The Press.
London, England, 1854-06-03 00:00:00

THE PRESS.

now we have, from a number of independent sources,
minute particulars of its forts, guns, and the sur-
rounding waters, together with details of the Russian
fleet and all matters relating to it. Even since Old
Charley's departure public opinion has much changed
as to the operations to be expected from him. A dash
at Cronstadt, with consequent destruction of its bat-
teries, capture of the Russian navy, and bombard-
ment of the capital, is no longer looked for. If
Cronstadt be not impregnable, it is certainly suffi-
ciently strong to require great caution in approaching
it ; and, so far as this principal outwork of the Rus-
sian empire is concerned, the great question of wooden
versus stone walls is not likely to be speedily decided.
Of the result of a tight between our ships and those
of the enemy there can be no doubt; but the question
is, how are our gallant fellows to get at them ? Some
remarks here (suggested by the attack on Odessa)
on the strange manner in which, to this date, the war
has been carried on deserve attentive perusal:—
" A reference to the Russian plan of the city shows that
the barracks and military establishments are almost, with-
out exception, in the rear of the town ; it is, therefore,
foolish self-gratulation to bout that Odessa is no longer
a point d'appui for the imperial forces. The attack was,
let it be granted, as far as it went, crowned with perfect
success, and the manoeuvres executed by the British and
French steam-frigates reflect the highest credit on their
inventor, for the citizens of Odessa have, undoubtedly,
witnessed a performance which must be considered to
belong to the pure mathematics of naval science.
" But now that the public find that the admirals did not
avail themselves of this beautiful combination (which
suggested to one writer, even amidst the din and smoke
of battle, the elegant and timed movements of a waltz),
except to dismount eight or ten guns, to destroy twenty or
thirty merchant•vessels, and to blow up a powder-
magazine and a few sheds, and that the consequences of
their forbearance have been already terribly manifested, it
is beginning to exclaim against such useless forbearance.
War is not an end but a means to the attainment of
peace, and that is the moat humane and Christian policy
which cuts short the train of its attendant horrors. But
the prevalence of slaughter and bloodshed may be limited
by time as well as by place, and a blow struck quickly and
fiercely at the heart of a nation is surely a greater peace-
maker than an injury inflicted on an individual or a class.
The ships and armies of a barbarous people belong to the
sovereign, and their loss or defeat is a mere personal
calamity to the owner, while the destruction of great
mercantile cities is felt by all his subjects. It is absurd to
say that the ruin of traders is not the humiliation of the
enemy : of those who maintain this doctrine we would ask,
with what feelings (we ourselves should contemplate the
prospect of this war if it had opened by the burning of
Liverpool, of Manchester, of Marseilles, and Bordeaux?

• • • .
•
" He who bids us save the trading city, and has mercy
for the enemy but no pity for ourselves, speaks in tones of
mawkish and illogical humanity. If we spare the houses
and stores of the merchants of the Dwina and the Dniester,
on what grounds do we spread ruin amongst the ship-
owners of the Gulf of Finland and the Sea of Azof ? And
why do we proclaim that a bale of goods on a beach is
sacred from attack, when the same bale of goods, trans-
ferred to a boat on that beach, is lawful prize for our
cruisers ? To be consistent, we should reserve our powder
for vessels of war, renounce onr blockades, and permit, by
sea, the commerce which we do not molest on land. Else
let out sword be thrown boldly into the scale, let our
etc vials be thundered from the cannon's mouth, and so
shall we quickly conquer the peace we are resolved to
dictate."
Another paper contains information on " The Per.
sonnel of the Russo-European Question," and a
third exhibits the influence of Russian diplomacy on
the Continent. The catechism taught in the Rus-
sian schools shows how absolute is the devotion
required to the Czar as " the Vicegerent and Minister
of God to execute the divine commands ":

Q. How is the authority of the Emperor to be considered
in reference to the spirit of Christianity ?
A. As proceeding immediately from God.

Q. Mist duties— does religiim teach us, the humble
subjects of his Majesty the Emperor of Russia, to practise
towards him?
A. Worship, obedience, fidelity, the payment of taxes,
service, love, and prayer. the whole being comprised in the
words worship and service.
Q. Wherein does this worship consist, and how should
it be manifested ?

A. By the most unqualified reverence in words, gestures,
demeanour, thoughts, and actions.
Q. What kind of obedience do we owe him?
A. An entire passive and unbounded obedience in every
point of view.
Q. How are irreverence and infidelity to the Emperor to
be considered in reference to God?
A. As the moat heinous sin, and the most frightful
criminality.
The other articles—excepting the continuation of
the tale by the author of "Digby Grand "—are of a
critical character, and carefully penned.

THE Dublin University Magazine has ten articles.
The first, on Sir Archibald Alison's " History of
Europe from the Fall of Napoleon," is laudatory
of (the work. " French Dramatists and Actors "
is the continuation of a lively and amusing collection
of facts and anecdotes relating to the French stage a
hundred years ago. The following is new to us:—

SATURDAY,
...-__

"An anecdote is told of numesnil, connected with her
performance of Cleopatre in Marmontel's tragedy of the
same name, which came out in 1750, and was ever one of
her favourite representations. When preparing for death,
in a frenzy of passion, she exclaims
• Je maudirois lea dieux, r its me rendirent le jour.'
' I should curse the gods, if they restored me back to life'
An old officer, seated immediately behind in one of the
balcony boxes, was so carried away by the reality of the
scene that he struck her violently on the back, exclaiming
with great vehemence, ' Infernal cat, go fu the devil at
once ! ' "
Next Dr. Hooker's " Himalayan Journal," lately re.
viewed in the columns of the PRESS, is culled to fur.
nish an instructive article on India. " Sir Jasper
Carew" is closed in this number, and we scarcely re_
gret it, for the subjects on which the author especially
loves to dilate are those from which most persons
revolt—crime and criminals. The hero is the claim-
ant of an estate, and within the last few pages of
the end occupies much the same position as the soi-
disant Sir Richard Smyth did at Gloucester some
months since. Whilst he is in the dock and on board the
transport-ship the writer lingers fondly over him ; but
when—more fortunate than Sir R. Smyth—his inno•
cence is finally established, the guiltless hero is ab-
ruptly dismissed in a few short sentences. " The
Reprieve," a tragic tale of revenge and murder, is
preceded by some sweet musical lines, called the
" Dirge for Little Mary," by Mrs. Acton Tindal.
The reviews and notices of novels and poems which
fill up the rest of this month's number maintain the
character of the magazine.

Tait bas ten articles. A brief notice of the late Pro-
fessor Wilson appears to us to be just, and the praise
which is awarded to him all the more valuable be-
cause it is not indiscriminating. " lltid Sraith" is
continued. " Letting Lodgings "is an article in
which the ordinary manner of treating the subject is
inverted. Instead of a pilfering landlady we have
defaulting and penurious lodgers.

PUBLICATIONS lIECEIVED.
BOOKS.

The Young Prima Donna. Mrs. Grey. Routledge.
Si/uria ; the History of the Oldest-known Rocks. Sir IL J.
Murchison. Murray.
The Russians in Bulgaria and Rumelia. Baron von Molkte.

Ditto.
The Pirates' Fort. Louisa M`Nally. Hodges and Smith.
_
Transcaucasia. Bator

In von Haxtgausen.

Chapman and Hall.
A Hero of our own Times. Lermontof. Bogue.
Annotated Edition of the English Poets. Cowper. Vol. 11.
B. Bell. Parker and Son.
Appollyon and the Reaction of the Slaronians. Colonel F. L
Buller. Partridge and Oakey..
The National Debt, and How to Pay It. Longman and Co.

PAMPHLETS.
Baptism. Bosworth.
The Administration of Justice in Southern India. Madras.
Bowie.
Self-government for the Metropolis. Viscount Ebrington.
Ridgway.
The Ground we Tread. J. S. I'akington, Esq. Hatchard.
Speeches on University Reform. Ridgway.
The Three Warnings. J. Clipham. Mitchell.
Military Sketch of the Danube and Constantinople. A Map.
Wyld.

ACTION BETWEEN RUSSIAN AND ENGLISH SUPS
IN 1810.—Before arriving at Revel a small bay is
passed, the scene of one of the most brilliant exploits
in the annals of the British navy. In 1810 a Russian
squadron of nine sail of the line was sighted off
Hango Head, the western end of the northern shore
of the Gulf of Finland, by the combined force of ten
Swedish and two English line-of-battle ships. The
two latter, the Implacable (Sir Byam Martin) and
the Centaur (Sir Samuel Hood), outsailed their
colleagues, and the Implacable attacked the stern-
most Russian vessel—the Sewolod—and made her
haul down her pendant after an action of half an
hour's duration. The enemy now bearing down to
the rescue, the two English ships made for the
Swedish fleet, then ten miles to leeward, when the
Implacable's prize was taken in tow by a Russian
frigate. On this the Centaur and Implacable made
a fresh attempt to secure the Sewolod, and drove off
the frigate, but had again to retreat, in consequence
of the Russians bearing down a second time upon
them. The enemy now stood in to the harbour of
Port Baltic (Rogerswick), and the Sewolod running
aground at the entrance, our two ships for the third
time returned to the attack, and after a sharp con-
test took possession of and burnt the Russian,
making the whole of her crew prisoners. This
(with the exception of two gun-boat actions in 1809)
is almost the solitary occasion on which English and
Russian vessels have come into hostile contact. In
the succeeding year the presence of two of our liners,
with a frigate and sloop, was sufficient to clear the
Gulf of Finland, and to strike such terror into the ,
enemy that he never ventured to leave his harbours •
—Cronstadt, reprint from Fraser's Magazine.

V

NOW

JUNE 3, 1854.

TURKISH DEFENCE OF FORTRESSES.
IN the third volume, just published, of " Alison's
History of the Peace " there is a detailed and eloquent
narrative of the events of the last war between
Turkey and Russia. Some particulars of the con-
test, illustrative of the indomitable courage of the
Turks in defending fortified places, will be read with
peculiar interest at this moment.
As until lately the Turkish armies have been un-
disciplined, they were not a match for European
armies in the open field, but in defending towns in
their own peculiar way they were truly formidable.
Vauban or Cohorn would pronounce a genuine
Turkish fortification to be untenable. It has scarcely
an outwork ; the approaches of the enemy are never
resisted; but, seated on a plain wall, with a ditch be-
neath, the Turk smokes his pipe, and calmly watches
the construction of the trenches. If, however, a
solitary sentinel or vidette is seen in the distance, he
will occasionally rouse himself to fire a round shot at
it, but this is only for recreation, or to keep his hand
in practice.
The wall is breached—were the garrison European
an Addiscome professor would take out his watch
and tell to a second when the place would fall and
at what cost of life. But the Turk reverts the
scientific mode of defence. It is precisely when the
breach is practicable that, in his opinion, the siege
begins. The outer wall lie regards as a mere mask,
a blind to hide the trap he has prepared within.
There the streets are retrenched in the strongest
manner, huge barricades of timber blockade every
avenue, the houses are loophooled, and at every
" coign of vantage" a practised marksman armed
with more than one musket, and at least a pair of
pistols, is stationed. By these means the head of
the storming column is always swept away ; and if,
by a sudden rush, the streets are penetrated, the
order of discipline must almost necessarily be broken
in the operation, and then the bayonet is no match
for the curved scimitar and the short sword, with
both of which the Turks are armed. At
Roudschuck in 1810, and at Brahilow in 1828, the
Russians were repulsed in the former case with a
loss of eight thousand men, and in the latter of three
thousand.

In the war of 1828, when Nicholas had joined the
army in person, an advance in the direction of
Schumla was made with 55,000 men and 108 guns.
The Turks, who were inferior in number, checked the
Russian advance with their splendid cavalry, and in
this arm they established a decided superiority.
But the Russians were too strong in guns and in-
fantry, and the Turks retired in excellent order
until they reached Schumla, which they occupied
with 40,000 men. Nicholas, having been reinforced
on the march, designed to strike a blow which should
be decisive, and to capture Schumla. But when
before it, and its strength became apparent, he left
a corps of 30,000 men to observe it, and turned away
himself with the remainder of the army to besiege
Varna. Meanwhile Silistna was blockaded by General
Roth with 10,000 men, whom the ultimate capture of
Brahilov, after one bloody repulse, had released for
this duty. This was in August. The guards and
reserves which bad left St. Petersburg in May had
not yet arrived, and without reinforcements the
Russians were not strong enough to effect anything
of importance. Under these circumstances the
Emperor left the army.
The corps in observation before Schumla was ha-
rassed by constant attacks, terminating generally
in favour of the Turks. Nay more, that novelty in
Eastern warfare, a nocturnal attack, which was ha-
zarded on a Russian redoubt, succeeded completely :
six guns were captured, and General Wrede, with 500
men, was put to the sword. Foraging parties were
constantly cut off, fodder failed, the horses died at
the rate of more than 100 a day, and the Russian
army was in the most serious danger. At this period,
too, it must be remembered that not only was the
sea open to them, but that they were its absolute
masters, and the granaries of Odessa were at no
great distance. Hoivever,towards the end of August,
reinforcements having arrived, the siege of Varna
Was actively prosecuted. Eight sale-of-the-line, with
an equal number of frigates, completely blockaded it on
the seaside, whilst, on the land, first I'rince Menscht
koff, then Count Woronzow, and finally the Autocrat
in person, urged on the effort of the besieging army.
Varna was surrendered by the second in command on
the 11th October, when the garrison, nearly 7,000
strongjstill possessed considerable stores of provision
and ammunition. The Russian corps in front of
Schumla had fallen back, so as to cut off all commu-
nication with Silistria, and, now that Varnahad fallen,
it was hoped that General Roth, reinforced, might
convert his blockade into an attack. But the ap-
proach of winter compelled the Russians to retire,
and they recrossed the Danube into Wallachia. This
campaign cost the Russians 80,000 men.
In May ib the following year the war commenced
with the siege of Silistria. According to European
notions this town was weak ; the fortifications were
imperfect, and commanded by some neighbouring
heights. So singular are the Turks in their method