The Sun.
London, England, 1863-12-30 00:00:00

Lithuanian Governor-General, and of the Minister
of the Interior for the Rnssian Empire.
Nevertheless, the Lithuanian bands of insurgents
appear, at last, to have been destroyed, and with
them a considerable portion of Lithuania itself—its
social organization, its resources in capital, and here
and there its forests and its crops ; and addresses of
loyalty are still being signed by the nobility and
gentry of these provinces, though the Minister of
the Interior describes most justly the." Polish mino-
rity" of the population as " consisting of the mast
educated classes of society—of the nobility, the
clergy and the Government officials, of the teachers
and the taught."

It is not astonishing that insurgents taken in
arms in a country on which Russia has so slight a
hold as on Lithuania should be very severely pun-
ished. I hear now that insurgents who surrender
under promise of pardon meet with but little better
treatment. They escape with their lives, but are
required to give evidence against their comrades,
and, refusing to do so, are told that their repent-
ance is not sincere, and thereupon are sent into

exile.
As to the armed insurrection in the kingdom, the
Russians seem to be of opinion that there also it is
virtually at an end. They have been of that opinion,
however, for many months past, and almost from
the beginning of the movement it has been as much
ti matter of coarse :in the Russian papers to re-
cord its gradual decline as it has been in the Polish
ones to announce its continual increase. In the
meanwhile it is quite certain that the insurgent
bands have hitherto not suffered very much from
the cold, on which the Russians counted so con-
fidently for aid. The Russians could prevent the
importation of furs and sheepskins into Poland, but
they could not command the frost, and even in St.
Petersburg, in the second week of December, the
mercury still stood several degrees above freezing
point, the Neva was as liquid as in the month of
August, and the thin ice which for a few days had
covered the canals seemed to be melting away much
more surely than the Polish insurrection. The
weather was detestable, no doubt, but until
within the last week it has not been cold. some
10 or 12 days ago the firing of signal guns from the
Admiralty, by night as well as by day, informed
the inhabitants of St. Petersburg that the river was
rising. Already a portion of the old town was inun-
dated, and, apart from Polish affairs, a sharp frost
was much wanted here, if only to stay the inunda-
tion of the Neva.
In another month the Poles will have shown whe-
ther or not they can hold the woods all the year
round ; but that they can maintain themselves in
small bands now until the return cf spring is scarcely
to be doubted—as regards, at least, the physical part
of the question. They will not allow themselves to
be frozen out ; but Europe's indifference is more
cutting to them than the snow, sleet, and wind of
the sharpest winter ; and they must be somewhat
weary of looking out for an intervention which has
been such a long time coming, and of the approach
of which there are now fewer signs than ever. But
until all prospect of war breaking out. in Europe
has passed away hope will not entirely abandon the
Poles ; and to live in the woods even during the cold
of a northern winter, however difficult and painful
it may be, is after all not impossible.
On the other hand, however, the Russian troops,
well hatted, well clothed, and now actually well
fed, will not suffer from the cold at all. Hitherto,
according to their officers, they have had much
better health under canvas than in the barracks of
Warsaw and other Polish towns. They have been
accustomed as peasants to live in the open air, and
it is only confinement that really does them harm.
In the meanwhile measures of the utmost severity
are continued in the Kingdom of Poland, as in
Lithuania.

The _Runian Invalid of a few days since reports
in one number as many as ten executions for poli-
tical offences in the Kingdom. It is remarkable
that of the ten persons executed six were Poles
who had deserted the Russian army to join the
ranks of the insurgents. At the present moment the
three leaders cn whom the Poles principally rely for
maintaining the insurrection throughout the winter
are all officers who quitted the Russian service for
the express purpose of fighting against the Russians.
It would be dlfficult to justify, but it is easy to ex-
plain, and even to excuse, such conduct. Under the
reign of Nicholas the landed proprietors in the Polish
provinces incorporated with the Russian Empire
were forced to send at least one son from each family
to the Russian army. Men thus impressed into a
rorelgn enu naterui service (=nor be expected to
distinguish themselves by their fidelity. They have,
doubtless, no right to disregard their oaths ; but as
men in general, and especially as Poles are consti-
tuted, it would be ridiculous to imagine that under
actual circumstances they would invariably observe
them.

To deserters and to Poles who, without deserting,
have broken the promise required from officers quit-
ting the Russian army never to take arms against
Russia, no mercy is shown if they once fall into
the power of the enemy. Not, as far as I can learn,
that mercy has yet been shown to any chief of a
detachment, whatever his previous career may have
been ; but the life even of the humblest insurgent
is not spared if he has ever been in the Russian
service. This distinction between ordinary insur-
gents and insurgents who have violated their word
as Russian officers :is intelligible enough. Some
further distinction, too, ought certainly to be ob-
served in the treatment of insurgent chiefs, as for in-
stance, between those who have acted in conformity
with the rules of civilised warfare, and others Who
(according to Russian accounts) have behaved
cruelly to prisoners or to the Polish peasantry.
Of late there have been so many small detach.
ments in the kingdom, that to sentence every chief
to death would almost amount to condemning
every insurgent doing the duty of an officer. This
is certainly not the time for increased severity, now
that the insurrection is lying out ; and the Rus-
sians would do well to avoid measures of a merely
vengeful character, or, at least, having that appear-
ance in the eyes of the Poles and of all foreigners.
When the insurrection is at an end, and with it the
frenzy of those who are now such ardent devotees
at the shrine of St. Michael Monravieff, the Russians
will be glad to be able to say that at least they had
some generals and general-governors who did not
display the savage qualities supposed at the pre-
sent moment to be peculiarly characteristic of
" archangels." I remember Prince Schachoffsky,at
the beginning of the insurrection, sending back
several Galician prisoners who were wounded—and
others, I believe, who were not wounded at all—to
Cracow. Only the other day General Annenkoff
liberated some score of the prisoners taken at Rad-
ziwillow during the Volhynian expedition, and if
let
tee officers have had no other reward, they have
lentat escaped the praise of M. Tucheff, the Mus-
covite
venal, who reserves his ridicule and his
inveettvn
enough tZer those of his countrymen who are weak
I spole,:tbllleor cruelty.
B,4,,,,ttprevions letter of a satirical poem
in
thelig
to
his
juittea_7:ll.lv3
t.Mouravieff and the Mouravieff
wdiorreschteipdpaers.
however, to have had less
tshtleccnieSasnthwahnoanfiii:r_osne, written specially against
gatteured to express in suitable
to a
st
be
felt at an executioner
terms
Prince Souvaroff, bow-
el): terms
willcomp ththe
notirne dd
always 1,,
Pointed to with scorn
hithzreaan grandson 0 oof the
as the degenerate
ajireo! men,Th
" eneteeetic"
Nezys
women, and children
reproach, such present
Governor-General ef
as it is, is deserved -
given
proofs of a humane disposition by actio,,,,
St. Peterab,,,t
has
by words. Thus, it is ow,
ute e
in the Nve
that the mother of Captain Sierako.wski
ee
at 'Mina by Mouravicfr, is now iit
Europe, and not in Siberia.
As to Sierakowski's wife,
his mother-in-law, nAd
his two sisters-in-law, it must be satisfactory to the
Mouravieff worshippers to reflect that they
have
received worse treatment than cou!d have been ex-
pected for them even had old Souvaroff been their
judge. We have heard of insurrections been sup-
pressed with cruelty in every country in Europe;
but, except in Lithuania, and under the Mouravieff
regime, no one ever heard of the offence of an ill-
supra chief being visited upon his wife and his
wife's relations. It is a fact, however, that Madame
Sierakowska's mother and two sisters (the mother,