The Press.
London, England, 1855-05-05 00:00:00

THE WEEK.

TEE mist which has lately shrouded the politics of Europe is rising—
not, indeed, to give place to sunlight, but to reveal a sky of settled
gloom. A nice distinction has been drawn in relation to the Vienna
Conferences. They are not broken off, but only " suspended." They
are to be kept alive, it appears, that Austria may ripen some scheme
for asserting her neutrality without positively breaking faith with the
Western Powers. Lord CLARENDON obligingly declares, in almost the
words one hears at a mock auction, that he is open to any offer. He
will not feel insulted by any bidding—he wants only something to
commence with.
The haughty rejection by Russia of the conciliatory proposals of
the Allies seems to have taken the whole diplomatic world I.y surprise.
Does she rely most on her own strength or on the weakness of her
foes? Evidently she makes small account of the power of England,
and perhaps conceives that the moment is favorable for engaging in
a mighty contest for the sovereignty of the world. The problem now
to be solved is, where and how she can be fought to the most advan,
tage. An able correspondent suggests that we should evacuate the
Crimea, and content ourselves with blockading the Russian ports.
But might we not, by such a course, be playing the Russian game?
Now that her military power is fully roused, how long would the
Turkish territory be secure from her armies? Ought we to allow
her to overrun Asia Minor? If she must be met on land, is not the
Crimea as good a battle-field as any other? While the war lasts, to
aban,:on the Crimea would be to confess a defeat.
Our recruiting service is not nearly so brisk as it should be, con-
sidering our urgent want of men. Recruits are to be had, but Lord
PANMIIRE cannot yet make up his mind as to an advance of the bounty.
Some fifty millions are voted for the service of the war, yet we hesitate
to pay the price which would secure us the best men for tha army.
No money can be so well spent as that which secures a superior class
of recruits. Say, we require a hundred thousand good men—does any
one doubt that our recruiting parties would have the pick of the
agricultural population by shaking twenty sovereigns in the rustic's
ears? Could two millions be spent so well in any other way? Nay, if
fifty pounds' bounty had to be given, the necessary five millions would
be well spent. On one point we should make up our mind—to get
the number of men, and the class of men we want, cost what they
may. With our army once raised to the required amount, there would
be no difficulty in recruiting it afterwards.
There has been little to excite attention during the week save the
war and the Conferences, and the latter are now of little importance
we imagine, except as they relate to the attitude of Austria. The
proceedings in the Legislature have excited little interest, except as
they bear on these subjects. Attempts have been nightly made to
screw from the Government some information as to the intelligence re-
ceived by telegraph from Balaklava, but without any satisfactory result.
The House was principally occupied last night with the adjourned
debate upon " The Tenants' Compensation Bill." The bill was sup
ported by the Government, the Irish members, and was carried by a
majority of 113. Mr. BETHELL, in the course of his speech, rather
astonished the House by indulging in a little Socialism.

" Between the knife of an assassin and the heart of an honest
" man there is a wide gulf," said DE RETZ, and the miraculous escape
of the Emperor of the FRENCH on Saturday last proves the truth of the
remark. That any man should miss his object when within half a
dozen paces of it seems incredible, and to nothing but the trepidation
of conscious villany can be ascribed the failure of the assassin. We
may well congratulate ourselves upon the escape from the disgrace of
having had such an attempt made in our streets, for it is stated that
PIANORI has acknowledged he followed the Emperor about in London,
with the intention of shooting him had a favorable opportunity pre-
sented itself. The enthusiasm of the people, however, and the vast
crowds in the streets, perpetually destroyed his chance. The inte-
resting details which will be found in our " Foreign Correspondence"
may be fully relied upon as coming direct from the best authority.

We have at length received decisive intelligence that the bom-
bardment of Sebastopol has been suspended, to use a mild tone, for some
days, from want of ammunition ; and that the Russian works are not
yet sufficiently injured to admit of an assault being made with any
prospect of success. The rumours of the camp anticipate the recom-
mencement of the bombardment very shortly, and some combined
attack by land and sea ; but private letters speak in any but confident
terms of the result of the attempt, and freely admit the difficulties to
be overcome. Meanwhile the Russians carry on their nightly sorties,
which are as often repulsed ; and on the night of the 19th a most
gallant attack was made by the 77th on some Russian rifle-pits in
front of our advanced works on the right attack. The Russians, taken
by surprise, were driven out in a moment and both pits secured, but
in a couple of hours four heavy columns of the enemy attacked and
recovered the more distant pit, overpowering our men, who fell back
upon their supports in the first pit. Attempting to carry this, the
Russians were driven back by the bayonet, and relinquished their
of to remove it. In this little affair the capture of a single pit,
we lost two gallant officers killed, Colonel EGERTON (the colonel of the
77th, to whom the expedition was intrusted), and Captain LEmeamax,
as well as six officers wounded, and about seventy men killed and
wounded--a severe loss for the possession of a single pit. Uporktheir
side the French also had had a desperate encounter for the postessiOri

SATURDAY,

of similar ambuscades, losing some 157 men killed and wounded in
the affair ; while, at the same time, they have sustained an irreparable
loss in the death of General Btzox, who died on the 15th from a bullet-
wound. The inactivity of the allied generals seems strange when the
force at their command is now so large. One reconnaissance in force
under Sir CoLIN CAMPBELL which failed in its object from want of
arrangement, but which, if successful, would have been productive of
some result, and a second the other day under Lord RAGLAN, which
had no object in view except to lionise 031E11 PACHA, and show him
the ground, make up the sum of our field operations for the
spring; for, according to appearances, the summer will be here and
passed before the third bombardment and assault is tried.

To judge from the admissions of the Minister of War we should
say that the affairs of the-War-office were in about as hopeless a state
as they were six months ago. Upon a point of such vital importance
as exists between the respective qualities of " Brown Bess " and the
Minie rifle we should wish to see our War Minister fully informed,
the more so when relating to the description of arms issued to the
troops proceeding to the seat of war; but the "jaunty style "is to
carry us through, akd on Monday evening when the Marquis of &Lis-
som questioned Lod PANMURE as to the truth of the statement that
the Guards when embarking for the Crimea had boen armed only with
the old musket, Lord PANMURE, after a little preface about such state-
ments being apt to produce the most erroneous impressions upon the
public mind, said "that he could not believe it possible that it could
" be true that ally detachment of her Majesty's troops had left this
" country armed with the old musket." "He could not believe it
" possible !" No, nor anybody else. But what is the real truth which
came out at length on Wednesday evening ? Lord PANMURE by that
time having made inquiries, found it was not only possible, but true ;
and the reasons which he gives in defence of the measure are quite
worth recording :—" The men so far as possible had been trained to
" the use of the Minie rifle, but, inasmuch as it was better to carry on
" the usual drill, the Government placed in the hands of the men the
" old smooth-bored musket, which upon their arrival at Constan-
" tinople were exchanged for a Minie rifle, a store being kept there for
" that purpose. He hoped this explanation woald be sufficient."
Lord PANMURE may well " hope ;" but Hope once told a flattering
tale, which will not be repeated in this instance. Any reason more
ridiculous, inconsistent, and absurd, we never read before. A man is
to bo drilled to the use of one arm, and then put back for three weeks
to the use of an obsolete weapon, and once more, if he is fortunate,
return to the use of his first. Bearing in mind that the men and boys
who went out in the last detachments of the Guards were scarcely
perfect in their drill, many of them not two months from the
plough's tail, the folly of this plan is apparent, if they are really to get
the Minie rifle again at Constantinople. But we have no faith in Go-
vernment depots, especially of Minie rifles. A store of Minie rifles
was carefully preserved at Balaklava, but when the arms were served
out they were found rust-eaten and worthless ; and we strongly suspect
that the Guards will go on to the camp with Lord PANBIURE'S pet
" Brown Bessies," then into the trenches, and finally be picked off by
every Russian rifleman who has the chance,

OF FLATTERY.
AN ADDENDUM TO LORD BACON.

(APROPOS OF CERTAIN RECENT LEADING ARTICLES.)
IT was cunningly devised by the Greeks—that saying—that " to prate`'
" a man inordinately is to raise a blister upon his nose." This is, in
especial, the case in flattery of kings and men in great estate; for as
the acts of such are, for the most part, done in the daylight of history
and their thoughts and designs well known, so the exaggeration and
puffing forth of these may end oft-times in a notable contempt. As
when a silly fellow saith of a potentate who, albeit able and sagacious,
hath yet had no lack of care for his own individual advancement, that
when he falls " he shall not have fallen before securing with all future
" ages the fame of the mightiest and the most illustrious champion
" which the gland cause he had espoused had ever found in Christian
" Europe," then the sarcastical reader may ask whether that great
cause was not, in a chief degree, his own glory and greatness, and so,
by jeeringly assenting, change the flattery to censure. Such adulators
also are, as it were, temper parati, and seize the most frequently on tho
wrong occasion to betrowel their idol with untempered praise. To
pursue the instance of those in the purple, there is nothing more
common amongst the dangers of great estate than that of assassina-
tion, by the hand often of the meanest and basest of the commoner
sort, of their own insanity, or led on by others ; yet have I read, on the,
occasion of the happy escape of a monarch, such prunella as is here,
though, at the same time, had no " actual stroke ' whatsoever taken
place
If the'sworn foes of society, if the desperate emissaries of political chaos, were curious
to know whether their illustrious vanquisher could undergo the actual stroke of assassina-
tion as calmly as he had all along confronted its worst menaces, they have now solved
that problem, while putting the supreme, the finishing touch, to their own flagitious
guilt, and irrevocably consummating their divorce from the sympathies of civilisation.
Such flattereis as these put in one's recollection that merry conceit
of the Orientals (which hath been made into an idle song), of an
attendant who could have driven a buzztly from the face of the Great
Mogul, but in making his blow the fly escaped, and the Emperor was
thrown prostrate. They are not suited to the climate of the Western
nations, wherein the heartiness of praise doth not, or ought not,
to partake anything of the hyperbbiieal which most frequently
proveketh derislon,

THE P

THIRTY-TWO OF THEM!
The number of individuals attending upon the Noble Lord (Lord John Russell) upon his
mission amounted to thirtptwo--male and female.—Times, May :ind, MS.

" Che Sara, Sara!" Of hope bereft
We're rapidly going to Gehenna,
Now that our thirty-two envoys have left
Their Hotel Munsch at Vienna.
Thirty-two trunks having pass'd its gate,
Marked " Johann Russell, passenger,"
The Conference farce is as out of date
As a tragedy of Massinger.

Thirty-two pilgrims of peace, employed
To stop this war of nations,
Have left their thirty-two chambers void
And their run of public rations.
Who would complain if they ate their fill,
Or suffered a free digestion,
If they'd settled either their tavern bill
Or the Oriental Question?

Sum up the cost of the burnt bougies
In thirty-two pair of sockets,
Without any saving of French fusses
Or of English congreve-rockets—
Compute the outlay morning and night
To limit the Russian launches,
While " thirty-two-pounders"' thunder in spite
Of thirty-two olive branches—

And a double tax we pay with grace—
A tax perhaps as essential
As the everlasting tenure of place
By kinsmen plenipotential.
The famille Russell, come war or peace,
Relies on our recognition
That England at large is a " Golden Fleece"
To grace its perpetual mission.

CABINET PICTURES AT THE ACADEMY.
THE Exhibition of the Royal Academy opens on Monday. We were
duly honoured with cards for the private view, but shall postpone
general criticism until another occasion. A few exceptions, in the
cases gof some paintings which first strike the eye, may not be unac-
ceptible. In the East Room the most prominent picture is,
No. 29, Jauntiness." It represents the Premier of England, at
the table of the House of Commons, joking gaily over the Crimean
war. The likeness is good, and the artist, by a happy thought, has
thrown on the table a report of the Sebastopol Committee, to which
the Noble Viscount points with careless contempt, his expression of
" perfect indifference" upon the subject being well rendered.
No. 33, " The Ambassador in Trouble." A painting of much
comic merit. It represents a council, or divan, composed of the re-
presentatives of various nations, and in the midst of the party a small,
elderly, vivacious gentleman, evidently English, who is burning with
inspiration but halting for language. He holds a little book, in-
scribed " French Without a Master," and the attitude with which one
hand bespeaks the attention and patience of his hearers, while the
orator is finding the word he wants, is very expressive. A Catholic
cross peeping from his pocket is not very intelligible.
No. 40, " The Pipe of Peace." The name of this painting is an
absurd one, but the work itself is meritorious. It simply represents
the Foreign Secretary, in a smoking-cap, lighting a cigar, with a des-
patch from Vienna. Some volumes of the World newspaper,
lettered " Clarendon Press," are in the corner; but these allusions are
scarcely within the mission of high art.

No. 45, " Mouse and Cranny." No one would suppose from the
title that this represented the Lord High Chancellor of England. If
the " mouse" allusion refer to any nickname the levity of the Chan-
cery bar may ever have conferred, surely an artist has no business to
perpetuate such things. The likeness itself is good, the harmless ex-
pression is very well rendered, and the hand reluctantly extended to
take up some work is an artistic touch.
No 50, " Caught by the Leg." A good-natured Scotchman, with
the gout. The subject has been treated over and over again, and the
only novelty is also an absurdity, the introduction of a soldier waiting
for orders. It is ridiculous to conceive that an individual like that in
the easy-chair can ever have been intrusted with grave duties. The
bundle of religious tracts near the chair is a better notion ; but the
artist had better go back to his maul stick.
No. 61, " Ver non semper viret." (Vernon was always green.) A
gentlemanly man, evidently intended by nature for an amiable lounger,
has, for some reason, been invested with a grand Oriental robe and
turban, and is receiving a paper, marked " Petition of 150 millions of
Persons." He smiles benignantly, but is much bewildered, and a bust
/of Mr, Macaulay (introduced with some malice) smiles sarcastically.

. .

425

We come to the Middle Room, where we find—
No. 92, " The Tapeworm." A curious fancy. A sober-looking
young man, very like the Under-Secretary for War, has harnessed a
horse to a cannon with traces made of red tape—the first tug has
obviously burst the ridiculous connection, and, with an ineffable
smile of self-conceit, the ingenious deviser is assuring the indignant
bystanders that all is right and regular.
No. 107, " Playing at Ships." The artist usually selects the face
for contemplati but the painter of this work has chosen to regard
nature from another point of view. An unlucky boy has laid down
his satchel', marked " Budget," and has been trying to sail some toy-
boats in a pond. Over-reaching himself, he has plumped head fore-
most into the mud, and he is kicking, legs upwards. On a slate by
his side is written "C. Wood." A tall Cumberland peasant is looking
rather maliciously at the poor stick-inthe-mud ; but he will soon be
out, as appears by a figure coming to the rescue; so the spectator's
pain is lightened.
No. 203, " John, what's Colonies?" A plagiarism of the celebrated
flunkeyism " John, what's taxes ?" A couple of her Majesty's servants,
a tall, gaunty one, and a small, self-complacent one, lounge before
Downing street, and the elder addresses the younger in the above
words. A newspaperplacard, just then carried by, bears the an-
nouncement " War at the Cape, Rebellion iu Australia," but the dig-
nified couple vouchsafe no notice.
No. 263, " The Catechist." Another likeness of the Premier, who.
is visiting a country school, and hearing the children say their cato
chism. His foot is on a page of the Articles—you can see that he
specially tramples on " Original Sin." A child is stealing its com-
panion's apple; through the window you see two boys firing a hayrick;
and on the wall is a " Last D3ing Speech and Confession."
Lastly, in the West Room we observe—

No. 299, " The Siege of Sebastopol, in 1854-5." An extract from
the catalogue will best explain this important work :—" An expedition,
originally sent out without an object, and utterly unprepared for active
hostilities, was ordered to assault one of the strongest fortresses in the
world. The troops obeyed with the unhesitating devotion of British
soldiers, but, without adequate arms or even sufficient food. they
failed, and the army was ruined." The artist has sought to depict the
confusion, sorrow, and despair, existing in the camp at the moment
when a courier arrives with the news " Fall of the Coalition," and
exultation and hope take the place of dejection. The picture is a
gloomy one, but historically truthful.