The Sun.
London, England, 1864-01-05 00:00:00

the coolest effrontery whether he would be
The Lcrd Mayor said, " Certainly not;'
The prisoner said, in a very off-hand
well, then, I shall immediately commence
these parties."
He was then removed to the cells.

when

manner, " Very
an action against

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

POST.—It is well that, at the commencement of a
year of which the political horizon may be generally
characterised as stormy, we should cast a glance at
the means at the disposal of Old England which
are available for the vindication of her time-hon-
oured claims to be " mistress of the seas." At the
present moment we need hardly remind our readers
that we are actually engeged in hostilities in China,
in Japan, and in New Zealand, while the unsettled
state of affairs nearer home renders indispensable
the maintenance of a comparatively large force upon
an active footing, or in an advanced state of prepara-
tion in case of any emergency. Our Admiralty,
whatever may be its shortcomings, cannot at least
be accused of a propensity to undue official reticence.
Punctually on every succeeding New Year'seday
issues the yearly return of the number, name, ton-
nage, station, horse-power, and armament of every
steam and sailing vessel which we possess, down to
the veriest cockboat stamped with the authority
of the Lords High Commissioners. Our bitterest
enemy has only to cast his eyes over the familiar
document to have at a glance what preparations we
have made to receive him, and to compare the
means which he knows to be at his own disposal
with those which we gratuitously inform him are at
ours. There is no pretence whatsoever either of
mystery or concealment, All the world is wel-
come to know how England stands as regards the
vexaga quastio of naval supremacy, what she has
already done in the way of adapting her armament
to the necessities of modern warfare, and what she
is prepared to accomplish in the same direction.
We think that the first impression of any one who
rises from the perusal of this interesting document
will be a conviction that, in dealing thus fairly with
all comers, Britain exercises a wise audacity. "Si
via pacem para bellum" is a motto which, if inter-
preted aright, has not lost its significance even in
the latter half of the nineteenth century. It will
do neither ourselves nor our neighbours any harm
to know that on the Ist January, 1864, the effective
fleet at our disposal amounted to nine hundred and
seventy-five vessels of all classes, not inclusive of
harbour ships at home and abroad, which would
be available for purely defensive purposes, or of a
large fleet of iron and wooden gun and mortar
boats laid up in ordinary at Chatham. Of
course in the sum total which we have given is
reckoned a large proportion of those comparatively
pigmy craft, which are not, in the opinion of com-
petent judges, likely to be in future the least im-
portant among our naval defences. There are, in
tact, no less than 500 vessels carrying from 4 to 21
guns each, although among these are many iron
ships of a power and tonnage which is altogether
out of proportion to an armament scanty in number,
but formidable in its calibre and in the character of
the guns. Besides these, there is a squadron of
one hundred and eighty-fine screw gun-boats, each
fitted with a couple of Armstrong guns, and pro-
pelled by high-pressure engines of not less than
sixty horse-power. Of the old line.of battle ships
we have still seventy-two specimens left, mounting
from seventy-four to one hundred and twenty-one
guns a piece. Many of them would have been
regarded but ten years age as models of naval
architecture, yet they are already well nigh num-
bered among the things of the past. We have 42
vessels classed as second rates, and carrying from
60 to 74 guns each, and 94 steamers and other ships,
which would have passed in old times for frigates,
but which are both of a size and tonne ge more than
equivalent to the line-of battle ships of the com-
mencement of the century. Below this, again, we
have 25 screw corvettes, a comparatively new and
very available 'okras of vessels, which carry 21 guns
each. The,whole force may be divided, roughly speak-
ing, into three distill et categories. One third, an round
numbers, of it is actually employed on active ser-
vice in every part of the globe. The second division
is attached to the reserve squadrons at the different,
dockyards, and ought to be able to proceed to sea
within a few weeks, if necessary. The third, or
reserve, properly so called, is laid up in ordinary,
and would not be available for some months after
the breaking cut of hostilities. Strictly speaking,
the ships which are in course of building should
constitute a fourth class, consisting of hulls in every
stage of preparation, from those which are just
ready td be launched to those of which the keels
are but rece2tl9 laid, and which, although named
and figuring in ti:' official returns, are as yet only
ships upon paper. Nines such, however, haVer beer
completed and launched the past year, in•
eluding, as we are happy to obsera7; n° less than
half a dozen iron-clad or armour-plater: vessels..
Four iron clads have been commenced within ta,
tame- period, and seven more are in various stages
of their stence, or in process of conversion
into experiments; f_hield ships. What the demands
are upon our navy may ,t,est be gathered from the
names of the different stet:aria to which they
are attached. For ,practical purpo;." these may
First,
be grouped under nine different heads.
of course, would come ships employed on home :.!'"
vice, or attached to the different dockyards, which
'ate perhaps the most numerous of .11. Then we
have the six vessels composing the elite of our navy
and constituting our present Channel fl et. The
East India and China squadron, under the command
of a vice admiral and a commodore, figures for fifty-
one in the list. Twent-nine vessels compose our
strength on the North American and West Indian
station ; and as many more under Vice-Admiral
Smart, form our Mediterranean fleet. We have
still a commodore and twenty-two vessels, mainly
of low ratings, employed in the suppression of the
slave trade on the West Coast of Africa. The
same number, divided, under the command of a
rear-admiral a piece; into the Pacific and the South
Eastern Coast squadrons, are in various parts of
South America. Lastly, we have eight ships
under the order of the admiral at the
Cape of Good Hope, and seven under the command
of a commodore in the Australian waters. We need
hardly say that a mere glance at any map upon
which these names will be found inscribed ought
to be sufficient to convince the most rigid economist
of the unprecedented demands made upon its naval
service by "an empire upon which the sun never
sets." It is true that, from henceforth, we shall
have to look rather to quality than to quantity.
But, inasmuch as one new ship costs about as much
as three old vessels, while it has yet to be proved
whether iron will in the end last as long as "hearts
of oak," we must not be too hasty in deciding treat
the change will operate as a saving of expense.
However this'may be, we are at least told fairly
what we have got for our money. There the ships
are at the service of any one who is bold enough to
assail them, whether the attack comes from a foreign
foe, or, upon the score of expense, from a homebred
financial reformer.
Ttetas.-of, the year just expired the most charit-
able record cannot say that " its end was peace."
It has taken its farewell of a world rife wig h wars
or rumours of wars, and died in the midst of a tem-
pest, like some historical personages who are said to
have sold themselves to the Powers of Darkness.
But the storm is raised by human passions, and we
fear the conflict will continue though the year has
passed away. We can scarcely congratulate the
nineteenth century, as it glides by us, on a decided
moral superiority to all its predecessors. We admit
all the material improvement it can claim as its own
work, but it has not shaken itself clear of much for
which it accuses former ages of barbariim. A good
deal of the experience of the last ten years is well
calculated to check the pride of philosophy, and it
begins to be doubtful whether the events of the next
decade may not deprive it of all ground of 'exulta-
tion. All our enlightenment has done little to di-
minish one of the oldest evils that have affiitted
mankind. The world has learned much, but net
enough to enable it to live in peace. From the
East and West, from the most ancient empires and
the newest republics, the reports are of the same war-.
like character. They come fast and,faster-upon us.
From Germany, Poland, and Italy, from Mexico,
from China and Japan, we hear of hostilities, or the
animosities that tend to hasten them ; and from the
great Western continent of America the tale of vio-
lence and battle is the fiercest of all. The Ameri-
can civil war has entered into the fourth year of its
duration. So far the predictions of European ob-
servers have been verified, and it now seems incom-
prehensible how American authorities could have
taken such an inadequate measure of the calamity.
Which side has suffered most in the conflict, or is at
the present moment most capable of sustaining the
terrible pressure on all the resources of the nation,
is open to dispute; but that a pacific settlement
of the quarrel is less possible now than in the
first year of the war is certain. All the evidence
compels us to assume that the struggle must con-
tinue. By the last intelligence we can at least
form an estimate of how Much of its avowed
objects has been attained. The submission of
the Southern Confederacy to the old central power
of the Republic is the great end the war is to secure.
The occupation or conquest of as much Southern
territory as may compel that submission is the means
by which the Federation is to re-establish its autho-
rity. The abolition of slavery was combined with
the war as a" military measure" only, though it is
now made to appear the principal motive of the
hostilities. The war commenced in the summer of
1861. The campaigns and battles of 1862 and 1863
are now matters of history. At the opening of 1864
how much Southern territory has the Northern Fede
ration gained, what has been the effect of that occu-
pation on the policy of the Southern S tato, and what

progress has been made in the abolition of slavery ?
The greatest success of the North was the capture of
Vicksburg, which, it was asserted, opened the wt.ole
course of .the Mississippi, and divided the revolted
States to the east and west of that river. Yet by
the last eccounts it is evident that the great river
of t

_he West is not " open" to navigation. The
Federals hold New Orleans, at the mcuth of the
Mississippi, and many other points in its course,
but the stream is as much closed for traffic as when
the Confederates garrisoned Vicksburg. Not a
steamer can pa as up or down without therisk of being
attecked by the Southern guertila, bands on both
banks. The immense territory through which the
river winds baffles all attempts to occupy it. The
whole army of General Grant now concentrated
in East Tennessee would not suffice to " command" e;
the Mississippi and "keep its navigation open." ,
For the greater part of its course it runs through
.1
a territory of which the people, as our corre-
spondent says, are "bitterly hostile" to the
Federals, and, as the actual consequence of such I
hostility, the river is closed. The same difficulty is
encountered on the inland lines of communication.
All the troops the North catild raise would not be
enough to fight and protect many hundreds of
miles of railway at the same time. It would re-
quire 100,000 men to keep the single line from the
Mississippi to Chattanooga in working order. The
distances appear to baffle all military skill,- and so
diminish the value of a successful operation
that it is followed by very slight results, A country
may be too large for decisive war, and the weste of
whole armies in America seems to prove the tact.
Napoleon swept over everything before Paris and'
Vienna, but Spain and Russ!et defied him and ex-
hausted his troops in a conflict with nature itself.
Gen. Grant is now contending with the same kind
of difficulties, while the Soutern forces appear to
be rallying in his front and rear, It is evident that
the Federal occupation of Eastern Tennessee, even
if it can be maintained, will not bring the war nearer
to a cone'usion. In Virginia the Southerners have
lost nothing in all the campaigns, and every attempt
to penetrate their country in this direction has been
defeated. The real task of the Army of the Poto-
mac is to defend Washington, which has been as
frequently in danger of capture during the war as
Richmond. The siege of Charleston has failed, and
the fleet of Monitors has suffered so much damage
during the operations that it cannot venture within
range of the Confederate batteries. The blockade
of the Southern coast does not deprive the Ile ople of
an ample supply of imported articles, nor does the
depreciation of their currency appear to disable
them from purchasing. Goods to the value of a
million dollars arrive in the port of Wilmington
every four and-twenty hours. The contraband
trade must be profitable in spite of c iptures and in
convertible Southern notes. It seems also that the
descriptions of suffering and want endured in the
South, given in the Northern journals, have been
grossly exaggerated. The general state of affairs of
the Confederacy, and, what is more important, the
feeling of the people, indicate both ability and deter-
mination to continue the struggle. They consider
Mr. Lincoln's last proclamation as a mere device to
secure political support in the North. Its terms
they regard with contempt. 'Time enough has now
elapsed to test the effect of his first proclamation in
reference to slavery. From Mr. Lincoln's Message
to; Congress it appears that the total number of
slaves the Federal armies have liberated is 100,000.
This is the whole result of three years of war in the
name of Abolition. And at an awful price it has
been obtained. For every negro thus freed it is
calculated that three white men have been killed in
the contest. If the four millions of Week are only
to be emancipated at the same cost, the calculation
becomes something terrible, and the feelings of
humanity will be appealed, to on behalf of a supe-
rior race. Toe worst evil that has grown out of
the system of slavery is the war carried on to extin-
guish it, To be succeseterl,_the conquest of the
Soup:tern territory must be complete, and, after all
the;, waste of life and' money, most of the task has
still be done. What Las been effected in the work
of abolition is even less 'in' 'proportion. me war
has liberated, one hundred thousand negroes, leaving
the condition of millions of slaves unaltered. Can
the most bigoted philanthropist assert that, as a war
of emancipation, the conflict 'has' been marked by
s'icceseP Or, taking it as'a War of conquest, has the
North gained territory enough from the-South ic
destroy its power of resistance and make its return
to the Union inevitable P If eithereof the objects
of the struggle had been obtained, the fourth year
of the war would not have found these questions
open and unanswered.