The Sun.
London, England, 1863-04-29 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

TIMES.—AS the vessel of the American common-
wealth labours more and more heavily in the revo-
lutionary ocean on which, in an evil hour, she has
embarked, the tendency to separation between her
straining timbers becomes daily and I.ourly more
manifest. Interesting and exciting as passing events
may be, the future begins to occupy more of men's
minds than the present ; and while we hear nothing
but the most frantic declarations that the Union
must, shall, and will be preserved at the cost, if ne-
cessary, of the depopulation of half a continent, and
the slavery of the other half, the actions of men are
beginning to show how little confidence they repose
in their own most solemn declarations. Of course,
by the Constitution of the United States, that Go-
vernment to which everybody is so loudly profess-
ing unconditional loyalty has supreme power over
foreign relations of the Republic, and it is only
through it that foreign nations can be approached.
Liverpool and Glasgow have exactly as much right
to establish diplomatic or quasi diplomatic relations
with France and Russia as Illinois or Michigan to
open negotiations with the British Government.
Yet this, or something very like it, has actually,
been done. We have now before us a paper ad-
dressed to the Governor-General of Canada, signed
by five influential citizens of Illinois, among whom
we observe the name of Mr. Osborn, the President
of the Illinois Central Railway, which looks ex-
ceedingly like an attempt to establish on a plausible
basis the means of a regular diplomatic communica-
tion between the State and the Colony. We are the
more strengthened in this conviction from the very
earnest disclaimer with which the document ends.
" We come," say those who sign it, "not intending
to transcend the limits of our power, and care•
fully avoiding the assumption of any other func-
tions of the Federal Government in its interna-
tional relations, but to present to the Provincial
Government of Canada, and through it to the
British Government, such facts concerning the
vast resources of the North-Western States, their
capacity for the pro'uction of the cereals; and
the difficulty of reaching tide water with their
product, as will tend to the opening of direct trade
between those States and Liverpool." The Commis-
sion must be delicate indeed which requires to be
so expressly guarded. The authority is nothing less
than an act of the Governor and Legislature of Illi-
nois authorising the Commissioners to proceed to
Canada, and to England if necessary, in order to
present statistics of the trade and productions of the
North-Western States, and to solicit from those
Governments early consideration and early action
on the subject. The case is a wonderfully strong
one, and though the fact of such a mission having
been sent to enforce it might pass without observa-
tion in times less eventful than those in which we
are living, the remarkable coincidence between this
movement and the events which seem to prove that
the North-West must give up for the future the
hope of seeing the Mississippi again open to their
commerce, seems to point to motives yet more ur-
gent than a mere wish to increase an already exist-
ing trade. The North-West, in fact, seems, however
tardily, to be awakening to the real urgency of its
situation. It has take n upon itself, with a gallantry
Equal to its ill-fortune, the task of fighting the bat-
tle of the whole Confederacy. It has bled freely at
every pore, without receiving any of the consolation
which the public plunder has afforded to the fervid
patriots of New York ; and the return which it re-
ceives for its gallantry and devotion is that it has
alienated the South, who are its natural customers,
without any hope of restoring that Union for which
it has fought and bled. The North-West seems to
have arrived at the conclusion that nettling but a
ship canal which shall open the furthest extremities
of Lake Huron and Lake Michigan can enable it to
pour its produce on a scale commensurate with its
abundance into the lap of Europe. The canals at
present connecting the Lake States with the
Atlanfc are small, shallow, and, though fit
for lake craft, quite unsuited for sea-going
vessels. The railway communication is entirely
inadequate, and large quantities of Indian corn aro
described as left in sheds, one of which was two
miles long, by the side of the railways, from the
harvest of one year to the harvest of the next, be-
cause the railway is unequal to the transport of so
vast a mass of food. In 1861 the United States—
which may for this purpose be considered to mean
the North-Western States since the Eastern States
consume more corn than they produce—imparted
into England alone 2,507,744 quarters of wheat,
1,723,334 quarters of Indian corn, and 3,794,865
hundredweights of flour, the whole of which are
computed to have been sold in England for
£12,643,918. But this wheat, flour, and Indian
corn was worth in Chicago only £4,817,567, so
that the difference between the value at Chicago
and the value in London is no less than
£7,826,351. The freight from the North-West to
Liverpool is, on wheat, one-half its price ; on flour,
one-third ; and on Indian corn, seven-eights of its
price. It is calculated that were a ship canal to be
made, so as to allow direct communication, without
transshipment, between Chicago and Liverpool, the
grain might be brought to
ismarketoffi
ne
resop,position
human
sbmsfmaiol
an
n(pryal
roonoofonbrhcea
hecatombs
I 1 one-fourth
tu
or
nt
:th b ofs
its present price. But this :calculation, stupendous
as it is, fails to give the least idea of what we may
reasonably expect the future to be. The State of
Illinois is the most thickly peopled of these regions,
and yet even there only one-tenth of the arable land
which it possesses is under cultivation. Its surface,
naturally cleared, watered by noble rivers, and pos-
sessing the same rich quality of soil as that which
made the deltas of the Nile, the Ganges, the
Euphrates, and the Tigris, the seats of the earliest
civilisation known to us, is capable of yielding
through almost any number of years ten times its
present amount of grain. In ordinary times
such statements as these would fill the
hearts of all patriotic Americans with joy
and exultation. Their lot, has, indeed, fallen in
pleasant places. They are the heirs of all ages, and
have come in the fulness of time to reap a glorious
inheritance, such as never fell to the lot of any.
other people. Unfortunately, man has lent himself
with almost unexampled perversity to mar. and
destroy the blessings which nature tries in vain to
shower upon him. It is proposed that the canal
should be cut from Lake Huron to the
Ottawa, and it is estimated that the expense
on the canal, together with the deepening of the
river, would amount to some £4,000,000. . But
where is the money to come from ? It is not likely
that Canada would contribute largely to suchi inte-
rested object—first, because she is only incidentally .
r e
st e d in
being its
tbe
producerth the personsand
consumers
secondly, because a long course of ex.tr.avnal a wII igel;-:
waste has reduced Canada to. a
on her own showing,
ing to any object, however ncisr
aiwere capital for
beneficial. In England thereldsout a altar less brilliant
any undertaking which he_s how e
than
ehhvuaetn;
theu satisfaction,
i more
.ex.ten.ding their dominion that England shouldnerica must no
.hope to enjoy
easi n g l fmaentlalliYncegi:-In-toellr:
excitement of civil war and the
esuch
y a prospect,
purpose.a ya, i ntn
0
blessings of pege•
demons of strife and w ar, she
must comee...ii
bent on restoring the u •
It the
Union, at
What English company will be
to
the mouth of the Mississippi, let
them abide by their
election, and give. up as worse than hopeless the
chance of carrying their trade down the waters of
isrr
ha::
es absorbed
things
aren t
sohe
evident s i n gl e
ftrhaenStic. Leananyuregnbceto.
sink
its
in land
capital awhere
thought. .of how to alienate, to ruin, and to exter•
that we cannot believe the men of Illinois would
everytn lat e
have opened negotiations on the subject had they
intended to stay exactly as they are. The very
whatever rtahttleei
vs:rrine
price, and
at:ll:di
tact of their insisting so loudly on the necessity
of further openings for their produce seems to
show that, whatever may be the case in New York,
there is on the still peaceful plains of the West
a disposition to look with no unfriendly.
.eye . otn.
the restoration of peace upon the. basis. of elxristo
ing boundaries and rights. It is very singular a_..om
find that while in the East the estrangement f.
greater every day,
England is growing greater and
to this country.
desire in the West to
.draw. closer.
s of tendencies
These aro the first
.faint indilcatiaonrominent
part
which may be destined to p aye p
They concern
in the history of tbe ptnurr
;war, and point to i
._ England, as a great America
that estrangement seems to be couuterbalauced by a
hyeerts jel°f
Itcbwfo snhci
httegher
contribute
b t

HERALD.—The great difficulty in tisetsatee rl e n
Pwohwi which
rl
le
satisfactory solution of the mainPolishql,stion,wtlaieyofa
°b
snwiuistth, impede any reeociat ions of the
W
loi
ire ofh t Russia,he insurgents
visionary nature of the claim?_ew.l:
reconstitution of
set forward, and less t,:lhoani which they are deter-
minedexisted before the first
livla:ntigitioasn,t htehyeydriehaemm
the od kingdom' of Poland, es it
os
themselves
l theve s
not to accept.
arc raising up a barrier
them the moral support oflctili zeiu?st alierate from
Though the dismemberment of l'ol,uropean Powers.
crime of the deepest dye, yet
it
is and in 1792 he a
or less a fait accompli than
theascarcely more so,
ralnk:i.ation of the
Duchy of Len eine by 'France but
viously, in 176(3. We can neither thelit'N ;7 yetas
P:"
nor in the other proceed to retrace the eur onefi case
lion of European countries es they were hsfors;utria;
time of Frederick the Great. The restoration of
Poland within its ancient linii!s would not he prze-
tic.ble. Any of the several maps of Poland e-stely
published enables one at a glance to refresh the me-
mory; and to see distinctly what the Pales den-lard;
and we think the same glance will convince all but
the most advanced Liberals that their claims are of
the most Utopian nature. They would take from
Prussia not merely what is now called the province of
Posen, but the whole of the ancient duchy, extending
as far as the Baltic, and embracing most of the coast
line of the Gulf of Dantzie, thus not only depriving
her of one-fourth of her dominions, but completely
dividing East Prussia from its sister provinces. To
all this territory there is not the slightest doubt that
the Poles can show the strictest title in law, but as
a Statute of Limitations applies in questions of pri-
vate right, so it must obtain in the affairs of nations.
An undisturbed possession of nearly a century has
given Prussia, as a kingdom, right which it would
ill become most of the continental Powers of Europe
to dispute, and has effected such material charges,
net only in the ownership of property, but in the
race and language of the inhabitants, that its re-
union to Poland would be no less an injustice than
was its original severance. From Russia Poland
claims a territory of four times the extent of the
"kingdom" known to the Treaty of Vienne. The
Poles insist on ignoring that Lithuania and Little
Russia are Russian provinces ; that the peasantry—
the great balk of the population—isnot Polish, but
Russian in race, religion, and in the sympathy which
naturally springs from these two powerful connect-
ing links; that the soil has only been appropriated
by Polish landowners in defiance of the first article
of the compact entered into when Lithuania and
Poland were united by a family alliance between
their respective Sovereigns ; and that during the
period that ensued Western Russia was subjected
to Polish rule by no other right than that of con-
quest, by no other law than that of force. There
is not an atrocity which has left its stain on the his-
tory of Nicholas to which the parallel cannot be
found in the cruelties of the Polish Kings on their
Russian subjects. The persecution of the Latin
religion by the Czars would find its match in the
bloody annals of the suffering Greek Church, which
contributed its victims to the stake as lately as the
beginning of the last century. If Nicholas deprived
the Poles of all political freedom, it was a Polish
Diet which reduced by one edict every Cossack of
the Ukraine to a state of absolute slavery, and pro-
voked that insurrection under Sollars, which ended
in the living impalement of its chief. We do not
wish to muster up in long array the crimes and
cruelties of Polish conquerors against the coneuered
Russians with any view of striking a balance be-
tween the two accounts. We wish only to remind
our readers that the tenure by which Poland held
Lithuania and Volhynia, from its first absorption
to its ultimate reconquest by Russia, was the tenure
of the sword. So long as Poland asserts claims to
this large portion of Russian territory she herself is
her own greatest enemy. The Emperor Alexander
would give the most favourable consideration to any
propositions emanating from the Western Powers
on behalf of Poland proper; he would spontane-
ously long ago have still further extended the
liberal institutions of which we have ira a former
article given a faint outline, if it were not self-
evident that any such grants would produce the
very opposite effect to that contemplated. Instead
of satisfying the Poles, it would only stimulate
them to attempt to make good their pretensions to
Russian soil. Any real power he might bestow on
them, such as the sight of granting supplies and
determining the levies of troops, would be putting
weapons into the hands of a bitter enemy, who
would most certainly use them to gain those ulte-
rior objects which they do not hesitate to profess
without disguise. The kingdom of Treaty Poland
is not a wince of strength, but an inherent cause
of weakness to Russia. The disaffection of the
nobility h Polis
. is an element of calculation in every
lii.!4iibi combination against her. Apart from the
1 claims of justice and equity, she would gladly eon-
; sent to a considerable sacrifice to be relieved of a
constant drain on her resources and a perpetual
clog to her internal development and progress.
But whilst the Poles not only privately foster but
openly profess their determination to recover their
usurped dominion over Russian provinces, whilst
every concession of power would be giving them a
locus standi, and a handle which they would not
fail to use against the interests of Russia as a native,
neither can the Emperor Alexander grant, nor the
Powers of Europe reasonably claim from him, such
concession. This is not merely a question of go-
vernment and of diplomacy. There is a strong
public opinion in Russia, a public opinion which
the free institutions the Czar has introdhisuced
throughout the lergth and breadth of do
minions renders capable of asserting itself. That
public opinion has long bean favourabole_
to the recognition of the real rig
that the
thef
Poland. It is in anonaccon: with it
ower,
Czar, unsolicited by y foreign
self-govern-
mentphas so largely developed the system f
° of
in the kingdom, removed many restrictions
the censorship, encouraged and endowed the
Na-
tional Church, founded seminaries for the education
of Catholic and United Greek priests, has estab-
lished secular schools of all degrees, has again thrown
open the gates of the University of Cracow, has
filled the offices of the civil administration with
Polish functionaries, and, in a word, within the
limits of the kingdom, has favoured in every pos-
sible degree the development of the Polish na-
tionality. But the moment the Poles assert claims
to any part of territory, in whatever light we view
it, really Russian, that current of public opinion
which no monarch in the nineteenth century cen
neglect if he would, sets equally strong against_
them. It is not only from the Provincial Diets of
the Russian nobles and from the munieipolities of
the towns that the strongest addresses have been
presented to the Czar, but the working classes,_
arise
peasants emancipated by his beneficent polioeevh..,„
rushed in thousands to publicly testify thelf!odzleal Tin!
readiness to oppose any attack on the 1
10,0004 working
tegrity. We have seen at Moscov_eo,o,,a
there
men assembled for that purpose._ I
basirc
01 "
been the
is scarcely a village whose oheuerech
dernonStratiOnB in
scene of one of those religious
which public feeling de
Russia and Poland.
have
been formed,
thronged bY hits to manifest itself in
delights
ereligious processions
*hum shrines of the •
and the _ .
suppliants offering
f their arms
up prayers
for the success 0 . against 'what
foreign attack, So
they consider a_long as
ents keep their eyes f
the insurg fixed on the
realisation of an impossible future, S
as they couple the cause of their 'O long
own freedom
with the pretensions to exerciseover Russian provinces, they usurped power
possibility of their own not only bar any
sueet-sQ 1,
avert any Practical sym . -, -ut they must
cause. pato), of Europe from their

le and characterlefinal
upon Prince
h
been
is every where decision of the Queen
expressed that a right choice has
D.Altue :;;;Ivs. Ti
have a
monumenthat in the Alemorial Cross we
herrince Consort has
an end, the work will be co
. of the memorial of the
Majesty's pleasure to all classes of
har in harmony at once with
subjects.cacitve" The opinion of the public
stEhiolattletshseilllavyiirntgueofolt. hNlei
eoerfwro
II:
nai
gndhdal t
ipowenristoohnf
atithheia tntirp, ofr
memorialitih the
made, and
shall
the national
thatrrieadll
forward
is att
lamented Prince.
unnecessary delay. It has been odeevmaredd wifill
ould be a public and ceremonious act. Such au
office belongs by pre eminent right to the Qut.ctr,
the memory to be perpetuated than as the hest
representative of the feelings of the nation, and we
have reason to believe that before the summer is
a far
advanced we shall see the Queen coming forwrd
and associating herself with
wi the courtry in this
sacred duty. We t
think hat thout trespassing'
on that perfect liberty of the Queen which public
opinion would never permit to be infringed, we may
express the respectful but earnest horpk a new pep
e that the er-
formsnee of this act of piety ma .i(d
iu the Queen's public life, and that her Meqcsty,
having once more met her people, will not again
withdraw herself into Eeclusion, but remain thence.
forward among them as aforetimc to countenate.o
their social life, and receive the testimonies of their
constant affection.

Importing Tea without colour on the leef pre,
u dteß. t hi'
li cim
hrnines aeripassing off inforior leaved LIB in the imusl
k
s Tea is uncoloured, tboripEortil 4 it i ( -`4l
s
pvvd 044#, eld in packets by 2A60 agents.
vents

TREAT RE-ROY Al,, HAY MARKET,
Lesece, Mr. J. I. Ruckstone.
THIS EVENING, STILL WATERS RUN DEEP.
Mr. and Mrs. Alfred 'Wigan, Mr. W. Farren, Mr. Chippen-
dale, and Miss Louisa Angel.

After which, an apropos Dramatic Sketch, introducing a
Panorama of the Tour of the Prince of W ales In the East.

To conclude with BORROWING A HUSBAND. Pamela
Rim Maria Harris. Commence at 7.

THEATRE-ROYAL LYCEUM orEs, under
the Sole Management of Mr. FECHTER.
THIS EVENING, at 7, to commence with an Original
s"aetch, entitled A SUDDEN ATTACK. Messrs. Shore,
earden, H. Widdicomb, Mies Henrade, and Mrs. Lee.
Attar which, at a Quarter to Eight, a New Romantic
Drama, In Three Acts, and Pr3loaue, entitled THE
MOTTO, by Paul Peva! and John Brougham.
U'ne principal character will be sustained by Mr. Fechter,
supported by Messrs. J. G. Shore, G. Jordan. J. Brougham,
B. iddimmbe, F. Charles, Garden, Raymond, Dawson;
Misses Carlotta Leclercq, Kate Terry, E. Lavenue, and
Elsworthy,

Acting-Manager, Mr. H. Barnett.

ROYAL PRINCESS'S THEATRE
Lame( e. resin 5. Lindua and Vining.

THIS EVENING the drama of AURORA FLOYD. Mi.. 13
Amy Sedgwick. Miss Henderson, and Mrs. Simpson - Messrs.
R• Roxby, G. Melville, G. Belmore, C. Seyton, Wallace, and
Cathcart.
After which, KILLING TIME. Mr. Geo. Vining. Mr. C
&yton, and Miss Amy Sedgwick.
To conclude with a new whimsical Extravaganza, entitled
BEAUTIFUL HA [DEE ; or The Sca Nymph and the Sallee
Rovers. Misses M. Oliver, Helen Howard, Hudspeth, Hen-
derson, and Murray ; Messrs. C. Seyton, G. Belmore, Fitlames, Moreland, and Cockerill.

NEW THEATRE-ROYAL, ADELPHI,
Sole Proprietor and Manson. Mr. B. Webster.
THIS EVENING, JANET PRIDE. Messrs. B. Webster,
J. L. Toole, Paul Bedford, St9henson,. Stuart, Eburne
Sefton, C. J. Smith, Romer; Miss Avonia Jones, Miss A.
seaman, and Mrs. Stoker.
• To conclude with DOMESTIC ECONOMY. Mr. J. L
Toole, Miss Kate Kelly, Miss A. Seaman. and Miss Stoker. L*
Commence at 7.

THE THIRD EDITION OF " THE SUN,"
Containing the Latest SPORTING INTELLIGENCE,
can be had Every Evening of
G. R. GLENIE, NEWS AGENT,
No. 4, Connaught-terrace, Hyde-park.

The Weather---Sun Office, April 29, 1863.