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

WHO IS TO BLAME?

THERE could not be a greater fallacy in die-
cussing our present evils than to suppose that
Government has been brought to its present
lamentable state by the incapacity of " subor-
dinate " officials. The lower posts in the
civil departments are now filled by exactly the
same class of clerks that occupied them when
the West Indian islands and the Canadas were
torn from the House of Bourbon, and a
mighty empire founded in the East. But it
is the recent and present chiefs of our public
departments who are of an infinitely lower
capacity than their predecessors. The fact
can be made evident to any person who tries
to conceive the Duke of NEWCASTLE, or Lord
ABERDEEN, or the " Whig families," ruling
England in the perilous period of the seven
years which preceded and followed Waterloo.
It is new men, we assert, for the principal
Ministers of State, and not a fresh relay of
clerks and underlings, that are required to
save the State. It is because we had nothing
but mere clerks as Cabinet Ministers that our
disasters have been so severe. Red tape and
routine have been deified, and bold energy of
design and promptitude in action have been
despised. Incompetency was installed in the
very highest post of the War office. A Minister
was employed who never had given any signal
prJula of public capacity, and both our mili•
tary and naval services paid an awful price for
the vanity of the Duke of NEWCASTLE, and the
servility of the Whigs iu deferring to his pre-
tensions.
If all the subordinate departments had been
perfectly manned, still, when they were put
upon the wrong cue, how is it possible that
t teir chief clerks and various subalterns could
have proved efficient? It was well said by
Lord DERBY several months since that
" Ministers had never considered the great-
" ness of the undertaking upon which they
" were encering;" and that is really the tersest
and truest mode of stating the real source of
the evils which have occurred. floe fonte
derioata clatter. The departments are blamed,
w ten the statesmen at the head of them are
the real culprits.
Was it, indeed, the clerks and the commis•
s tries, the Filders and the Boxers and the
Chriaties, and the rest, who committed the
enormous blunder of sparing Odessa, thus
• nailing the Russian foe to victual his troops
from its vast granaries, while the British
soldiers were left in the state which makes the
blood run cold to think about? Was not that
gigan tic blunder perpetrated deliberately by
the Cabinet ? They (lid it upon humanitarian
reasons. They made war sentimentally in
rose-water fashion against the enemy, and con•
trived its direst horrors for their own troops.
For that enormous blunder are " subordinates"
to be held responsible ?
Again—look at the tremendous recklessness
of " the leap in the dark" to Sebastopol. Our ,
readers recollect the stringent terms used by
Lord LYNDHURST in describing the folly of
sending an expedition against a stupendous
fortress without ascertaining its resources,
ald the number of trocps by which it was
dofended. Well, let them turn to the despatch
of the Duke of NEWCASTLE, on the 10th of
April, read by his Grace in his first day's
evidence, and they will see that the military
men were really left no option as to the pro-
priety of making the " leap in the dark." It
was a mandate, and not a discretionary order.
Any candid person reading the whole despatch,
with its intimation " that the Government was
" of opinion that the difficulties
in thee way
" the siege of Sebastopol ware to be increasedof

THE PRESS.

" by delay," must see that Lord RAGLO had
nothing else but to advance, even without
transport or adequate support It wound up
with reminding Lord RAMAN (as if in a taunt),
that it " was to the gallantry of the troops
" under his command that the country was
" looking to secure the result of a just war."
It is like a " leap in the dark " to blame the
subordinates.
And will any one tell us that for not
organising the Irish and Scotch Militia in
time, and supplying a reserve, that " the
subordinates " are to be blamed, and not the
Cabinet Ministers? Our present Premier has
often winced under Mr. DISRAELiS well-
founded strictures upon this grave charge
and upon such an enormous oversight ; it is
worse than ridiculous—it is dishonest—to
direct blame against "the subordinates."
And, lastly, are we to be told that it was
" the subordinates " who appointed his Grace
the Duke of NEWCASTLE to be the War
Minister of England !
Why, this miserable cant about the " subor
dinates" is absolutely sickening, and scarcely
less so is the hollow cry about reforming the
departments. Yes ! they do want to be re
formed, but not after the fashion of the hot
and hasty clamorers for mock changes. They
want to have able men placed at their several
heads. Men of energy and commanding
qualities would give a tone and vigour to
the public service which it greatly needs.
CANNING said well, " that in times of difficulty
" and danger men are everything, measures
" are comparatively nothing. Kingdoms rise
" and fall not by well-meant endeavours, but
" by the commanding talents of able men."

COLONEL PARLDY, of the 10th Hussars, an officer
of nearly forty years' service, now commands the
cavalry division in the Crimea. Lord George Paget,
who had from his seniority held temporary command
of the division, commands the light cavalry.
THE Cologne Gazette states that the object of Lord
Stratford de Redcliffe's visit to Balaklava was for the
purpose of taking Lord Raglan's evidence, to be sub-
mitted to the parliamentary committee on the state of
the army before Sebastopol.
Is addition to Aldershott, which is to accommo-
date 10,000 men, several other encampments on a
minor scale are to be formed, namely, one at Haver-
fordwest, capable of accommodating 1,034 men ; one
at Exeter, for 2,453 men ; one at Gloucester, for
3,895 men ; one at Colchester, for 3,322 ; and one at
Shorncliff, Kent, for 3,313 men. These encamp-
ments will be appropriated principally to the militia
that cannot be accommodated in barracks.
THE court-martial, sitting under the presidency of
Rear-Admiral Plumridge to investigate the recent
stranding of H.M.S. Hecla, has given its decision.
The commander of the Hecla, Captain H. S. Hawker,
is found to have been culpable, and is adjudged to
be severely reprimanded. The master, Mr. J. H.
Tucker, is sentenced to lose two years' service, and
to be dismi> sal the ship. The prisoners produced
numerous testimonials.
MESSRS. Loses, WILSON, ♦ND BELL, iron manufac-
turers on the banks of the Tine, have received an
order from the Ottoman Government for the manu-
facture of 35,000 bombshells ; each shell will weigh
sixty-five pounds, and nearly 1,000 tons of metal
will be consumed in their manufacture. A large
quantity have already bean sent off. About 500 are
made a week. The same firm have an order in hand
for some large 38-cwt. mortars for the same Govern-
ment.
NEARLY 150 Poles and Fins wbo for some time
have been in the barrack at Millbay, Plymouth, with
the other prisoners taken at Bomarsund last year,
having volunteered for servicu against the Russians,
have been temporarily removed on board the Royal
William ordinary guard-ship at Devonport, Captain
J. Kingcome. This was a necessary precaution
from the hostile feelings evinced by their Russian
comrades on hearing they bad offered to serve
against Russia.
FROM a return to the House of Commons issued
on Saturday, it appears that the land force,- in I loia
amount to 281,940 officers and men, b. sides w.iieh
the subsidiary native troops number 31,004. The
police corps numbers 35 officers and 24,015 men.
Wa regret to learn the eyesight of Lord Charles
Wellesley is considered irretrievably lost. His lord-
ship is brother and heir presumptive of the Duke of
Wellington.
A SINGULAR RESULT OF THE CHEAP FARES between
Glasgow and Edinburgh wa- exemplified last week,
when a firm at the former city received a considerable
remittance by the hands of a clerk, whose fare, first
class, was considerably less than the commission
charged by a banker.

SATURDAY,

BY CONTINENTAL TELEGRAPH.
VxmiNA, Thursday evening.
The departure of General Hess is deterred to the
6th inst.

VIENNA, Friday.
It is asserted that the reason of the postponement
of Boon Hess' departure for the army is the hope
still entertained that the last Russian proposals will
lead to peace.

HAMBITRO, Friday.
Admiral Dundas has left Kiel in his flag-ship to
commence the campaign in the Baltic.

Constantinople letters of the 23rd ult. announce
that the first detachment of Piedmontese troops
arrived there on the 21st. The ?hocks of earthquake
have not ceased at Broussa, and were even felt at
Constantinople, where all the European inhabitants
of Broussa had sought a refuge.

Some cases of cholera have been reported in the
French catnip of Maslak.
The trial of Pianori is fixed to take place on Mon-
day next. The prisoner has a wife and two children,
who are at present living with her father in Italy.

Miss BURDETT COUTTS offers three sets of prizes,
which in value will amount to 501., for the teaching
of common things. Miss Coutts proposes to school-
mistresses in schools connected with the Church of
England who have pupil-teachers apprenticed to
to them, under Government inspection, in the county
of Middlesex, one prize of the value of 51.; four
prizes of the value of 41. each ; five prizes of the
value of 31. each. To the pupils in the Whitelands
Training Institution who are in their second year,
and have passed a Government examination at the
end of their first year, ten prizes of the value of 1/.
each. To female pupil-teachers in schools connected
with the Church of England who are apprenticed in
the county of Middlesex, who have entered their
third year, and not completed their fourth year of
apprenticeship, eight prizes of the value of 10s. each.
The examination for these prizes will be held on a
Saturday in June or July, at the Whitelands Train-
ing Institution. The Bishop of London and the
Committee of Council on Education sanction the
scheme.
THE ROYAL. SOCIETY has lately received a valuable
addition to its collection of manuscripts by a present,
fr an Mr. Edwin Canton, of a series of autograph
letters from Dr. Franklin, Priestly, Sir Joseph Banks,
Howard, ttc.
Ma. BAILY has finished his statue of the Lord Chief
Justice Mansfield, and it is now in Westminster-hall,
preparatory to its erection among the other statues
in the vestibule of the Houses of Parliament.
THE English Protestant church at Alexandria was
to be opened on Wednesday the 25th ult.
CASTLE MENZIES AND SHOOTING, according to the
Glasgow Daily Mail, have been let to an Indian prince
fur two seasons. His name is Dhuld Sing, and he is
a convert to the Christian religion.
AFTER years of deliberation, it is at length decided
to introduce gaslights and waterworks into Copen-
hagen. The corporation have for this purpose con-
cluded a loan of three millions of dollars, to he amor-
tised by yearly annuities of the value of 150,000 dols.,
terminable in about fifty years.
M. Bu.Lstivr, the French Minister of the Interior,
has refused to authorise the introduction of bull-
fights into Paris during the time of the Exhibition.
Such spectacles, he says, are repugnant to French
ideas.
"NATURE-PRINTING."—A splendid work, entitled
the "Ferns of Great Britain and Ireland," is now in
course of monthly publication by Messrs. Bradbury
and Evans. The novelty of the process consists in
transferring the surface of the plant to a copper-
plate, whence any number of impressions can be taken
on paper, so as not only to delineate these beautiful
species of vegetation with general accuracy, but to re-
present, with the most literal fidelity to nature, the
hairs, veins, and other minutiae of superficial structure.
From the plates given in the first nuntbere of the
work, we can testify to the extreme delicacy and
exactitude with which the forms of the various
species of ferns are represented, so as in fact to
convey the impression that the plants th mselves
have been transferred to paper rather than that they
have been printed from the copper-plate on which
they were first represented. The descriptions
are, it may readily be imagined, excellently
written, as the work is compiled by Mr. T. Moore,
whose admirable " Handbook of British Ferns " 24
well known, and edited by Dr. Lindley. The E kl.l
with which this novel process of nature-printing
as
bees executed by Mr. Henry Bradbury cannot be
too highly praised, and from his complete success .D
this instance we look with toatidence to such an
ex-
tension of the process as will eff. et a revolution in
the art of representing botanical forms.

MAY 5, 1855

Vratthings in arliattunt.