The Press. — London, England, 1857-08-01 00:00:00

748 THE PRESS, AUGUST 1, 1857. the most serious, and might have had the most disastrous, effect upon our starving and exhausted troops. If it is known by our Government for a feet that General BARNARD is deficient in stores and ammunition, that his supply of the latter is limited to twenty-four rounds a man, it is quite possible that this fact may be known to the rebels, and hence it is by desperate and frequent sorties, which would exhaust both his men and his ammunition, that they may best hope to achieve a successful defence against General BARNARD'S attack. Under these admitted circumstances we cannot regard the report of the capture as at all credible ; but even allow ing that the rumour from Madras be correct, we may rely upon it that the desperate defence of 30,000 mutineers against the assault of the 4,000 British troops must have been such as to cripple them to some extent, and to render all effective pursuit of fugitives from the town impossible. The full details, which will arrive this morning, will enlighten us much upon these points. It is possible we may learn that, in addition to want of men, stores, and ammunition, General BARNARD has to contend against that terrible and fatal scourge to European troops—the cholera. We may learn that the ramifications of this " mere military mutiny " are so extended among the peasantry as to explain every difficulty in the way of our gallant army obtaining supplies, and that the rebellion, so far from being limited to the Sepoys, has even. extended to the Sikhs and Irregular troops. It would be premature to anticipate those details to any extent, but we frankly confess that, in the telegraphic despatches received, we fail to discover one single fact which tends to reassure the country that the terrible crisis through which our Eastern empire is now passing approaches its termination. We believe that it has not yet reached its maturity, and that before it has been fully developed on the one hand, and suppressed on the other, that great calamities and serious sacrifices will have to be endured. Wo still adhere to our opinion that the Kensington-gore estate would be a more suitable site for the new National Gallery than the one now proposed by the Commissioners. In the first place, it would be impossible to make use of the Trafalgar-square site without inter fering with the barracks behind, a step not likely to meet with the approbation of his Royal Highness the Commander-in-Chief. Secondly, we should thereby lose both the `Sheepshanks and Turner collections, for the former was bequcated to the nation only on condition that the gallery was removed to Kensington ; and the collection of the latter is so extensive that it can never be accom modated in the existing National Gallery; while, if the Government fail to provide accommodation within a given time, half of which has already elapsed, the collection is lost to the country for ever. A great deal too much has been said upon the central position of Trafalgar square. This is rather the result of habit than a reality. Astists and men of letters would for the most part find Kensington as central as Charing-cross. All that large class who formerly peopled Bloomsbury have now migrated to Tyburnia and Brampton ; and there can be no doubt that if we regard the con venience of the working classes, Kensington would be in many respects the more eligible site of the two. When a working man is out for a holiday, and then only would he go, a mile makes very little difference to him—not more difference, at least, than the advantage of being so near Kensington-gardens would fully compensate. It is with much pleasure we record the result of this week's Election Petitions. On Wednesday the two Liberal Members for Great Yarmouth were unseated; and yesterday Mr. CODBOLD, the Conservative Member. was confirmed in his seat at Ipswich ; but in the other two cases of Huntingdon County and Sligo Borough, the result is even more grati fying, both having proved a decided and clear gain to the Conser vative party. In the former, it will be remembered, there was a dead heat between Mr. HEATHCOTE and Mr. FELLOWES. A scrutiny followed, which has resulted in the return of Mr. FELLovrEs. The decision of the Committee upon the Sligo election is only that which our readers must have been prepared for, after reading the letter of our Irish correspondent, which gave a full and faithful account of the trial in the Queen's Bench, Dublin. Never was a clearer or a more revolting case unfolded to popular view. By the fortunate indisposition of the principal actor in this drama of fraud and corruption, the House of Commons was not favoured with the disclosures on which an Irish jury were called upon to adjudicate. But we are unwilling that the facts should escape attention. It would he a pity that the country should not understand the mode in which Palmerstonism was attempted to be foisted upon it. Mr. J. P. SOMERS invades Sligo not merely as a supporter but as intimate friend of the Premier. It was his leading claim and his dominant pretension to the confidence of that constituency. His vauntings and his boasts, however, on that score, were found to be impo tent to defeat a candidate coming before the electors with the character and reputation which attached by universal assent to Mr. WYNNE. A deep-laid scheme therefore was devised to insure Mr. SomEas's return at all hazards and by all contrivances. The tools were at hand. A corrupt mayor, corrupt deputies, and corrupt poll-clerks, constituted the staff empowered to secure a triumph for Palmerstonism in a Pal merstonian borough. They did their work bravely and well Legal votes for Mr. WYNNE were refused ; votes for Mr. WYNNE were entered for Mr. SOMERS ; votes tendered for Mr. WYNNE and - rejected were 000lly planed to filr. Somnitie credit; THE WEEK. Ma. DISRAELI in his speech on Monday night not only attested the vigour of his mind and proved to the nation his great capacity for public affairs, but in the indefatigable research, and in the profound knowledge of the subject the speech displayed, the Right Hon. Member for Bucks showed that he comprehended with intuition the exact nature of the crisis in India, while in the broad and compre hensive measures he proposed he exhibited the capacity to en eounter, and the vigour to break through, its most complicated evils. Never was the strong and clear understanding, the thinking power of Mr. DISRAELI, more remarkably shown than in the easy, copious flow of those profound and sagacious observations, enunciated in terse and striking language, upon the position and necessities of India. The speech of Monday night will be preserved as the most masterly and tatesmanlike exposition upon the Government of India ever deli vered in this country, and years hence it will be consulted by the reflective and studious statesman for its accurate know ledge of detail, and its profound and farsighted views of the true piinciples of that policy which should be adopted, in order to insure the safety and secure the submission of our Indian empire. The name of Mr. DISRAELI is for the future identified with the great question of Indian policy, and the country will learn from the speech of Monday night that in the House of Commons there is one great and genuine statesman who has mastered the difficulties of this intri cate question, whose sound and sagacious views are acknowledged upon all sides, and who with unrivalled political foresight has laid down for us principles of policy which can alone bring this crisis to a satis factory and definite conclusion. The petty and insipid charlatanism which puts forth the plea that the period was inopportune and the speech unpatriotic will be accepted by the county at its worth When the heart of the British nation throbs with anxiety for the fate of India, it is the fitting time to recall our attention to the measures adopted and the policy proposed by her Majesty's Govern ment for the safety of that Indian Empire. It is time, we maintain, to consider the state of India with respect to her misgovernment and her resentful discontent, to the nature and application of the former, to the rise and progress of the latter, and to the necessity and means for diminishing both. Experience should not be lost upon us. Our political delirium in favour of any Government, however popular and however incapable, should no longer be continued. In place of that sentiment of impassioned allegiance which the master-minds of India had succeeded in creating, it is time when we find substituted a feeling of deep and perilous dis content that the abuses and corruption which have brought about this hazardous change should be examined and extinguished. It was for the real interests of this country, for the integrity of our (empire, and for the safety of India, that Mr. DISRAELI, regardless of the gratification of party feeling, brought forward his motion on Monday night. His speech will remain upon record as a masterpiece of political foresight, and the country will accept it as the view of the only statesman in the House of Commons who has arrived at a just and lofty sense of this great and terrible crisis. The intelligence from India is undeniably bad. The mutiny has spread most extensively, and the anxiety of the Government is only equalled by the gravity of the crisis. It is now no longer considered a mere military mutiny. It is felt to be a national revolt, and one which will tax all the energies of England to effectively suppress. It is in vain for the Ministerial journals to hold out the prospect that the next mail will bring better news, that Delhi by that time will be cap tured, and the rebels dispersed or slain. The next mail and the mails for months succeeding, we venture to say, will bring us little intelligence that may be accepted as satisfactory or consoling. Delhi no doubt will be captured in course of time, but with the fall of Delhi will commence the real struggle. The rebels, no longer con centrated in a single stronghold, will traverse the country, confirm to their cause the wavering peasantry, and sow the seeds of a desperate guerilla warfare. The very fall of Delhi will teach them at once their strength and weakness. They will no longer confine themselves to the defence of a single spot, but, spreading out like a fan over the neighbouring provinces, will carry revolt and massacre from one end of Hindostan to the other. But Delhi, which Mr. VERNON SMITH told us somo weeks since was to be razed to the ground, still stands, defended by 30,000 rebels, bidding de fiance to our troops, and, from what we can gather from the :Ministerial papers, with every probability for a lengthened period. One organ states that possibly want of force, want of stores, and even want "of ammunition," may have compelled General BARNARD to the defensive ; another seeks to prove that the sorties of the rebels were symptoms of weakness and fear. It may more reasonably be regarded as a proof of conscious superiority and of strength. The gravest fault committed by the Russians in their defence of Sebastopol is allowed to have been their neglect of this very mode of attack during the terrible winter of '54 and '55. No one pan deny that had such harassing sorties been continued throughout Slat wiater ao were resorted to later is that siege, they Ironic' have had