The Express.
London, England, 1855-07-07 00:00:00

LONDON, SATURDAY, JULY 7.

Tan statement made last night by Lord JOHN RUS-
SELL in the House of Commons, respecting the part
taken by him at the couelusion of the late negotia-
dens at Vienna, will be received with feelings of no
ordinary surprise mingled with sentiments of very
deep regret. In reply to certain interrogations from
Mr. MILNIS GIBSON, as to the accuracy of the allege-
dose contained in Count BuoL's last circular de-
spatch, the noble lord confesses that substantially
those allegations are correct. There may be verbal
errors and incidental omissions, but in the main the
Austrian Prime Minister is perfectly warranted in his
assertion, that to the final proposition made by him
for compromising the questions involved in the third
basis of settlement between Russia and the Allies, the

Plenipotentiaries of England and France at Vienna
gave their assent; and that they undertook to urge
its adoption upon their respective governments.
M. DROUTN DE LIMITS returned to Paris, laid before
the EMPEROR the reasons which had led him to come
to that conclusion, and fading to convinos him of its
edequeey deemed it hie duty to resign his place in
the administration. Lord .101114 RUSSELL returned to

Loudon, iovited the cabinet to concur in the opinion
he had declared to Count Bon, was out-voted by hie
colleagues on the sufficiency of the terms he
had consented to, and instead of retiring from office,'
Proceeded forthwith to defend in Parliament the
rejection of the offer. We own we should have hesi-
tated to believe any other testimony than that of
Lord Jonx himself on such a subject : but as be has
thought fit to place the matter on record, we have no
choice but to express our disappointment at the
course be has pursued, and our astonishment at the

reasons he has set forth as its justification.
As for the proposition of Austria accepted by the
French and English plenipotentiaries, and subse-
quently repudiated by the Cabinets of Paris and
London, little need now be said. It was in effect
neither more nor less than that unsatisfactory patch-
work of conditions—partly of equipoise, and partly of
limitation of naval force in the Euzine—which has

so often been discussed in Parliament and the Press.
The complete delineation of its mongrel features will
be found in Lord JOHN RUSSELL'S speech, reported
in soother column. In a few words, it may be de-
fined to be the signature of a treaty of peace
upon condition (as regards the Third Point)
that each of the Allies should be at liberty
to keep half as many vessels of war in the
Black Bea as Russia, in addition to the fleet
of the SULTAN; but no stipulation whatever was
made for the destruction or dismantling of Sebas-
topol. A condition was indeed annexed that if this
were agreed to, as an ultimatum Austria would send
it to the CzAR, and, if rejected, she would then—
declare war ?—no such thing, but withdraw her am-
bsssador from St. Petersburg, and put her army in
Galicia into a menacing attitude ! And with this
miserable conclusion the British Minister for the
Colonies, and the French Minister for Foreign
Affairs, were willing to be satisfied, notwithstanding
all the blood and treasure lavished unavailingly in
the Crimea during the nine preceding months.
But if the error in judgment wee grave which would
have led to the conclusion of a peace upon such
terms, we are bound to say that the sudden renun-

elation of an opinion so expressed as that of Lord
JOHN to the Court of Austria, and the vehement
defence of the opposite line of policy in Parliament,
so as not to weaken the tenure by which the present
Cabinet hold office, seem to us still more extraordi-
nary and indefensible. We are not now to learn what
. .

are the rules of political consistency by which men
of honour and of spirit ought to be governed. No later
than January last the noble member for London as-
signed as the one and sufficient muse for his withdrawal
from the Cabinet—although at the risk, nay with the

certainty of thereby insuring its overthrow—that he
could not be expected to defend in the House of
Commons as sound that which he had confidentially
argued with his colleagues to be the contrary. He
did not then think they Lad made the best man
Minister of War, and therefore he could not resist
Mr. ROEBUCK'S motion, which by inference charged
them with that and similar faults. Lord JOHN was

upon that occasion assailed by every species of vitu-
peration and abuse, both in and out of Parlia-
ment. For some time this journal stood alone
in vindicating the rectitude of his conduct,
measured by the rule of personal consistency
he had himself laid down. We adhere to that
role; we deeply deplore that he has been induced to
abandon it. And what is the paramount considerr.-
tion which the noble lord says out-weighed all others
in his mind? From a distance hi saw that the ad-
ministration of Lord PALMERSTON was from the out-
set unpopular. The authority of Government ap-
peared to him to be shaken. He could not see any

justification for this national distrust in the constitu-
tion of the Ministry under his noble friend's
auspices; and he therefore resolved to sacrifice
on the most momentous of questions, that of
peace or war, his individual convictions, and
to become the defender of the Government
through thick and thin. The most oligarchic
and exclusive administration that the people of this

generation have seen—the most recklessly jobbing and
incompetent that we can call to mind—is, according
to the noble member for London, so well worth pre-

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serving at any price that he ie content not only
to give up his own views, and to retract his own
declarations as a diplomatist, but to become its un-
reserved apologist and eulogist in his place in Par-
liament.

SIR GEORGE GREY promises a full, complete, and
searching inquiry into the conduct of the polio. in
Hyde-park on Sunday last; but declines to specify
the mode in which it is to be instituted and eonducted.
We confess that our hopes of any good to result from
such an inquiry as the right honourable baronet ialikely
to sanction are of the slenderest. To be of any use
the committee, or commission, charged with the in-
vestigation ought not to confine their mutiny to
individual oases of undo. violas.* by the police, or
provocation by the populate, but to examine into
the entire proceedings of Sunday last as a whole.
It is a matter of comparatively little moment
whether Policeman A 1 be a brute, or Super-
intendent BLazin too hot-headed for his chirp; or
whether these individuals have been merely goaded
into excessive energy by an agravating mob. It is
clear that then has been a collision, much to be re-
gretted, between the polio* and the people; and that,
at tit!' usoussot, there is great and Wonsan era►
ratios gs both siiss. Jo. Ibis simplatke