The Sun.
London, England, 1863-03-31 00:00:00

TEM SUN, LONDO \, TUESDAY EVENING, MARCH 21, 1863.

and portable enough. Two long thin eight-ouncers
on one-horse carriuges formed the whole of his siege
train. Of course a half-pound ball would hurt a man
if it hit him, and it is said these guns carried a con-
siderable distance, and were found very eerviceable
on many occasions when the Russians, having to
move quickly over difficult ground, were obliged to
leave their cannon behind. But the title of " Chief
of the Artillery" becomes as comic when one has
seen the field-pieces as that of "Director of the Civil
Government" die, when it appeared there was no-
thing for Langiewiez to govern, except his own
troops.
General Langiewicz's independent Poland was of
a far more moveable nature than the heavy Russian
columns which followed it as it shifted its locality,
and which re-established Russia by fire and sword
wherever Poland had once more ceased to be. For
about a week before its fall the Polish Government
had no power outside the Dictator's camp, though
before Langiewi2z's last march it really exercised
fall sa ay over all the territory between the camp
and the Galician frontier—a much smaller extent
even than that of the little republic of Cracow,
created in 1815, and swallowed up in 1846. Any
person properly recommended to one of General
Langiewicz's agents in Cracow could obtain a pass
signed in the name of the Provisional Government,
but many went without any pass at all, and no one,
unless openly and conspicuously bearing arms, was
prevented from crossing the border by the Austrian
soldiers or police. I fancy the barbarous manner
in which Mr. Finkenstein or Finkenstone was
treated by the Cossacks must have had a powerful
effect in stopping all commercial visits and cer-
tainly all visits of pleasure to the Polish camp.
For nearly a week, however, before the battle of
Zipasice (fought on the 17th) the difficulty of
conveying provisions, clothing, and ammunition
across the frontier had been gradually increas-
ing, and this not owing to the alertness of the Cos-
sacks, but to the formal prohibition, strictly en-
forced, of the Austrian Government. That there
might be no mistake about the matter Count Meng-
dorff on the 15th published an order which may
now be seen on all the walls of Cracow, and which
forbids the transit of food, cloth, and ammunition
from Galicia to the kingdom of Poland. Bread,
brandy, boots, and gunpowder were all that the in-
surgents wanted, and these articles of prime neces-
sity would have been liberally supplied to them had
not the frontier been closed.

BRE SLA u, March 27.
The defeat of Langiewicz was no sooner known
at St. Petersburg than the Russian Government,
in a note addressed to its representative at Paris,
expressed a willingness to improve the condition of
Poland, and bestow another batch of liberal conces-
sions upon the unfortunate country. Nov that the
rebellion might be expected to subside, Prince
Gortschakoff added, the Czar had no compunction
in announcing his benevolent intentions towards a
province he had always wished to raise to a higher
degree of prosperity and wealth. Tne communi-

cation was immediately transmitted to M. Drouyn
de Lbuys, who recommended a lenient treatment of
the recusant dependency. So says the Vienna cor-
respondent of the Cracow Czas, one of the best
informed contributors to the leading organ of
Poland.

AFFAIRS OF PRTJSSIA.

(From the Times Correspondent.)
BERLIN, MARCH 28.
Any hopes of a reconciliation between the Government
and the Chamber, that may have been based on the King's
friendly reception of the President and Vice-Presidents on
his birthday, must now be considered completely dissi-
pated. MM. Grabow, Behrend, and Borkum Dolffs were
received by the Cour officials with anxious courtesy, and
by his Majesty with a benevolence and kindly affability to
which they cannot be said to have been of late accustomed.
Some persons were inclined to argue thence that a change
had come over the Royal mind, and to attribute it to un-
easiness at the aspect of foreign affairs. It was but a few
who indulged in this belief, and they, by this time, are
despoiled of their illusions. M. von Bismark's officious
organ took an opportunity of damping any hopes that may
have been aroused of an acceptance by Government of the
Forckenbeck amendment, and a document proceeding from
the Ministry of War, and published last night in the official
Auzetger, finally dispelled them. The Royal smiles on
the Royal birthday were due solely to the entirely non-
political character of the occasion; the Government is as
resolved as ever against the two years' service, and it nails
to the mast the flag of army-reorganisation, with the
motto of "No concession." In the form of a refutation
of Deputy Baron Vaerst (the author of a counter project of
army reorganisation, of which mention has already been
made to you), the War-office confirms the unfavourable
auguries which had been drawn from the tone of the Go-
vernment commissioners in the Committee of the Chamber.
It will evidently abate nothing of its demands in respect of
time of service, and therefore continues in opposition to
every section of the constitutional party in the Chamber of
Deputies. This certainly naturally diminishes the general
interest which might attach to the proceedings pf the Com.
mittee and to the discussions now going on in evening
meetings of the combined Left and Left Centre. In the
Committee, it may be added, the Ministers seem to have
entirely discontinued appearing.
In quarters usually well-informed a belie? is expressed
that M. von Bismark, who has lately undergone so many
reverses, will shortly play a card of sufficient value to efface,
or at least to weaken the memory of them. What trump
it is that he thus holds in reserve can for the present only
be subject of conjectures, but these point to the treaties of
commerce, navigation, &c., concluded last year with France
and an intention is again supposed of putting them into
force so far as it can be done without infraction, on the part
of Prussia, of the Zollverein Treaty. Such a step would
be at once a drawing near to France and a triumph over
Austria, and would doubtless give to this Government
some portion of that prestige in which it is now so entirely
wanting, and of which it stands so greatly in need.
The question which, at this moment, most engrosses the
attention of Prussian politicians and journalists is that of
Poland. Notwithstanding M. Billault's speech (generally
considered of so pacific a tendency), the war party maintain
their apprehensions. The Cologne Gazette of to-day's date
brings a telegram from Vienna to the effect that "France
wishes the complete independence of Poland, with the
Duke of Leuchtenberg as its King,and that she has already
communicated this programme to the Ambassadors of the
great Powers in Paris." A letter which follows this start-
ling announcement, and which one might suppose to come
also from Vienna were it not dated from Paris (26th inst.),
contains similar information. The present Grand Duchy
of Warsaw, it says, is to be a Sovereign kingdom. Russia
is to retain her old Polish provinces ; the Polish posses-
sions of Austria and Prussia are not to be interfered with,
This, we are told, is the will of France. From the same
source we are informed, equally authoritatively, that the
British Ambassador in Paris, when returning to his post,
a few days ago from England, took with him instructions
from his Government to declare in favour of a Congress
of all those European Powers which signed the
Treaties of Vienna. There has been much talk
lately in Berlin of a coming Congress, but hitherto,
it would seem, with exceedingly small foundation, and,
notwithstanding the recent article in La France, such a
project obtains little credit in the quarters usually best in-
formed. The Cologne Gazette, however, guarantees the
essential correctness of its information, and triumphs in the
confirmation it considers a portion of it to afford to its re-
cent warlike wsrnings. It will very likely have been justi-
fied in doing so if its statement be correct, that France is
determined to leave no connexion subsisting between Rusaia
and the new Polish kingdom beyond the purely personal
one arising from the relationship between the Sovereigns of
the two States. If such were the determination of the

Emperor Napoleon, which he was resolved to carry out at
all hazards, Europe might very well expect to hear the
sound of cannon again at no distant data. Before believ-

ing, however, that we are on the brink of a great war, likely
enough to become a general one before it had long con-
tinued, it may be prudent to await confirmation of the dis-
quieting intelligence, which to-day reaches us from the
banks of the Rhine.

A provincial journal having announced that M. Vincke
had seceded from that small fraction of the Chamber which
has generally been designated by his name, the Berlin
organ of that party has confirmed the intelligence, adding,
:hat the separation in fact took place before the debate on

the Convention with Russia, that it is only temporary,_ and
that Vincke will again be seen in full vigour at the head of
the Liberal party—meaning, we presume, the "old" or
_ _

moderate Liberals, from whom he has just detached himself

This may be so; it would be most imprudent positively to
deny the possibility of any political changes in Prussia—
where events so strange and unforeseen occur that one
would hardly have a right to wonder if M. von Bismark

himself were to come out some day as a Fortschritt•man ;
but M. Vincke's arrogance and overbearing disposition

have sadly impaired his chances of playing that prominent
part in the political history of his country to which, in the

opinion of many, his talents fairly entitle him. His aggres-
siveness and general pugnacity have made him many ene-
mies, and although the organ of the little knot of deputies
(including several men of high starding in the Chamber) to
which he until lately belonged, thinks it only becoming to
spread a cushion for his fall from their head, and to predict
a return of harmony, there is ro concealing the fact that
he now stands isolated, estranged from those last few friends
who still stood by his side, and, to a certain extent, ad-
mitted his leadership, As a specimen of the style he thinks