The Sun.
London, England, 1855-04-24 00:00:00

what should we do without Austria neutral, or
rith her, if hostile ? We have been guilty of the
vicked folly of putting her iuto the provinces,
instead of OiER PACHA. and ourselves—What
:an we now do ? The treasonable folly we admit,
and the increased difficulty we admit ; but wa
Arm that Austria is an empire of sand, and better
As an avowed foe than a fatal clog. She is ripe
for another 1848. Her troops are composed of
varied races, all hating each other, but hating her
'ar more. She cannot rely on them. War wia
the Allies would be to her utter dismemberment.
Poles, Bohemians, Hungarians, Croats, Lombard:,
:could all fall asunder at the watchword of nationa
freedom, and leave her a poor naked Dukedom t•:,
repent of her bloody atrocities and perjuries in
tong centuries of insignificance.
But perhaps Prussia would add her troops to
those of Russia ! Let her try it. She too has
an 1848 to recollect, and her Monarch has broken
promises and oaths to be atoned for yet. She has
Poles in her present despot-made and despot-
ridden Chambers, who yet dare to tell her that
hey refuse all participation in her present course,
and that the interpretation of their silence is loud
rebuke—Cum tacent clamant. She has Rhenish
provinces speaking the French language, and she
has a Baltic coast which an English fleet could do
what it pleased with. Prussia, i.e. her Monarch,
would like to fight for Russia ; but he fears
his people, fears France, fears England, fears
neutrality, shudders at fighting for independence,
is reeked to death with the ignominy of being
nothing, yet quakes at the effort to become any-
thing. Prussia is perfectly harmless. Amidst
all the horrors of war she has at least the merit of
keeping up our spirits ; she kindly enacts the fool
for us, and makes herself the laughing-stock of
the business. We owe to her, every now and
then, the exhilaration of a good, hearty
laugh. Contempt and detestation will some-
times give way to irrepreslible merriment over
her merry-Andrew attempts at bigness.

better term a than any yet submitted for conaidera-
don. Russia will find when she becomes an
humble suitor for peace on any terms that her
past treaclhe ry has not been forgotten, and that
ample retribution will be exacted for the sacri-
fices we have made—the blood we have shed—
the millions are have expended. We now know
tohat we have • to encounter, and France and Eng-
land will prove themselves to be Worthy of their
tncient reputata7onti, and prepare to make amends,
by the most energetic efforts, for the time they
'lave wasted in consequence of their too credulous
belief in the protestations and professions of their
faithless adversary.

Lord GREY the other night, we suppose lest
iris inborn Whiggery should be forgotten, actu-
illy went out of his way to tell the Noble Lords
that Church Rates are no longer a hardship ! A
majority only can Tote them now, therefore it is
no hardship to pay them ! Why, the Noble
Lord has out-Whigged the Whigs. They them-
selves, before that absurd wresting of the law and
common sense which gave a minority the rights
of a majority was propounded at Wes'minster,
made efforts to abolish them. Why did they do
so ? They surely thought them a hardship on
Dissenters then. Can they be less a hardship
now, when the law is declared to be precisely what
it was then understood to be? The truth is, no
sophistry, legal or political, can alter the
plain fact that every sincere Dissenter
feels it a grievance to be forced to
pay a penny for a system of Church government
tnd worship which he never uses, and of which, in
addition, he probably disapproves. On men so
bigotedly wedded to the dominance of their own
Church as not to understand the galling nature of
such an enforced tribute to a hated supremacy all
argument is lost. They need a higher, a more
generous morality, and a more living religion, not
a better knowledge. The defect is in the heart,
not in the head.

Well at length the Conference is at an end,
and time it should be. Now then if war is to be
a costly reality instead of a costly sham, let us in
all conscience get to work as we ought. The first
thing is to strip to it. We are encumbered with all
the appointments and arrangements of place both
in the civil and military service. Away with
them ! Merit and ability must now be put into
every post, and incapacity dismissed or pensioned.
No more seven millions wasted in transport blun-
dering, to be made up by taxes on commerce and
income—the country cannot and will not endure
it. We are encumbered also with Prussian and Aus-
trian diplomacy. Strip off all that too, and let us
get to work with the zeal, the ability, the energy
of France and England. We can do it. But one
thing is wanted—fling all cant and aristocratic im-
position to the winds, and this summer's cam-
paign would, we believe, bring Russia to terms.
A loan (however badly managed) and the enlist-
ment of Poles and Fins are good signs. We only
want more such signs.

• Some few well-meaning persons are really per-
plexed about a substitute. The answer is, you
have it. You have used it. You have used it
munificently. You have raised millions by
voluntary subscription to build new churches, and
sometimes in country places too. Do the same to
maintain them. You will never miss the amount
required ; it is but a fraction of what is raised
yearly for church building. Boldly repeal the
impost altogether, and in six months people will
wonder how it could have been the subject of so
long a quarrel. Even poor Church-Rate LORD
JOHN will smile at his own fatuity.

The Newspaper Stamp Bill has passed through
committee, with the exception of the propositions
relating to registration and securities, and the
tonal clauses recently brought forward by the
Chancellor of the Exchequer. These matters will
be further considered on Monday next, and we
earnestly hope that the proprietors of public jour-
nals will not be excluded from the privileges of
their fellow-Englishmen, and deprived of that
which has been justly regarded as the great pal-
ladium of the national liberties—the trial by
jury. We have already pointed out the vexatious
character of these provisious, and the constant
annoyance to which public journalists must be
subjected when any degree of inadvertence, any
pretended violation of the law, and that inter-
preted by a single stipendiary magistrate, or two
of " the great unpaid," must be expiated by a
minimum, penalty of five pounds, or possibly up to
thirty pounds, although a jury might consider that
there had not been the slightest infringement, or any
legitimate copyright ; or if there had been, that
the smallest coin of the realm would afford ample
compensation for the loss. These are serious
matters, and even those who now loudly clamour
for the restrictions, who hold out their hands for
the gyves to be fastened thereon, will find that
they have committed a f ttal error, and too late
deplore the grievous mistake into which they
have fallen. It is, however, much easier to
put on than to remove the fetterA. "The
liberty of the Press" is a matter of too
great importance to be tampered with on
trivial grounds, or to gratify the crotchets of an
incompetent Minister. As we have already stated
there is not the slightest pretext for the change ;
the want of the alleged protection has not deterred
any journal from using its utmost exertions to
obtain priority of intelligence. There is under
the existing law a full oopyright in original
articles and literary compositions, but there can-
not be in news : that which is circulated on the
Stock Exchange and become the common
topic of conversation cannot be considered the
exclusive property of the first journal that
contrives to catch and embody the floating
rumours. Let the independent Members of Par-
liament just consider the probable consequences
that may result from the change—how greatly
the public may be injured by any virtual mono-
poly conferred even for. 24 hours. We unhesi-
tatingly declare that it will be impossible -to pre-
dict the disastrous effects to all journals without,
exception ; for eve❑ those who spare no expense
to procure the earliest and Most authentic
intelligence must still either come within the
meshes of the law or supply a mutilated article to '
their subscribers. Let these matters be fully
considered, and let Parliament pause before it

The Conferences at Vienna have been adjourred
sine die, and the representatives of France and
England are now en route .to the scenes of their
respective duties. We earnestly congratulate the
country on these auspicious tidings. It is well
that the solemn farce shinild be brought to a con-
clusion on any terms. It had for a long time
been manifest—in fact since the commencement
of the discussions on the Third Point—that Russia
had no intention of making any real concessions,
or abandoning the aggressive pOlicy which she had
so steadily pursued for a succession of ages.
Although she deliberately entered into engage-
ments to negotiate on the basis of the Four
Points, after resorting to every species of subter-
fugefor the purpose of procrastination, she peremp-
torily rejected every suggestion offered by the
Allies, at the same time refusing or neglect-
ing to bring forward any counter-proposi-
tion on her own account. The proposals of
the Allies were indeed of a very diluted character.
No mention was made of Sebastopol ; that "stand-
ing menace to Europe" was still to remain in all
its strength and power, ready to shelter any fleets
which the AUTOCRAT might think it advisable to
construct. Not one inch of Russian territory
was to be surrendered, and, in fact, no security
given beyond the personal recognisances of Russia
to keep the peace. We should have been satisfied
with mere promises, although experience has
proved, by numerous examples, that the pledges
of Russia are not worth the parchment on which
they may be inscribed. All that was demanded
was that the amount of the Russian naval forces
in the Euxine should henceforth be limited by
treaty, or that the Black Sea should be declared
wholly neutral ground, and all chips of war, of all
countries, wholly excluded from it, so that hence-
forth it should be a sea for commerce only. Even
these meagre and unsatisfactory conditions were,
after a further delay, absolutely rejected by the
Russian Plenipotentiary, and hence the breaking
up of the Conferences, and the departure from
Vienna of Lord JOHN RUSSELL and ,M. DROUYN

enacts in haste that which will be repented of at
leisure, not ony by public journalists, but by the
entire community.

nz L'Huvs. The history of the Duke of NEWCASTLE as War
and not least that part of it which he
It will be seen that the above statement rests Minister,
on no doubtful authority. We are not compelled reveals himself iu his examination before, the Se
-
to give it either as the guesses or accounts of bastepol Committee, is exceedingly edifying andinstructive. It shows us in the most charming
" well-informed correspondents." The Premier manner how affairs of Slate are managed under
has announced the facts in his place in Perna- our aristocratic administrations, and beautifully
ment, and further explanations w.ll doubtless be illustrates the celebrated remark—" See, my son,
accorded on the return of Lord JOHN RUSSELL with how little wisdom the world is governed."
from his abortive and futile mission.
" There is a Providence," says HAMLET, " in the
We shall
then see what dependence can be placed on the -
fall of a sparrow .
'" but it requires a large gulp of
promises of Austria, and how far she is prepared faith, after the late revel ttions, to believe that we
have not been delivered over for degradation and
to carry out the engagements— such as they are— plunder—as events have turned out—to the
into which she entered by the Treaty of the 2d absolute dominion of Chance.
December, as explained by the memoir of the In the first instance, how came the DUKE to be
28th December. We are told that she "agreed War Minister ? Simply because he was Colonial
to"—perhaps elicited might be a more correct Minister, and a Duke. Fired, as Lord JOHN
phrase—the principles laid down by England and RUSSELL tells us, with "a laudable ambition," he
and, of course,
chose an office for which he was pre-eminently unfit,
France, and that her Plenipotentiary joined with
those of the Western Powers in pressing either without • he got it. Without experience,
weight, without firmness, and without
branch of the alternative above referred to on resolution, be undertook a department that re-
Prince GORTSCHAKOFF. It is time, therefore, quired them all in an extraordinary degree. And
that she should be prepared to act decisively and what did he do ? In the first place, he had energetically, unless willing to be held forth to to
appoint two Under Secretaries of State
for the de-
partmen t
the reprobation of Europe as an example of per- Having,of which he had become the head.
comparatively speaking, no tidy and bad faith. As we have repeatedly stated, nor experience in war matters him knowledge
self it might
neutrality is impossible. She must henceforward be supposed he would endeavour to supply the de
array herself either for or against the Conserva- ficiency. Vain supposition. He appointed his
tors of the peace of the world. Her course must c.ousin—a gentleman who at least knows his rela-
h• to
ris rp the Duke, and his Private Secretary,
be clearly defined ; and it is scarcely possible to tio
who knows less of war than
either • and, with
e that the French and English Ministers similar wisdom and propriety, he went to work to
suppos
could have taken their departure from Vienna make a host of minor appointments ! From an
before a complete understanding had been arrived 1 Executive like this what could be looked for but
at on that important topic. the
We suspect, from the most hopeless confusion and the most ful expenditure.
waste-
ominous silence of Lord PALMERSTOI.C, that the
anticipations which we long since put forward 1 Take another example of the Duke's incapacity.
will be completely verified, and that, as in the He actually allowed Lord HARDING; another
olden t.' 'lmbecile in office, to foist certain colonels into
ime, she will still show herself to be I commands as generals in the Crimea without con-
'
"Pcstnn ,
a 4 champion, that does never fight I suiting him 1 In his own words, these officers
But when her '
humorousf ladyship is by iwere appointed by "inadvertence." Men on
To teach her
But whatever safety
Iwhose skill and prudence the fate of battles might
the drop-scene ha the_s result, we rejoice that depend appointed by " inadvertence! ". His
terminated. We
1150v1,a.lien---that the farce has Grace may console himself with the rcilecticn
knee that that he meant well ; but this is poor satisfaction
have obtained a dislues we could only
'Arable and for buried thousands and wasted millions--f -r
peace, which would only l precarious
est until R • the domestic bereavements and the burdensome
a suitable opportunity for viol • mama found •
ating, its taxation his and other men's niisnianagemeDP, of .
prc i •
We no longer trust to uegot-r-d-, -.;-- , v ".T. .4,1 have• .-•., I- advertence," '
la ions. lth-e-v;:e ,- le Isar occawont d. ea vertence, in-
of our naval and military foreos wiu eLeur deed ! For
such aoto there is a noire appropriate ,
Owe
far s term.