The Sun.
London, England, 1863-09-11 00:00:00

THER3IO3IETER.

This morning
This day at Two o'clock GI
Barometer-30.13.
Wind—W.N.W ; moderate, and fine.

nit

LONDON, FRIDAY, SEPT. 11, 1863.

The quiet irony of " S" in our leading contempo •
rary must be rapidly rendering his contributions as
distasteful to the Federals as those of their own wilful
" MANHATTAN." The initial must sound to Yankee
ears sarcastically sibillant. " MANHATTAN" often
blurts out the unpleaeantest truths, home truths that
must perforce be doubly and trebly uopieasant, when
discussed at the hotel bars of Washington and New
Yark over modest quenchers in the guise of a mint-
julep or a cocktail—because coming avowedly from
the lips, or rather from the pen of a partisan. But
with " S." it is altogether something very different.
Liverpcol is the place he hails from, it will be ob-
served. It may be taken for granted, we presume,
that he is no American, neither from the North, nor
yet from the South—but that, on the contrary, he is
a right-down, plain-spoken Englishman. Then it
is, 95 we legan by saying, the very quietness of his
irony, that gives so much poignancy to its sting.
The perfec t self-possession of his manner in jotting
down his commentaries quite deliberately, must be
something frightfully irritating to a Northern ;
must render his calm insinuation of a sneer, when-
ever they fall upon genuine Yankee ears, as agree-
able to that same genuine Yankee, as though
his palate had been suddenly drenched with
gall and wormwood. Among the latest of these
penetrating, and surely intolerable gibes flowing
to all appearance from a pure love of mischief on
the part of S., is the casual remark with which
he opens out upon his old enemies, the Federals,
to-day, in the manner following :—" The City of
Washington," he says, "reports the capture of two
Federal gunboats on the Rappahannock—a curious
fact, as the Confederates have nothing afloat in that
quarter, and men have taken them by attack from
the land.'' And he adds, with an air of scornful
incredulity that he takes no trouble whatever to
conceal—" We ere also informed of the seizure
of 100,000 bales of cotton at Natchez.
There was some moderation in not calling
this 1,000,000, which sounds much larger,
and only takes one or two more ciphers of
type." Now for all those barbed and poisoned
arrows of ridicule perpetually hurtling about them
from all imaginable quarters, the Federals have
simply and solely and wholly to thank themselves.
They have to thank their own flagrant and noto-
rious mendacity. Their own aptitude for "piling
it up mountainously." Their own passion for what
we are accustomed to call in this country, a wilful
perversion of facts and an unseemly preference for
exaggeration and antipathy over telling the plain,
bold truth. When" S." flouts them for not putting
down 1,000,000 instead of 100,000—he de-
rides them not out of any perverse spite on
his own part, but because cf the systematic
mendacity notorious upon theirs. He is merely
uttering in a few plain words the obvious thought of
thousands. They might just as lief say 1,000,000
as 100,000. " All's one for that"--to them—just as
it was of old JACK FALSTAFF when, with his lips
yet wet from the flaggon, he protestedto Prince HAL,
with an oath, that he had not that day tasted sack
or canary. If we were to have believed the Yankee
statements after Gettysburg, MEADE and his
men were to make short work of LEE
ad his defeated army. Whereas—ever since Gettys-
.,"
R—the Confederate commander-in-chief has con-
ducted :his
any
et larmy whithersoever he listed without ,
his
ow u r
s hnaolestation, has recruited it, has chosen
ad
quite deliberately
afresh, and has prepared
operations. The
for a choice of his own future
~a evictorious MEADE all the while
acting,
since 4
simply
upon
the vaunted success over the South,
defensive. Again, the crash-
inc.; of Fort semier
taught to believe by
h into ruins was, we were
aireetle exultant commentators
upon that news,
of the fall of Sumter
hthe glad tidings
York and Washington—the 4ci reached New
fall
was to lead the assailing Federal of Sumter
roe almost by a
hop, skip,
and a jump, into Charleston
however, apper .0
b. -ale pro-
babilities there,
t e fading out
rapidly before the advance of the autumnal,
and
the prospect of the wintry season. All we
can
do
is to wait, and watch, and listen to the accounts
brought to us from time to time from the bide
0,
the Federals, with ao much credulity in the accuse}
of their assertions as those same Federals have
left us.

At the Liverpool School of Science, the QUEEN's
Prizes were delivered by Lord STANLEY. His
lordship mado a most interesting speech, and intro-
duced several instructive topics into his discourse.
He explained the object and purpose of the insti-
tution, which were to promote the general know-
ledge of science. He said, truly enough, that It
was idle for a man to walk through a alr-Olion of
interesting objects in art and nature without being
able to understand them. It 'was also felt that
it was not suitable for a town like that, the centre
and capital of the commerce of the north, to have no
special institution to teach science. Lord STANLEY
remarked further on that in Liverpool they had not
suffered from the American war to any very conei-

derable extent, and, indeed, some had been gainers; '
but still all had felt that they had a paramount
claim on them superior to that of education " in
the sufferings and privations of nearly half a mil-
lion of their fellow-countrymen." To this cause he
attributed the fact that the funds of the institution
were not so prosperous as might have been de-
sired. Still the attempt had not been a failure.
So many as 123 had attended the lectures, and the
students who had gone through state examinations
had passed in the respective numbers of 41 from 43,
and 31 from 33. Therefore, the best use had been
made of the resources. He would touch another
point, and mention that institutions such as these
often get connected with some particular sect or
party, however free and unfettered may be their
opening course. But science was "neutral ground,"
and he might say that this institution had been
formed and continued without in any way passing
from its ostensible object. But, his lordship aptly
remarked, if it were otherwise, perhaps, they might
have fared better. In most men there was some of
the fighting instinct, and it was often strange how
the love of good was stimulated by a little oppo-
sition. For them, however, things were doubtless
better as they were, for, if they excited no enthu-
siasm, at least they had no prejudices
wtoeh religion,neounter
They had nothing to do with politics, with
or social controversiea, than that they be-
lieved that the more scientific training was cul-
tivated the less likely any one was to become
the sort who injure any cause they take up, hot-
headed, narrow-minded, mischievous enthusiasts.
This is very correct reasoning, as it is never from
the class who is the most highly cultivated, or the
most reflective, that the violent notions proceed
which do so much damage to all who are connected
way, whether in concert or in
owpipthositthioenm in any
opposition. If was asked what was the aim pro-
posed by such a school as that here referred to, he
would say that its result was two-fold. In the
first place, it decided to impart a number of the
principles which they had to apply to men occu-
pied in various pursuits, it taught them to work as
men, and not as machines. This is certainly a
great desideratum to be achieved, and one that is
sure to prove advantageous to a large and influen-
tial body of men who, working in their several
arduous vccations, are great national benefactors,
and are well worthy to enjoy that pride and pleasure
in their engagements which gives the truest zest to
labour, and makes the skilled artizan as great in
his way as any king that walks the earth in pride.
LORD STANLEY then said that the institution had
another object, to provide a more special culture for
those who fall into loose and vague habits of thought.
Into this very comprehensive subject he did not
mean to enter, but he would remark in passing,
that he had long believed that even in the education
of the upper classes those who were supposed to be
the" brain-workers as opposed to the hand-workers
of the community, too much time is given to the
study of the works of man, or too little to those of
nature." Lord STANLEY further illustrated his
valuable remark by instancing how an English lad
might go up to college after having carried off the
highest honours of a public school, who is skilled
in the compilation of Greek and Latin verses, and
yet cannot tell why water runs down hill instead
of up, and how the heating of water in a boiler
enables a ship to move. His lordship went on to
say that he disparaged no kind of culture, and
indeed felt kindly disposed towards pursuits that
he once followed himself, but he did not see why
one pursuit should altogether supersede another.
In the best foreign schools the case was different,
and in intellectual training we were behind them,
if we were superior to them in moral and physical
discipline. This is very true, and the sooner
these mistakes aro rectified in our public
seminaries and colleges the better. There
is no reason why a more extensive style
of teaching
_should not prevail, and the results
aro sure to be beneficial to all concerned. Lord
STANLEY justly observed that almost all great in-
ventions, and especially those in manufactures,
were made by men who had risen from the ranks.
People might say that if they succeeded so well,
why should their successors need improvement?
He answered that they did not know what might
have been done, and "Brain Power," was too rare
and valuable to be allowed to run to waste. These
toilers and searchers after truth might be wasting
precious time for want of right information, and be
lilee men who lost their way in dense forests, who
did not know that within a few yards there was a
good road leading to the desired end. There was
no room here for the usual objection what was to
be done with the trained man when they got him.
Every manufacturer in Lancashire would ask what
was his use and value. The demand exceeded the
supply, in fact. Lord STANLEY concluded his inte-
resting speech by saying that they must look to in-
dustrial science as a means towards the develop-
ment of a higher civilisation. The slavery of man
to man was terrible ; but there was another kind
of slavery, that of those whose sole existence was
an unrelieved struggle to supply their wants.
" What they need is to have a portion of their work
taken off their hands. To this end we aro daily
progressing." The winds of heaven, the waters of
our rivers, the force stored in our coal fields, are
multiplying a thousandfold the power of human
muscles, and giving leisure for human thought.
There was no reason in the remarks constantly made
that machinery was unpopular ; the history of
science was the history of improvement ; it was
the conquest of man over nature, "of intelligence
substituted for brute force, and skill for toil ; of
life lengthened, disease rendered less severe, leisure
more abundant, knowledge more ample, and men
better fitted for those high destinies which, we
believe, it is the purpose of Providence they should
fulfil." A more fitting and appropriate conclusion
could hardly have been made to this highly in-
structive discourse, on a subject, too, which Bo
intimately and materially is connected with the
interests of all.

An interesting ceremony took place on Wednes-
day last in the to wn of Dundee. On that day the
People's Park, the noble gift of Sir DAVID BAXTER
to the town, was formally opened to the public.
A general holiday was observed in the neighbour-
hood in honour of an event which promised such
great and substantial benefits to all future genera-
tions of citizens. Such gifts are happily not so rare
in these days as to be matters of wonder, but they
are not common enough to deprive them of interest
and importance, and the large and liberal spirit in
which the
present undertaking has been carried '
131 t. renders it in every respect a national work. The
hearty cheers
of f
thefellow-citizens must have carried
gratifying assurance
to Sir DAVID BAITER
that his munificent
satisfaction, and donation had given universal •
that his . ,
residents in Dundee.
deservedly in hepcur name Will song be held
Another ilpeetator, NoloYt tilke
ah prominent part in
ihe day's proceedings, must
invited to be is staying
terested by them. Earl RusstL, been much in-
in the neighbourhood, was i
present on
the occasion, and to receive at the
same time the
freedom of the town from the hands of the.. n
—Orpo,
ration. The eulogistic address with which the gift
was accompanied, and the allusion made to the
achievements of his earlier career, must also have
been gratifying to his lordship, Comparing the