The Sun.
London, England, 1855-11-19 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON, MONDAY EVENING, NOVEMBER 19, 1855.

sia_—oonvince them that "indifference is a false

calculation and silence an error !" and, as a natu-
ral corollary, that they must be either for us or

against us—the avowed supporters of Muscovite
aggression or the energetic vindicators of interna-
tional law, the first principles whereof had been

so shamefully violated.
But there has not been something worse than mere
neutrality, something that may, on thepart of some
at least of these parties, be regarded as decided as-
sistance to the enemy ? We have seen how the
Russian trade has been carried on under cover of
the Prussian flag, and how she has obtained the
means of continuing the contest, through the co-
operation of the professed neutral—nay, more,
how she obtained the actual materiel for fighting
which has been conveyed to one of the belligerents,
while the proceedings of the others have been sub-
jected to an uncalled-for and offensive vigilance.
Here, again, Austrian perfidy has gone beyond
Prussian indifference. Prussia at the eleventh
hour refused to forward " contraband of
war," which has been sent in large quantities
from Austria. We are told that the communications
of Prussian Silesia with Warsaw, and other rail-
road stations on the same line, " have been inter-
rupted by the immense transports of sulphur sent
from by way of Cracow to Warsaw, which accu-
mulate to such an extent that the railway station
at Granitza finds it impossible to forward them as
quickly as they arrive," and that " within the
last month considerably more than 600,000 cwts.(!)
of sulphur have been forwarded in this manner
from Austria to Russian Poland, and every day
about 600 cwts. of this article continue to arrive,
packed partly in chests and partly in casks !"
This is surely going a little too far, and it is high
time that stringent explanations should be de-
manded for these very unjustifiable proceedings.
But this is not all. Austria, not contented
with the occupation of the- Principalities, has
usurped a complete sovereignty, insulting not
merely the inhabitants, but even the representa-
tives of other nations. A very gross outrage has
just been perpetrated on an officer wearing the
British uniform, and under the protection of the
British flag. That uniform has been forcibly
taken from the person of an officer engaged in the
service of England, and replaced by an Austrian
military great coat. The Consul-General of Eng-
land fortwith demanded his liberation, but was
met by a brief and contemptuous refusal. The real
intentions of Austria with respect to the invaded
territory are Cans manifested. She seems to
think that the time has arrived to learn she may
at length throw off the mask, and evince her
real purpose without disguise or concealment.
But she may reckon without her host. She may
find to her cost that England and France will no
longer truckle to the principle of Germanism, but
will, however tardily, assert their own indepen-
dence, and compel the respect and sincerity
which cannot be obtained by more gentle
means. King LEOPOLD should also look about
him, and consider seriously whether it is
worth his while to forfeit the vast advantages
which he derives from England and the protection
of France in pursuit of the Austrian phantom—
whether he can sacrifice his English connexions to
German predilections. He, too, must at once
decide, and declare himself for or against Great
Britain.

The last success of OMER PACHA. reminds us
hat the War has been a great teacher. It has

taught us all much more of mere geography itself
than we ever knew before ; and it has also re-
vealed both perfidy and meanness on the part of
sonic nations, or, properly speaking, their Courts ;

arid unexpected noble qualities in others. The
varied military and naval prowess of the Allies

has been developed, and not by any means in

,he aspects which most of us had anticipated,

while the capacities of individual commanders and
leaders have been severely tested, and are now

pretty well ascertained.

We do not mean to take credit for any particu-
lar foresight, but we believe we were amongst the

first to recognise the apparently remarkable genius
of Olizit PACHA for high command. Others have
shown bravery, skill, and cleverness, but OMER
PACHA alone has shown high military genies. The
inspiriting and successful feint at Oltenitza, with
the permanent seizure of Kalafat, and its con-
sequences both military, and civil in regard to
Bosnia and Servia, indicated equal far-

S
sightedness and ability to lead and inspire
an army. The right positions were chosen for the
present and the future, and each part of his army
did its part with precision, and with the utmost
ardour and confidence in their commander. We
even believe that had not the Allies reached
Varna, it is more than doubtful whether the Rus-
sians would ever have passed Silistria. At least
his moves were so taken that any help from the
Allies became of double value. The next step
was the grand blunder of the Allies ; the one
whose bitter consequences we soon felt and yet
feel. lnstead of furnishing the Turkish General
with the one thing he wanted, money to supply the
wants of his army, and to march them, all habi-
tuated as they were to the climate, after the Rus-
sians into the Principalities, the traitor Austrians
were forced upon the SULTAN, his great general
thwarted, and his noble army suffered to melt away!
The immediate military consequence was, that the
only troops of Russia available at that time were
set free to fight the battles of Balaklava and
Inkerman ! Had OMER PACEIA. been furnished
at once, with what we at last have had to supply,
—the sinews of war, it seems quite reasonable to
suppose that he would have distinguished himself
fully as much in Bessarabia as the Allies have
done at Sebastopol ; and, that engaged in both
places by potent armies and skilful generals, the
Russians would have cut a very different figure at
Sebastopol itself, especially had Odessa been
destroyed or captured.
All this spring and summer the Turkish gene-
ral has been almost burked at Eupatoria or Con-
stantinople, for he is not the man for merely subor•
dinate command. Once more he is placed at the
operations,
aallnodtteids to himselfhim
head of independent
again ; the Asiatic campaign . $
and
d imgemneerthaalstheli, butypheb theegin to prove, not only his
own
efficiency of Turkish
soldiers in the field as well as in a fortress. The
the water up to their armpit
Ingour is but a repetition of C istate
as;
with
,we
are told, like another OLIVER CROMWELL,
in the face of a tremendous fire he crosses the
river at four points, so complete was the skill of
the general, and so enthusiastic the bravery and
confidence of his men.
We have the most entire reliance on the fore-
sight of his whole scheme. It must be observed
that he did not land at Batoum, the nearest point
to Kars, and make straight for the beleaguered
town, but at Suchum-Kaleh, some hundred miles
nearly further north, and on Russian, not on
Turkish, territory. From this point the enemy
could not guess what he would do. Mingrelia
and Immeritia, with Georgia and their capitals,
Kutais, and Tiflis were equally open to him, and
MURAVIEFF must have been placed in great per-
plexity. At present OMER PACHA seems to be
making for Kutais, the capital of Immeritia,
from whence be can march with equal ease to

Tiflis, and so place the Russians between him-
self and Kars, or to Kars itself. Of one thing
we are quite certain, he is the same general
who placed himself securely at Kalafat,
and he knows what he is doing. He has already
secured that influential man the Nein, and with
him the help of the numerous Caucasian tribes,
and if fairly aided will drive the Russians out of
Georgia and all the country south of the Cau-
casus, as he did out of the provinces. How lucky

in that case that there are no Austrians in Asia

;o walk in and appropriate what his skill and

valour had won ! Without meaning to disparage

any General, French or English, we have no doubt
that history will pronounce OMER PACHA, take

him altogether, as decidedly the superior of any

of them ; the greatest Commander developed by

the War. Could be have been generalissimo of

all the forces, could they by any possibility have
served under him, and could he have had the
tens of millions of money and all the mechanical

resources of the Allies at his command, it is pro-

bable that by this time all Southern, so-called,
Russia, from Bessarabia to the Don, would have

been wrested by this time from the aggressors.
If it could hardly have been expected that the
Turkish General would have turned out the most

remarkable military genius of the War, neither
should we have thought Sardinia and its King
would have so outshone Belgium and its King—
or rather have consigned them to the contempt of

Europe. To be sure LEOPOLD was fain to boast
to his Chambers of the consequence of their
country, as illustrated by the kind of honeymoon
experiences of " my son and his Austrian bride "
among the Courts of Europe. He had better have
told them of the style in which Coburg visits were
received in England, and he may certainly soon
communicate to them the news of a very different
reception for VICTOR EmextrEL. Belgium, a con-
stitutional government, stands aloof from the
battle for freedom and civilisation. Sardinia
bravely joins in it. LEOPOLD and his people, who
are indebted to an English navy and a French
army for their independence of Holland, the King
being himself a pensioner of this country and the
uncle of its Queen, skulk in selfish and effeminate
ease ; Vicron EmerTuzn and his people, under no
political obligations to the Allies, generously
proffer their aid. We fear, unlike most of the
German States, that in Belgium the people are as
selfish and ignoble as their Sovereign. Pocket
reasons in the former case, political reasons in the
latter, deter both from even the mention of a war
for national freedom.
If Turks and their General, and Sardinia with
her King, have exceeded all expectation, we can-
not say that Germany and Scandinavia have dis-
appointed us. Every Court of the former was so
notoriously overriden by Russian influence—
nearly every despot, if only to save his neck, was
so averse to a war against the despot's friend—
each of them, too, was so steeped in perjury and
oppression, that it was impossible to hope with
reason for the aid of any of them. Sweden, on
the other hand, could not move without money,
and ought not to have moved without the pro-
mise of Finland, of a guarantee against Russia for
the future ; and she might properly have asked
also that war should have been carried into
Poland. The Allies ought to have purchased
Swedish alliance at almost any price. They would
have fully saved the cost of it in the Baltic in the
two campaigns. Sweaborg, Cronstadt, Revel,
and Helsingfors, with Swedish gun-boats and our
broadsides, would by this time have been heaps
of ruins, and probably, therefore, a peace worth
having have been concluded this winter.
Indeed the people of this country, taught by
the past, ought now to bestir themselves.
Hitherto they have tolerated the infatuation of
their rulers, merely boxing in gloves, and seem-
ingly only fearful of making too much commotion.
Cruelly has the money and life of England and
France been wasted to the tune of "leaving Rus-
sia her present territories," of " not offending
Austria," of peace with Prussia, and of retaining
Poland, Hungary, and Lombardy in slavery. We
literally can afford this no longer. It costs too
much in money, not to mention the worthlessness
of the aim. How can a mere battle between
crowned heads ever command the ardour of
Europe ? The nations want to see the Holy
Alliance arrangements torn to pieces, to see the
rights and wishes of important and injured peo-
ples consulted, to see a settlement of the map of
Europe not upon the forced and barbarous scheme
which now tramples half of it beneath the hoofs
of hated and foreign despots, but upon something
like respect for peoples as well as kings. What
to civilisation are the Bombes, Hapsburgs, and
Hohenzollerns of the day. Polish emancipation is,
to the peace of Europe, of more value than the
whole worthless tribe of bayonet despots.

The position occupied politically by Belgium at
this moment is more than anomalous. It is sus-
picious. Neutrality at such a time is treason to
the inalienable rights of the nations of Christen-
dom. It is a defection from the sacred cause of
European freedom. It is an outrage to the in-
terests of modern civilisation. And, let it be

remembered especially that—besides being the
immediate neighbour and personal ally of the Em-
peror of the FRENCH—LEOPOLD is uncle at once
to the QUEEN and PRINCE CONSORT Of ENGLAND.
Ho himself having been originally husband to
that other grand-daughter of GEORGE 111., appa-
rently destined, at the time of their nuptials, to
rule the destinies of Great Britain under " the
name, style, and title " of Queen CHARLOTTE.
Since which period LEOPOLD has been in the re-
ceipt annually of many thousands of pounds ster-
ling, supplied by the pockets of that English peo-
ple from whose just quarrels this princely pensioner
can keep aloof so very economically, and, as he
doubtless fancies, so very " wisely," too, in his
generation ! Sooner or later a day of reckoning
always comes to your paltry economists, it mat-
ters not whether he be a monarch or a coster-
monger. And so in due season it must be
known far and wide, and proved in the
face of the whole world, whether it has really pro-
fited the King of the BELGIANS after all to shirk
the responsibility of his position by emulating the
cowardice of the Prussian and the time-serving of
the Austrian Governments. It will be then
known,
ewith tolerable accuracy, how far LEOPOLD
judiciously, to say the least of it, by
allowing his policy to be wholly and exclusively
Germanised. Sardinia will then, we conjecture,
contrast somewhat favourably with Belgium both
in regard to the credit obtained and the advan-
traegfeersenance to accruing from
war now beingfromthnepartt waged b
taken by each
the
hine
Western Allies against the great Russian Auto-
cracy.

Sardinia, we remarked some months ago, is
literally earning Lombardy. How far Belgium
is earning anything for herself by her conduct in
the present juncture we leave to the sagacious
judgment of the more discerning.
There can be
little question but that the upshot of the struggle
between the CZAR and the Allies will be the careful
and comprehensive revision of the Map of Europe.
It will then become apparent, among other things,
whether the Belgian provinces might not in some
i manner be rather judiciously absorbed 1 Whether