The Press. — London, England, 1857-10-17 00:00:00

1012 THE WEEK. Tax intelligence from India by this mail, which appeared unusually Satisfactory upon the surface, is not, we fear, of a nature entirely to assure us of our security, or to relieve us of our apprehensions. The spirit of insurrection is far from being suppressed. The Bombay army, there is no denying it, is rotten to the core; and at the last moment of the mail leaving such serious symptoms had exhibited themselves at Vellore among the Madras cavalry that a powerful British force, with artillery, was ordered to proceed at once to the spot . This is not reassuring. The mutiny first spread through Bengal much in the same manner: partial disaffection was succeeded by the decided mutiny of solitary regiments, and the rest is now matter of history. Similar first symptoms have appeared in Bombay and Madras ; and unless the speedy arrival of British troops from the Cape and England place at the disposal of the Government a British force sufficiently powerful to overawe the population and disarm the suspected troops, some very serious consequences may be looked for. With regard to Delhi and Lucknow, and Bengal generally, it is clear that our tenure of the ground we hold within the ring of British bayonets, wherever they be, depends more upon the capacity of endurance possessed by our troops than upon the skill and audacity of our generals. Lucknow has been miraculously preserved hitherto, and its relief would seem at length to be at hand ; but then again the force with which OUTRAM is advancing to the assistance of HAVE LOCK will not, after all, so materially increase the physical power of HavaLocx—it will not raise his brigade to more than 2,000 men; and it was with a force numerically not much less that he first advanced from Allhabad. The question, then, that remains to be decided is whether with that small force he will be enabled to clear the way to Lucknow? We have, justly, every reliance upon the fortitude and valour of his troops ; but, as we said at that time, skill and courage, fortitude and daring, cannot always compensate for inequality of force. The rebels are numerous, well provided with artillery, and strongly for tified ; and however despicable in the open field, they are not to be regarded lightly when behind intrenchments. If a more powerful force were at HAVELOCK'S command, we should feel no apprehension for the result of this third attempt to relieve Lucknow ; but we warn our readers against exacting impossibilities from men who have proved themselves superior to every peril and equal to every effort The capture of Delhi, which must come sooner or later, and which is perhaps nearer at hand than details would justify us in anticipating, we shall not regard with any particular satisfaction, and for this reason, that while we see the utter inadequacy of our army to invest tine city, and the free egress and ingress the rebels still command, •we doubt if they will remain to be destroyed in detail. A part, if not the whole, of the lesson of Sebastopol it is quite possible will be repeated at Delhi ; the rebels, if they do not set fire to the town, will desert it en masse in a single night. Whether we shall gain on the whole by such a diffusion over the country of the rebel element remains to be proved. The Punjaub continues in a state of feverish tranquillity. The con firmed death of GHOLAB SINGH must be regarded as a gain. We do not look forward to the collection of the autumn revenue with much confidence. On the whole, therefore, the satisfaction to be derived from the intelligence brought by this mail is purely negative. The position of the contending forces is in the main unaltered; every day that it continues so is a gain to us ; but six long weeks must at least elapse before the English reinforcements arrive. We now begin to appreciate the value of the time so recklessly wasted by the Govern• meat in the earlier stages of this perilous insurrection. The speech of Mr. GLADSTONE at Chester is extremely remarkable for the character of its important admissions and its eloquent confes sions. If other public men had spoken in a similar tone, faction and personal malice might have joined their defamatory forces for the purpose of vilifying such speakers of plain truth. Let us see what fell from the Member for the University. " Unfortunately," said Mr. GLADSTONE, "if ever there was a people who had cause for great " national humiliation, in regard to a great national crisis, I do not " hesitate to say that it is the people of England at the present " moment." He then proceeded to say—" The effect of our curious " contrivance for governing India was that it made India to us a foreign " country." He went still further, and said boldly and broadly— " England knows nothiny of India." That is strong, very strong and plain language, and more still remains. We request of our readers to observe what follows Whatever the cause " of the outbreak, you may search the records of history far " and wide before you come across an instance of so vexatious "and extraordinary a failure on the part of a governing power in the " administration of its political trust." Mr. GLADSTONE, at least, seems anxious to free himself from underrating the crisis. We see nothing but what is creditable in the frankness of his words. The Right Honourable Gentleman's eloquent statement of our past errors we commend to notice, and there certainly was nothing mealy-mouthed in his language. We were glad to see that Mr. GLADSTONE thought it proper to protest against the ferocious spirit manifested in some quarter s. " The cry that went out from this country was, I hope, but " the passion of the moment;" and the eloquent speaker then alluded to the unfavourable effect of that savage cry, as regards the character of England on the Continent. Mr. DISRAELI has already spoken with energy on the same theme, and there are symptoms that other public men of station and influence will endeavour to direct the public feel ings from adopting NANA SAHIB as a model for English justice, and for English policy. A few days since there was a " cry " against Mr. DISRAELI for having uttered words calculated to recall the public mind to a sense of duty, and to stop the hysterical expression of abject alarm and frenzied thirst for vengeance. The " cry " soon lulled, and now another " cry "is heard. " Organs," in the meanwhile, have become attuned to a new key ! Such is the popularis aura! Well might Mr. GLADSTONE say, "We find, after " all, that we are not wiser or stronger than other people." We rejoice to find two public men of such distinction and political im portance as the Right Honourable Members for Bucks and the Uni versity standing up manfully against a temporary outburst of wild fury. " Those passions which may be excusable there, become odious " and unnatural when excited here " Tt was neither the Earl of ELLENBOROUGH, nor Mr. DISRAELI, nor Sir BULWER LYTTON, nor Sir JOHN PAKINGTON, that spoke that. It was Mr. GLADSTONE; and we advise those who attacked Mr. DISRAELI a short time since, and who now praise Mr. GLADSTONE, to be more cautious at another time how they interpret the real leanings of the public mind. The plain fact is that our Parliamentary records prove too strong a case as to our own neglects of India for us to deal in wholesale acts of iudiseriminate vengeance. Let it be remembered that WARREN HASTINGS has never been accepted as a model for English justice and statesmanship. Let us recollect that, even to the last, the Crown and its various advisers of different Cabinets refused WARREN HASTINGS the peerage which he ardently coveted and constantly solicited in vain. Let us not forget that all Lord MACAULAY'S brilliant rhetoric and fascinating power of narrative have not blinded thou sands of readers to the fact that the dazzling essayist has glossed over some of the foul crimes of HASTINGS,and that his elaborate article, with all its literary beauties, fails lamentably in judicial severity, and in what Mr. GRATTAN so eloquently termed " oppression's natural scourge, " the moral indignation of history." Neither the Duke of WELLINGTON nor his brother the Marquis WELLESLEY followed the precedents of HASTINGS, and we trust that the English people will never enthrone him in a political Walhalla. The Times this week, in discussing the question of the amount of native sympathy and resource we have met with in India, remarks, "in justice to Lord DALHOUSIE'S policy," that if the origin of the insurrection is to be found in the annexation of Oude, that act, " though it might have precipitated the revolt," had " certainly tended " to deprive it of its vitality ;" and hence argues that if a King of Oude had reigned at Lucknow at the time of this revolt, his army and treasure would have furnished the rebels with " a far more formidablo head" than they have been now able to acquire. That the King of OUDE " would have " helped conspirators against our rule is an assertion entirely contradicted by all previous testimony as regards the good faith of that Sovereign. Lord DALHOUSIE himself bore testimony to that fidelity in the following terms : The rulers of Oude (observes Dalhousie, in his Minute) have yet ever been faithful and true in their adherence to the British power. No wavering friendship has ever been laid to their charge. They have long acknowledged our power, have submitted without a murmur to our supremacy, and have aided us, as best they could, in our hour of need. This is Lord DALHOUSIE'S opinion; and we should remember tho hours of our need. The meaning of the term " have aided us as " best they could " is, that the King had lent us a million of money, which we owed, and found inconvenient to pay, at the time of the annexation ; and which, under any circumstances of conspiracy or rebellion, would have at least proved a material element in keeping the King securely to our cause. To endeavour, therefore, to excuse the annexation of Oude by an assumption of the King's possible trea chery towards us, if he had been on the Throne, is simply sily, illo gical, and unsupported by fact. The inauguration at Birmingham this week of the "National Association for the Advancement of Social Science " has attracted con siderable attention. We are glad to observe that the society does not propose to meddle directly with the subject of political institutions. We cannot help fearing, however, that even as it is the facilities for conducting such a society have been a little overrated, and the analogy between its proposed objects and those of the elder Associa tion been too hastily adopted. Lord BROUGHAM, who in his inaugural address drew the distinction between them with great clearness, stopped short, as it seems to us, just at that paint when a further com parison becomes perilous. It is perfectly true that science has been greatly promoted by the system of learned societies, not withstanding the differences of opinion which may ha•re arisen between their members. But the real truth of the matter is that no man is personally affected by the difference between " the Newtonian and the undulatory theory of light.' No man's income suffers ally diminution because of the war between electricity and magnetism. When Lord BROUGHAM, therefore, recom mends that people should treat differences of opinion which affect their every-day life with great calmness, he is surely indulging in very sarguine anticipations of human progress. No symptom of an approximation to this state of serenity can be discovered at present, and this is the real reason why men's political progress so constantly lags behind their intellectual and scientific advancement, and why it will almost always be impossible, while men remain what they are, for "kings to be philosophers or philosophers to be kings." The middle of October sees everybody returning to work—some refreshed, some reluctant, some eager to re-enter the arena, some dis pirited at the thoughts of it. Among the former class must certainly be ranked the Metropolitan Board of Works, though whether the First Commissioner participates in their zeal may reasonably be doubted. The satisfaction of the public with the present arrangement is not likely either to continue very long if things go on for the future as they have done all along, and are still doing. The principal occupa tion of the Board appears to be the construction of plans fur the drainage of the metropolis for Sir BENJAMIN HALL to pull to pieees. Those gentlemen show amazing alacrity in this somewhat unprofitable THE PRESS, OCTOBER 17, 1857.