The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1855-08-28 00:00:00

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TUESDAY, AUGUST 28, 1855.

FROM OUR LONDON CORRESPONDENT,

MONDAY MORNING.
To use a figure borrowed from the martial spirit of the
time, the legislative campaign having been brought to a close,
--2 and the- various divisions of the Parliamentary army having
gone into cantonments, the diurnal or hebdomadary chronicler
of their achievements is necessarily put to his shifts for ma-
terial wherewith to garnish his tale. If, however, abandoning
the often unwelcome, and more frequently unprofitable task
of recording their performances, or censuring their non-per-
formances, he casts his eyes abroad upon the everyday world,
-he will find no lack of themes to exercise his talent—no want
of objects solicitous of observation. True, the Court, and
with the Court the gaiety of fashionable life, have conjointly,
for the time being, deserted the English, and taken up their
temporary residence in the French metropolis. But are
courts and pompous pageantry the only objects worthy of
consideration among a great and enlightened people, as the
English profess to consider themselves? Assuredly they are not
Unquestionably, every loyal subject of QUEEN VICTORIA--
that is, every breathing Briton—must feel proud and grateful
to learn, that in the person of his Sovereign the national vir-
tues and the national graces have met with appreciation, and
commanded esteem and admiration from our noble-hearted
allies. The visit of the QUEEN of BRITAIN to the capital of
France, and the welcome accorded to her—not merely by her
Imperial hosts, but by the myriads of that people who were
taught from lisping infancy to regard the subjects whom she
sways as enemies, and who were taught to tune the first
accents of their tongues to reproaches of her people, and to
designate the island-home in which her throne is placed as
-perfidious and deceitful,-must stand recorded in the page of
history as a memorable event. If regarded only as indicative
of that cordial fellowship which exists between the rulers of
two great and powerful kingdoms, the visit is one fraught
with no ordinary or ephemeral interest. Viewed as the
symbol of that harmonious unity of feeling which better
knowledge of each other has ripened into ties of friendship
and affection between the people of the two most powerful
and enlightened nations of the earth, the interchange of visits
and reception acquires a significance rarely accorded to the
acts of individuals, and confers a new aspect on the destinies
of Europe. A brief space of time only has elapsed since the
world, almost for the first time, saw the armies of England
and France contending in the same field for the same object-

Brethren in arms, though rivals in renown;

• but the past week has witnessed the generous strife of the
people and the sovereigns—the rulers and the ruled—in giv-
ing assurance to the world of their cordial union in defence of
enfeebled right against aggressive might. The political im-
portance of the friendly intercourse between the monarchs far
exceeds, as it will long outlive, the gorgeous splendours of the
numerous spectacles—the balls, illuminations, banquets, and
other social glories, with all their fascinations and delights,
will speedily recede into the dim oblivion of the past, and be
thought of only as a gorgeous dream—not so the grandeur of
those moral results which must flow from the union of two
mighty nations leagued together as the active foes to oppres-
sion. This night our beloved SOVEREIGN takes leave of her
august ally, and ere to-morrow's dawn she will be speeding
her homeward way, followed by the vivas and the blessings of
the French people, as she will be welcomed by the joyous ac-
claim of her own true-hearted subjects.
While gala, rout, and roundelay have lent their combined
charms to enliven the royal progress, performances of another
order have contributed to keep attention awake at home.
Further communication from the Baltic has enabled, or rather
constrained, us to class Admiral DUNDAS' talismanic an-
nouncement, " Sweaborg is no more," with the memorable
" Sebastopol est grit" of the French EMPEROR, uttered about
ten months ago. Sebastopol is not taken, and Sweaborg still
exists. The completeness of the work done at the latter for-
tress is much less than the language of the first despatch had
led to the belief of. The guns and fortifications of the place
remain almost uninjured, although the destruction of naval
and military stores has been greater than was at first sup-
posed. The enemy has indeed received a severe blow, under
the effects of which he must reel and stagger, but without
producing any very vital injury, or such as can exercise a
decisive influence on the immediate progress of the war. The
success, such as it is, however, has had the effect of igniting
the explosive mixture which forms so conspicuous an ele-
ment in the composition of Sir CIrARLES NAPIER, and the
result has been the discharge of a long and angry letter, in
which, with great unction of ascerbity, he renews his quarrel
with, and his denunciation of, Sir JAMES GRAHAM. He main-
tains that the bombardment of Sweaborg has effected nothing
which he did not foresee and foretel last year, and which will
not require to be done over again next year. Much and severe
animadversion has been spoken, written, and printed in con-
demnation of the brave old admiral's somewhat spicy letter ;
and " natheless," as DOMINIE SAMPSON would say, it is greatly
open to sharp criticism. To find fault with even the partial
success of another, in a sphere of action in which he himself
did nothing, seems, at the first blush of the business, to look
invidious. To repeat a series of accusations against the late
First Lord of the Admiralty, which he had previously fulmi-
nated, and on various occasions, is certainly open to the charge
of egotistic indiscretion. For an officer who has held a high
command to turn round and assail his superiors because he has
not been able to carry their instructions into effect, does savour
of insubordination, and assumes the aspect of querulous incon-
sistency; but when the matter is examined a little deeper than
the surface, many of the seeming improprieties disappear ;
while further inquiry leads to the conviction that the veteran
has not only considerable ground of complaint, but that the
very success of Admiral DUNDAS is corroborative of the
injustice to which Sir CEARLES NAPIER complains
he has been subjected. From Admiral DUND.LS'S state-
ment it is perfectly clear that such destruction as has
been hurled upon Sweaborg has been by means of mortars
and -that the large ships of the line took no share in
the affray beyond that of distant spectatorship. Sir
CyfintpS NAVER had no gun-b4:43 or mortar-boats, nor, as
he himself says, a single mortar in his fleet. He urged on Sir
JassEs GRAHAM and the Admiralty the expediency, indeed
the necessity, of being furnished with these, to enable him
effectually to attack ri;weaborg, and even Cronstadt, and
pointed (rse not with the assistance of these, he would have
teen able completely to destroy the foitifibitions of Sweaborg,
and even to reach the shipping sheltered tinder them. Instead
of furnishing him with those instruments which he declared
indispensable to success, their lordships ordered him to attack
with the ships he had, and, because he would not do so, they
deprived him of his command. This, coupled with Admiral
DUNDAS'S success, gives Sir CHARLES the opportunity of
making a strong hit, with which he concludes his peppery
epistle. "Sir :Jeases GRAnAM," he says, " was one of the
ministers who sent a British army to Sebastopol in the middle
of last September, without the means of moving, without food,
proper tents or clothing, and without hospitals, to pass a
dreary winter and perish ; and he was the minister who
wanted me to take a British fleet, in the end of October,
to perish among the rocks of Sweaborg, and, to their shame,
got two naval officers to put their names to the insulting
letter he wrote me : and these men still remain in the
Admiralty—and that is the way the navy of this country is
managed." Strong language this from an officer in accusa-
tion of a public servant; but not stronger than the circum-
stances seem to warrant ; the glorious triumph achieved against
Sweaborg forming the chief evidence of its propriety, and
conclusive justification of his conduct in refusing to obey the
orders of Sir JixtEs Galata.k. Admiral DUNDAS was the
officer chosen to repair the alleged errors committed by Sir
Cnismns NAPIER, yet he delayed making any attempt upon
it until late in the summer, and would not undertake it till
he was furnished with that particular arm of strength which
NArinn said was indipensable, and which was denied to him.
In point of fact, Sir JAMES GRAHAM'S conduct was a natural
corollary to the sentiments connected with the war indulged
in by the Cabinet of which he was a member. The object of
that Cabinet was evidently to carry on war on negative prin-
ciples. The whole was expected to be managed by demon-
stration, and the rude Contest of war was by them intended
to be carried on on the same bloodless principles which regu-
late a game of chess. The pawns, knights, and bishops ; the
kings, queens, and castles being placed in particular array,
it was supposed that the antagonist force, perceiving the hope-
less condition in which) according to the regulation, they
were placed, would gracefully bow acquiescence to the conven-
tional strategy, confess beaten, and there an end. In pursuance
of this demonstrative mode of waging war, an army was
landed. at Gallipoli for the protection of Constantinople from a
`coup de main, but there running the smallest possible risk of
conflict with the enemy ; a fleet was equipped for the Baltic,
so arranged that it would prevent the Russians from coming
out of harbour, but utterly incapable of approaching them
if they chose to remain there. Under such circumstances,
was there anything unnatural in finding that, when forced to
assume the offensive, the army was found unfurnished with
the means of prosecuting a vigorous campaign ; and that
the fleet was discovered incapable of doing what it was never
meant to perform ? In connexion withtiltlisselfupon usubject,obser-
one
flagrant, if not unpardonable, matter forces
ration, If the commanders knew that they were expected to
perform real warlike services, instead of the chess-board style
of combat, why did they not see that their respective arma-
ments were suited to the service expected, from tbtm ? If

they could not estimate the requirements, they were them-
selves but indifferently qualified as leaders in the enterprise ;
if thty knew what was expected and could estimate what was
needed, but did not insist on having it, their qualifications as
commanders do not rise in estimation. In either case, or both,
what has been said a hundred times, and a hundred times over,
comes back with double force,—the Ministry, collectively and
individually, were greatly to blame for the gross waste of
public means, the discredit brought upon the Country, and
the misery and suffering endured through their mismanage-
ment.

While indulging in so unpleasing a retrospect, the mind is
involuntarily led to inquire, what of the future ? For a con-
siderable period past, the public have been made bitterly
familiar with that " hope deferred which maketh the heart
sick." The summer has run its round, and is waning into the
"sere and yellow leaf" of autumn, and still our brave country-
men and our gallant allies continue in the trenches on the
south side of Sebastopol. The actual condition of the fortress,
of its defenders, and resources, are little'if at all better known
to us now than they were twelve months ago, unless indeed
we reckon the uncheering knowledge that its defences have
been greatly augmented within the period referred to, and
that everything seems at present to indicate the probability
of our armies spending another winter in those trenches which
last year proved so fatal. The battle recently fought
in the line of the Tchernaya is differently looked on,
and conflicting conclusions are drawn from it by dif-
ferent parties. One set deduce from it as an inevitable
I conclusion that nothing but starvation in the garrison
could have induced the Russian commander to hazard
an engagement under the circumstances. These parties
argue, but do not state their ground of argument, that dissa-
tisfaction, engendered by suffering, and misery occasioned by
starvation, prevail to such an extent in the garrison as to
make death itself preferable to longer continuing within the
walls ; and the advocates of this theory assert that the battle
was occasioned by an exodus of the discontented from the city
of Sebastopol—a theory requiring no small amount of credu-
lity to secure acquiescence in. Another party, with much
more show of probability, say the battle was fought by, or
chiefly by, reinforcements newly arrived in the Crimea, now
liberated from the Galician frontier by the defection of
Austria from the Western Alliance. This latter conjecture
appears the more entitled to credit, when it is considered that
little less than absolute madness, or positive despair, could
have induced Prince GORTSCHAEOFF, without reinforcements,
to attack the greatly-augmented army of the allies, posted,
too, in a strong position, like that which they at present
occupy, and which they are engaged in still further for-
tifying. Estimated by the number of Russians slain,
the. victory is far from unimportant ; yet, like other
victories achieved in the Crimea, it has, so far as
can at present be seen, produced no permanent result,
and, like the destruction of the arsenals at Sweaborg,
the victory produces only barren laurels. With such facts
and prospects full in view, the inquiry forces itself strongly on
the public mind, are adequate measures afoot to secure the
army against a recurrence of the dreadful calamities under
which it suffered last winter ? If they are not already organ-
ized, no time is to be lost. Surely our rulers will not again
plead ignorance of the rigours of a Crimean winter in extenu-
ation of official negligence. Let it not be forgotten that the
French, last winter, had a road from their harbour to their
camp, sufficiently hard at bottom to be practicable at all
weathers, while that which should have been the road from
Balacklava to the British camp, was represented byan irregular
trench of sludge and semi-liquid mud. The Sardinians, on
the Tchernaya, have already begun to experiment on the Con-
struction of winter huts ; it is to be hoped the British army
will not again exhibit the only departure from the rules of
prudence in such matters.
Among the celebrities which have arisen out of the
calamities of the last winter's campaign, and the shameful
ignorance and negligence which characterised all the public
departments in oonnexion with it, no one has shone with a
purer lustre, or been marked by a more disinterested zeal, than
that which hallows the name and exertions of Miss NIGHT-
INGALE. This lady has now, it is understood, succeeded so
far in arranging the chaos in which our hospital provision and
management in the East were involved, that her onerous and
dangerous labours can be spared, and, accompanied by her
noble-hearted sisters in humanity, she is about to return to
England. As was to have been looked for in a case of heroism
so great, self-devotion so unhesitating, many of the most
benevolent and humane who adorn our land have set about
preparing the way for a public acknowledgment and enduring
memorial of those services she has rendered to her country
and humanity. This, in compliance with the desire of Miss
NIGHTINGALE herself, has taken the form of a subscription,
to found in London an hospital to be worked on her own
system of unpaid nursing. This is to be called the " NIGHT-
INGALE Hospital," and a subscription list is about to be opened
at Messrs. COUTTS' bank, for collection of a fund to be placed
at her disposal when she returns to England. The proposal
has been met with general approbation, and without doubt it
will call forth a bounteous flow of liberality. If, through the
Divine blessing, Miss NIGHTINGALE is thus enabled to carry
into operation her benevolent desire, we shall be indebted to
the ruthless hand and dire calamities of war for the introduc-
tion of personal devotion in the administration of our public
charities—thus further illustrating the wisdom and benevo-
lence of that Providence which is continually

From seeming evil still educing good.

Such members of the political clubs as have not yet departed
on their autumnal migration,or, having made but a short flight
have returned, and like ghosts "revisiting the glimpses of the
moon," are still to be seen flitting about the coffee-rooms and
corridors of their favourite haunts, are at present amsklerably
beset for topics of convenient gossip. By these members of
the necessitous classes anything is eagerly swallowed as matter
for rumination in the bovine sense, and odd affairs they some-
times do contrive to "bag." Among the most recent of these
fancy flights is that which transfers the present Speaker of
the House of Commons to the peerage by the title of Baron
HECKFIELD. Long before the end of the last session, it was
hinted that the Right lion. J. Slaw- LRFEYRN, tired of his
onerous task of sitting and trying not to yield to the influence
of those soporific s+rains by which his ear has been nightly in-
veded, was desirous to escape from the involuntary penance,
and hence the proposed promotion. Of course, in providing
retirement and a peerage for the right hon. gentleman, it is
also necessary to furnish the collective wisdom with a substitute,
and for the last few days a report has gained considerable cur-
rency that Sir GEORGE GREY or Mr. BAINES will be put in
nomination for the vacated office. 'Whether the election of
either of those right hon. gentlemen to the post vrould be fol-
lowing
out the principle of "putting the right man in the rights
place" may well admit of doubt; but in the pre%.nt uncertain state
of parliamentary parties, to calculate securely on the success..
of either, would be a labour much akin to that of " countistg..,
chickens before they are hatched." Among other matters.)
which have occupied the attention of the useful class of idlers.
referred to, the Herts Guardian has afforded them a delsotable •
bit of political sweetmeat. According to that authority, Mr.
HATTER, who sits for the borough of Wells, and piles the
" parliamentary whip " for the immaculate Whig party now
in power, has hi the most disinterested manner inaaginable
unfolded to the wondering eyes of his constituents and his
country, the astonishing aptitude for public servie4svhich has
hitherto lain buried and unsuspected in the borough of Wells.
The registered electors of this borough number 125, of whom,
at the last election, 175 recorded votes in favour of Mr.
HATTER, Among this limited number of claimants on his
political
bounty, the right hon. gentleman has-discovered that,
they or their children, or their children's children, have caps.
city for government service to the number of fifty-one, and
these, profiting by the spirit of the time,he has had placedsia
"the right places." Of the public administrators hatehedin
Wells-20 have been suitable for appointments in thecuss
toms, 18 have found their proper nestling-plaess in, the
excise, 6 have been born to do date in. Somersetsliouse• and
the Stamp-office, 3 have had capaclty for the Postsoffiee, 1 has
been fitted for the Royal Dock-y ,1: for a posilion (which is
not mentioned) in the convict establishment,, 1 has alighted
in the London police, and 1 in, the packet service ! How can
this country ever run short of public servants, so long as we
have warrens for their production as fruitful as Wells, with a
ferret as active in unearthing, them as Mr. HATTER !

Scarcely has the hur4 of wonder been bushed on this exci-
ting topic, when it is again. stirred up by the ." sough," as our
Caledonian brethren would call it, occasioned by Lord
RUSSELL'S purclmse of Hillhouse, Radborough, near Stroud,
until lately the residence of Sir J. D. PAUL. ' The an dit has
it that Lord Jonx means to make it his future country resi-
dence; and, the Gloucester Journal says "political motives
are attributed to the noble lord in fixing his residence at
Stroud. It will be remembered that he sat in Parliament for
the borough from 1835 till 1841." Does his lordship already
feel his city throne " tottering to his fall ?" is the question put
in all the clubs Of course it is answered differently at Brookes'
and the Clarendon, although there are not wanting plenty
who say the same opinion predominates in both.

Your neighbOtir, Lord STANLEY, who, I see, has been making
himself agreeable to the popular leaders on the subject of
Education and Mechanics' Institutes, has published a letter
advocating the earlier assembling of Parliament, as a means
of economizing the public time. The letter has occasioned
considerable remark, and its tone is generally 'approved of;
but those most, familiar with the subject maintain that the
true mode of economising the time of Parliament, like that of
any other assembly, is to work more and speak less.
Theal.rical and other amusements are dull and uninviting
as they always are in the dog-days, yet some exception must
he taken to this in favour of the Haymarket, where a bur-
lesque has been got up of the late Administrative Reform