The Press.
London, England, 1854-10-07 00:00:00

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No. 75.—VoL. 11.

LONDON, SATURDAY, OCTOBER 7,1854.

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ever dearly it may cost us. The triumph of our
arms will be the triumph of the whole people.
We have faith in the star of our country, but
we disconnect its glory from the temporising
expedients of an Administration avowedly
without principle or policy. '
Its conduct of the war has been without
plan or foresight. One of its earliest acts after
the formal declaration in the Gazette was to
revolutionise our whole code of maritime war-
fare, and to decree that free ships should make
free goods—in other words, that the flag of a
neutral should protect the property of an
enemy. The immediate effect of this regula-
tion was to relieve the great producing in-
terests of Russia from all fear of exclusion
from their lucrative foreign markets, and to
transfer to German ports that carrying trade
which had previously been mainly in the hands
of British merchants. The folly of attempting
in any way to maintain commercial relations
with a country opposed to us in war was ex-
posed at the time. We reproduced the words
of NELSON, that the proposition that free ships
make free goods was so monstrous in itself,
and so injurious to the maritime interests of
this country, that we should resist it to the
last drop of our blood. But the economical
section of the Cabinet prevailed—the order
was upheld—and what has been the result?
Russian produce has flowed into our markets
without intermission—an enormous price has
been obtained for it—the price has been paid
in heavy and continuous remittances in gold
—Russian landowners and Russian shippers
have been getting rich at our expense—and
the finances of Russia have been upheld
through the timely aid of English capital. Sir
WILLIAM MOLESWORTH, at Edinburgh, makes
this measure one of the claims of the Govern-
ment to public confidence : he pedantically
describes it as establishing " the maritime
" rights of neutrals on the firm and solid basis
"of reason and justice." But the Ministerial
press takes another view : it has discovered
that the system does not answer, and hints in
no obscure phrase that it must be modified or
abandoned—a new proof of the unanimity of
the Government, and its accord on principles
of vital import.
The sailing of the Baltic fleet excited the
highest hopes of the country, but it now turns
out that it was despatched without the gun-
boats, which Sir CHARLES NAPIER declared
were indispensable to the success of the
operations ho contemplated. He has pe.
titioned for them in vain; the great strong-
holds of Russia remain in consequence uu-
assailed ; the fleet, since the capture of
Bomarsund, has been cruising about without
an object ; and the last intelligence we hear
concerning it is, that the orders for its return
had been countermanded—whence we are left
to infer that it was ordered home when the
weather was fair, and some weeks of the open
season remained, and that it has been ordered
to stay out, when storms and fogs are to be
expected, and the hazard of all operations in
the difficult navigation of the Baltic must be
greatly increased.
In the ordering of that expedition on which
the eyes of the world are fixed, and from which
such great results are anticipated, what
evidence do we find of the despatch, the
energy, and the secrecy which should charac-
terise the councils of a really able and prudent
Government? Before pestilence broke out in
the camp the spirits of the men had been
weakened by their forced inaction. The de- I

LONDON, SATURDAY, OCTOBER 7, 1854.

IT is evident that the Ministry of Lord ABER-
DEEN are quite ready to make political capital
out of the war into which they have helplessly
floundered. They are as willing to avail
themselves of the popular feeling in its favour
as they would be of a cry for Reform, or of
any other movement which promised them
support on condition'that they headed without
pretending to direct it. 'We all recollect Lord
ABERDEEN'S sneer at Lord LYNDHURST as a
" Colonel of Dragoons ;" we all know with what
earnestness he deprecated any encouragement
of Turkey or defiance of Russia, long after
the Russian troops had entered the principa-.
lities, and long after fatal Sinope, yet now, to
crown the absurdity of his gyrations, he con-
sents to masquerade in the character of a

War Minister We shall, perhaps, next hear
of him as the champion of Liberal ideas against
continental absolutism.
Can we forget a year ago, when the fate of
Turkey, so far as it depended on British in-
terposition, trembled in the balance? How
cunningly was the pulse of our public then
felt to ascertain its temper ! What had we to
do with upholding the barbarous empire of
Othman? The quarrel was none of ours—
why not let those whom it concerned fight it
out? It was not until this country spoke out
in a voice not to be misunderstood, and till
France, weary of the incertitude of our
Government, took the lead in action, that
resistance to Russia was seriously contem-
plated. Could Lord ABERDEEN have had his
way, the legions of the Czar would have been
at this moment in Constantinople, and his
ships riding safely in the Sea of Marmora.
We were saved from the ignominious neutra-
lity he meditated only by an outburst of
public feeling which he saw it would be dan-
gerous to resist. Throughout last summer
and autumn, when the Opposition insisted on
the necessity of a firm and decided policy, it
was reproached with its eagerness for war,
and now it is represented as Russian in its
tendencies if it denies that the successes of
our arms are to be regarded as Ministerial
triumphs.

We believe that the war might have been
avoided—that no one really desired it—that
the arrogant pretensions of Russia were en-
couraged by the weakness of our Government
and the notorious predilections of its head—
that the strife with its bloodshed, its dangers,
and its waste, is in great part due to the timidity
which dared not use the language of count
genus statesmanship when it might have com-
manded deference. But we are not the less
satisfied of the course to be pursued in the ac-
tual state of affairs. The mischief done is ir-
reparable. The honour and interests of Eng-
land are bound up with the contest in which
we are engaged. It may yet severely try our
strength ; and the spirit of the country must
be sustained, and all its energy put forth, to
bring the struggle to a successful issue, how-

Tbt I)tt,6s

I

PRICE SIXPENCE.

pressing results of that dreary time of idle
expectation are visible in all the letters which
have reached us. We know enough now to
feel assured that, had the expedition, though
in inferior force, sailed three months back
from Varna, those brilliant consequences
which have deluded the country during the
week would most probably have been accom-
plished to the letter. Tho Russians in the
Crimea were then unprepared for an attack by
a land force, and Sebastopol might have been
carried by a rapid assault. The slaughter of
our troops which has occurred shows how
dearly we have already paid for the delay, and
warns us that the resistance may yet prove
formidable. Still more culpable than the
delay was the ostentatious proclamation of
the purpose of the expedition two months
back. The mischief done by this disclosure is
altogether incalculable. In great military
operations secrecy is the first requisite of suc-
cess. The safety of the whole expedition has
been perilled by the babbling which, on the
most favourable construction, was authorised
as the price paid to a powerful newspaper for
its support. Should any real disaster attend
our arms we shall have to attribute it much
more to this inexcusable betrayal of the
secrets of the Cabinet than to the strength
or sagacity of the enemy. The French knew
better how to keep their counsel. The disclo-
sure was on our side alone.
Our hearts and hopes attend our gallant
troops. Their loss has been severe. Nobly,
too, have our officers refuted the aspersions
cast on their courage. The two thousand
killed and wounded in the first engagement
with the enemy are an earnest of the sacrifices
the war will demand from the nation, and
should moderate the exultation which a
thoughtless portion of our people seem inclined
to indulge in. Come what may, we have all
confidence in the valour of our soldiers and
the ability of their leaders. But we refuse to
ascribe the merit of their success to a Ministry
which, by glaring mismanagement, has
heightened all their difficulties, and inter-
posed many a bloody field between them and
the conquest which we yet confidently hope
they will finally achieve.

FACTS FROM THE CRIMEA.
THE melodramatic details of the fall of Sebas-
topol which prevailed during the early part of
the week were set at rest by the Government
despatches published in an Extraordinary
Gazette on Thursday afternoon. The battle of
the Alma was fought on the 20th of September,
and from that date to the 28th, when the latest
intelligence left the Crimea, no other engage-
ment of consequence seems to have taken
place. We must suppose that Prince MENs-
MINIM, through driven front his position on
the heights of the Alma, was enabled to re-
treat in good order ; and we gather from his
despatch to St. Petersburg that he retreated on
Baktschi Semi, and not on Sebastopol. The
allied commanders, finding that their landing-
place on the west coast of the Crimea did not
afford facilities for the debarkation of the siege
artillery, crossed the country in a south-
easterly direction, leaving Sebastopol to their
right hand, and established themselves at Bala
Cleve, on the south coast, about seven miles