The Sun.
London, England, 1855-01-17 00:00:00

THE MILITIA.

The Royal Westminster Militia, Col. Lord Chelsea, is
ordered forthwith to be embodied for permanent duty.
Yesterday the East Suffolk Regiment of Artillery as-
sembled at their depot, Brook-street, Ipswich, prepara-
tory to their marching to the stations assigned to the
various detachments. During the morning the follow-
ing movements took place:—For Tilbury Fort, a de-
tachment, under the command of Captain Whitbread,
Lieutenant D'Eye, and Lieutenant Everard. ForLand-
guard Fort, Harwich, a detachment, under the• com-
mand of Captain Leathes, Captain Gorton, Lieutenant
Eagle, and Ensign Gower. For Harwich redoubt, a
detachment, under command of Captain Barlow and
Lieutenant Daniel. A detachment had also been or-
dered for garrison duty at Hull, but this has been
countermanded, and a detachment of the Norfolk Mi-
litia Artillery are ordered for that post.
The Artillery battalion of the Royal Sussex Militia is
to be embodied on the Ist of February next, at the
depot in Southover. The men will be drilled for a few
weeks, after which they will probably be placed along
the coast in the martello towers.

The East Norfolk Militia have only been assembled
about a fortnight, and up to Friday last 69 men had
volunteered to the regular forces-35 to the Coldstream
Guards, and the remainder to the Royal Artillery, lst
Foot, GOth Rifles, 98th, and Rifle Brigade. Previously
to the embodiment of the regiment about 200 had been
released from their militia engagements to join the
army. The recruiting goes on briskly, the men being
almost immediately replaced. The regiment still mus-
ters nearly 700 men.
Two hundred men of the 2d Somerset Militia, chiefly
recriits, arrived in Cork by the Sabrina steamer, on
Sunday from Bristol. They Will remain there to fill up
the vacancies caused by the large numbers that have
volunteered into the line.

ROUEN. —The letters from Rouen mention that the
market for manufactures was steady, with a slight ten-
dency to improvement, the attendance of buyers having
increased.

The CHAIRMAN gave the; health of the borough mem-
ber. Mr. 'Lindsay, he said, had not long representel
the town, but if he went on as he had began he 'conlj
not trill to give satisfaction to his constituents. (Ail-
plause.)
The health was drunk with loud cheers.
Mr. LINDSAY, en rising, was received with renewed
cheering. After adverting to local topics, the hon. mem-
ber said—With regard to the war, although holding the
same principles as the Ministry, yet he must say that when
they first resolved to take up arms against Russia, they
shoul have done so with more hearty good will than they
had evinced ; if we had been better prepared for war, there
would have been fewer losses and sacrifices, and the object
would have been easily secured. He would say one
word further. They were aware of certain propositions
for peace which had been made, and of the nature of
what were called the " four_ points ;" and, considering
what we bad done and suffered--remembering the' vic-
tories of Alma; Balaklava, and Inkerman, not gained
without the loss of much valuable treasure and many
precious lives—ha believed that, even if these points
were agreed to by Russia, they would not satisfy the peO-
ple df this country. (Cheers.) He was an advocate for
peace.; he thought it a horrible tliing that civilised na-
tions should have to resort t(x,...gitting each other's
throats to settle their quarrels ; but it seemed neces-
sary to resort to war, and having done so, with re-
luctance as they all knew, he must say that he for one
was not satisfied with the four points. The honourable
member recapitulated those points, and urged that Rus-
sia had failed in its engagements to keep open the
mouths of the Danube, having an interest in drawing
as many ships as possible to its own port of Odessa,
and insisted that not only must the Black Sea be
opened to our ships of war, as proposed, but that
Sebastopol must be destroyed, if we would protect Tur=
key from the aggressions of the Czar., (Cheers.) There
was, he said, one point more connected with the war on
which he would touch. We had already expended a
great deal of money in carrying it on—there had been
additional taxation in consequence—and he thought Eng-
lishrnen, and he was sure our French allies (John Bull
had always been liberal in these matters), would expect
that one of the conditions should be that Russia should
pay the expenses of the war to which she has driven us,
(Applause.) Upon the conduct of the war it would ill
become him to venture an opinion. He had read with
deep interest the accounts in the public press; he had
admired the bravery and indomitable courage of our troops,
and although he had also seen with much regret painful
statements of their privations and sufferings, yet he
scarcely thought things werequite so bad as reported. In
the sister service, the navy, however, there was great need
of better organisation. This he knev. With regard to
the management of matters connected with the transport
service France was greatly in advance of us. We had
tY---we could hardly
Graham—but
amnedn ,the tmhoerfiersatbalbeilni tlyanat
tthhaenAdsmirir
jalam
when he told them that the same iyatena was now in
operation which was pursed a hundred years ago, they
would not be surprised at the difficulty and confusion
which prevailed. The form of the charter-party was
verbatim the same as in the days of the Dutch war and
Lord Camperdown, whereas the French adopted a form
like that used in the merchant service—being in this
respect, therefore, a great step in advance of us. (Cheers.)
These were facts the recital of which night give offence
to some, but he thought it his duty to the country to
state them thus publicly. Then, again, France had a
responsible head, to whom all might appeal. If a mer-
chant had occasion to send a message by telegraph to
the Minister of War, requesting to know for instance,
what goods were to be shipped in a certaiA vessel, there
was an answer bythe same rapid medium by four o'clock
in the afternoon. But if you wrote to the Admiralty—
muCh nearei—the probability was you would not get an
answer in a week, and sometimes five weeks elapsed be-
fore an answer was returned. (Hear.) This was not the
fault of the men, but the system; there was no responsible
head—responsible to the House af Commons, and through
it to the country. Messages were sent from the Admi-:
ralty to the War-office, from the Ministry of War to
e
the Ordnance, from thOrdnance to Deptford, and then
came back to the source from which they originally
pi-obeeded; A change therefore, must be made in this
respect before they could reasonably hope matters would
improve. (Loud cheers.) Having dwelt at some length
on this question, lie would only add a few words on
the burdens of shipping. A consolidation of our mari-
'lime laws was effected last sessionzqe wished it-had
been still more extensive and simple, hut a great im-
provement had been effected ; but the Admiralty Court
had not yet been reformed, consular charges had not
been abolished, burdens on shipping still remained to
be removed, and he would only assure them that to
these measures he should continue to direct his atten-
tion so long as he bad the honour and satisfaction of
being their representative in Parliament. (Cheers.)
Several other toasts were then drank, and the com-
pany separated. —Newcastle Guardian.

PECULIARITIES OF THE ENGLISH

CAVALRY.

The military critic of whose memoranda, the fruit of
long experience in high command in the Peninsula and
now again in the Crimea, we availed ourselves on Satur-
day last, remarks, with much good sense and modera-
tion, on the peculiarities of the English cavalry. There
is not'such universal admiration for our cavalry as for
our infantry. The horses are not broken nor the equip-
ments prepared in a manner to meet the approbation of
foreign cavalry officersLbut on these he abstains from
offering an opinion. :We cannot
h
ourselves to emulate his moderation wino thisl p re
respect.vai l upon
If
there he a sight at once ludicrous and painful, it is that
of a cavalry soldier on a rough trotting horse, with the
saddle canted; up' behind, and his stirrups of such a
length as to render it impossible for him to indulge in
the forbidden .luxury of rising in his stirrups—braided,
belted, and shakoed, a perfect picture of splendid and
deference to senseless custom, let
superfluous winery.rlafgaololynoinsecawilies
dh
ptoonk
t 0
00 we what, it
foi
rs
thathuiomotlnihileoerur:etralt°lhl;tb;lzrrigest and roughest carriage horse he
can find, on a boy's saddle, without stirrups, and, pre-
serving a perfectly erect position, keep the horse at a
trot as long as he can endure the process. He will find
that a mile of such discipline goes further to weary him-
self and his steed than ten ridden in the ordinary way,
and will form some faint idea why it is that the most
insignificant journeys wear out both horses and men, and
render our cavalry little more available for one of their
most valuable purposes—the gaining knowledge of a
country—than if they were not mounted at all.
Apologising for the digression, we return to our
Mentor, who observes that the British Cavalry soldier is
afflicted with the same helpnessness as the infantry, and
experiences the same inability to provide for himself out
of what the country legitimately affords, the evil being in
this instance doubled, inasmuch as the horse must also suffer
for the improvidence of the rider. The cavalry soldier
also is said to be equally ignorant of the art of war and
of the duties required from officers, non-commissioned
officers, and private soldiers in the field, from which it
happens that the early periods of a campaign by a Bri-
tish army are almost always more or less marked by
serious errors on the part of the cavalry, which they
often vainly endeavour to compensate by extraordinary
prowess in actual conflict with the enemy. These are
mortifying criticisms, proceeding as they do from no un-
friendly censor. One would have thought that a nation
like ours, possessing undoubtedly the finest breed of
horses in the world, and a race of horsemen more bold
and more skilful than are to be found probably in any
other civilised country, would at least in this arm have
shown a marked and unquestionable superiority. But
the spirit of narrow and prejudiced routine and the effect
of a discipline which seems to aim at making men ma-
chines, instead of retaining for them the advantages of
reason and intelligence, have somehow or other con-
trived to construct out of first-rate materials an article
not wholly first-rate. But even these defects are small
compared with that pervading vice of the English ea-
valry which renders it, notwithstanding all its dash and
all its bravery, the most inferior arm in our service.
There is little attachment between the man and his horse.
The best of our cavalry soldiers will do what the rules
prescribe for their horses, but it is a labour of duty,
not of love, and he will do no more. Tho bad soldier
will avoid, when he can, even doing that, without re-
gard to the injury that his horse suffers, and the worst
will not scruple to sell the forage of his charger to ob-
tain liquor for himself. He views his horse much in
the light in which a Russian colonel regards the boers
who form his regiment—as creatures containing in
their organisation a power of indefinite starvation,
which he is at liberty to strain to the uttermost for
his own personal profit. The result is the same in
both cases. The Russian foot soldier dies on the
march or in the bivouac, from causes which hardly
affect the better-fed troops of other nations, and the
English trooper's horse breaks down and dies under
privations and hardships which, however severe, are
not found to dismount and destroy the cavalry of other
countries. So notorious has the inability of the Eng-
lish cavalry to endure long campaigning become, that
people have sought to account for it by the plausible
hypothesis that the English horse, pampered and shel-
-1 tered at home, is unable to endure the privation and
hardship of a campaign. Our censor is not of this
opinion. He observes that the Hanoverian troopers
in the Peninsula ware actuated by a real spirit of huma-
nity and affection for their horses, and that this good
example and the effect it produced on the English
dragoon were the means of preserving the regiment's
in far better condition at the end than they were at
the beginning of the war. In confirmation of this
view we may urge, that while our horses have been
dying by thousands from cold, wet, and starvation
in the Crimea, the battery commanded by Cap-
tain Barker, where care has been taken to shelter
them, and give them all the relief which, 9irealnetancefi

We presume that, when Parliament meets on the 23d
of this month, the Government will make some general
statement of the scope and objects of the measures
which they intend to introduce during the remainder of
the present session. To expect a supplementary Speech
from the Throne, except in the shape of a royal message,
would be contraryto official etiquette and. Parliamentary
precedent ; and therefore the public must be content to
wait until the leaders of the Government, in both
Houses, condescend to explain the programme of legis-
lation which they are about to propose for the year 1855.
With the exception of one general allusion, her Majesty's
Speech was silent as to the domestic concerns of the
country. Her Majesty said, " Although the prosecution
of the war will naturally engage your chief attention, I
trust that other matters of great interest and importance
to the general welfare will not be neglected." The express
sion of this hope on the part of her Majesty was a direct
invitation to hon. members to ask the Government what
were " the matters of great interest and importance to
the general welfare " with which they proposed to deal ;
but in only one instance was a reply of a satisfactory
kind obtained. Two days after the meeting of Parlia-
ment, the President of the Board of Trade gave a pro-
mise that, shortly after the Christmas recess, a measure
would be introduced for the amendment of the law re-
lating to partnership—a subject which is obviously of the
greatest importance to the general welfare of the first
commercial country in the world. On the same even-
ing, one question having been satisfactorily answered by
a member of the Government, Mr. Hadfield, rather in-
nocently as it would appear, was induced to put a simi-
lar question, with respect to a subject of at least equal
importance, to the Lord President of the Council,
when his lordship said—" Regard being had to the
state of the business at this early period of the
session, it was desirable that the Government should
have time, until after the Christmas recess, to consider
what measures they might think fit to introduce. They
would he prepared to make theasomusencement after the
recess." The subject to which Mr. Hadfield's question
had reference was not Parliainentaly Reform, or any
question likely to excite strong political or party feeling ;
it related merely to a question which, during the last
twenty years, has repeatedly engaged the attention of
Parliament, and which was taken up by the noble lord's
Government no longer ago than the commencement of
last session. The question was that of the proposed
transfer of testamentary jurisdiction to the Court of
Chancery. The noble lord and his colleagues had the
whole of the Parliamentary recess to consider whether
they would reintroduce the measure on this subject,
which they succeeded in carrying through the House of
Lords before Easter, and which they unaccountably with-
drew to wards the close of the session ; and now they have
to consider, in the interval t etween the 23d of December
and the 23d of January, not only this particular mea-
sure, but every other measure which they may think
fit to introduce having relation to the domestic concerns
of the country. This is a careless and slovenly mode of
conducting the public business, unfair to Parliament
and the public, and not even to be extenuated on the
ground that the prosecution of the war naturally en-
gages the first place in the minds of all men. If the
Government had adopted the usual course of indicating,
in general terms, the subjects with which they proposed
to deal, the short Christmas recess would have afforded ,
a convenient breathing time in the progress of legisla-
tion—the public would have had an opportunity of can-
vassing the several propositions of the Government—ho- ,
nOurable members would have returned to their duties
with some knowledge of the questions which, at a future
period, would more formally engage their attention, and
the Government would have received some inkling of
that public opinion out of doors with respect to their
contemplated measures which is always a salutary check
upon hasty and immature legislation.
The last session of Parliament was remarkable for the
great number of really useful measures which were sud-
denly, and apparently without sufficient reason, relin-
quished by the Government. As examples, we may
mention the bill to facilitate divorce, the Testamentary
Jurisdiction Bill, and the bill to establish an uniform
system of constabulary. Measures on these subjects,
we believe, will be introduced immediately after the
re-assembling of Parliament; a measure on the law
of partnership, recognising the principle of limited
liability, has been prepared, and its introduction has
already been promised ; and the commissioners ap-
pointed to investigate the transfer of land have made
such progress in their labours, that a bill embodying
the recommendations of their report may, at no distant
day, be expected. We trust that proper care will be
taken duly to apportion this mass of prospective legisla-
tion between the two Houses. The principle of trans-
ferring the testamentary jurisdiction to the Court of
Chancery having been affirmed by the House of Lords
last year, the most convenient course now would be to
submit the new measure, in the first instance, to the
House of Commons. The partnership bill should also
originate in the House of Commons, to receive the care-
ful consideration of the many eminent mercantile men
who have seats in that branch of the Legislature. The
divorce bill, and the measure relating to the transfer of
land, should concurrently occupy the attention of the
Upper House, and especially' of the noble and learned
.orris, the weight of whose authority on all questions of
,aw reform is beyond dispute.—Morning Post.

HOUSE DRAINAGE.

Sir JOHN SHELLEY desired to know what power the
Court had of compelling the owners of houses to drain
into the sewers, and so get rid of cesspools ?
The CHAIRMAN stated that the surveyor had no power
in the first instance to enter houses for the purpose of
inspecting them.
TITHES AND SEWERS' RITE. •

Mr. OFFER moved "That doubts having been enter-
tained as to the legality of assessing tithe or tithe rent-
charge to the sewers' rate, the secretary drew a case for
the opinion of counsel upon this question, and that such
case, when drawn, be submitted to the Court both for
approval and to name the counsel to whom such case
shall be sent."

Mr. TUwAITES seconded the motion, which was passed
after a short discussion.

Mr. WADE then moved, " That a premium of 5001. be
offered for the best scheme for ventilating the sewers un-
der the control of this Commission, and for the destruc-
tion or neutralisation of the gases generated by the
sewage of the same; which, after a short, discussion, was
withdrawn.