The Press. — London, England, 1853-06-11 00:00:00

---___ tl t ' S d rt 4534 LONDON, SATURDAY, JUNE 11, 1853. No. 6.—VoL. I, Virtss. VONDON, SATURDAY, JUNF: 111, 'Pea WE have endeavoured from the first to guard our readers front falling into the convenient toils of the Stock Exchange and of the ABER DERN prints, and of believing their represen tations that the present state of affairs in Tur key Is a mere diplomatic imbroglio. Accord ing to the representations of the Ministers, the assertions of their journals, and the rumour of the Bourse, all ought by this time to have been satisfactorily arranged On the con trary, the situation becomes daily more dan- gerous. Prince MENSCIIIKOFF travelled night and day from Constantinople to St. Petersburg. His announcement that the ultimatum had not been accepted excited the liveliest anger of the Emperor, who ordered a common courier to depart immediately for Constantinople , and 41frer again the propositions of the sth of May, with a declaration of immediate hostilities in case of their renewed rejection. This mode of communicating between two great powers, by an ordinary messenger, was of course only intended as an insult to the Porte ; and it is understood that despatches were sent on the same day to Sebastopol. We are informed, also, that the English Minister at St. Peters burg, Sir HAMILTON SEYMOUR, has had an au dience of the Emperor, in which his Majesty expressed, without circumlocution, his deter mination not to spare the Turk. and the in dignation with which the eonduct of Great Britain had filled him. We shall see in a moment that his Imperial Majesty may have good ground for this latter sentiment. We are assured that this audience assumed in its ; The a painful and alarmin g character. The Emperor stated that Russia would spend her last rouble alike against detested enemies and treacherous friends If the Russian fleet sailed from Sebastopol —the possibility of which was intimated a ' week ago by Lord HARDWICKE and Mr. Dm- RAELI—it might anchor in the Golden Horn on the 13th inst., while the English fleet, if it have received instructions to repair to Tene dos, which is in the vicinity of the Darda nelles, could not arrive at that station before the lath inst. Supposing the Emperor of RUSSIA chooses not to act immediately from the Krimea, he has at this moment two corps dartaie in Bessarabia; one may enter Mol davia by Kapriana, in which ease there would be time. and perhaps inclination, to negotiate; the other would enter Bulgaria by Ismail, which would be a direct violation of the treaty of IS4I, and an absolute invasion. In this latter case, the Russians would follow the same line of advance as they pursued in 182$, when the interests of this country and of Europe were before betrayed by Lord ABER DEEN. They would follow the sea-road to Varna, their army provisioned from Sebas topol and their other stations on the Black Sea. and from Varna they would move in the direction Of Sehumlat, cross the Balkan, and descend, as they did before, into the plains of Adrianople. Anticipating this last project of war by the Russians, the Freneh—baffled by our vacillation in their plan of arresting, by the united action of the French and English fleets, the possible invasion front Sebastopol— have proposed to our Government, in the event of the invasion of Bulgaria, to pass the Darthmelles . on the appeal of the Sultan, enter the Black Sea, defend Varna, and blockade Sebastopol. This movement would guard the flank of Turkey, and arrest the march of the Russian army, which, under these circum stanees, could obtain no supplies, and which would not dare to leave such a force in their rear. But Lord ABERDEEN '4001104 paralysed with the responsibility of action, and 1401 . 41 C LA REN DON only whimpers and wrings his hands. Perhaps this latter distinguished statesman may have suffieient cause for these significant, though humiliating, evidences of a panic stricken soul. Why, it. nmy be fairly asked, is the present , conduct of Russia—in general so cautious and so adroit in the accomplish ing of her designs—so contrary to all her antecedents? Why, with apparently a weaker cause than she usually embarks in, is she so imperious, uncompromising, uncontrollable ? What is the secret reason of these angry words from the Emperor to Sir H. SEvmoun? If our solution of this mystery be a true one, a graver charge has seldom been made against a British Minister. We are informed, and we believe our informant, that, early in the spring, and before the arrival of Prince MEssent KO FE at the capital of Turkey. Baron BauNow eommuni cated to Lord CLARENDON the propositions which the Imperial Government was about to make to the Porte, in order that the Emperor, before he took any step, might 'weenie ae quainted with the general feeling of England on the subject. Lord Clarendon made uo oljw that to these propositions, awl in. noorime raged the intended nurse if the Ilmodon blorern meat. We understand that Lord CtitnENDos on this occasion only consulted Lord Anew DE EN . Hence the early and justifiable eonfidenee of Baron BRU NOW changed into indignation, disgust, and despair, when he witnessed the vacillation of the English Secretary of State —when Lord PAL3tFaisTos demonstrated to the Cabinet the blunder which his Colleagues had perpetrated—and when Lord C LAREN DON finally relinquished, in obedience to the public voice, a policy in which his sanction had induced the Emperor of Reform to embark, and which the honour of the Czar, and the ultimate interests of Russia, are alike bound to sustain at all hazards. Under these unpreeedented (growl stances, it is not impossible that it may be the hitter portion of the English people to find that they have alike deserted Turkey, offended France, and outraged Russia ; that our nearest neighbours may reap the sole glory of main brining the balance of power, and vindicating the independence of Europe ; and that, for the first time for a hundred years, England will not take the lead in a great naval ex ploit. In the meantime, the curse of " antiquated " imbecility " has fallen, in its fulness, on Lord ABERDEEN. His temper, naturally mo rose, has become licentiously peevish. Crossed in his Cabinet, he insults the House of Lords, and plagues the most eminent of his eta leagues with the crabbed malice of a maun dering witch. His inability to sustain debate, or to endure discussion, becomes every day more painfully apparent. It i 5 probable that he does not possess that varied and more re cent knowledge which, in these days, is requp PRICE SIXPENCE. site for any one who presumes to lead a house of Parliament. But, however this may be, he is not gifted with the faculty of narration, and therefore etuutot make a public statement. For a more difficult office of elotetenee— namely, sustaining a chain of reasoning in a publie assembly—he is utterly, anti appare forntle. c onsciously, incompetent. Having, there neither filets nor arguments at his command. he absolutely takes refuge in seobling, and his supporters and opponents either blush OE titter, as he morosely intimates the insigniti• t , twee of his own order, and gives the most seeptival as to that tenet, anti the most eonti tient in the genius of our constitution, some reason 14) credit his ill-conditioned iuuendoes, by the fact that melt a man can, by any acci dent of fortune, or by any contrivance of in trigue, become the Leader of the Housg og Loans. THE INDIA QUESTION. SIR CHARLES WOOD'S display of last week, though unmercifully long, and thought the ma teritds for it were unmistakeably picked up at. second band, was nut destitute of a certain kind of ability. Ho dealt with a vast variety of subjects, showed sow knowledge of them all. avoided gross blunders, and, on the whole, performed his part as well as could be CX peeted from a broken-down tinaneier trans funned into an Oriental Minister. That ho should take am optimist view of his subject was but natural ; that. he should I indicate the Company front exaggerated aecusations was not only natural, but right. But this optimism was surely 411114(4 too Mr, when Ult.(' hint not. merely to palliate , but to defend, the gravest faults of the 1)1E4414,60 administration —the want of roads, the want of schools, the uueer Minty of laws, the ignorance of judges, thu reckless extension of British territory, the ne potism of Directors, and the irresponsibility of the Board of Control. Without fully con• curving in the invective of Mr. Batton against all these, it must 1w owned that his speech came in as a seasonable oirreetive. The op posito exaggenttions neutralise one another ; and between theta something like truth may be elicited. But, if the Ministerial statement, eontain some indieations of talent, the satine cannot be said of the plan which it introduced. The f a ilure which we last week predicted at scarcely an hour's notice is now reeognised and regretted on all hands. 'the scheme bears on its face the marks of a compromise, hastily decided upon and clumsily carried out. Thu Court of Proprietors still exists, although no human being defends it, either eta the ground of theoret loth fitness or of practical expediency. The Direetors are " 1/11L1'01Illge ;" for the mere ntising of their salaries from :mot to row. yearly (" adding V. a week to their " wages," as Mr. Munn has it) will never in duce any rational being to go through a three yearm . c anvass for the office, while the head clerks in Downing-street receive twice as much. The amount of patronage at their disposal, again, is little diminished ; for. if we mistake not, the proportion of the civil to the military falls below one in four, a n d the diminished nmnber of those among whom these offices are shared leaves to each almost as much as before of that which _ a i _.