The Sun.
London, England, 1855-06-14 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

(From the Times of this day. )
Through a strange omission in some quarter or another we
have not had the opportunity of giving till now a most in-
teresting, though very short, speech by Prince Albert at the
annual dinner of the Trinity Corporation last Saturday.
" Brevity is the soul of wit," and his Royal Highness has put
more point into an address that cannot have taken three
minutes to utter than some of our Parliamentary orators can
accomplish in two hours. The Princejudiciously confined him-
self to one topic, and that a topic of the greatest importance.
He compared the operation of a constitutional and of a des-
potic Government at. war with each other. The comparison
indeed is forced upon us by the facts, and is very striking.
There cannot be a more singular contrast.. On the one hand
we see a profound policy, which we may suspect, but cannot
ascribe to Russia, till the Czar himself blabs it out, and puts
the world on its guard. We see unknown and infinite accu-
mulations of stores as if by the hands of Genii, or from the
subterranean workshops of the Titans and Cyclops. We see
myriads of armed men suddenly presenting themselves through
the morning mist, whence and how conveyed no man can
tell. We see a vast fortress garrisoned by men whom we
once despised, but showing not only the desperate courage of
fanaticism, but the inspirations of genius and the depth of a
great system. The conduct of the war on the part of our foes
is subjected to no canvass, and has not even the benefit of an
historian. A few scanty notices in the Invalide Russe are
all that posterity will read of the heroism and the taleAs of
great armies. From that field of glory every ray of licrht is
concentrated on one mind. One man has to endure all the
uncertainties, all the suspenses, all the mistakes, and all the
disappointments of the, awful conflict. On our side everything
is the contrary. Virtually, the whole British public fill the
amphitheatre, and surround all the arena of the war. We
hear and see ,verything; we discuss the programme ; we
canvass the behaviour and the plans of the generals ; we criti-
cise, we condemn, and, what is more, we inform, we advise.
We care not who listens. It is the British people that carries
on the war, and they will have it in their own hands. Such
is the comparison which the Prince makes, more briefly and
more tersely than we have done, between the character and
position of the two parties in the present war, and he draws
the very proper conclusion that we ought to show great con-
sideration for the Government which has to carry on war
under such manifest difficulties—that is, a public against a
secret power, which is much as if a being of common mortal
mould had to wage a desperate battle with an invisible
demon.

Such comparisons force themselves on the mind, and sug-
gest so many reflections, that the power of making them is a-
great help to the understanding. An Englishman might be
at a loss to describe the conduct of the war by his own coun-
try, and a Russian might see little that was distinctive or
worth particular notice in the military administration of his
own Government. But place these two things side by side
and they instantly become the measure and test of one another.
Wo see, then, what neither the Englishman nor the Russian
alone does, and we immediately arrive at a high degree of
negative knowledge. Wo see at once, for example, that Rus-
sia has not newspapers, in our sense of the word ; it has not
" correspondents ;" it has not public committees of inquiry,
changes of the Ministry, debates on negotiations for peace,
and discussions before the eyes and in the hearing of the whole
world as to the best mode of carrying on the war, the proper
objects of that war, and the terms we might possibly accept
from the foe, ~This is, perhaps, only negative knowledge,
for, after all, it does not give us the true rationale of
either aide in the comparison. But it is an immense
help to what may be called the infirmity of human knowledge
to have such a contrast, and to make one side the foil of the
other. Plntarch's Parallels has been a favourite book with
thousands in every age who would otherwise have cared little
to explore the several characters compared. What perhaps
is not always observed, but which imparts the principal charm
to these contrasts, is that the imagination assists at the pro-
cess, and gives a sort of dramatic affinity and likeness to the
two subjects of the comparison. We put them in one an- i
other's place, to see what they would do with a transposi-
tion of circumstances. We imagine, in this case, the Emperor
of Russia harassed, anticipated, compelled to change his Mi-
nisters, defend his policy, announce his plans, define his ob-
jects, and lay down his principles, by the public opinion of
his subjects. On the other hand, we imagine the British
Cabinet wielding immense armies with an unlimited power of I
conscription, with privileged secresy, and an utter absence of i
responsibility.

The purely dramatic parallel will satisfy, few minds. It
will tempt them to that more particular study of each side,
which is necessary to a just and useful comparison. It is
true that we may learn something from the contrast, but so
also may the Czar. It is true that constitutional government
is tried in these days, but so, also, is despotic. Publicity
has its dangers, but, if it occasionally helps a foo, it is neces-
sary to a friend. Commissaries, Quartermasters, Generals
will not tell the truth either to War Ministers or to Empe-
rors; so, while the British authorities at home aro learning
the approach and progress of their disasters in the newspapers,
the Rumba Government only discovers them too late even for
mitigation. In this country grand schemes of policy are
divulged, ventilated, condemned, and possibly prevented. In
Russia they run their course to actual catastrophes. An im-
mense secresy protects the designs and the administration of
Russia, but it protects those designs to the ruin and death of
their author, and that administration .to its final breakdown.
The Emperor does not even know the strength or the
weakness of his own army, and learns only to distrust
all returns with no other warrant than that of his
own servants. It is true that our councils of war are very
public, and our loyalty candid ; it is true that we expose our
own sores to the eyes of all the world ; but to that publicity
alone we owe the correction of our errors, the present suffi-
ciency of our armies and their supplies, and even, perhaps,
the defeat of Russian diplomacy, Possibly to her own in-
scrutable policy and impenetrable secresy Russia now owes
that she has not one ship afloat in the Black Sea, nor more
than one fortress still in her hands. In this country it is,
indeed, rather the whole people that carries on war than the
Sovereign or the Parliament. Thus far, that people need not
be ashamed to compare its performances with those of its Im-
perial antagonist. Even by the te.t of success the people
wages war batter than the despot. But success is not the
only test, for failure also is an hour of trial. We have already
turned our failures to good account. Will the Czar, like us,
have either the necessary knowledge or the means to profit by
his failures, to reform either his policy or his administration I

(Prom, the Morning Herald of this day.)
We cannot help recurring to the absolute necessity of some
independent member of the House of Commons moving for
the secret despatches now openly acknowledged to have been
sent to the admirals in command of our fleets in the Baltic
and Black Seas, whereby instructions, superseding, and di-
rectly contrary to those which were professed to contain the
intentions of the Ministry, wore conveyed, and of necessity
acted on.

Be it remembered, that these secret despatches being of a
nature which the admirals were bound to conceal, but to
obey, directly put an end to Cabinet and Ministerial responsi-
bility, the very names of which become a mockery while a
system is allowed to exist by which Ministers can profess one
object, then positively prohibit its being carried out, and
throw the whole onus upon the unfortunate officer in com-
mand, by recalling him as a scapegoat at the end of the cam-
paign, and refusing him an inquiry.
The public must now take care of itself, and declare its
opinion so determinately, that • independent members ap-
pointed to investigate shall not find that they have screened
the Government by " burkine the inquiry they were ap-
pointed and volunteered to carry out. Our readers must re-
member that this present Government is composed of men
who were colleagues in the Cabinet with those who have ac-
knowledged themselves as implicated in these most dan-
gerous machinations, and as we cannot suppose that indivi-
dual members of any Government would dare to act in the
manner in which Sir James Graham is supposed, on good
grounds, to have acted, it is absolutely necessary to ascertain
whether Lord John Russell and Lord Palmerston are not
participes crintinis, as everything would lead au observer to
suppose must absolutely be the case.
'We have unmistakeable evidence of the fact that the prin-
ciples which governed Lord Aberdeen's Cabinet are still in
the ascendant, and that while professing to make war against
Russia, our armies are wilfully paralysed and rendered non-
effective. How else are we to interpret the following facts ?
That the whole effective strength of the British army in
the Crimea at this the crisis of its fate, amounts to about
24,000 men. This force being without a reserve of any kind.
That the cavalry is so weak as to bo almost totally ineffi-
cient—while regiments and detachments, which have been
months under orders, are waiting, in the middle of June, for
transports, which are still in Balaklava Harbour, orders
having just been despatched to send them home, if not want-
ing there.
" inexplicable
d "neglect
That the militia force has been by
tot Ally destroyed for any efficient purpose, an no measure of
any kind even announced for its restoration. That the army from want of baggage-cattle at this moment
is•as immoveable, nearly, as it was at Varna. We believe it
could not possibly move 25 miles from the coast without risk,
.
nay, certainty, of being left 'without supplies.
Surely all these thins, after the warnings of last year. Can'
not be accidents.
We say, therefore, that in order to get at the delinquencies