The Sun.
London, England, 1863-09-18 00:00:00

SPIRIT OP THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

TIMES.—It would seem that if the Germans
could get their country into a mess they would.
The long perspective through which their Professor-
led minds regard all practical questions magnifies
molehills into mountains and diminishes mountains
into molehills. They have no eye for real difficul-
ties, and they are frightened at little ones. H, re
are they still disputing and quarrelling about their
union in such simple matters as customs and mutual
trade, and at the same time hoping to establish all
at once a great German State in the centre of Europe
by the mere force of Imperial and Royal resolutions.
Prussia and Austria are still at variance; the
Prussian Kingdom Is itself in as great confusion and
weakness as a country can suffer without actually
undergoing a revolution ; and yet we are told by
the Frankfort correspondence of a German paper
that Austria is on the paint of enforcing what is
called " Federal execution" in Holstein. Prepara-
tions for the same purpose are said to be on foot in
Hanover, and there is no doubt that many of the
Germans rather hope to see this formidable lan-
guage put in force. We do not think that either
Denmark or Europe need be in any fear of imme-
diate "execution.' The two great German Powers
have far too much to do with their own affairs to
trouble themselves more than they can help with
the oifficultv the people of Schleswig seem to find
in talking Danish, and Austria and Prussia know
too well the dangers they would run in any such
interference. But the learned simplici,y of many
of the German people, and the conceit of some of
the pompous little Principalities of which we have
heard so much lately, appear to be euperior to any
such considerations. We are told, for example, in
The intelligence we publish to-day, that Austria
has made a positive declaration to all the great
Powers—to France, Russia, and England, especially
to the latter—that the D ino-German question must
be settled, and that Federal execution has become
indispensable, it Denmark should persist in her re-
'istanne no matter what the consequ nces may be."
This is certainly a heroic resolution, and worthy a
nation of philosophers. The consequences, as the
writer of this formidable piece of news appears to
know very well, might be the interference of
France, England, and Sweden in aid of Denmark,
and it would certainly require an entire disregard
of consequences in the Diet to oppose Fatherland to
such an alliance as this. Few countries are so
capable of defence as Denmark against a mere in-
vasion by land ; and the combined fleets of England,
France, and Denmark would reduce the Germanic
Confederation to a still more helpless isolation from
the sea than even at present. Looking at the mat-
ter as a mere military question, the Diet would be
absolutely heipltss to " execute" anything if the
Danes were supported by an effective force of the
two Western Powers. The only chance of their
success would be a diversion in their favour by
Russia, but the interest and declared policy of Russia
are in the opposite direction. If England and
France made up their minds, as the Germans seem
to be afraid they may, to act with Denmark and
S xeden, the Germanic Confederation would have to
give up their attempt from sheer inability to do any-
thing. Tnere would be no need of any great ex
pease or of bloodshed. An Anglo-French fleet at,
he mouth of the Elbe, and an additional corps
d armee or so thrown into Denmark, would suffice
to reduce the Federal " corps of execution" to per-
fect harmlessness. This magnanimous disregard of
consequences may be all very well, however, as re-
gards the Germans themselves. If they liked to
run their heads against a stone wall at the southern
extremity of Denmark, they would be perfectly
welcome to do it, if it would only hurt themselves.
But we object to their disregarding the conse-
quences to other people of executing this meddle-
some theory. They must know very well that
military difficulties would be the least they would
have to encounter. A very short time, and a much
slighter pretext would be sufficient to raise all
sorts of political dangers. They cannot suppose
char their dreaded neighbour the other side of the
Rhine would confine his interference to the boun-
daries of Denmerk ; and there is no saying where
the consequences of this " execution" might land
us. The Germans may think it more important to
regulate the language of Schleswig than to avoid
the expense and confusion of war, 'out Europe
will he of a very different opinion. If Austria
it has declared in a straightforward manner that
it reels with tho Copenhagi'n Cabinet to prevent
armed intervention, and that Denmark, not Ger-
many, must give in," we are sure that Austria will
be informed in an equally straightforward manner
that it rests with Europe to prevent armed interven
tion, and that Germany will certainly have to give
in. If the impracticable brains of German philoso-
phers are really contemplating any such absurdity
as this, we hope the Diet will be warned of thecon-
sequences in such plain and unmistakeable lam-
guage as will prevent any further attempt or threat
of the sort. We really do not want to be dragged
into war for these pedantic rights and theoretic
necessities. We are in danger enough of European
contusions without the mode of education in Schles-
wig and Holstein being made a question of national
importance. If the Germans have no regard for
their own peace and prosperity, they must have some
consideration for more practical countries. We
have, besides, repeatedly expressed our opinion that
the Confederation have not a shadow of justice to
rapport their present pretensions. What may have
been the territorial arrangements of 4640, what in-
terpretations some articles of treaties may possibly
be made to bear, we do not care to inquire. It is
quite sufficient that Schleswig is not a member of
the Germanic Confederation, and that the Germans,
therefore, have no reasonable right to interfere with
the administration of it in any way but by friendly
representations to Denmark. Holstein is a mem-
ber of the Confederation, and the Diet, therefore,
has a right to see that its customs and laws are in
force in that Duchy; and the King of Denmark is
so far from refusing this right that he positively
gave Holstein, by the patent of last March, what
almost amounted to an independent Constitution.
But the Confederation have no more reasonable
claim to interfere with Schleswig than that the
population is half German ; and if the territorial
arrangements of Europe were to be unsettled to suit
every sentiment of nationality there is scarcely one
country which could avoid the interference of some
other. The Germans have no more right to Schles-
wig because there are many Germans in it, than
Ireland has to Scotland, or Scotland to Eng-
land, because in each case numbers of Irishmen and
Scotchmen have in the course of time intruded
themselves into those countries. We, at Iciest, with
the example of Ireland and Scotland before us, can
never admit that a separate nationality necesaarily
means a separate State, and the sooner the Ger
mans give up the dream of acquiring the seacoast
of Schleswig on any such paltry pretext, the better
for their own comfort and the peace of Europe.
They had better, at least, settle their own Con
stitutions before trying to mend their neighbours';
and until they have consolidated their own power
a little they would be wise to be less careless of the
consequences of a European interference.
Pont.—The question, How to dispose of our felons ? has
for some time been agitating the public mind. Transpora-
tion to Botany Bay and to Van Diemen's Land were the
approved recipes of the olden time when George 111, and
George IV. were kings. But the thing was so overdone that
th© convicts outnumbered much the free population in those
colonies, and a state of th;ngs was produced the description
of which outraged the feelings of soberminded, benevolent
men in this country; and on representations from the colo-
nies, which were, however, by no means unanimous, the Co-
lonial Department and Parliament abandoned the system
of transportation to Australia altogether, and adopted the
scheme of home inniteutiaries, hulks, athi other establish.

meats, in which work was to be found for felons at home,
with the promise of reformation and such instruction as
should enable the felon, when released, to obtain an honest.
livelihood. The ticket-of-leave system has been the result
of that change. Now, however, every one is agreed that the
scheme of reformation and ticket-of-leave release from gaol,
with free license to prey upon the community, is an entire
failure. We have had a special commission appointed to
investigate this sullect, and they have recommended a
recurrence to the scheme of transportation to such colonies
as are willing to receive convicts, and, of course, under
such restrictions as will prevent the evils which attended
the unlimited importations of the old regisns. Amongst the
colonies which have professed their willingness to receive
convicts in a limited degree is the colony of Western Aus-
tralia, to which shipments Piave already been made, not
in large quantities, but suffi.iently to enable the colonists
to judge whether the importation of men of this description
will be a desirable thing for them, or the contrary. Their
feeling has been decidedly expressed in favour of a large
importation. They want labour, they want public build-
ings, they want roads and bridges, and they see in such an
importation the readiest, if not the only, means of obtaining
all these benefits ; they know Owe that any expense attend-
ing their reception will be paid by the Imperial Treasury,
'o the great benefit or their own produce market. These
considerations have induced the Government to revert to
the scheme of transportation, and to make further
shipments of convicts to Western Australia, and a vessel
is said to be on the point of sailing freighted with a consi-
derable number. Against this measure, however, there is
a howl raised by the party in the old Colonies of Australia,
who, by their representations, procured the abandonment
of the scheme of transportation to them, 'The question to
be considered is, whether this opposition is warranted and
just, and ought to be acceded to or not. It is said that
Melbourne and Sydney are on the same continent with
Western Australia. and that the influx of a felon population
into the Swan River Settlements will lead to the certainty ot
large numbers finding their way, either by escape or after
the expiration of their sentences, into the older colonies,
which have already suffered so much from the predominance
of this felon class in their population. Let us first inquire
whether this reason is sound. It is not pretended that it
will be possible for any convicts to make their way overland
from the Swan River to Melbourne or Sydney ; there are
no roads nor rivers by which communication has been or is
likely to be opened by land for the next hundred years.
But they say that in whalers and coasting Graft the felons
will mate their way to those older Australian colonies,
which, though situated at a distance of several thousand
miles, have yet considerable traffic in this way with the
west. If this argument, however, be allowed weight, what
island or settlement of any kind could be named wtth
which communication by sea wir.h Australia is not
frequent. There is large intercourse between Singapore
and India and our Australian settlements; so between
them and every port and island of the Pacific, even
to the Falkland Islands beyond Cape Horn. Is India
to be prohibited from sending convicts to the Andamans,
and to settlements in the Straits of Malacca, for fear lest
they should find a means of escape in whalers and other
craft to the old settlements of Australia ? The argument is
nonsensical, and partakes to our minds somewhat of the
Monroe doctrine of America, as if, forsooth, Melbourne and
Sydney had a right of domination by inevitable destiny
over the whole continent of Australia, and were eneitled to
prohibit England, even with the. concurrence of the
colonies of the west, from adopting a different system
there from that which they approved for themselves. To
our minds, it is conclusive that the reception or non-recep-
tion of convicts in West Australia is a thing to be settled
between the Imperial Government and the people of West-
ern Australia; and that the people of Melbourne and
Sydney have no more to do with that matter than Abe
Lincoln and his Cabinet have to do with Mexico. But
Sydney and Melbourne have gut free dewocratical consti-
tutions, and talk loudly, as other free people are in the
habit of tieing. They say they will not permit the Govern-
ment of England to make a separate arrangement with its
colonies of Western Australia, and they threaten Heaven-
knows-what consequences if such a thing is thought of.
Whether the soberminded men of discernment in those older
colonies will think the case one to justify a eeverment from
Great Britain, and a declaration of independence, having
such a population as they have, and no army of their own
to keep the peace and give them protection, is a question
for their serious consideration. We do not suppose that
they mean yet to threaten that issue. But in a recent
letter in the Times there is talk of a project of retaliation
by transporting their own convicts back to England. We
know not zo whom this threat is especially addressed, or
whom they expect to infi.ence by it. The colonies could
no more transport a convict by judicial sentence to England,
or to any other colony of England, without previous ar-
rangement and consent, than they could transport felons
to France or Spain; and as for sending back men whose
sentences are expired, and who are therefore free men, we
know of no law which would warrant a compulsory expor-
tation of them if unwilling, or which would prevent them
fr .m coming to us as tree men if desirous of so doing,
and believe they are very much in the habit of doing so.
No man, however, who is still under a judicial sentence
by any British court could venture to show himself in
any place where British Law is administered ; and the
law of England must be much altered in the old colo-
nies of Australia before any one of these could be made
liable to a sentence there of the kind threatened. We
are therefore not disposed to hold these retaliatory threats
of much account, or to think that they are likely to have
any influence in producing a change of the policy which
her Majesty's Government is stated to have deliberately
determined upon.
HERALD.—WhiIe Admiral Kuper is waiting for instruc-
tions from home end expecting reinforcements from China
to arrive in the roads of Kanagawa, the attitude of the
Japanese Government become daily more threatening to-
wards foreigners. We should, perhaps, say the attitude
of one of the Japanese Governments. The whole mind of
Japan has been thrown into a ferment, and the political
system of this people of 30 millions has been shaken to
its foundations by the intrusion of foreigners and the in-
troduction of lcuropean ideas. The latest lesson from
abroad by which they have profited is the art of revolu-
tion. There is civil war in the island, and a declared
antagonism between the Governments of the spiritual and
temporal Emperors, the Mikado and Tycoon. F. r ages
the Japanese have gone on quietly with their strange
methoa of an i2nperiurn in imperio. The supremacy of
the hereditary ruler has not been disputed by the powerful
commander_in•chief, who has been accustomed to admi-
nister most of the affairs of the country. The truth has
now dawned upon the benighted minds of Mikado and
Tycoon. It has become apparent to them that they re-
present opposite principles, and that they have no choice
but to fight it out, each backed by his supporters, in the
approved fashion of that outer world to which the
Japanese and their rulers have so long been strangers.
The quarrel is a very pretty one, and unless one side
or the other js disposed to give in, we do not see how it
is to be settled in any other way. The Ja-
penese, we suppose, must set to work to cut each other's
throats till every one of their fertile valleys and breezy
plains has a right to an honourable comparison with the
corpse. strewn battle-fields of that pre-eminently civilised
country, where, because there are also two parties among
them which cannot agree precisely as to certain details of
this civilising work, the nation has set its heart on two
years of fratricide. It is lamentable to think that to the
dreary details of American and Chinese butcheries we shall
now have to record with each mail the progress that another
race is making in self extermination. The Japanese islands
are fertile and productive to a wondrous extent; their pro-
ducts are varied ; their wealth is prodigious ; they cover an
area of a quarter of a million square miles. Unfortunately
for the Europeans, whose cupidity is excited by contact
with them, there are thirty millions of troublesome natives
on them. But we may spare ourselves all anxiety. We
need not go to war with them, and shoot them down with
Armstrong guns and Enfield rifles. We need not settle
among them and wear them out of the world, as we have
fretted away the native races of America, New Zealand, and
Australia. These poor Japanese seem conscious that they
are in the way, and seem bent upon saving us all trouble
in their behalf. By this time one-half of the nation is
arrayed in arms against the other half. The wars of such
people are endless. Before they have half finished, we may
expect a considerable reduction in the population of Japan.
The Tycoon, or military Emperor, represents the "party
of progress" in Japan. Compared to his antagonist, he is
a mere plebeian without descent or claim to high rank. The
middle class and the merchants are with him, with all those
who wish to profit by commercial intercourse with Europe.
He can only make Saimios of those followers whom he
delights to honour. These are a kind of knights, an in-
ferior order of nobility. The Daimios, or great nobles, are
created by and owe feudal allegiance to the Mikado, who
has his court at Miako, while that of the Tycoon is at Yeddo.
The spiritual Emperor and his followers represent the old
respectability, the aristocracy of Japan. The Daimios are
great landowners, each more or less independent in his
princely domain. The landed interest in Japan and elsewhere
is on the side of the Crown and of conservative institutions.
The aristocratic party have their prejudices. They are all
for the old policy of exclusiveness. They hold in abhor-
rence the treaty concluded with Lord Elgin. They retired
in a body from Yeddo some time since, as a protest against
the radical innovations ot the Tycoon, against the party of
the friends of foreigners, and against the European Minis•
ters, whose entrance into the capital was regarded as an in-
famous intrusion. Nor have the nobles confined them-
selves to this moral demonstration. It has been by their
armed retainers that the various outrages upon Europeans
have been committed. It was they who attacked the Bri-
tish embassy and nearly murdered Mr. Oliphant, It was
the Prince of Satsuma by whose orders Mt. Richardson was
butchered. It was in the territories of the Prince of Kewsew
that English and American ships were fired upon some
weeks since, an outrage promptly avenged by the destruc
don of the fort. In the strait of Simonasaka, a narrow sea
which separates Nipon, the great island, from the western-
most i- land of Kewsew, a Dutch man-of-war has been since
fired upon, by the orders of the same prince, who thinks
himself strong enough to set all Europe at defiance. Na-
gasaki, the most important open port in Japan, is on this
island of Kewsew. What are the English Government to
do in this complicated dilemma ? The Tycoon does not
seem to be at fault, and we cannot get at the Mikado. The
Tycoon, bee paid. the indemnity money for poor Riobard-

P.-
son's murder.." There came along with it a peremptory
order from the Mikado that all foreigners should at once
leave, which order, of course, has not been complied with.
The Dutch have had a special notice given to them. This
is rather hard upon than, after they have been admitted to
exclusive trade for some 200 years—a privilege which their
traders in old times procured by submitting to unheard•of
humiliations, such as being made to knock their heads
against the ground and trampling on the cross, and being
shut up in a pestilential island, and only approached at
arm's length with a pair cf tongs. The Dutch Govern-
ment has responded to this notice to quit by sending four
vessels of war to arrange matters. And now the Japanese,
or the Mikado, or the Tycoon, or all of them, may
consider themselves at war with all Europe, and America
to boot. If the Tycoon is really our friend, and the Mikado
our enemy, and if we can depend on late news as to their
whereabouts, we may at once have an opportunity of oblig-
ing the one at the expense of the other. The large port of
Osaka, on the southern coast of Nipon, is to be soon opened
to our trade by the orders of the Tycoon. This gentleman
is said to to in great straits just now at this very place.
He is hemmed in there by the troops of the Mikado, whose
Imperial city of Miako is only 20 miles from Osaka. Troops
were being sent, it is said, in an English vessel to Osaka to
the assistance of the Tycoon. If so, we are already in the
thick of the Japanese civil war.

COUNTRY MARKETS.

MANCHESTER-THURSDAY.

At our market this morning there was a good attendance
of buyers, but trade was inactive. The demand for new
English wheat was again slow—red at a reduction of 2s to
3s per qr, and white is to 2s. American wheat was offered
at a decline of 3d to 4d per 100 lb on the prices of this day
se'nnight. Flour inactive, at 6d to is per sack and barrel
lower. Oats receded ld and 2d per 4blb, and new oatmeal
Is per load. Indian corn and Egyptian beans wera each
rather easier.

BIRMINGHAM—THURSDAY.
English"'wheat was sold at 46s to 50s for white, and 40s
to 46s per 36 atone for red, Barley, new malting, 36s to
42s per qr ; grinding, 26s to 30s Oats, old, 24s to 30s
per 30 stone ; Irish, 21s to 255. Beans, 40s to 44s per qr.
Peas, 36s to 44s per 36 stone.