The Press.
London, England, 1855-02-03 00:00:00

TH

PRES

that his own department of the Admiralty had
escaped censure. Our military system, he said, be-
longed to the middle ages. The staff was utterly in-
capable; the system of promotion ruinous to the
public service. No operation could be sucoessful till
the Horse Guards had been thoroughly recon-
structed, and without a new system everywhere
nothing but reverse could be expected. The seces-
sion of Lord John Russell had destroyed the present
Government, but would make that of any other
hazardous and difficult. He trembled for the conse-
quences when the report reached Petersburg and
Vienna.

Mr. HENLEY said that the Government was con-
scious of all that was wrong iu our system, but made
no attempt to ;remedy it, and acted just as if no
evil existed. We could transport sixty thousand
persons to the Antipodes, and could not get thirty
thousand properly provisioned to the Black Sea.
The Government had not made use of what opportu-
nities they had; they had grossly mismanaged those
opportunities, and then laid the fault on the system.
It was a libel on England t 3 charge it with want of
organisation. The immense private enterprises of
the country were admirably conducted, and why
could not Ministers du as well ? He supported the
motion, which was demanded by the universal feeling
of the country.
Admiral BERKELEY, with much warmth, vindicated
the transport service from the objections of Mr.
Henley. He had engaged every available transport
in the country, and was cotnpelled to seek transports
for the cavalry in foreign vessels. The difficulty of
supplying the army was due to the smallness of the
port at Balaklava, where the ships were obliged to
lie singly. The transports from this country to the
Crimea had been admirably managed.

Mr. BERESPORD Raid that if the army of England
was a rotten one, he hoped it would continue so, if it
performed deeds such as those of the late campaign.
He then entered into a long vindication of Lord
Raglan, who had been unwearied in his endeavours
to provide for the comfort of the soldiers, though,
perhaps, some officers could not., and newspaper
correspondents would not, see him. Lord Raglan
would come triumphant out of any investigation. He
endeavoured to prove the statement of the inexperi-
ence of our commanding officers to be erroneous, and
charged all the evils on the deficiencies of the means
of transport and the commissariat. He thought an
inquiry imperatively called for.
Mr. Rice opposed the motion, as not inquiry
but prompt remedy was what was wanted at the
present moment.
Mr. MILES, as he now found the incompetency of
the Government, saw no remedy but in inquiry.
Sir. F. T. BARING said that immediate energy
was the thing required, and would be totally anni-
hilated by a committee of inquiry. He detailed the
inconvenience of the process of inquiry, and should
oppose it, though he could not approve of the pro-
ceedings of the Government.
Mr. BENTINCK saw all the inconveniences of a
committee, which he did not think could possibly
work under present circumstances. But, as he con-
sidered the present motion one of want of confidence,
he should vote for it, only regretting that it was nut
more explicit.
Mr. RICH said that similar objections of public in-
convenience had been made to all inquiries, but few
inquiries could be required with greater urgency than
the present.
Sir E. B. LYTTON did not see the objection to the
motion as a precedent, for be hoped the same cir-
cumstances would never again recur. The Ministers
had said that the vote was not one of inquiry but of
censure. Let them take it so, and hand down the
precedent in that sense to posterity. By refusing to
vote for inquiry they would be accomplices in the
evils which had been so forcibly detailed, and from
which even Lord John Russell shrank, and chose
rather to incur the pangs of separation from his col-
leagues. He bad nothing to say to details of diffi-
culties on which the Ministers rested their defence.
He accused them of entering hastily on the greatest
enterprise of the generation without thought, without
knowledge, and without inquiry. He scrutinised the
conduct of the war, and demanded why Odessa had
been left to be the storehouse and depot for the
enemy. He read several letters to show the mis-
management of affairs at the seat of war, and asked
if the Government were not aware that rain, snow,
and hurricane were the common appendages of
winter. The Government had been charged as a
coalition, but coalitions bad not always been so un-
fortunate. He observed

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that many of the most popular and powerful Adminis-
trations bad ben coalitions. Some of the Administrations
of Mr. Pitt were coalitions, and the last was a very
remarkable one ; for Mr. Pitt, having first ejected the
Addington Administration, coalesced with three of Mr.
Addington's men. Nay, he was not content until he had
made the expelled Prime Minister himself his Lord Presi-
dent of the Council. But one essential element of a
Coalition is, that its members should coalesce. That,
however, is the element which seems to be wanting in the
present Government. It has been a union of party in•

tenets, but it has not been a coalition of party sentiments
and feelings. A man of very obscure family having
married the daughter of a lady who had attracted a large
number of not unsuccessful admirers, Lord Chesterfield
said that Nobody's son had just married Everybody's
daughter—(roars of laughter)—and it might be said of the
present Government that Everybody's principles have
united with Nobody's opinions.
He said of the eulogies of Lord John Russell on the
Whigs that it only amounted to this, that the Whigs
resigned a part when they found it impossible to
get ehe whole, and said that, it was his firm belief,
that on whatever side of the house a Government

may be formed, that Government would be as fully
alive to the necessity of popular measures, of; stead-
fast progress, and of sympathy with the free and en-
lightened people they desired to govern, as any of
those great men who are democrats in opposition and
oligarchs in office. lie concluded a brilliant and
effective speech by remarking that :
In the last century there was a Duke of Newcastle who
presided over the conduct of the war, and was supported by
a powerful Whig combination. The commencement of that
war was indeed • series of blunders and disasters, In
vain attempts were made to patch up that administration.
In vain some drops of healthful blood were infused into
its feeble and decrepid constitution, but at last the people
became aroused, indignant, irresistible—they applied •
remedy; that remedy is now before ourselves—they dia.
missed their Ministers and saved the army.

Mr. GLADSTONE began by an allusion to the state-
ment of the late President of the Council, whom he
thanked for the eulogium passed on himself, but
gently rebuked him for having resigned without
giving his colleagues a chance of acceding to his
demands, and when they had reason to believe him
satisfied with things as they were. He had stated to
Lord Aberdeen himself that he had no intention of
pressing the changes that he once recommet4ed,
and had abandoned his former views on the advise of
friends in whom lie could confide. It might be
thought that, deprived of the support of the noble
lord, they ought not to have met the house without
at least some reorganisation. But he felt that they
had no right to attempt to make terms with the
house in this way, or to shrink from facing its judg-
ment on their past conduct. If they had no spirit,
what kind of epitaph would be placed over their re-
mains? He would himself have thus written it:
Here lies the dishonoured ashes of a Ministry
which found England at peace and left it at war,
which was content to enjoy the emoluments of
office and to wield the sceptre of power so long
as no man had the courage to question their
existence. They saw the storm gathering over
the country; they heard the agonising accounts
which were almost daily received of the state of the
sick and wounded in the East. But had these
things moved them? As soon, however, as the
member for Sheffield raised his hand to point the
thunderbolt they shrunk away conscience stricken ;
the sense of guilt overwhelmed them, and, to escape
from punishment, they ran away from duty." As to
the motion before the house, if he thought it co*
sistent with the public welfare, he should be the first
to vote for it. But he was convinced it would aggra-
vate evils instead of alleviating them. He might
state that according to the last accounts from the
army it was slightly improving. Warm clothing had
been furnished to the troops, the huts were about to
be sent up, the railway operatives had arrived, from
which time it was calculated that three weeks
would suffice to conclude the railway. An arrange-
ment had been concluded between the generals
by which 1,600 French would do permanent duty
in the trenches, representing, of course, the actual
assistance of a much larger number of men, lie
believed that, while there was undoubted distress and
great loss of life in the Crimea, the actual state of
the army had been greatly misrepresented. Accord-
ing to the last accounts there were 28,000 English
troops under arms before Sebastopol, to which was
to be added three or four thousand seamen and
marines, so that our effective force was at this mo-
ment not less than 30,000 men. It was, under such
circumstances, absurd to say that the British army
was annihilated. Many unfavourable comparisons
had been made respecting the British and French
military system. He did not believe that the ad-
vantages were all on the side of the latter, although
it would not be in good taste or convenient to make
theth a subject of public discussion. He ridiculed
the blame thrown upon the Government for not
occupying Odessa. Why, Odessa was an open town;
it had 100,000 inhabitants, there was a hostile army
of 300,000 men in its neighbourhood, and he could
not think that such would have been very comfort-
able quarters for the British army. With respect
to the War Department, he admitted the deficiencies
in many points, but much had been done to improve
them, and they did not deserve the reproaches which
had been cast upon them. He instanced many im-
provements—the Minis rifle, the reconstruction of
our field artillery, and the facilities secured for field
exercise and manoeuvres. Ile then proceeded to
vindicate the Duke of Newcastle, saying that if they
thought the War Minister had in any way neglected

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