The Press. — London, England, 1855-10-13 00:00:00

972 some hundreds of dismounted troopers, with four guns. Ali Packs, who commanded this detachment, a brave old general, who has taken part in most of the recent wars of Turkey, was made prisoner. Moreover, we captured one officer and forty five men, a flag, two standards, the four guns previously mentioned, sixty-eight caissons with powder, and fifty-five caissons with cartridges. The whole camp, with an extensive booty, remained in our hands. The Turks had nearly 400 men killed. A despatch from Constantinople of October the 2nd, states that Omer l'acha was at length about to make a vigorous effort to save Kars. • . THE BALTIC FLEET. (From our Own Correspondent.) NARGEN, Oct. 2. No particular news since I last wrote. The admiral, in the Duke, has commenced to visit the different parts of his station. At present ho is at Seskar, where Admiral Seymour, with several ships, is sta tioned. A line of vessels extends from that place to Cronstadt, within signal distance of each other from Cronstadt, round to Biorko Sound. On the north coast of the Gulf lays another chain of men of war ; so that Cronstadt is most effectually blockaded this year. At this time last season the fleet were withdrawn to Nargen, thus leaving the whole space between that place and Cronstadt open, not only to the coasting trade, but to any vessel that in heavy weather might escape the vigilance of our cruisers at the entrance of the Gulf. Nothing is as yet said of the fleet leaving, and we all anticipate remaining here at least a month later—a prospect which is by no means a pleasant one, considering that the weather is getting unpleasantly cold and stormy. All hands here are heartily tired of this blockading work. The Russians no longer give us the fun of harassing their detachments of troops along the coast, for they always withdraw on the approach of our cruisers. I presume that they find our grape and canister reduce their muster-roll. We are to withdraw gradually down the Gulf. I hear our last anchorage will be near the Island of Wormroe, in the neighbourhood of Pager Ort. The Merlin has gone there to lay down buoys. The James Watt and Imperieuse have been very close in to Cronstadt on two or three occasions during their turn of block. ading that formidable place. At the mouth of the port are lying a Russian liner of 100 guns, five steam frigates, no end of gun-boats, and a large screw steam-frigate, all ataunt, and quite ready to come out. When you consider that we had only two ships, and no others in sight, it cannot but strike one as extra ordinary that they make no attempt to humble our pride on our own element. However, they appear determined to act entirely on the defensive, awl we must bide our time until next season, when we hope that the Government will at last have opened their eyes to the necessity of sending a sufficient force to a part of the world where the most severe blow might be struck at the power of the enemy, of the utmost importance regarding the attainment of the object of this war, and which appears hitherto to have been overlooked most unaccountably. The Vulture takes the mails. Cossack, with two gun-boats, has gone to pick up anchors, cables, and other gear left at the bottom by Hasting during her late mishap. Nothing new from the Gulf of Bothnia, where all remains quiet. All trade, or attempts to break blockade, is at an end. We have lots of ex ercise to keep the devil out of our minds ; hut what is the use of being in good order unless the Russians will give us a chance 1 Two RUSSIAN CADETS, confined in the War Prison at Lewes, escaped from custody on Saturday last. They left their prison clothes behind, and each had a large sum of money. One, it is said, decamped with upwards of 100/., a portion of which belonged to other prisoners. A strict search has been followed up by the officials, but as yet without success. It is believed that they are somewhere secreted in the neighbourhood. ARRESTS IN FINLAND have lately taken place to some extent. The mayors of the various districts are the principal sufferers. The causes are said to be political. DESERTION IN THE RUSSIAN ARMY has become SO marked, that the authorities have been compelled to adopt moot stringent measures to keep the recruits to their colours. THE POPULATION OF THE CRIMEA consists of about 179,000 persons, of whom 156,000 are Tartars, and 43,000 Christians. Of the Tartars, 80,000 are pea- sants, 10,000 nobles, about 16,000 priests, and the rest petty traders resident in towns. The number of Russians settled in the country is calculated at not more than 3,000, while the remainder of the Christian populationi is route op of (}reeks, Voles, and Clemons. THE PRESS. lortion gorrtsponbenct. FRANKFORT, October 9. NOTWITHSTANDING that the journey of the Emperor Alexander is cited as an earnest of the unanimity prevailing in the Russian councils on the subject of the war, and the determination to persevere in it at any cost, there is a party at St. Petersburg, German patrician and commercial, strongly opposed to the continuance of hostilities without an endeavour being made to attempt a pacific solution of the dial culty militant that now pervades Europe. To this party the present Empress of Russia is said to give a cordial encouragement, and at her instigation, as likewise of that of the Empress Mother, an applica tion was made to Prussia for its mediation, with what result is already known. The manly and honourable feeling of the Emperor Alexander, which prompted him to declare that Russia would not con sent to peace on the basis of disaster, commands respect, and is worthy the sovereign of a great and powerful nation. To that resolve he will cling with tenacity, and all the more from being influenced, or rather being under the direct influence of the stern Muscovites, the Russian " parti de la Croix," that holds the Sovereign in subjection—of that faction, which will not, on any terms, abandon the plans of policy and conquest conveyed in the testamentary in junctions of the first Peter. The chief of this faction is the Grand Duke Constantine, and the journey to Moscow, with the visit to Nicolaieff, Odessa, and pos sibly the Crimea, is the result of his absoluteness in council. In the North no fear is entertained by Russia of attack either by sea or land, from the absence of material by the force of season, which has before befriended Russia and defied Napoleon. Prussia is ruled by the " parti de la Croix"—let it be said despotically ruled—and the first amongst its subjects is the King himself. It is an " Imperium in imperio," an unprincipled minority, yet powerful enough to rule and to compel the adoption of a poli• tical course opposed to public opinion. For Northern Russia, then, there exists no present Danger. On the Danube the principalities are held by Austria, avowedly neutral and intrinsically Russian. " Lorsqu' une chose plait a la Russie, it faut bien qu'elle plait it l'Autriche," was the observation made by the Em peror Nicholas to Sir Hamilton Seymour; and in pursuance of that state of dependency, Austria occu pies the principalities with the consent of Russia, and dares not to stir in contravention of her order. Thus says, openly and without hesitation, the Count Benkendorf, the military representative of Russia at Berlin. Bankrupt and faithless, Austria disbanded her northern army—first, from a want of means to maintain it, which she hoped to conceal; and, secondly, in order to strengthen Russia by enabling her to apply the southern army stationed on the Aus trian frontiers to succour Sebastopol, which she denied until challenged and contradicted by the statement of M. de Benkendorf. Russia is thus enabled to concen trate her gigantic forces upon the single point of the Ctimea. The Emperor Alexander does not visit his army to superintend a retreat ; he is not accompanied by the Muscovite Grand Duke Constantine, in order that they should bear witness to the defeat of the favorite project of their ancestor, without striking a further blow in defence of their hereditary plan of ambition. Russia is stricken, but not subdued. There are two speeches that have attracted much public attention in this place and throughout Ger many—that of Lord Palmerston at Romney, and the other of Sir Alexander Valet at Hamburg. The declaration of Lord Palmerston is straight forward War to the knife. It is capable of being understood by the meanest capacity. Ger many—independent, liberal, and united Germany— the ancient noblesse, the commercial and agricul tural classes, and the enlightened spirit of the old empire, respond cordially to the expressed determi nation of arresting the absorbing ambition of the Cabinet of St. Petersburg. But with this avowal of an unflinching resolve to attain this definite object, the definite means whereby it may be gained must be made equally patent. To be plain, to seek to cir cumscribe the power of Russia with the present governmental and territorial dispositions of Europe would be utterly vain. It would be simply and in the very truth a return to the " statu in quo ante bellum," and could not encompass the desired end. It would be to defy for a short interval the outburst of a war general, excruciating, and devastating, such as the civilised world never yet has seen. Russia is supported iu her overbearing power—the grievance that occasioned the war—by Prussia and Austria, nominally neutral, yet spiritually and essen tially assistant. But it must be observed that the nobles, the people, and the soldiers of Germany proper are not to be identified with the acts of the several Governments, to which they are opposed, as SATURDAY, shall be hereafter shown. The liberals of Germany would have that governmental reform thro ug h means of which they be empowered and intrusted to counteract the insidlouely Regressive policy of Russia, and they state firmly that the evil of the moment arises from the injustice of the Vienna Congress of 1815, whereat kingdoms were disunited, divided, and apportioned as at an auction-mart, with. out reference to race, nationality, or fitness. Italy was given to its hereditary oppressor, the empire of Germany was denied its ancient dominion, and France was shorn of her just proportions. Each and every one are discontented; each and every one view the present as opportune to repeal these acts of signal injustice; and each and every one are de termined that the sword shall not be sheathed with. out the juster application of a political moral less Russian and more consonant to right and reason. Therefore it is that, accepting the declaration of Lord Palmerston against Russia, in contradiction to the private views of his Whig Cabinet, they simply desire and honestly pray that the European policy, present and future, of the English Minister may be direct and explicit. They will forget olden causes of complaint, they will not refer to that which will not bear a satisfactory explanation, and in all honour and faith they will resolutely follow if he will valorously lead. Aud be it categorically spoken—for periphrasis would be miserably indecent on such a subject and at such a time--that the onward leading of Lord Pal merston must not conduct to the reinstating Europe in her former position with the causes of national discontent unrepressed, and with the evils unremedied ; but it must bring about and arrive at that settlement of a European balance of power which shall estab lish constitutional right, crush an insensate democracy, protect monarchical privilege, and pre vent the Governments of Austria and Prussia—op pressors at home, mendacious abroad, dependant and craven, prodigal and bankrupt—from the possi bility of aiding Russia to convulse Europe by a course of abject servility and disloyal misdemeanour. When a Whig speaks with warmth, unless the ex citement be elicited for ends selfish and pettish, he is never sincere, and he is certain to go astray into the path of much grief. This is the rule. Sir Alex ander Malet, the Minister Plenipotentiary of the Queen of England at the Diet, in giving the toast of " The Allied Armies" at the public dinner at Hamburg in celebration of the fall of Sebastopol, and of which he was the chairman, vituperated with excessive severity the conduct of the King of Prussia in refe rence to the war. Herein he was right, excepting always as such vituperation might affect the peculiar situation in which he stood at the Diet. Neverthe less, the facts justified the Ministerial attack on the Sovereign of Prussia. The animadversion, however, did not rest here—it was extended to the German princes of the Confederation to which he was accre dited. This again was justly merited, judicious or injudicious as it might have been always in reference to the ambassadorial position ; but the censure in creasing in verbal and acrimonious plenitude, and being unlimited in a national sense, comprised Ger many and the Germans without distinction and with out exception. Herein he was wrong. He might, should, and ought to have known that the Prirce Royal and the Princess of Prussia were brave and loyal dissentients to the misconduct of their royal relative, which he properly and unsparingly de nounced, and that the prince, their son, VMS at that very moment the guest of her Majesty of England, his royal mistress, precisely because the prince was not a participator in the opinions and misdeeds of his royal uncle. He might have learnt that the " parti royal de la Croix" is in a pitiful minority in Prussia, and that the popular and Liberal party, in a large and increasing majority—loyal in their devo tion to the Prince Royal and the Princess—are strongly attached to the alliance with England, and inflexibly opposed to Russian influence in Prussia and Germany. The Prussian soldiers sympathise with their Anglican brethren in arms, and the Count De Farstenberg Stanheim, the first nobleman of the Rhenish provinces, publicly told the King that in he event of his drawing the sword against the Western powers, the Rhenish provinces would be lost to him for ever. These facts were stated at the meeting, and acknowledged to be true. However, it is certain that the speech of the English envoy has been held throughout Germany to be a general con demnation of the Fatherland, inclusive of the large party who sympathise deeply and sincerely with England and the English. But the original source of the evil is to be traced to M. Bismarck Shon hausen. This Russo Prussian, impelled by an inve terate hatred of England, in a conversation by no means confidential, when speaking of the Minister of her Britannic Majesty at the Diet, said, snapping his fingers in derision, "that he had him in his pocket," so to say, " potted." Now, it must be 4- lowed that the vulgar platitude was offensive and derogatory in the highe4 degree to the character and dignity of the British Minister. " Hine illie,la chrymre." And the Whig was disquieted, and the A big waxed wroth, and he cried aloud in his sore &spies; jou