The Captain Bashaw is equipping the fleet with all possible dispatch, and will sail early in the spring, with a force that will compel the Russian squadron on the Black Sea to act on the defensive, unless their fleet from the Baltic is permitted to enter the Mediterranean, and make a diversion to the southward. But as this would be entirely depriving the Porte of every prospect of opposing, with any success, the machinations of her enemies, England certainly can never permit so decisive a step to be taken in favor of the ambitious, and to us, destructive views of the two Imperial Courts. The Reis Effendi, or Principal Secretary of State, is said to possess sufficient abilities to fill that office in any country in Europe. The following anecdote of him, will give you an idea of his opinion of France and England. The spirited conduct of our Court during the late disturbances in Holland, reflects the greatest honor on the King and his Ministers; and it is said, that Sir Robert Ainslie, our Ambassador at the Porte, with his usual patriotic attention to the honor and interest of his country, drew up a short narrative of that important business, and delivered it to the Porte. At an audience afterwards given to Sir Robert, the Turkish Ministry congratulated his Excellency on the distinguished success of his Court, and the Reis Effendi, I am told, made these observations, "You have acted with all your usual courage--but with more than your usual wisdom. You have carried your point without bloodshed, and have left the French to fight among themselves." The last sentence occasioned some surprise; but by what I learn from the French officers who are just arrived, a violent convulsion in France is not far distant, and the Reis Effendi bids fair to prove by it, his profound knowledge of the interior state of that kingdom, a knowledge which Turkish Ministers are not generally expected to possess, at least of nations that are not their immediate neighbours. An army of observation is forming on the Banks of the Danube, to watch the motions of the Germans, whose hostile declaration is hourly expected. The Baron de Herbert has given himself great airs in the Divan, and threatened vengeance on the Porte, for daring to attack the ally of the Emperor, his master. The Turks treated these threats with the contempt such impertinence deserved; but at the same time, with great gravity and wisdom, they informed the Baron, that they were aware of the power of the Emperor, and would be sorry to see it exerted against them; but still that, trusting to the equity of Europe, they were determined to risk this unequal conflict, rather than submit to those incessant encroachments, which, by daily weakening the Porte, and increasing the power of the two Imperial Courts, must end, if unopposed, in the total subversion of the Ottoman Empire.