The Sun.
London, England, 1863-05-12 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS,

TlMES.—There is not an Englishman who does
not long to find in each batch of American news
some indication of an end—amicable, if possible, but,
anyhow, an end, to this horrible war. How that
end may come people imagine for themselves. It
may be by a relenting of mutual animosities, or by
an exhaustion of men on either side, or by a bank-
ruptcy of means and credit, or by some tremendous
blow which shall place one side at the mercy of the
other; or it may be by the appearance of :new and
unexpected perils, such as dangerous conspiracies,
or a fresh secession in another quarter; or by the
apprehension of interference; or, in the quietest
way of all, by the accession of a new Government,
more likely to gain reputation by putting an end to
the war than by carrying it on. As yet we cannot
perceive the smallest sign of peace by any of these
ways ; and even though some of these circumstances
are matters of fact, they have no other effect than to
increase the obstinacy of both antagonists. The
North fights not so much to recover the South as to
retain the North-West and the Border States. It
fights against that tremendous repudiation which is
to throw all the costs and all the future consequences
of the war on New York and the great cities. It
fights to rid itself of the enormous obligation it has
contracted on behalf of the African. It fights to
tain its credit with the immigrants from the Old
World, whom it has invited to do the work and
divide the spoil. Succeed it never can, but to con-
fess as much is something impossible to the Ameri-
can nature. It has yet to learn that lesson. Bat the
lesson, so abhorrent to all its feelings and habits,
will be in itself the hardest ever thrust on a repug-
nant pupil. The Northern States will one day have
to sign a renunciation which will be only the begin-
ning of dismemberment and ruin. This is the horror
they fly from, though the further they fly the more
surely do they entail it. Like him who will not
turn round to sec, because, having once done so, I is
eye caught that which he wished not to see again,
they refuse to face the calamity which they know
to be apprcaohing. Neither statesmen nor soldiers
know how to deal with it—not even states-
men of the Stanton class or soldiers like Hooker.
Both sides in this extremity look to us, and nurse a
quarrel with us. They do this while each draws
from us the met its of carrying on the war. The North
has drawn, and continues to draw, those supplies of
men that cannot so easily be obtained from its own
exhausted cities. It draws from us all the material
of war. Yet it assures us that as soon as three
months of decided measures have put an end to this
rebellion it will immediately hurl its armaments
against England, against our hold upon Ireland,
against our dominion in America, against our com-
merce all over the world. Whether we interfere or

lot, this is the fate in store for us, and meanwhile
we are expected to express the warmest hopos for
the success of the Federal arms. From the South
there comes, in somewhat milder accents, a scarcely
less unreasonable complaint. France and England,
we are told, have only to recognise the independ-
ence of the South, and the war will be over at once.
Would, indeed, that it were so, and that we could
persuade the North to save the wreck of its for-
tunes! But no recognition or mediation would have
the smallest weight unless it were backed up by the
probability of more forcible arguments, and those
arguments we are not inclined to apply. Dreadful
as this war is, we have no desire to substitute
another for it, to take ourselves the place of one of
the combatants, and, perhaps, engross the hatred of
both. We have nothing to do but to wait and hope
that these two unhappy maniacs may soon come to
themselves, and see what they are about. It is not
for our interest that either should conquer the other,
or that both should be irreparably injured. This is
a civil war, not, indeed, in our own borders, but
within our own race—that race which but the other
day we were proud to reflect was fast peopling a
continent and surrounding the world.
PosT.—The course which the Russian Govern-
ment is pursuing, according to our latest telegraphic
despatches, is certainly not calculated to divert
the public sympathy of Europe from its present
channel in favour of the Polish insurgents, or to
facilitate the task of those whose duty it is to de-
fend er excuse its policy. Prince Gortschakoff'
may set forth in epigrammatic sentences the danger
to Europe of the cosmopolite revolutionary party,
or he may describe in precise and even most con-
vincing terms the situation of Russia with reference
to Poland, but his insinuations and his logic will
alike be unavailing if the whole civilised world is
outraged by the ferocious and brutal acts committed
by the chief instruments ho employs, in frantic en-
deavours to extricate the Government from the
difficulties into which an injudicious and precipitate
act of legislation has plunged it. Had the measures
adopted by the Russians for the suppression of the
revolt been in accordance with the usages of civi-
lised warfare, Europe might still have felt sympath
with the insurgents, but the more moderate andtleast
Conservative section of politicians would
have made allowances for the difficuel Go-
which the treaties of 1815 placed .
4 the
the force of
vernment. They would have admitted
been
to
that reasoning which has refused
been
granted,
tit peoessiietaino n i n
Poland, because, whenever theyrta theAm to notch own
would ave
the Poles have always convenor
insurrectionary purronscees• 4
of the European party:of
denied that the existence e
re-
volutionarytwheollld
within their dominions
elernentb thee
before
ek
been,
f su suppressing s stihnegy
more
action has rendered
difficult than it has
in the position
so often assumed by
have agreed
that to grant reforms in -
Russian statesmen, one por -
•of the empire—and that an annexed
teen province
—more ample than those enjoved b y the inhabi-
tants of Russia Proper, could not b
expected of any Government, and be reasonably
to endlesa murmurs of di,eo must give rise
the country where such discontent in parts of
ref()
People would not have .
t., rats were impossible.
ignore the validity
the result migl
tt be •
these excuses, even though
tai unsgovernme t d
n amount of oppres '' I) an a cer-
make
allowances f sion ; but any disposition to
rule in Poland or the character of the Russian
those horrors WI
.must vanish before the narrative of
Which have been resorted to to crush
a people whom years 0 f
ievolt. m, o tyranny have goaded into
i oproceedings of Nezinsoff, the Gover-
nor of Lithuania, might touch a responsive chord
in the soul of Gen.'
Butler, if indeed they did not
cause him to feel a pang of
in his treatment of defenceless women. What Butler
only threatened Nezimoff has done. It is due to the
Northern soldiery garrisoned in New Orleans to
admit that the violation of women was not a pro-
minent feature of their barbarities. We are in pos-
session of trustworthy accounts from persons just
arrived from Lithuania and Livonia which fully
confirm the atrocities committed upon the Countess
Mole and other distinguished ladies reported in our
yesterday's impression. This young lady, who W