The Sun.
London, England, 1855-05-09 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

(From the Times of this day.)
There seems to have grown up among our public
men a most unreasonable, and to us most unaccount-
tble, desire for peace at almost any sacrifice. :These who
:ast year could speak of nothing but humbling Russia,
ircurnscribing her dominion, reducing her power, and
apturing her strongholds, of opening the Danube and
Ott Dardanelles, and driving her from the Trans-Cau-
asian provinces, and who took infinite credit to them-
dyes fur not immediately unfurling against her the flag
f every nationality she has extinguished, are now con-
-oat with little more than the status quo ante bellum,
grid only seek for a nominal limitation of the Russian
leet in the Euxine, in order to colour, by some aPPa'
eta concession, their real disgrace and tergiversation.
The arguments by which this recreant policy is ad-
ocated in Cabinets and coteries are as yet little farni-
,ar to the public ; but we believe that they are pretty
early the following:—First, it is sail that all restric-
,ve terms of p,-ace with Russia are useless, since while
and France are united they aro already able to
of, irce moderation, and when they cease to be united
ail stipulations of this nature will lose their cogency.
:hen it is said that we are putting everything on the
Hiik of the life of a single man ;
and, laitly, that Russia
inaccessible by sea, and that we, owing to the break-
in of our military system, are incapable of assailing
,er by land. At the bottom of all this there may pro-
,ably also lurk a secret conviction that the duration of
4cv
he war is encouraging a spirit of inquiry, and leading
.0 results unfavourable to that predominance which our
governing clique nowhere asserts so completely as in the
oanagement of the army. The first of these arguments
,eerns to suppose, and indeed requires, as-a condi-
,:ion of its validity, that the force of. England and
France should not be diminished, nor that of Russia
,ncreased, by the conclusion -of a dishonourable
,eace, for unless this be so it seems idle to expect
bat Powers which admit themselves utterly unable to
.oerce Russia will he able to do so hereafter. But will
England and France, after the conclusion of a dishonour-
tble peace, be no weaker, or will Russia be no stranger?
Reputation is no trivial element in success. There is
,•ot a petty Court in Germany, or indeed in Europe,
There the praise of the Emperor will not be sung, and
its triumph over his vaunting enemies will not be cele-
• rated by sycophant kings and pensioned nobles. The
King of Prussia will become his viceroy, Sweden and
Denmark will surrender in despair the last hope of inde-
oendent existence, and Austria, exhausted by the ex-
lenses of an armed neutrality more costly than war
itself, will seek only to appease by the humblest submis-
non the anger she has excited. Of the position of
Pnrkey in such a case we need hardly speak. Her re-

qurces are utterly exhausted, her national spirit is gone,
her councillors are venal, and her councils divided. The
continuance of the war and the presence of large armies
atom the West have shaken to pieces her old system
without providing her with a new one, and the allies
cannot but leave her infinitely weiaker than they found
ler. Having, then, as we have shown, weakened Turkey
md strengthened Russia, we should retire from the con-
. est with the absolute certainty that we bad greatly ac-
celerated the catastrophe which we took up arms in
1854 to prevent. Nor could it be a matter of indiffer-
ence to us that in the opinion of Asia, as well as of
Europe, Russia would have established her decisive
superiority over the Powers of the West. There is not
a tent on the steppes of independent Tartary, not a hut
that clings to the precipices of the Himalaya, not a village
in China, India, or Per pia, in which would not be told the
tale of our repulse and our submission. The same races that
forgot Genghis in Timur, and Timur in Nadir, would bow
itefore the spell of a fiercer race than the conquerors of
dindostan. Meanwhile how would it fare at home ?
The armies of England and France would return crowned
with bloody and barren laurels, victorious in battles but
vanquished in the fortune of the whole war, ill satisfied
.with themselves' and little disposed to do justice to each
other. Those bitter recriminations which ill-success
'ever fails to provoke would certainly break forth, and
the embers of old jealousies and heart-burnings would
,rtainly be once more fanned into a glow. Thus would
he created in either country a feeling inimical to the
other, and that cordial alliance, which may well_ be con-
sidered an ample indemnification for she dangers and
sacrifices of the war, would run the most imminent risk
of extinction amid the repining of peace. Nor can we
conceal from ourselvestbat, whatever be the risk to which
he recent attempt on the life of the Emperor warns us
we are exposed in relying so much on the precarious
~xistence of a single man, that risk would be fearfully
'nerea-ed by a peace which should give the discontented '
factions of France the opportunity of suggesting to a na-
tion sen-itive above a'l things of its military honour that
the second empire had tarnished by an ill-conducted war
a.Azl an ignominious treaty the martial splendours of the
first, The steel of the assassin might still glance aside,
but there would remain the risk of the rising of that tur-
bulent popuLtion which no ruler of France since the
days of Louis XVI. has been able wholly to tame and
to subdue. Suppose a change of dynasty, and how great
the probability that the first act of the new power would
be to direct popular feeling once more into the well-worn
channel of ancient rivalry with England ! If we escape
1 this danger bow long will such a peace last ? We must
either be content to see province after province left be-
hind
the ever-advancing frontier of Russia, or once more,
with diminished character, with impaired confidence in
ourselves, and with feebler alliances, prepare to confront
an enemy emboldened by success, and instructed alike
in his weakness and strength by the results of the former
struggle.
We have suffered in the present war no disasters which
we may not trace to the improvidence of our councils
and the corruption of our system. It is absolutely ne-
cessary that the country should be placed in a state of
defence, that obsolete routine should be swept away,
and that an organization of thorough and business-like
efficiency should take its place. For these purposes we
need the unrelenting stimulus of war. We cannot and
ought not to trust ourselves to repair in peace those evils
that war has disclosed. Too many persons are interested
in concealing the true state of matters from us to allow
us to trust to any except the test of efficiency, which

hostile operations alone afford.—We can choose our
point of attack, and our enemy is, and must continue to
be, reduced to a defensive position. Our resources are
practically unlimited, while his must be growing scantier
and scantier every day. Our commerce is free,—his is
destroyed. Our people are free from all taint of disaf-

feetion, while among his ill-assorted dominions one por-
tion of the people is in actual insurrection, and many
others in a state of dangerous and chronic discontent.
We have no civil war to fear,--no Poland, no Georgia, no
Mtngrelia to watch and to guard. Grant that Prussia
and Austria fall from our side, we have been able hitherto
to carry on the war without them, and can do so still.
There can be no greater mistake than to suppose that by
putting an end to the war the Government would put an
end to the burning discontent it has engendered. Past
miscarriages we may forgive, but any attempt to screen
them behind an ignominious treaty
will infallibly pro-
duce a state of public feeling which would induce the
nation to take effectual precautions against such mis-
carriages and such disgraces for the future.

(From the Daily News of this day.)

Count Walewski, Minister of Foreign Affairs, M. de
Persi_ny, Amba,eador at the Court of St. James's—
rtehseisgenaaptipeoriinetfrnmet.itps ar,p)upyeaer
dteo
it,hHroeywe.somme. lidgehtpeornsigtnhye
has been understood to be friendly to the resuscitation
of the Kingdom of Poland, as a bulwark against Rus-
sian encroachments. A pamphlet advocating this policy,
which was published a short time before he retired from
geTnheeraildlyeaaetftrrieb.euettaedbtlioshhiinmg,paenidiehwnitehtoieuntacloitny-
rffiat de ei
t ie wasn.
must,views
of M. py
however, r
ebee presumed
de i
wu
Huy
s,
to
eif hbe
that
at
statesmanwithb
e
the
dis-
posed,tem per asisi
temporising he
ei
Austria.bel believed toT hbee,Gto e
vbeeraerm stillee t longer
Viennawithetahne.
not be expected to regard a proposal for the restoration
of Poland otherwise than with apprehension. When Poland
was partitioned, Austria came in for a large slice of its ter-
y,treitnoere e swahni cebt,i nn
,tehhee emv
jegnhttobtePeobl
gn ldbteei being
frecalled
eo,
Ae xui se
tria has been allowed tooccupy the Danubian Principalities,
and might hope to be allowed to retain them as a com-
pensation for any territory ceded to Poland ; but then '
the re-establishment of Polish nationality would be a
"revolutionary movement," and Austria has a morbid
fear of the mere word " revolutionary." No French or
English statesman, therefore, who still hankers after an
Austrian alliance can think of calling in the aid of the
Poles. It is consequently but natural that the recent
change in the councils of Napoleon 111, should be re-
garded as a triumph of the friends of Polish nationality
over its opponents. And it cannot be denied that the
steps recently taken for the organisation of a Polish
Legion point to the same conclusion.
It must, moreover, be admitted that the history of the
more recent wars between Russia and Turkey seems to
suggest the expediency of striking a home-blow at the
former power by raising Poland against it. Sebasto-
pol is not a new erection, and the Russian fleet in the
Black Sea is not a thing of yesterday's creation. Yet
Russia has never thought of availing herself of her
naval preponderance in the Euxine to seize Constanti-
nople by a coup de main; she has always commenced by
a land campaign, with Poland for the base of her opera-
tions.iandsh thee defencesacophobl e
ihas ofn g thethe
Turkish
uB
securing
case,Rkl
ikuasTh u
sntuif, Turkey
of
her
e.
r it
ktto the
eni
ys
This strategy was dictated by necessity• for
though an advance upon Constantinople by the Bos-
phorus would have enabled Russia to turn the line of the
Danubiann tdheE fortresses
harbourng of
fleets.
sb
ssut
l sinking of a few ships of 'war at the mouth of the Bos-
phorus would have shut out her navy from the capital
of the Sultan as effectually as the same operation at the
mouth French of
and
the reverse of improbable that the French Government
nrtiary
baseas havet ofe
h i
entertained
t y
neltiseltirt ne enedepeetrehafet
operations
ema
nearestaon feetly
depriving
the kept
againstbe regardedplateami no
more
he e
extendedlight of
Theseh
ee encroachments.
conjectures
njeetu ree ean e
n ly
loliteeasepeinrteemto the character of pro-
loambs ilibtiileisti.es—ThtahteYthdel'An
elan of campaign than the mere capture of Sebastopol,
.icarcely, indeed, admits of a doubt. The intermission
the bombardment, the reconnaissances on the Teher-
qaya, the strengthening of Eupatoria, and the hastening
up of reinforcements both of men and ordnance--all
plat in that direction. Repute ton roach us go*