The Sun.
London, England, 1863-11-03 00:00:00

way to get out of it was to listen to
the well-meant advice of France, England, and
Austria. She mast accept the six points or prepare
for the worst. If not, she must be left to her deserts ;
the Poles might triumph, they might establish their
independence and be welcome to it. The Three
Great Powers would wash their hands of Russia.
Matters are changed during the last four months.
It is now Russia who has the upper hand. In June
she did not hesitate to accept the issue. She ap-
pealed, without flinching, to the arbitrament of war.
As for the mediating powers, she would do without
their sympathy, she did not want their advice.
She told them so plainly. Never, perhaps, was the
Minister of a great power so lightly and contemptu-
ously treated as was Lord Russell in the second
dispatch of Prince Gortschakoff. He was told to
mind his own business. He was a little irritable at
first, after receiving this advice. NV hen at 13' eir-
gowrie, he said he would not put up with i‘ ; he
was determined to show fight—on paper, of course.
He would issue against Russia a bull of deposi'ions
like that which the Pope launched against Queen
Eliz►beth, Her claim to Poland should be declared
forfeit, so that any one might take it who chose.
But, having slept upo❑ it a few times, it came to
pass one night that the sun did not go down upon
his wrath. He came to the wise conclusion that
after all, perhaps, it would be better to take Prince
Gortschakoff's advice, and mind his own business.
But he could not help writing one more letter, a
very tame and inoffensive one this time:—`` Her
Majesty's Government is sorry, very sorry, that
the Emperor of Russia does not intend to take its
advice about his Polish subjects. It is informed
that the Imperial troops have been on the whole
successful against the -insurgents, and that the in-
surrection is not likely to outlast the winter. It
congratulates the Emperor of Russia on the suc-
cess of his arms, on the prowess of his soldiers.
Under the circumstances it is unnecessary to remark
further on the little misunderstanding which lately
took place between the two courts. It is taken for
granted that the Emperor will not forget that
the treaty of Vienna, which guaranteed to him
the Kingdom of Poland, did at the same time
hold out the promise of certain rights to the Poles.
The manner and time of the fulfilment of the
promise may be safely left to the wisdom and cle-
mency of the Emperor." And so the Emperor of
Russia is salved down ; the Poles are left to them-
selves; and we are saved from a war in which their
was nothing to be gained, very much to be lost.
Next to the Poles, the party in these negociations
most to be pitied is Lord Russell. He has been con-
tradicted, snubbed, humiliated. It is not we, the
people of England, who have been insulted. It is
only the Whig Government, and for that we do not
care much. The people may be congratulated on
having escaped a great danger, that of being led by
the nose to make war for a chimera. There is some-
thing about diplomacy of this sort that is at once
ridiculous and melancholy. It is so impotent, and
at the same time so mischievous. The thorough
deadlock reached by the Three Powers in their com-
bined intervention is admirably pictured in one of
Chain's drawings in a late number of Charivari.
Englishman, Frenchman, and German, are march-
ing together near a signpost, which indicates the
road to Poland. But they are not advancing in any
strict sense. It is a crab step, a pas d'ecrevisse.
The Zouave and Grenadier are hooked arm in arm,
but the one is attempting to go forwards, the other
backwards. The heavy German, hanging on the
Frenchman's left arm, is dragging him towards the
ground. This is a very exact deenription of the
latest chef d'ceuvre of diplomacy. Lord Russell may
flatter himself that something has been done for
Poland by this combined and " peaceful" interven-
tion. We need not tell him what we think of it.
We will tell him what his friends think of it—those
who up to this time have encouraged him, and bid
him persevere. " l'he Three Powers," says a lead-
ing contemporary, " have not lightened by a single
feather the weight which presses on Poland ; they
have not dried a single tear, or prevented the flowing
of a single drop of blood. Again it says," The Poles
cannot believe that the th reePowers who have made so
vigorous a rt monstrance against Russia will leave
them to perish without striking a biow in their be-
half. It they are wrong in this anticipation, then
to the intervention of the Three Powers are to be
ascribed all the miseries that Poland is to suffer dur-
ing five months of fruitAess and protracted warfare."
Flow better than in the language of the limes card
we recapitulate what we have urged so often ? The
Polish intervention is the greatest blunder of the
year. To England a deep humiliation ; to Russia
an impertinence ; to the brave, but wretched men,
whom the leafless forests are now betraying to their
doom, a cruelty beyond expression.

- -
PosT.—On Thursday the French Chambers wilt
be formally opened by the Emperor. To many per.
sons in this country the inauguration of a Partia-
mentary session, with e speech from the Throne,
would seem an event of but comparatively little
interest. We are always in a great hurry, it is
true, to read " The Queen's Speech," but it is rarely
indeed that our anxiety is rewarded by the dis-
covery of anything novel or unexpected. If we
happen to be at peace we will be sure to find a
paragraph congratulating the country on the auspi-
cious circumstance ; and if we are at war, the un-
toward fact will be regretted in a neatly pointed
period. Of the future, so far as regards our foreign
relations, not a syllable will be said—not because
the Government are desirous of maintaining secrecy,
but simply because they can have no secrets to tell,
Bat on the other side of the Channel it is different.
France is governed by one man, and whether for
good or for evil he absolutely determines the course
she shall pursue. He keeps his counsel, and leaves
the world to indulge in what must be only the
vaguest conjectures, until on such an occasion as
that which is at hand he either openly declares or
shadows forth, in a manner not to be mistaken, the
course which he deems it expedient to follow. And
so it is; for the past month Europe has been on the
tenter hooks of expectation to hear the language in
which the French Emperor will address his Cham-
bers on the sth of November. The events which
have crowded on each other during the present year
both in the Old and in the New World, and in the
peculiar position in which France finds herself
placed invest with more than ordinary interest the
possible steps which will be taken by her ruler. The
horizon is overcast, and when it is borne in mind
that it is in the power of the French Emperor to
bid the storm burst forth, it is not surprising that
the speech in which he will announce his policy
should be looked forward to with impatience,
if not alarm. However, two days hence, all
doubts will be set at rest, and a suspense which
has made itself injuriously felt in all the money
markets of Europe will be brought to an end. The
principal points of foreign policy to be touched on
in the forthcoming speech must refer to the Polish,
the Mexican, and the American " difficulties," and
doubtless the threatened rupture between Germany
and Denmark will receive a passing
comment. It
is, however, the policy which France will pursue
towards Russia which, before everything else at the
present time, possesses paramount interest. The
dipiomatic intervention of the three Powers in
favour of Poland has proved a failure, and it remains
to be seen whether an attempt will be made to
secure that with the sword- which fruitless endea-
vours have been made to attain with the pen. 'f he
refusal of Great Britain and of Austria to have re-
course to arms to vindicate the rights of the Polish
nation has placed France in a position which it is
notorious that her ruler considers equivocal. It is,
indeed, clear that the intervening Powers were
foiled by Russian diplomacy, and the final reply of
the Cabinet of St. Petersburg was such as to render
all further negotiations on the previous bases cer-
tain to be unavailing. But, because diplomacy has
been at fault, it would be incorrect to conclude that
war now must supervene. However warm may be
the sympathies of France in favour of the Pulioh
nation, they are not warmer than those of Great
Britain, and, like the latter Power, she does not yet
see that it is necessarily by war that a constitutional
Poland is to be created. Those who have antici-
pated intimations of a warlike policy in the forth-
coming speech from the French Throne will most
probably find themselves agreeably mistaken. It is
clearly the interest of the French Government to
avoid war, and Europe may rest satisfied that if her
peace should eventually be disturbed, the cause will
not be justly attributable to the French Emperor.
Had it not been for the extraordinary and, by
every one but Frenchmen, unhoped-for success
which attended the expedition to Mexico, the Go-
vernment of Napoleon 111. might have had some
difficulty in justifying the policy they adopted in
respect to that country. Bat success constitutes
the surest and most satisfactory of jurisdictindnse, an
and
the Emperor is entitled to allude with pri
fro
satisfaction to the results which have sprung
lm
Mexican intervention. The expedition was a cost
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possess themerits of being respectable and respected.
Each successive mail which is despatched from
Mexico to Europe testifies to the increasing influ-
ence of those who went as conquerors, but are
accepted as deliverers, and to the growing desire of
the Mexican people to be ruled by a responsible
and substantial Government. An Austrian prince
has accepted the throne on conditions which are
sure to be fulfilled, and within the past few days
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elect to depart for his future empire in a manner
consistent with his high dignity. So far, there-
fore, es re,:-..!ards M-eieo, the French P.m
,Ask with eonlidence iroth his Chambers u
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