The Express.
London, England, 1861-08-14 00:00:00

THE EXPRESS, WEDNESDAY EVENING,

a lesson that when Volunteers are called out it
must be for a period and under conditions which
shall not leave it in their power to go in when they
think enough has been done.

But the causes of the flight of those troops
which did remain to fight, and which did fight
bravely and successfully, still remain to seek. In
broad daylight, and in the tido of victory, they
fell, we are told, into a panic. What first caused
the panic we probably shall never learn, nor is it
very material to inquire. There never was a
battle yet fought in which at some moment and at
some point a panic has not seized upon some of
the troops engaged. But that in such circum-
stances it should grow and spread into a complete
rout of the whole army is the strange and start-
ling peculiarity, and of this it happens that the
cause has become tolerably clear. The officers,
who among regular troops would to the last retain
their coolness and their heads, and who by exam-
ple would extinguish the momentary impulse of
fear, were at Bull's Run the leaders in the flight.
Instead of re-forming the wavering lines, they broke
away under an impulse of terror. The contagion
spread more rapidly among them than among the
men. They knew not why they ran nor who pur-
sued. The spectacle is disgraceful enough, yet
here again we must remember that those who thus
acted were men of our own blood and of probably
equal courage with our own officers. But they
yielded to the impulse of fear because they were
in a place for which they were not qualified, and
the more hopelessly yielded because at the last
moment the conviction came to themselves that
they were incompetent to the situation in which
they found themselves. With but a scanty know-
ledge of elementary drill, with no knowledge of
war or of the circumstances of war, unaccustomed
to the confusion of battle, and unable to depend
on the arrangements for their support or relief
being carried out by those whom they knew to be
as inefficient as themselves, it is no wonder that a
sudden alarm threw them into a confusion from
which they could not recover.
The essential point for our consideration is, by
what means we may raise our Volunteers above
the chance of falling from like causes into like
but far more irretrievable disgrace. Our Volun-
teer officers have exactly the same qualifications
as the American volunteer officers. They are, as
officers, half educated. They include, indeed,
many, wbo from a natural aptitude for arms would
be found equal to any emergency. But they also
include many whose incapacity, known well enough
now to their own men, would become conspicuous
to the world in a battle-field. With such men defeats
originate. Will the Government continue to leave
us to the certainty of defeats from such a cause
Or will it, by insisting that all who aspire to com-
mand shall undergo the instruction which is neces-
sary to render the best fit for command, and which
would expose the incapacity of those whom nature
has denied the qualifications required, save ns, so
far as human forethought can, from so fatal a re-
sult 1 There are abundance of men in the Volun-
teer ranks with sufficient capacity and able to de-
vote sufficient time to the rendering themselves
good officers. These are the men whom we ought
to have, instead of the " gentlemen of influence"
or the loud bluaterers who are now most readily re-
commended forcommiasions by the Lords-Lieutenant.
If the present officers can qualify themselves for
their posts by all means let them continue in
them, but let it be remembered that upon Govern-
ment rests the responsibility of ascertaining that,
from colonel to corporal, no man shall hold a post
for which, in the hour of battle and on the out-
break of such a panic as that of Manassas, he shall
be found unequal. Better far that we had no
Volunteers, than Volunteers on whose competent
leading, under every circumstance of danger, we
cannot confidently rely. In dealing with this
source of weakness, Government will have the
country with them, and none more earnestly than,
with a few exceptions, the Volunteers themselves.

SOUTH LANCASHIRE ELECTION.
MANCHIIITEL WgDNISDAY MOILVICO.
The nomination foe South Lancashire took place
this morning. The eandideles proposed were Mr. Charles
Turner, conservative; mid Mr. John Cheetham, liberal.
The show of hands was in favour el Mr. Turner.
A poll was demanded for Mr. Chasidim.
The procesdiasp were of a quiet ammeter.

SIX Court.

OSBORNE, AuGorr 13.

Her Majesty awl the Prince Consort, accom-
panied by the Crown Prince and Princess of Prussia,
Prince's Alice, Princess Helena, Princess Louise, Prince
Arthur, and Prince Leopold, embarked at half•past fire
o'clock yesterday afternoon, on board the royal yacht Vic-
toria and Albert, and steamed to the esetward.
The whole of the Ladies and Cent'omen in Waiting were
in attendance.

At about half.past six o'clock bee Majesty met the Swe-
dish corvette conveying the King of Sweden and Prince
Omar towards Osborne. The Prince Consort immediately
west of in the barge, and proceeded on board the corvette,
and invited the King to aceon.any him on board her Ma-
jesty's yacht. A royal salute was fired by the Emerald
frigate, which was in attendance on her Majesty.
The King of Sweden and Prince Oscar, with their suite,
were received by the Queen on the dock of the Victoria
and Albert, which immediately returned to Osborne, and
arrived about eight o'clock.
The King's suite consists of Baron Silferachiuld, Major.
General Bildt, and Commodore Haffner.

Captain-Lieutenant Afsetius is in attendance on Prince
Oscar.

Viscount Palmerston, Earl Russell, and Viscount Sydney,
arrived in the afternoon, and remain on a visit to her
Majesty.

Baron Beck-Fria, Secretary to the Swedish Legation in
London, also arrived on a visit.
Her Majesty's dinner party in the evening included the
King of Sweden and Norway, the Crown Prince of Prussia,
the Crown Princess of Prussia (Princess Royal), Princess
Alice, Prince Omer of Sweden and Norway, the Lady in
Waiting to the Crown Princess, the Baroness von Dobeneck,
the Earl Russell, the Viscount Palmerston, Viscount Syd-
ney; Baron Beck-Fins (Secretary to the Swedish Legation),
Baron Silfenchiiild, Major• General Bildt, and Commodore
Haffner, in attendance on the King of Sweden and Norway;
Count Furatenatein and Lieutenant-Colonel von Obernits,
in attendance on the Crown Prince and Princess of Prussia ;
Y. Duncker ; Captain Lieutenant Manlius, in attendance
on Prince Oscar of Sweden and Norway.

Her Majesty's Commi:xionen for the International Exhi-
tion of 1862 held a meeting at their offices, in the Strand,
yesterday.
The Building Committee of the Exhibitioti of 1862 held
• cresting at South Kensington.
It ham hese intimated to her Majesty's Commissioners for
the International Exhibition of 1862 that a joint resolution
has peened both houses of the United States Congress,
authorising the President to take such measures as shall
seem expedient to facilitate • proper representation of the
industrial interests of the United States, at the forthcoming
Exhibition, and that • sum of 2,000 dollars is appropriated
for the incidental espouses.
Despatches were received yesterday, at the Colonial-office-
from the Governors of the West fedi' Islands.

SOUTHAMPTON, Ammer 14.

The royal yacht Fairy, the Hon. Copt. Denman
commander, has just arrived from Osborne with the King of
Sweden, the nines Consort, the Crown Prinoe of Prussia,
Lord Palmerston, Earl Russell, Lord Sydney, and Major Du
Plat on board.

The royal party go to Aldershott, and return to Osborne
this evening.

They were received by Colonel Barlow and Philip Hedger,
Esq., oa the part of the dock company ; and by Morn.
Godson and Bank on the part of the railway company.
Prime Oscar ►as gone from Osborne to Portsmouth.
Royal salutes won Arad by the British frigate Donation
mad tie Portuguese Bigots Bartholomew Din.