The Sun.
London, England, 1855-11-24 00:00:00

course, ultimately—but, meanwhile, to moral dig-
nity and intellectual rennement.

(Front the Times of this clay.)
These are new days for the British soldier. Time
was when he was of less account in his General's
despatch than a gun or a mortar, and it would
have been considered preposterous to mention his
name among the killed and wounded. Time was
when the people would no more have thought of
knitting hose and nightcaps for them, dosing them
with champagne when sick, and sending out deli-
cate women to sootho their pain and cheer their
languor, than they now think of performing the
same services for the regimental horses. Time was
when it could excite no wonder and little regret to
hear of a drunken army and to imagine every sol-
dier a bottle imp. The bottle, in fact, formed part
of the national idea of a soldier as much as his

bayonet and his musket. He was the type of a
good fellow that would stand not only fire but
fire-water, until he fell on that inglorious field of
battle—under the table. The sergeant drank,
and the young recruit took the King's shilling in
the glorious fellowship of the alehouse. His
health was drunk twenty times a-day by ad-
miring comrades; the farmer's wife quenched his
thirst, as he passed her cottage, with a draught of
homebrewed ; gin ho enjoyed, his ambition was
cognac, and he was as happy as a king when he sat
nightly in the bar of the Swan-with-Two-Necks, a
pipe in one hand, a pot in the other, and his
mouth full of smoke, mild ale, and blarney. Every
song-writer asked the question, why should he not
drink? "A soldier's a man,. life's but a span,
why, then let a soldier drink. if he went to the
picture gallery he saw a pretty vivandiere serving
out liquor to the defenders of her country. If ho
went to .the play he saw the model soldier tippling
like a fish, and every man, woman, and child be-
longing to that lath and canvass village thinking
it an honour to bring him brimmer on brimmer.
lie read a novel, and either some Major Galbraith
was found throughout the volume hiccoughing
" God save the King," or the first chapter re-
quired a drunken quarrel of redcoats to set the
story agoing. Who ever heard of sober soldiers ?
Cromwell's Ironsides were not soldiers ; they were
merely militant parsons, who could not drink be-
cause they were always holding forth—because the
devil of talk had cast out the devil of drink.

All is now changed ; or, rather, the facts still
remain what they were, but our ideas of what
ought to have been considerably modified. It is
no longer a point of honour with gentlemen to drink
so many bottles of wine per diem. The modern
reader is rather startled to find Boswell, after an-
nouncing that his physician has put him on the
shortest possible allowance of wine, taking great
credit to himself that for six weeks he actually has
not exceeded one bottle of sherry at dinner. Without
any Maine Liquor Law or teetotal pledges the edu-
cated classes of society have became extremely tem-
perate, and it may almost be said that drunkenness
is unknown among them. We do not despair of
soon seeing this good example influence all classes
of the community, and without the aid of those
physical restraints which the more violent advo-
cates of temperance in this country and in Ame-
rica seek to legalize ; but it cannot be denied that
in the masses, and in that section of them from
which our army is recruited, the vice is as preva-
lent as ever, and appears, indeed, to be worse be-
cause we of a different class have become better.
Let it not be supposed for one moment that we
have any desire to palliate irregularities in the
British army which, with shame and sorrow, it has
been our duty to record. There is the sad fact
still staring us in the face that in our Crimean
army sobriety is the exception, intoxication the
rule ; and, that a remedy may be applied, we wish
to ascertain clearly how the case stands, and where
the blame lies. Let us therefore say, in passing,
that we are measuring the British soldier by a
standard not one hair's breadth higher than it
ought to be, but considerably higher than he is
accustomed to. The blue jackets get drunk the
moment they get on shore. The redcoats spend in
drink every fraction they can spare. The French
are a whit better ; the Zouaves are as hard drinkers
as any of our Highland or Irish regiments. Our
soldiers are doing what has been the immemorial
usage of soldiers, and we conceive that the blame
lies far less with them than with the authorities.
In saying this we do not so much allude to the
fact that the Commanders in the Crimea have it
very much in their power to put a stop to the sale
of spirits as to the mal-arrangement of the scheme
by which the pay of our soldiers at the seat of war
has been increased. The pay has been increased,
but what facilities have been given to the private
to dispose of this otherwise than on the spot There
the drinking-booths are continually open, and if he
cannot get spirits from the English canteens, he
can from the French. But what opportunities
have been given him to send his money home or to
save it ? Who is to take it from him ? Who is to
take all the extra trouble of keeping separate
accounts of savings and remittances ? Who is to
take the extra responsibility of hoarding money
not his own in specie ? The thing can only be
managed by favour. It is true that many more
soldiers than the public are aware of do send re-
mittances home ; and it will be seen from a letter
which appeared in our columns yesterday that if a
man will but keep sober he can contribute mate-
rially to the relief of his family ; but we are sure
that this bright example would be more generally
followed, and the soldier would control his thirst,
if proper means were taken to facilitate in every
way the accumulation and the remittance of his
money. As it is, the extra pay is simply wasted,
and worse than wasted, for it is employed in demo-
ralising the individual and in degrading the national
character. We hope that the authorities will con-
sider this. And is it not possible to provide inno-
cent amusement for our soldiers during those
months when the army must be comparatively idle?
We have heard something of a scheme to establish
a circulating library, and hope that it will not be
allowed to fall to the ground. Lord Panmure has
in his day done much for the education and im-
provement of the soldier, and we trust he will see
to it that the moral character of the British army
be raised, and not lowered, by a winter in Sebas-
topol.

(From the Daily News of this say. )
The question of Church Rates is again coming
into the law courts. On Thursday, we find by our
report, Mr. Sergeant Shoe moved, on behalf of
certain parishioners of St. Clement Danes, for a
mandamus requiring the churchwardens to convene
a meeting, under the provisions of Sir Benjamin
Hall's Act, for the election of vestrymen and audi-
tors. A rule nisi was granted, and the matter will
probably be disposed of at the next hearing. As
we believe the principle involved to be scarcely less
important in its kind than that which was settled
by the long litigation of the Braintree Case, we
make no apology for at once bringing it before our
readers.
It will be recollected that the Attorney and So-
licitor-General have lately given an opinion that,
under the 16th clause of the act in question, pa-
rishioners would not be entitled to take part in an
election unless they had paid their church rates
previously to their voting or being nominated. In
the parish of St. Clement Danes there has long
been the now usual amount of opposition to these
imposts ; and the churchwardens have been fain to
acquiesce in the accumulation of considerable ar-
rears. It was a course, doubtless, which appears
the reverse of impartial, and calculated to produce
very considerable confusion in the parish accounts;
but we cannot say that they were not wise in their
generation. If they summoned the recusants be-
fore the justices, they were met by a simple, but
generally a rather too well founded, denial of the
validity of their rate ; and the jurisdiction of the
bench being thereby ousted, the costs—the only
produce of the proceeding—fell upon themselves.
If after this they adventured into the Ecclesiastical I
Courts, the whole expense, and that not of the
lightest, fell again upon themselves in the first in-
stance, while they would be dependent for reim.
bursement upon the goodwill of parishioners
against whom they had for years been waging an
internecine war upon this very question. Even
the fruits of success in their own courts might be
snatched from them at the last moment by a pro-
hibition, should there be a flaw in the manner or
in the fact of the ecclesiastical decree. They would
doubtless have reaped the earliest instalment of the
fate in store for all churchwardens, but that the
fast ripening knowledge of their legal rights as
vestrymen by the inhabitants of even the rural pa-
rishes will be anticipated by the immediate passing
of Sir W. Clay's bill.
But within the limits of the metropolis Sir B.
Hall's Act, as construed by the law-officers, has
been thought to promise at least a temporary solu-
tion of the difficulty. Although the rate was
inca-
pable of legal enforcement, yet, if the exercise of
vestry privileges were dependent on its payment,
the most refractory parishioner would quik
ly be
reduced to submission. So thought, it appears,
the churchwardens of St. Clement Danes. When
the meeting was convened for the choice of vestry-
men wider the new law, certain gentlenien were