The Press.
London, England, 1855-10-27 00:00:00

THE WEEK.

GENERAL SIMPSON, whose certain resignation we announced in THE
PRESS of the 29th September, has at length been relieved of his com-
mand, and General CODRINOTON been appointed his successor. There
was some difficulty, we believe, felt in passing over Sir COLIN CAMP-
BELL, but this Gallant Officer has now a separate command at
Eupatoria, which it is believed he will for the present, at least, hold,
independent of the Commander-in-Chief. We may mention at the
same time that General AIREY will come home and take the place of
Mr. FRITH as Quartermaster-General. General MARKHAM has arrived
in England, and General JONES and General BENTINex aro both
shortly expected. The Fourth Division, thus left vacant, has been
conferred upon General WINDHAM, and the command of the Engineers
upon Lieutenant-Colonel LLOYD.

The capture of Kinburn—which we briefly announced in our
Second Edition of last week—is at length a substantial success for our
Black Sea fleet to boast of. The operations up to Monday last had
been entirely satisfactory. The strong fortress of Kinburn, which was
partially bombarded on the 16th, was attacked by a combined move-
ment of the whole fleet. ,and land force disembarked, on noon of the
17th, and, after a short but severe bombardment of one hour and
thirty-five minutes, the Russian force surrendered with the honours of
war. Fourteen hundred and twenty prisoners, including General
KorsowiTew in command, and forty officers, with one hundred and
seventy-four guns, and a large depot of military stores and ammuni-
tion, fell into the hands of the Allies.
The loss of Kinburn was a severe blow to the Russians, as the
fort commands the entrance of the Liman, and its possession by the
allied troops opened the passage to the mouths of the Bug and
Dnieper to the fleet. On the ensuing day the Russians blew up the
fort at Otchakoff, and retreated on the approach of our gun-boats.
From the absence of any announcement of farther movements for four
days, we may infer that the fleet is engaged in buoying the passage up
to the mouths of the Bug and Dnieper., and making preparations for a
further advance. The depth of water up the Liman, though not
enough for a three-decker, has an average of about twenty-two feet;
and from Nicolaieff down the Bug, we know that, only in June last,
the river was carefully dredged out, and the passage deepened, in order
to afford depth of water for the Russian liners buildine. at Nicolaieff.
The real strength of the military force on board thee fleet has not
yet been stated, but a letter from the camp affirms that it consists
only of 4,000 English and 6,000 French troops, with a small detach-
ment of artillery. If this be the positive strength of the land force
with the expedition, we doubt much whether any attempt will be
made against Nicolaieff. or even against Kherson, except by the gun-
boats.
There is not the least doubt that the Russians have powerful
corps placed at all the principal points of the coast. At Odessa the
garrison was estimated at some 40,000 men, while a similar force is
said to be collected at Nicolaieff, and 30,000 more to garrison Perekop.
In the face of such strong forces, unless we have something more
than 10,000 men in band, it is clear that they will not be risked away
from the protective guns of the fleet. On their part the Russians ap-
pear to be making the most desperate efforts to save Nicolaieff. Fresh
batteries and bastions were being daily thrown up under the eye of
the Grand Duke CONSTANTINE, and large supplies of a new destructive
shell are announced as being on hand ; but such reports will only
stimulate the allied Commanders the more to achieve the destruction
of this young Sebastopol, if it be possible. The occupation of
Otchakoff would be a most important strategical position for the
Allies, as commanding a road to Nicolaieff ; while Kherson, on the
other leg of the triangle which Nicolaieff as the apex forms
with Otchakoff, is on a second direct road to Nicolaieff
also. But speculation is useless upon any possible plan
of operations for the allied Commanders. Their present
object, perhaps, is less the capture of Nicolaieff than holding the
garrisons of Nicolaieff and Perekop in check, in combination with
the advance of the Allies from Eupatoria, and an attack upon the
Russian army of the Tschernaya from that front by PELISSIER and the
main English army.
From the Sebastopol and Tschernaya camps no decided intelligence
had yet been received. The French army under PELISSIER were certainly
advancing, and had reached within very few miles of Baktchi-Serai,
but the hilly nature of the country, and the necessity of making roads
for his artillery as he went, compelled him to be slow and extremely
cautious in the presence of so powerful au enemy. The Russian plan
of defence, or probable tactics, seem difficult to define. GOETS-
CHAILOFF appears to be taking no active steps to cover his retreat,
although we know, by his despatches, that he is well aware of
every movement of the allied armies, either in his front or on
his rear. He appears to have confidence in his position, or else
to be unwilling to retreat without the special authority of his master.
It is announced positively from Odessa that he has despatched his
sick and wounded to Perekop, as well as several detachments of troops
and one field battery of guns. The probability is that the Russians have
prepared for the worst by sending off all their impedimenta during the
last six weeks, and that GORTSCHAKOFF, feeling perfectly safe in his
rear from the powerful reserve at Perekop waiting on the allied Eupa-
torian force, will concentrate his army round Simferopol, which is well
fortified, give battle to the Allies, and, if beaten, retire behind the line
of the Salgbir, or evacuate the Crimea at once.

SATURDAY,

The possessor of one of the finest fortunes in England—au
accomplished scholar, a graceful essayist, and an amiable man—Lord
ELLESMERE is sure to be heard with attention when he delivers his
opinion on so important a subject as the war. With that fondness for
rare ideas which marks minds rather fine than powerful, he claimed
for the war an origin which few persons ever thought of before. The
people supported it, he said, not as they had supported other wars,
through a pressing sense of danger, as when an invasion was
apprehended under NAPOLEON,—fbr no one feared invasion from
Russia, nor from old animosity, for our commercial intercourse
with Russia had been rarely interrupted, but from the
words are his Lordship's own—a sentiment and an instinct of future
danger. His Lordship really seemed to think that he was paying a
high tribute to the magnanimity of our people by this view, when, if
literally correct, it would only show that we had made one of the
greatest blunders in our history. Wars are not to be justified by any
such motives. It may seem to a very elevated, cultivated class of mind
much grander to go to war for a sentiment than from the necessity
of self-preservation, as a gourmand may fancy that it is more
refined to eat for the mere pleasures of taste than to support nature.
But in reality all wars are positively criminal, unless a direct positive
necessity exists for them. As for the " sentiment " and the " instinct,"
it is a pity to puff up the minds of the people with any such nonsense.
The war was supported by the sense of the country, because it was
felt to be time that the aggressions of Russia in the South should be
checked, and that Turkey should be protected. When those objects
are attained, we trust that sentiment and instinct will remain nowhere
but in his Lordship's lecture to show what curious views were at one
time entertained by a nobleman of Lord ELLESMERE'S high intelligence
on the great question of his day.

LORD PALMERSTON, with the inherent quality of "young blood," is
said to possess a pugilistic reputation; and, from the sudden announce-
ment of the Times and _Morning Post this week, that there is no very
remote probability of our having a fight with our cousins across the
Atlantic, this peculiar tendency of the Noble Premier seems likely to
have an additional field besides the Crimea, on which to despoit its
prowess. It is an unfortunate reputation, to be sure, for a Prime
Minister, but we suppose it is one which must be indulged. " Boys
Dill be boys," and so General PIERCE and Lord PALMERSTON must
" have it out." Truly, we shall have our hands pretty full of work, if
General PIERCE or his people think themselves capable of giving us
and Spain an everlasting thrashing. At war with Russia and
America at once, a doubtful truce with Burmah, and a half-suppressed
insurrection in India, we should only require a bad harvest, a famine
in Ireland, a Caffre outbreak, and Lord ABERDEEN in the Cabinet, to
make things pleasant for the nation. The Yankees, it seems, are de-
termined to have Cuba, by fair means or foul, or at least to get a foot-
ing somewhere among the West Indian Islands, at any price. The
only way to prevent these buccaneering gentlemen of piratical tastes
indulging their peculiar notions of " meuiu and tuuni," is to take the
initiative in defensive measures, and not offer a premium to their
rapacity by any show of indecision or weakness. A war with America
would be an event much to be deplored, and could only be " drifted
into" by gross mismanagement and impolitic conduct Unfortunately
in this case we have placed ourselves in the wrung, because, while we
blame the American Government for permitting
filibustering expedi-
tions to be fitted out in American ports, we send agents into America
to engage American subjects to enter upon an expedition against tt
country with which the American Government is ou terms of peace.

The Daily News on Tuesday last, in an elaborate article upon free
trade and cheap bread, operatives and agricultural labourers, stated a
case of extravagance against the working classes which moderate ob-
servers like ourselves find it difficult to credit :

When bread is cheap (says this writer) large pieces of it may be seen in the gutters
of our manufacturing towns ; and the country folk who keep the market will tell that the
earliest peas and potatoes, the 'spring chickens, and the lanne-fed lamb are bought by the
workers who, at critical times, have not a crust of bread for their households.

Now, this is the unkindest cut of all, for the working man's friend, the
representative of Liberal opinion, to say that he (the working man)
eats peas and spring chicken, potatoes and lamb, at the earliest sea-
son! The labouring classes, we know, are rather imprudent; but, for
peas and spring chicken—and, worse than all, home fed lamb ! No,
no, it won't do. Free trade may have done a good deal one way and
the other, but we cannot believe in peas at a guinea a quart, with the
spring chicken and home-fed lamb, garnishing the dinner-tables of our
workers between February and June !

The policy of the Government towards the Militia has met
with a practical reproof this week, which we hope will call attention
to the error of the system, in obtaining a recruit by offering him, as a
bounty, one sum, and paying him another. The case to which we
allude is the mutiny of the Militia on Thursday last at the Horfield
barracks, Bristol. A number of hot-headed Irish recruits, fresh caught
with the offer of a 51. bounty, when paid their money, found that
various deductions for uniform, &c., were first made, and the balance,
rather diminished in value, handed over to them. Upon this the men,
rightly enough, said that they had enlisted with the understanding
that they should receive five pounds as a bounty, and not a balance
of something less than three. The adjutant, upon this, remon-
strated with them, and very injudiciously threatened to confiLe
them, when they immediately made an attack upon him andr
knocked him down. Other officers attenipted to restore orde

OCTOBER 27, 1855.

but " the blood of Ireland was up," and the recruits attacked
them vigorously, tore off their epaulets, and pelted them with
stones. The riot becoming so serious, messengers were sent to the
Artillery for aid, and at length, by the imposing appearance of a
howitzer and a body of artillerymen, the recruits were subdued, and
some thirty or forty arrested, to be tried, of course, by Court-martial. We
have no wish to excuse such a breach of discipline, but, as we have
remarked in the THE PRESS more than once, this system of offering
s►l. for a bounty, and then paying about half that sum in weekly
instalments of five shillings at a time, is a contemptible evasion
of its word by the Government. The times are far too serious for
trifling with recruits. Every one who remarks the wretched men we
do obtain, will admit that the system adopted by the Government is
not that best calculated to place our army upon au efficient footing.
If good men are wanted, we must pay for them. There are plenty to
be obtained, but they will not come forward in the face of such cir-
cumstances as these. Let us have no more of this wretched haggling.
Why, we spend millions upon a horde of beggarly Bashi-Bazouks, and
yet we cheat our own bone and blood in a petty-larceny manner too
contemptible to be believed.

REVELATIONS OF THE NEW COALITION.

(By our own Gobemouche.)

O yes, it's all true, and between me and you
(So stated a quite well•informed politician)
Its ramifications and secret relations
Are really astounding—this new Coalition.

The Member for Bucks, with John Bright as his dux,
Both promptly discarding each party tradition,
With Subtle, of Oxon, have sworn, the green box on,
To join heart and hand in the new Coalition.

This terrible League, which designs, by intrigue,
To check my Lord Palmerston's vaulting ambition,
Is busy recruiting, refining, transmuting,
And fusing old foes for the new Coalition.

They've asked Charley Wood, but with this understood,
That he really must master the rules of addition;
But by this requisition our arithmetician
Is excluded, we fear, from the new Coalition.

They asked Vernon Smeeth, who displayed his white teeth,
And, like Mantalini, exclaimed " 0, demuition ";
That political giant they hope will be pliant,
And lend his vast force to the new Coalition.

The next man they summoned was old Henry Drummond,
Who, being just then in a lucid condition,
Placed all his aspersions, queer tales and quaint versions,
At the service of Bright and the new Coalition.

They asked Ernest Jones, who, in eloquent tones,
Was jauntily pleading the cause of sedition,
And have sworn to the Charter, contented to barter
King John's for King Jones's—this new Coalition.

They wanted a Bedford, but Duke has no head for%
And people remember John Russell's sad mission,
So they thought best to call on the other one, Paul.
" I believe you my boy" 's in the new Coalition.

Then they asked Mr. Murrough, who into some borough
Slipped, and luckily wasn't kicked out on petition.
That bold Boanerges, whose words fall like scourges,
Will be made a law Lord in the new Coalition.

Then G. W. M. Reynolds, who such a chaste pen holds,
They presented a rather warm picture by Titian,
And enlisted the scribe, by that delicate bribe,
As Lord Privy Seal to the new Coalition.

To Bomba they wrote a diplomatist's note,
Assuring that monarch, the pocket Domitian,
That they'd take his part, and Les Sardines should smart,
When they came into office—the new Coalition.

No stone was unturned, and no artifice spurned,
To tempt other persons to ask for admission ;
And the Three, at this hour, are departing to scour
The country for aid to the new Coalition.

I regret to perceive it, you don't quite believe it.
When Parliament meets you'll express your contrition—
And 8., G., and D. on one bench you will see,
And Palmerston floored by the new Coalition.