The Sun.
London, England, 1863-10-29 00:00:00

Octogenarians and Nonagenarians,

Lord Palmerston, who completed his seventy-
ninth year on Tuesday, and who, if any man can,
may be take❑ as a thorough type of the working
statesman, is still the gay, buoyant, ever-youthful
hero of debate, because of his active interest and
participation in the affairs of the time. Leigh
Hunt, who was born the day before Palmerston, and
who may stand as a perfect specimen of the pure
literary man, fell short of seventy-five, though his
theoretical interest in all kinds of questions was con-
siderable. Of the Lake poets and essayists, Words-
worth was the only one who died really old, Rogers
—to speak of another set of authors—lived to be
ninety-two; but then Rogers was a man
abroad in society, and very little of a dreamer
by the Lethean streams of Helicon. Walter
Savage Landor, still surviving at nearly
ninety, is a case against us ; but he is con-
spicuous as an exception. Goethe and Humboldt,
in their 85th year, showed, however, no diminution
of their mental vigour; and Hobbes went on writing
politics, philosophy, and poetry, up to his 92d
year, in which he died.
Intellectual wrestling, or golf-playing, seems to
be the greatest aid to length of years that we can
identify as such. The statesman is "always in a
triumph or a fight ;" and where this does not ex-
haust the system (as it does in the physically feeble)
it seems actually to stimulate, intensity, and prolong
the secret energies of being. There are measures to
be carried, or to be defeated, on the success or failure
of which the man has set his heart ; there is a
party to be served, and another party to be out-
witted and out-mancsavred, or met openly in the
lists, " Shall this dearly cherished object fail for
want of trying ? Shall that other succeed because I,
a party leader whom my party can't well do without,
choose lazily to give up the battle, and slink away
to my arm-chair and slippers ? The fight is still
proceeding; the enemy is strong, and threatens to
outflank us ;is this a time for rest ?" These are
considerations which rally all the forces of life, as
the sound of a pibroch is said to rally the Highland
regiments whenever for a moment they are driven
back and disheartened. The old statesman con-
tinues to live because he has a motive for living, or
rather many motives, which will not suffer him to
stagnate. The mere desire to live is much ; but
there must be a specific object to live for—some-
thing in the future whereon our gaze is earnestly
fixed—something towards which we direct all the
capacities of the soul. This is more the case with
lawyers and statesmen than with any other
class. Bishops often live to an extreme
age ; but they are the statesmen of the
ecclesiastical world, and are kept alive by
precisely the same influences. The Bishop of
Exeter is nom 86, and bids fair to rival Lord Lynd-
hurst in length of days. It is sometimes the same
with great soldiers and sailors. Lord Combermere,
who must be 90 or more—who was an officer in the
British army when Robespierre was heading the
Reign of Terror, and a cavalry general as far back
as the Peninsular war—has been in the thick of
affairs all his life, and therefore comes within the
conditions to which we are alluding. The service
of the State, i❑ some capacity or other, seems to be
your true elixir vita. Nestor, we are persuaded,
was a myth, embodying the idea that to be a prime
minister, or a lord chancellor, or a bishop, or a
fi,3ld-marshal, or in some other way a leader of men,

is the surest nit a-is of living to be very old. The
poets say that the eloquent adviser of the Greeks
during the Trojan war survived 3 generations of men.
It has been disputed whether this means that he
lived to be three hundred, or only ninety, counting
thirty years as the average of a generation; but the

latter will serve. Homer, in writing of Nestor, fore-
shadowed Lyndhurst, Lansdowne, and Brougham.
Doge Band°lo, when above ninety, and blind, con-
quered Constantinople, and reigned there for two
years. When Brennus and his Gauls invaded Rome,

they found a senate of old men seated in their ivory
chairs, and recoiled for a moment, awe-struck, from
such an assemblage of legislative antiquities. It
has been so in all times and countries. Your states-
man is constantly living to be old, and, when old,
is alwa7s to be found repelling wild irruptions.
Talleyrand lasted to eighty-four, and Metternich to
eighty-six. Nesselrode, the Russian, and General
Cass, the American, are both instances of longeveus
politicians. The Americans are not remarkable for
long life; but the public men of the New World
contrive to hold out ea well as their congeners in
Europe. John Adams, the fellow-labourer of
Washington, lived to be 91 ; his friend Jefferson,
who died the same day, was 83. Josiah Quincy,
who wrote a letter the other day about the present
struggle, is of Lord Lyndhurst's age. He was
born, like Lyndhurst, a British subject in Ame-
rica, before the Declaration of Independence, and
has been an active politician. General Scott and
Mr. Buchanan still link the stormy present of the
United States with the early part of the century,
when all seemed smooth and safe ahead. Eng-
land has invariably been remarkable in this
respect. " Old John of Gaunt, time-honoured Lan-
caster," was but the forerunner of a ling of aged
counsellors. Queen Elizabeth's Lord Burleigh was
Prime Minister of England for more than fifty
years ; and Sackville, Lord Dorset, reached the age
of eighty. But. Continental nations have shared the
honour with us in equal proportions. Sully was
eighty-two when he died; and Andrea Doria ninety-
four, though his life was one unresting contest.
Prince Adam CzArtoryeki must have been more
than ninety when, but recently, he laid down
the burden of his sorrows and his exile. Among
the ancients, Cato lived to be eighty-five; and
Isocrates, the " old man eloquent," whose spirit
was broken down by the news of the fatal battle
of Chseronea, starved himself to death in his
ninety-ninth year, and even then, if we may credit
the histories, had strength enough to withstand his
voluntary abstention from food for four days.

Yet, after all, the few special instances of longe-
vity which seem to border on the preternatural are
not to be found among statesmen, or men of intel-
lect of any kind whatever. Old Parr, who is said
to have lived to be a hundred and fifty, and old Jen-
kins, who seems to have been nearly twenty years
older still, were persons of humble birth and small
intellectual capacity. We cannot call to mind
any man of eminence --even of a small
degree of eminence—who passed the age of a
hundred, with the exception of Macklin, the
actor and dramatist, who did not finally quit the
stage till he was at least ninety-nine, and lament-

ably broke down, from sheer lack of memory, while
playing Shylock. Anacreon might have lived to be
as old, had the grape-stone spared him ; but it
didn't. Titian got on to ninety-six, or, as soma say,
ninety-nine; but there he stopped. 'Macklin has it

- -
a'.l to himself as au intellectual centenarian. lit

wu.s an Irishman ; and it is noteworthy that, at the
present day, the most remarkable instances of longe-

vity are to be found among the Irish poor. Lynd-
hurst, too, was Irish by blood; bat the actor beat
him by sixteen years, dying at a hundred and seven.
Fancy a peer at a hundred years old getting on his
legs to address the House of Lords, and losing the

LATEST INTELLIGENCE.

[REUTER'S TELEGRAM.]

POLAND.
EXECUTIONS IN WARSAW.
WARSAW, OCT. 29.

At 9 o'clock this morning four Polish gendarmes
were hanged on the Gezyhoff-square in this capital,
by sentence of court-martial.

AUSTRIA.

VIENNA, OCT. 28.

The Presse of this evening has received advices
from 'Warsaw announcing an increase of Russian
arbitrary rule. Upon the 23d a razzia was made
upon the young men of the Polish capital. Several
hundreds were seized, searched, and stripped to the
skin. The same operation was repeated at night,
130 young men being arrested and carried off to the
citadel.

The OsideutscAe Post publishes a leading article
upon the danger of the general situation, owing to
the systematic hesitation of Austria, " who could
easily prevent any catastrophe." The writer con-
cludes by observing that the true interests of
Austria are only to be found in energetic communi-
cation with France.

SPAIN.
A Council of Ministers has approved the draft
of the speech from the throne to be delivered at the
opening of the Cortes.

THE BOMBAY AND MAURITIUS MAILS.
The following telegram has been received at Mr.
Reuter's office from the Peninsular and Oriental
Steam Navigation Company :
ALEXANDRIA, OCT. 28.
The Euxine and the Delta left with the above
mails at 10 a.m. this day.
The former may be expected at Marseilles on the
3d, and the latter at Southampton about the 10th
November.
The Noma, from Mauritius, reached Suez on the
25th, and the Benares, from Bombay, on the 26th
inst.

FRANCE.
PARIS, OCT. 29th.

The Mexican Consuls in Paris, Bordeaux, and
Havre having been compelled to cease their func-
tions, the affairs of these consulates have been tem-
porarily placed in charge of the Consuls of
Guatemala.

BOURSE, Oct. 28.—The market continues heavy,
and business done shows a further decline. Threes,
for the Account, are now at 67t. Mobilier have
receded to I,ooof. Railway Shares rather offered,
with a slight decline in some of the lines. The
market continued heavy to the close, and the left
off as follows :

11- per Cents .. 95
Do. end month....
3 per Cents
Do. end month 66 90
Credit Mobilier 1082 b 0
1)o. end month 1082
Bank Shares 3310
Credit F oneier 1282 50
Roman

Italian Loan 73 05
Do. end month 73 05
New ditto
Do. end month.... -- --
Russian
Austrian
Spanish Threes 53 75
Rome Debt —
Deferred

RAILWAYS.

Cash. Account.
Orleans
Northern -
Lyons and Mediterranean 955 .. 950
New ditto 9lO
--
Geneva..
Southern
Western
Eastern
Sardinian 413 75 .. 415
Austrian
Lon, hfird
North of Spain
Saragossa 630 .. 630
Ditto to Barcelona

AMERICA.

(REUTER'S EXPRESS.)
(Per City of London.)
NEW YORK, OCT. 17.

The reported falling back of General Meade's
army to Manassas is fully confirmed, and Lee's
army is said to occupy most of the old Bull Run
battle-ground, and the road leading into London
Talley to the North of it. The following is from a
despatch to the Hew York Times ;
The enemy made two desperate and unsuccessful
attempts to-day (Oct. 14th) to whip our army in
detail, and destroy our trains. Just at daybreak
between Catlett's station and Warrenton, Stuart
and A. P. Hill made a simultaneous attack upon
Gregg's cavalry, and the second corps. Almost the
first intimation of their presence was the opening
of their batteries upon the second corps. Our troops
were speedily in position and the enemy were re-
pulsed with considerable loss. Late in the afternoon
Hill made another dash to cut off the second corps.
Le first attacked the roar of the fifth corps. When
the head of the second corps had reached Kettle
Run near Bristoe's Station, Hill made a terrific
onslaught upon both corps. The second corps was
on the east side of the railroad track and used
the road embankment for breastwork with
great advantage. Several changes were
made, and each time the rebels were
forced back with great slaughter, leaving their
killed and wounded in our hands. A rapid artil-
lery fire was kept up until long after dark by both
sides, when the enemy gave up and retired. The
following General Order was published on the
15th :

" Head Quarters, Army of the Potomac,
Oct. 15th.

"The Major-General Commanding announces
to the Army that the rearguard, consisting of the
Second Corps, was attacked yesterday while march-
ing by the flank. The enemy, after a spirited
contest, was repulsed, losing a battery of five guns,
two colonels, and 450 prisoners. The skill and
promptitude of Major-General Warren, and the
gallantry and bearing of the officers and soldiers
of the Second Corps are entitled to high commen-
dation.

" MAJOR-GENERAL MEADE.

By command of

(Signed)

" S. WILLIAMS."

A despatch to the Associated Press says :-
4' The falling back of our Army from Rappahannock
station to Bristow's and Catlett's stations is repre-
sented as a magnificent spectacle. They marched
by four parallel lines. There were no delays nor
confusion. Every movement being conducted with
remarkable regularity,"
In the recent conflict between Pleasanton and
Stuart's forces the latter were endeavouring to
(fleet a flank movement on the former.

A few particulars of the engagement at Bris
tow's and Cattlett's station have been received. It
appears that the rebels furiously attacked the
Second Army Corps, commanded by General
Warren, and the cavalry division of General Gregg.
The corps being one of the oldest and highly effi-
cient, succeeded in stopping the rebel advance, com-
pelling them to fall back with heavy loss, our own
troops suffering also largely. The Federal cavalry
fought with great desperation, leaving many dead
and wounded on the field.
At six o'clock in the evening General Lee made
a desperate attempt to flank General Meade by the
way of Chantilly, and endeavoured to get in his rear
by way of Fairfax Court-house. In this he was un.