The Sun.
London, England, 1864-08-04 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS,

TlhiEs.—lf ever the history of the present
American Civil War is fairly and fully written, the
world will have reason to wonder at the annoy-
ances with which it vexed British subjects, and the
good temper with which the British Government
submitted to them. There are, probably, at this
moment scores of English families who can testify
to the vexations and cruelties suffered by their re-
lations during a temporary residence in the United
States—to the deception and fraud, the violence
and menace, by which they have been coaxed or
bullied into involuntary service, and made to fight
for a cause with which they had neither personal
nor national concern. There are scores of families,
too, who have tales to tell of violent and unconsti-
tutional arrests—of equally unconstitutional im-
prisonment under vague charges or more vague
suspicion of disaffection to a Government to which
the unoffending victims owed no allegiance. But,
although the martyrs to this tyranny may be
counted by hundreds, their persecutions are gene-
rally unknown beyond the limits of the domestic
circle. Some of them, through ignorance of letters,
are unable to write a statement of their grievances ;
others, through ignorance of the world, are at a
loss to whom they should write with a chance of
obtaining redress; and no inconsiderable number of
them discover that appeal and remonstrance are
futile, unless they possess the means to corrupt the
satellites of power, and make the tools of tyranny
the instruments of its evasion. It is probable that
not many more than half of the sufferers succeed in
transmitting their complaints to the English Con-
sulate at New York and the other Consulates in the
United States. It is also probable that not more
than half of those whose complaints do reach this
destination obtain a place in the diplomatic corres-
pondence of the country. We may, therefore, assume
that such cases of oppressive or vexatious treatment
as figure in Parliamentary papers represent the
character rather than the amount of the injury sus-
tained by British subjects in America during the
Civil War. A typical case of this kind is presented
in the papers laid before Parliament respecting
the imprisonment of Mr. James M'Hugh. It is a
typical case, inasmuch as it illustrates the despotic
licence enjoyed by the military authorities of the
United States, and the difficulties in the way of
redress successfully interposed by the insubordi-
nate obstinacy of venal inferiors. Mr M'Hugh
seems to have been arrested and imprisoned in Fort
Lafayette for some unproved disaffection to the
Federal Government. Of this charge he seems to
have been pronounced innocent by a Military Com-
mission so far back as last February. Yet he con-
tinued a prisoner. About the 26th of June Mr
Seward answered a remonstrance which Lord
Lyons had addressed to him on the case by calling
in person at the Embassy and promising that Mr
M'Hugh should be released immediately, On the
let of July Mr M'Hugh was still a prisoner in Fort
Lafayette. On the 2d of July the English Acting
Consul at New York ascertained that he remained
a prisoner. On the 4th of July he was released,
eight days after the Secretary of State had pro-
mised that his liberation should be immediate. But
the mode of his liberation was characterised by cir-
cumstances which showed the laxity that pervades
American administration, and the tendency of the
American authorities to conflict with one another in
favour of harshness towards the helpless. The Secre-
tary of State had ordered the instant and uncondi-
tional release of M'Hugh; but Mr Stanton; it
seems, thought Mr Seward's order too liberal, for
on the 3d of July Major-General Dix thus writes
to the Commandant of Fort Lafayette:—" By order
of the Secretary of War, you will immediately re-
lease James M'Hugh upon his taking the oath and
giving his parole of honour to immediately leave
the United States." Properly enough, M'Hugh re-
pudiated the conditions which, by Mr Stanton's
orders, General Dix attempted to affix to his libe-
ration. He refused to accept his liberty on terms
which were inconsistent with his status as an Eng•
lish subject, and with his admitted innocence of the
charge originally preferred against him. Owing,
however, we suspect, to the urgency of Lord
Lyons's intercession, M'Hugh was the next
day liberated from his confinement of seven
months without any condition at all. We have
called this a typical case. We suspect there
are many others which bear a family likeness
to it, but are more aggravated in the harshness of
their features. Here we have an English subject
imprisoned under military law for a period of at
least seven months on a charge of which a military
commission had pronounced him innocent. We have
the Home Secretary of the United States Govern-
ment, after seven months, promising the English
ambassador that he should be released forthwith.
Wo have the Secretary of War, the General com-
manding the New York district, and the Com-
mandant of Fort Lafayette, all combining to nullify,
the distinct orders or the Home Secretary, by im-
posing terms at once illegal and unmerited. Finally,
the prisoner is released. But, we should like to
know, how many cases are there resembling this
case of M`Hugh'e ? How many English subjects
are there at this moment lingering in Fort
Lafayette and other prisons of the Federal Govern-
ment, who are likely to linger on till death, per-
haps, unknown, unheard of, and unpitied ? M'Hugh
appears to have had some pecuniary means. He
uses the telegraph. Ho writes to the Acting Con-
sul at New York. His telegrams and his letters
reach the hands of those for whom they are in-
tended. Now, the notorious venality of the func-
tionaries who clutch the wages of this American
Imperialism renders it very improbable that the
hands through which his letters and messages
passed were not lubricated by currency notes. But
now many poor wretches may there be who, for an
incautious word, on a groundless suspicion, for a
refusal to enlist in a foreign army, or for any prey
text whatever, pine on in a dismal gaol, without
the faintest prospect of boin' able to communicate
with the external world ? Worse than this, how
many men are there who, having been dragged
into enlistment, and having scratched a few lines
to the nearest English Consul, have, on the faith of
official intervention, ventured to escape from the
hated service, and only found out that their poor
petition had miscarried when they heard the sen-
tence of death pronounced for their desertion ?
We do not wish to throw unmixed blame on the
Government of the United States for these things.
Like other Governments, it has bed servants, and
its bad servants are in equal degrees cruel and
corrupt. No one would accuse Mr. Seward or the
President of a deliberate wish to annoy, oppress,
deceive, trepan, and enlist unoffending English sub-
jects residing in the United States. In this very
instance of which we are speaking, Mr. Seward
appears to have met Lord Lyons' application with
friendly promptitude. 11fir, Stanton's interpolation,
too, may perhaps be attributable rather to spite
against his own colleague than to malignity against
English or the English Minister: And we must
admit, too, that the institutions of the United States
do not favour an over-courteous demeanour towards
foreign Governments ; while the intensity of the
passions excited by the present desperate strife in•
fuses a venomous malignity into the zeal of the
lowest class of partisans. But while we wish to
make every reasonable excuse for the precipitation
of patriotic passion, for the imperfection of institu-
tions framed rather to suit a theory than to work
practically, and while we admit readily exceptional
instances of considerateness and good feeling, we
cannot forget that, during this unhappy war, there
has accumulated a series of grievances on the part
of English subjects, of which our Government will
hereafter be bound to remind the Government of
the United States.

POST.—Stretched on the rack, Denmark has
yielded. She hes succumbed to a force she had no
means of withstanding. She has surrendered when
further resistance was impossible. She submitted
to a pressure she could not resist. She has laid
down her arms, and given up a good half of her
kingdom, to save her life. She has accepted the
terms of peace that have been dictated to her, and
has subscribed the preliminaries under constraint.
We will not speculate on the legality of an engage.
ment signed, as it were, with her own blood, but
that the signature completes the protest she had
already recorded is indisputable. W. hen, however,
we are asked to see in all this a satistac,tory result—
when wo are requested to rejoice at the termination
of hostilities on such conditions—we must say that,
so far from being matter for congratulation the
conclusion is one calculated to produce, not only
sorrow and shame, but apprehension and dismay.
It has invalidated the title-deeds of Europe ;
it has set aside moral right; and it has propounded
a principle which the‘ conscience of the civilised
world condemns. Those who look with a cynical
eye on human feeling, and those who cannot, or
will not, perceive that these miserable expedients,
and this hand-to-mouth policy, do but postpone for
a little time the catastrophe they tend eventually
to aggravate, may make light of the sufferings of a
defeated nation; that is their own affair; but it is
not within their province to profess to explain the
sentiments which are entertained by the people of
this country. Nor is there, as has been pharisai-
cally pretended, the slightest ground for supposing
that Prussia and Austria have been prevented from.
grasping at more than they have actually laid the
hands upon by what is called the " moral influence"
of Europe. If these Powers have bean advised to
moderate their demands, the advice has been con-
veyed in language which c!early intimated a decided
intention to enforce compliance, and it has emanated
from a Government which is known to keep its
word. The Austrian Minister may have been in-
vited to consider certain eventualities, and Count
Bismarck, though he assumed the air of a dictator
at Vienna, was not in a position to guarantee the
Possession of Venetia. But if the ruck woe, to quote

as
ol
the words of Lord Bur!eigh, used "as charitab 11 r
such a thing can be," it was because policy d
Belled discretion, and not through the exercise o
any " moral influence, 'which would have been
tirely thrown away. It is indeed just possible tl sat
the King of Prussia saw the necessity of impc‘s: ing
some restraint upon his haughty Minister. :F.' fen
Charles V. forbade the destruction of the ton ib cif
Luther. Be this, however, as it may, the questic n for
European reflection is not so much the terms o
transaction as its character. It is not primarily t hat
Prussia has dismembered Denmark, but that the
ratification of her aggression by treaty establis ace
a dangerous precedent. The securities for the pr
of Europe have been signed away in the Con fer
ence at Vienna, and the confidence which has sub-
sisted between the Powers is virtually at an end.
Instead, therefore, of experiencing any fel 'ling
approximating even to satisfaction, we must view
the arrangement which has been determined ellen
with considerable anxiety. It is based upon r
eiple which can hardly fail to lead to a goner: &war.
The theory of nationality, as it is now exp
means, if it means anything, that a political. unity_
constituting a State should include all who -are
the same race, who speak the same languaV 39 and
who who have the same national character ; ant that
peoples who live under a Government not of
their
race are to be regarded as the victims of intoll arable
oppression. Now, no country, not even Fran( :e, has
ever realised this condition, and England unitoubt-
edly has under her sway the largest number of Bub,.
ject races who are aliens by birth and lauguege"
We have a confusion of tongues, every form of tell,
gion is professed amongst us, and there is no conk-
mon law far the whole population. Then there is
Austria, made up of foreign dependencies. Italians
Hungarians, Poles, and Croats, her soldiers for it e
most part understand no more of the German len
guage than is comprised in the words of command
and the rank she holds has been assigned to her no 1,.
as a German but as a European Power.
Bismarck, too, ought to pay assiduous worship tOu
Nemesis; for Prussia has. on this principle, all °ni
count to settle in Posen, if not on the Rhine.
course it will be said that any attempt to carry 011
doctrines so subversive of all government would be
instantly resisted. But by whom 11 They have beed
carried out in Denmark, and Europe has watehet
the operation with philosophical equanimity.
however, if France or Russia were to undertake L" ;
same mission ? Russia did, in fact, set up a 001 `„..
claim in appearing as the champion of what elle d ";
scribed as the rights ab antiquo of the Christie
in Turkey; but then England and France 013
tained the dominion of the Porte, and el"'"f
their blood and treasure to uphold the luvr ed
Europe. At present that law has been viola
with impunity; and an act of lawless aggreti °ty
is about to be consummated in a tr:
which will, we; apprehend; be formally eon': rrs,
nicated to, and acquiesced in by, all the Foy' od
There is certainly one consolation. Austria I ~o
Prussia will assuredly be the first to suffer under, %o
new order of things they have inaugurated. • be
measure they have meted out to Denmark wiLl ore
brought home to them with interest. They " are
sown the storm and they will have to real}
arc.
whirlwind. It does not require any extraordirlteir„
prescience to ..ee what the end will be as far as t' uf'd
are concerned. A resuscitated Holy Alliance vi°, of
be blown down like a card house before the gto,
Italian, Polish, and Hungarian nationality. I.7"ata
their suicide can be a very serious and costly I•vorg
ter for Europe. The immediate effect of the vi the
they have been allowed to accomplish is that au
ea,
Powers must hold themselves in a state of preParthe
ness for war; while, as for the future, as far "nig
eye can reach, everything appears to be conYerble
towards the great arbitrament which the c 000.0...
sion and the sufferance of wrong have rendered
evitable.