The Sun.
London, England, 1863-11-05 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

HERALD.—The Polish intervention. as far as Eng-
land is concerned, may be considered to have come to
an end. A moat couci Li dory note from Lord Russell
has been presented by Lord Napier to Prince Gorts-
chakoff, and with the parting remark that Poland
has certain rights which ought to be respected the
British Foreign Minister retires disheartened from
the field. The correspondent of an influential con-
temporary has informed us that a dispatch couched
in far stronger terms was originally prepared, but
that on this intention being made known to the
Prussian Court it was received with such marked
expressions of disapprobation that the design had
to be abandoned, or the friendship of Prussia for-
feited. This may or may not be true. To succumb
to bellicose demonstrations is so much a habit with
Lord Russell that we are not surprised that such re-
ports as this should be credited. Lord Russell may in-
deed have meant to declare that as Russia had failed
to fulfil the stipulations of the Treaty of Vienna, her
right to Poland was forfeited. He has,however, been
overruled in his mischievous purpose. The last of
hisidispatches breathes anything but a tone of defi
ance. A mild regret is all that Lord Russell has
left for the despair of Poland. If there has ever
been any notion abroad that the English Govern-
ment was prepared to join in a crusade for the ro-
, storation of the Polish constitution or the establish-
ment of Polish independence, that is all at an end
now. The British Government wishes only to
wash its hands of a disagreeable business. Aus-
tria, who has so much to fear, and so much to lose,
is still less inclined to play the Don Quixote of
Europe. If the Emperor of the French is either
able or willing to go to war in this, he most assume
the whole responsibility, the whole of the danger.
To appreciate fully the utter and ignominious
failure of this diplomatic masterpiece, it must be
remembered that Lord Russell, in assuming on the
part of England a prominent share in this joint in-
tervention of three Powers, was confronted with a
puzzling alternative. He was exposed to two dan-
gers ; it seemed that he might choose between them,
but he has contrived to fall into both. From the
first the Government was resolved, and so tar justi-
fiably, that under no circumstances would it make
war upon Russia in this quarrel. But it could either
announce that would not go to war, or it could keep
this resolution a secret. In the first case, its remon-
strances would have been likely to have little effect
upon Russia. In the second case, the Poles would
have been tempted to the obstinate continuance of
a desperate struggle in the hope of foreign succour.
Now the avowal of the peaceful intentions of the
British Cabinet was so precisely timed, and so
ambiguously made, that the Cabinet has contrived
to tumble into both of these pitfalls. Russia, who
seemed to yield at first, was reassured, and per-
sisted in her work of conquest. The Poles, who at
the beginning hoped for impossible things, had been
allowed to indulge in their dreams till it was im-
possible to awaken them to the desolate reality. The
mediation has been well managed, if to do as much
mischief as a mediation can effect has been the object
of Lord Russell throughout. The Russians have
learned to laugh at it; the Poles have been induced
to trust in it. The positive declarations of English
statesmen, the tenor of diplomatic letters, have
made the Russians feel secure. The gloss put by
bellicose newspapers end warm partisans upon these
speeches and despatches has kept hope alive in the
breasts of the unfortunate Poles. Had there been
no intervention the rebellion would have ended long
ago. The sham mediation has kept on throwing
fuel on the fire, the fire in which the Polish na-
tionality is being burned to ashes. When a Minis-
terial organ in the press ventures to declare that
there is not a Pole who supposes that anything more
than a peaceful intervention is intended by the Three
Powers, we wonder who are its informants; we are
surprised at its presumption in venturing a state-
ment so notoriously the reverse of the truth. The
opposite to this is stated by a leading contempo-
rary which has generally supported the Ministry of
Lord Palmerston. If the Poles, it says, are mis-
taken in supposing that the Three Powers intend
to strike a blow on their behalf, then to the inter-
vention of the Three Powers are to be ascribed all
the miseries which Poland has to suffer during five
more months of fruitless and protracted warfare.
It is pretty well known that the so-called National
Government has determined to prolong the struggle
through She ensuing winter, in the hope that in the
meantime some one or more of the kind strangers
will rush to their aid. The Poles have, at the out-
side, some 6,000 men in the field ; the Russians about
twenty times that number. Who can doubt of the
issue of a contest with such terrible odds ? The
trackless forests that have protected the Polish
guerilla will now shelter him no longer. The kind
leaves have fallen, the friendly swamps are freezing
over. Through the open branches of the trees, and
over the frozen wastes, the swarming Cossacks will
scent and hunt down the patriots. Poland from the
first was a mere pigmy in the grasp of Russia.
Without strong foreign assistance her insurrection
was but a fruitless sacrifice of noble lives. In saying
as much as this, plainly and openly from the first,
we have been true friends to Poland. We do
not care for the silly talk about a " Tory press," the
"friends of Russian tyranny." We are the friends
of tyranny nowhere; had we ever been disposed
this way the tedious rule of the Whig oligarchy in
England would have cured us lone since of such
proclivities. We wish to see Poland once more in
the full enjoyment of her freedom and constitutional
rights. During the Polish insurrection, and while
a single Pole remains in arms, such a concession
cannot be extorted without a general war. The
wrong thing at the wrong time is the maxim which
seems to guide the foreign policy of Lord Russell.
One war has been aggravated and prolonged by his
istediation in Poland. Another war, vaster in its
p fol on ged by his non-mediation in America.
proportions, and more terrible, has been aggravated
and
TeerEs.--Two
great nations are now fighting for
Union. In
Northern States of America twenty-
on© millions of people are bent upon subjugating
and bringing back to their body a population of
nine millions which has seceded from them and
claimed an independent existence. In this desperate
work they have contracted an enormous debt, have
maintained prodigious armies, have sacrificed their
political liberty, and fettered their commerce by
exorbitant tariffs. In Europe the belief is almost
universal that they are striving after an unattain-
able object, but we can do no more than look on and
be neutral. It is not for us to interfere in an Ame-
rican contest either for the Union or against it.
Very different, however. is the position of Italy. In
that country twenty-two millions of people are
fighting for Union, but only in a pacific fashion.
They are, indeed, compelled to keep costly armies on
foot, and to incur a large debt in doing so, but they
are not actually at war. The Union for which
they contend is the consolidation of seven States,
naturally homogeneous, but heretofore sundered
by political distribution. The Italians desire to be
one people, having been hitherto Piedmontese,
Tuscans, Lombards, or Neapolitans. The work is
not an easy one. The inhabitants of these pro-
vinces are all of the same race, but they do not
speak quite the same language. The territory to
which they pretend is not extravagantly large, and
is clearly defined, but it possesses geographical fea-
tures which have materially conduced to the isola-
tion of one district from another. Italy was inha-
bited by one family, but thavarious members of the
household had been so long and so jealously sepa-
rated from each other that they now find many
difficulties in the way of a complete union. Here,
however, we are not confined to any neutrality. We
are enabled to give the Italians our best wishes,and
something more. It was not our province to inter-
fere in the strife by which their present opportu-
nities were won, but we cheerfully gave them our
recognition, and we are now cordially assisting them
to establish freedom of trade. The Treaty of Com-
merce and Navigation between Great Britain and
Italy, which we yesterday published, marks one of
those events which are chronicled in Royal speeches
and elevated to the dignity of historical landmarks.
If we cannot say, as in the case of the French Treaty,
that certain broad channels of natural trade will
now be opened instead of closed, we can still say
that an interchange of commodities between two
great countries is now facilitated, and that the re-
sults ought to be very large. No product of Italy
can be actually compared to the wine of France.
We cannot lay our fingers on any trade which ap-
pears to form an especial vocation of Italians ; but,
though the specialty which was so conspicuous in
the case of France may be here wanting, it is im-
possible to put a limit to the advantages which this
Treaty may bring. Italy commands an infinite
not. be. •
variety of produce, and its industries will all be
never yet
effectually stimulated by freedom omfwietgrhadtdisebp.eaririamirge.
cannot tell, for instance, that cotton may
Italianc om e a
wines,s a pl
perhaps,of ltalian
beeesapuosret,waenbdave
signed and ratified
ascertained how mmuncath
remarkable
erkwaibnlees
is entering upon
prov feature in this
iastittshedamten.melntthwahs
ebneelntaly
exactlysrre a t y
a new national life. The letters of our correspondent
have recently depicted the extraordinary phase in
which that country now appears. All is stir anima-
tion, , ' enterprise, and hope. To break
consolidated by the traditions of 20 generations is
no easy task. North and South had
to be brought
together and permanently amalgamated after centu-
ries of disunion, Perhaps the necessity which the
friends of Italy most acutely bewail has been one
of the most serviceable
instruments in producing
this consummation.
The army is the great centre
of fusion. Common standards, common discipline,
and common aspirations h
ave created also sone-
munity of general sentiments, and, whet is more
extraordinary, of language. In the ranks of the
, army eyory mau IN All l& AD; Yf Weyer pro-

vince may have been his birthplace, so that pro-
vincial prejudices and provincial dialects are dis-
carded together. But this singular process is
seconded by works of peace. There can be no real
political or social unity without good communica-
tions, and when we say that one town has been
" united" to another by a line of railway we ex-
press a groat truth. So the Italians have been
making railways, and to such effect that in the first
four years of their new life they have more than
doubled the length of railway lines opened before.
Then comes shipping; and in one year the Italians
have added 600,000 tons to their entries. Every-
body is busy on some project or other. It is at this
critical conjuncture that we join hands with the
Italians on a Treaty of Commerce, and we could do
nothing in the world better calculated to serve them.
Of course we shall get an equal benefit ourselves,
for that is the characteristic operation of such mea-
sures, but no policy will conduce more rapidly to
Italian prosperity than that of Free Trade. At
present this is Italy's weak point, and if the treaty
before us should inaugurate a new system of tariffs
and duties throughout the Peninsula the Italians
may date their financial progress from the 29th of
October, 1863. It must be confessed in justice to a
people who have been conducting an arduous expe-
riment, that if the Italians have been reckless in
matters of finance, they are not chargeable with
delinquency on any other point. They have disap-
pointed the expectations of their enemies, and sur-
passed the hopes of their friends. They have shown
a capacity for immediate self-government which
few would have ventured to predict. They have
not been hurried into any extravagance or se-
duced from the path of constitutional progress
by the theories of political fanatics. They have
shown that they could wait as wall as win in a
struggle for unity, and have displayed extraordi-
nary patience under prolonged disappointments.
They have suppressed or discarded those ancient
provincial jealousies which were expected to prove
the ruin of the experiment, and have entered upon
the new era of their history with singular concord,
They have made only one slip, and that was not
entirely avoidable. They have lavished mosey
without stint, if not without heed. Perhaps they
thought that of all faults this was the one which
could be most surely rectified after the struggle was
over ; but nobody can measure the importance of
finance. It is said to have been at the bottom of
almost every revolution. It makes States strong
or weak, crippled or prosperous. Debts are easier
to bear than deficits. A country which pays its
way year by year may do well even with heavy
burdens, but when it continually fails to make
both ends meet the prospect is bad. The statesmen
of Italy understand their position, no doubt, but the
absolute necessity for a strong army prevents re-
trenchment of expenditure, while the fear of
meddling with long established interests deters
them from those financial reforms by which the
Exchequer might be replenished. The latter of
these two experiments would be the safe one. The
military exigencies of Italy are beyond her imme-
diate control, but a bold and judicious treatment of
commercial abuses would quickly bring about its
reward. That it may be soon commenced and suc-
cessfully conducted is what every friend of Italy
must desire.

COUNTRY MARKETS.


NEWARK—WEDIvEsDAY.

About the usual quantity of wheat on offer at our tnar.
ket to-day, and the demand was fair, at fully the rates of
last week. Barley a tolerable show, at top prices. Beans
steady.

White wheat new, 42s to 458 Barley, grinding.. 30s to 323
Red do, 37s to 42s Oats, old, . 2ss to 28i
Old white 46s to 46s New do 203 to 24s
Red do. 40s to 44s i Beans 37s t 0,400
Barley, malting... 368 to 40s 1 Beans, new 32s to 340