Awful Tornado---Natchez Destroyed. We are indebted to the captain of steamer Vicksburg for the following melancholy intelligence of the destruction of Natchez:

The devoted city of Natchez was visited with one of the most awful and distressing calamities which it has been our fate to witness. On Wednesday about 2 o'clock, P. M. a dark cloud made its appearance in the southwest, preceded by a loud and continued roaring of the winds; as it came on swiftly and with the speed of the wind, it was met by another, which was wafted from directly the opposite point of the compass. A description of the sublime spectacle which ensued is beyond the power of language to convey. At the moment of the concussion large masses of seeming white spray were precipitated to the earth, followed by a roaring of the wind as if old Eolus was there guiding and directing the storm. Houses

were dismantled of their roofs and then almost immediately levelled to the earth. The air was filled with bricks and large pieces of timber, and even large ox carts were uplifted and thrown hundreds of yards from their original position.

About sixty flatboats lying in port were driven from the shore and sunk. The ferry boat plying between Natchez and the opposite shore, was capsized and sunk, and every one on board is supposed to have perished. The steamboat Hinds was capsized and sunk-crew all lost. The steamer Prairie had her cabin entirely taken off; crew nearly all lost. The two hotels in the city were shook, one partially, the other entirely to the ground. Almost every house was more or less injured. It is impossible to tell how many were killed, as the streets were filled with large piles of timber, rendering them impassible, and the work of extricating the bodies from the fallen houses was not completed when the Vicksburg left; some fifteen or twenty bodies had been found. It was

very difficult to find a landing, as every house under the Hill, except five or six, was blown down, and the river filled with floating fragments of houses and boats.

The tornado in leaving Natchez, followed the course of the river about 8 miles down the coast. The court-house in Vidalia was levelled to the ground and the parish judge killed. The trees on the opposite side of the river, as well as those of Natchez Island were all torn up by the roots or deprived of their branches. The damage done to the crops was very severe; some plantations were deprived of all their fences and others had every cabin taken away by the storm. [N. O. Bee.

Usury Laws---Silks.

By the British Queen we have received another letter from an American merchant residing in London, from which the following extracts are made. It is dated 28th April

"There is one thing I wish particularly the Legislature of Pennsylvania to take the lead in, it is to modify the Usury Laws as Parliament has done, and thus make money abundant comparatively speaking. The British nation tried a moderate modification (that is as regards bills of exchange having only 120 days to run) for three years and finding it attended with so much advantage to the whole community, they have abolished the Usury Laws altogether, except so far as relates to mortagages and bills of exchange and notes of hand having more than 12 months to run. And now a capitalist can (with these two restrictions) sell his money for whatever he can agree for, in the same manner as the Pennsylvania farmer can sell his wheat at whatever price he pleases, but not so with the Philadelphia capitalist-he can only sell his money legally at 6 per cent. per annum, and the consequence is, as experience shows that the Philadelphia capitalist evades the law, which never has been and never can be enforced, and makes the poor borrower pay from 10 to 36 per cent. per annum for his money-whereas, if our laws were the same as the English, the borrower would never be compelled to pay higher than from 5 to 15 or 18 per cent. per annum, in consequence of the competition among the lenders of money. I know there is no early prospect of the Usury Laws being modified in our State, but I am sure they will be so in the course of time, when intelligence shall be more abundantly spread amongst our people.

"There is a national measure of much importance, I should like our Congress to adopt. It is to levy a duty of 20 per cent. on silk manufactures, which would have the effect of promoting the growth of silk in the United States, whose soil and climate are particularly adapted for it, and would prevent the immense annual import (25 millions of dollars) of this foreign article into our country. It certainly is most unreasonable that our Government should allow France and England to send their silk goods to the United States free of duty, whilst these two Governments charge our two important staples, tobacco and flour with almost prohibitory duties. England charges 1200 per cent. ad valorem duty on tobacco, and will not allow our bread stuffs to come in except when her population is nearly starving. This absence of reciprocity ought not to be allowed.

"Money is cheap and abundant and discounts have been had to day at 3 per cent. per annum."

We have also received a file of Bankers Circular down to the 28th-from which we give the closing paragraph of an article on the Corn Trade and some remarks on money matters, &c.

"At present we expect that the quantity of American flour taken or to be taken out of bond at Liverpool, and the partial liberation of foreign wheat at that and other ports, will have a depressing effect on prices generally, but not sufficient to lower them suddenly and materially below their present level for about two months. All will then depend on the quantity of foreign wheat which has been thrown into the English markets, and the promise of abundance or deficency afforded by the growing crops. Without anticipating so large a foreign supply as six or seven millions

sterling in value would describe, if our more moderate estimate of about one million of quarters, or above £2,500,000 should be realized, the effect of such an inpouring would be sensibly felt in our markets until the month of July. On the whole, therefore, we congratulate the public on seeing the causes of gloomy forebodings from scarcity and high prices gradually dissipated by the extraordinary energy and perseverance of British farmers, and the genial weather with which it has pleased Providence to bless us. "We are, Sirs, obediently,

"H. B. & Co."

"If we are right in the view taken in the foregoing article concerning corn, one element of uneasiness and disturbance in banking and money affairs may be regarded as neutralized, and for a time satisfactorily settled. Whatever amount of British capital may have been required for purchases of foreign corn, during the last three or four months, has been expended during that period. No additional sum can, we conclude, under present circumstances, be required in that channel of trade, as far as Europe is concerned; and we care not how much flour the Americans may think proper to put into our ports. The Directors of the Bank of England will not feel much anxiety at any imports of this discription from the United States; they would assist the payments of the dividends on their stocks, a large amount of which will fall due in July next. It is worthy of notice that almost all the corn, and especially wheat, which has recently been sent to England and is now arriving from the continent, is on consignment. In the present state of the grain markets, and the existing position of the Corn Law question, our merchants will not make large advances on such consignments; and we should not be surprised to witness some of the more recent arrivals of wheat sent to France, instead of being warehoused for an indefinite period in England.

"It does appear to us not altogether unreasonable to expect that some more speedy relief may come to the Bank of England from the operations of the Corn Trade than would now be in store for them, if the purchases of our merchants at the northern ports had been less extensive, because from intelligence which we obtained at Hull of the impossibility of getting an adequate supply of shipping to convey corn from Hamburgh to France, and the high prices prevailing on the Continent, we should think part of the stock of grain held abroad by British capitalists will be resold, and conveyed by our ships, or those of Sweden and Denmark, to France. We are under no alarm for the effect of any such contemplated demand on the prices of grain in England; at the most it would only check a decline, which might otherwise be more sudden and decided than we have imagined to be probable in the foregoing observations. If instead of a million of quarters, as we have supposed not altogether improbable, there should be only one half of that quantity taken out of bond between March and July, that diminution in the supposed influx would make a great difference on prices. Advices have been received to-day of the Amsterdam corn market being nearly cleared out for France; the quantity purchased, however, we believe was under 20,000 quarters.

"We have made inquiry respecting the posture of affairs between the Government of the United State and our own concerning the boundary disputes, and we are glad to find that those who know the most have less anxiety concerning the issue than the public generally. Letters have been rethe authorities of the State of Maine as being very desirous ceived from eminent public men in America which represent of leaving the whole question to be adjusted by the Executive Government of the United States, And those best informed on the subject are of opinion that some third power or powers will be selected by the two disputing governments, who will have to pronounce a final decision which shall be binding on both. The evil in the case of the King of Holland's award was that he had no power to make such an award as he did; this evil will be prevented in the case of any future arbitration, by giving absolute power to the referee to settle the whole question on just and equitable principles.

VOL. II.

NATCHEZ.

FRIDAY EVENING, May 8-6 o'clock.
Dreadful Visitation of Providence.

About one o'clock on Thursday, the 7th inst. the attention of the citizens of Natchez was attracted by an unusual and continuous roaring of thunder to the southward, at which point hung masses of black clouds, some of them stationary, and others whirling along with under currents, but all driving a little east of north. As there was evidently much lightning the continual roar of growling thunder, although noticed and spoken of by many, created no particular alarm.

The dinner bells in the large hotels had rung a little before two o'clock, and most of our citizens were sitting at their tables, when, suddenly, the atmosphere was darkened, so as to require the lighting of candles; and, in a few moments afterwards, the rain was precipitated in tremendous cataracts rather than in drops. In another moment the tornado, in all its wrath, was upon us. The strongest buildings shook as if tossed with an earthquake; the air was black with whirling eddies of house walls, roofs, chimneys, huge timbers torn from distant ruins, all shot through the air as if thrown from a mighty catapult. The atmosphere soon became lighter, and then such an awful scene of ruin as perhaps never before met the eye of man became manifest. The greater part of the ruin was effected in the short space of from three to five minutes, although the heavy sweeping to:nado lasted nearly half an hour. For about five minutes it was more like the explosive force of gunpowder than any thing else it could have been compared to. Hundreds of rooms were burst open as suddenly as if barrels of gunpowder had been ignited in each.

As far as glasses or the naked eye can reach, the first traces of the tornado are to be seen from the Natchez bluff down the river about ten miles, bearing considerably west of south. Sweeping across the Natchez Island it crossed the point below the plantation of David Barland, Esq., opposite to the plantations of P. M. Lapice, Esq., in the Parish of Concordia. It then struck the Natchez bluff about a mile and a half below the city, near the mansion called the "Briers," which it but slightly injured, but swept the mansion late of Charles B. Greene, Esq., called the "Bellevue," and the ancient forest in which it was embosomed, into a mass of ruins. It then struck the city through its whole width of one mile and included the entire river and the village of Vidalia on the Louisiana shore-making the path of the tornado more than two miles in width. At the Natchez Landing on the river, the ruin of dwellings, stores, steamboats, flat boats, was almost entire from the Vidalia ferry to the Mississippi Cotton Press. A few torn fragments of dwellings still remain, but they can scarcely be called shelters.

In the upper city, or Natchez on the hill, scarcely a house escaped damage or utter ruin. The Presbyterian and Methodist churches have their towers thrown down, their roofs broken, and walls shattered. The Episcopal church is much injured in its roof. Parker's great Southern Exchange is level with the dust. Great damage has been done to the City Hotel and the Mansion House, both being unroofed, and the upper stories broken in. The house of Sheriff Izod has not a timber standing, and hundreds of other dwellings are nearly in the same situation. The Court House at Vidalia, Parish of Concordia, is utterly torn down, also the VOL. II.-43

No. 22.

dwelling houses of Dr. M'Whorter and of Dunlap and Stacy Esqs. The parish jail is partly torn down.

But now the worst remains to be told. Parish Judge Keeton, of Concordia was instantly killed while at dinner at the house of Mr. Stacy. He was a noble and esteemed man. No other person was killed in Vidalia although some others were hurt. At the Natches Landing, out of fifty or sixty flat boats only six are now afloat. Those best acquainted suppose as many as one hundred flat boat men were drowned in the river, which swelled instantly to the height of six or eight feet.

The steamboats Hinds, Prairie and the St. Lawrence were boat on the river-more or less persons being lost in the two destroyed and sunk at the Landing, and the Vidalia ferry first named boats.

From the ruins of the Steamboat Hotel, Mr. Alexander, the landlord, his lady and bar keeper, were dug out alive, as also Timothy Flint, the historian and geographer, and his son, from Natchitoches, La., besides Dr. Taliafero and many others. Mrs. Alexander is considered dangerously injured. Two of her children were killed in her arms. As many as nine dead bodies have been dug from the Steamboat Hotel.

The number of burials which have taken place to-day is about fifty, and many are still in a dangerous and dying condition.

As soon as possible we shall publish a list of the names of the killed and wounded, and those missing whose bodies have not been found.

Meanwhile we beg the indulgence of our kind friends and patrons for a few days, in which time we shall be able to get our office in some order.-The Free Trader office building has been crushed in and much shattered. We are all in confusion, and surrounded by the destitute, the houseless, the wounded and the dying. Our beautiful city is shattered as if it had been stormed by all the cannon of Austerlitz. Our delightful China trees are all torn up. We are peeled and desolate.

A public meeting has been held by the citizens in the courthouse to-day, at which Col. James C. Wilkins presided, and F. L. Claiborne, Esq. was secretary. Addresses were delivered by J. M. Hewett, and J. M. Duffield, Esqs. and resolutions offered by the latter gentleman and others appointing relief committees, &c. &c.

The City Hotel, through the kindness of the proprietor, Noah Barlow, Esq. has been thrown open to the wounded. Doctor Pollard, with his usual promptitude, has taken the Tremont House for an additional hospital, Stephen Duncan, Esq. having generously offered to be responsible for the rent.

The neighbouring planters are generously sending in large gangs of slaves to assist in clearing the streets and digging the dead from the ruins.

M. Ruffiner and S. J. Boyd, Esqrs. have been at the trouble to go over the whole extent of the city, and make a practical and careful estimate of the damages, which we endorse, as far as our observation extends, and present to our readers: Houses and goods under the hill, Four steamboats,

...

.$150,000

50,000 Fifty flatboats at the landing,. ...100,000 Buildings below Main and West Canal street,..... 25,000 Below Main, west of Canal, south of Franklin to Main,.. Railroad Depot, Buildings, &c., 50,000 Light-house and adjoining building, on the south,.. 8,000

25,000