenian, at the Sailor's Home picnic. The ball has since been extracted, and he is now going on well. 'O'Farrel, a brother to the solicitor who absconded from Melbourne about live years ago, is the name of the assassin. A gentleman, whose name we have not ascertained, and who was beside the Prince at the time the shot was fired, is seriously wounded. ' The telegraph is working badly, and full particulars are not at hand.' As yet the information at our command is extremely scanty, and we must patiently await the arrival of fuller particulars before the details of this atrocious crime « cau be laid before our readers in ali their horrible entirety. It is sufficient at present to know that, by God's mercy, the young Prince's life has been preserved, and we have been spared that most painfully humiliating thought thafc, trustiug himself in our midst, and winning golden opinions at every step by the uniform courtesy and good feeling which he has displayed towards men of all races and creeds with whom he has come in contact, he had yet been done to death on colonial ground by the murderous hand of a fiendish assassin. This reflection, let us be thankful, is spared us, but the intention of the wouldbe murderer remains no less evident, and the terrible fact yet stares us in the face that a crime, which is without a parallel in the annals of the British Empire for the last three hundred years at least, has been perpetrated, which is rendered ali the more dastardly under the circumstances of the Prince's visit to these colonies, intended, as it was, as an earnest of the affectionate regard entertained by the worthiest and most beloved sovereign thafc ever occupied the British throne towards her liege subjects of all races in these distant latitudes. Bufc there is yet much comfort in the thought, not only that this deep additional sorrow has not fallen upon the royal mourner, but that the fiendish object of the assassin, and of the misguided faction to which it would appear that he belongs, is so far frustrated, that the event will only call forth a fresh outburst of loyal affection from the length and breadth of the Empire, towards the persons of our liege lady and of every member of her august family. Devoid, indeed, of all manly feeling must be the heart tbat can sympathise or find excuse foi* a deed so

dastardly and unprovoked, so opposed to the heroic and chivalrous feelings which actuated the Irish heart in times gone by, so destructive of the very end which these deluded men are supposed to have in view, so provocative of strong and summary measures, which, however their necessity may be deplored, can neither be wondered at nor condemned.