The Sun.
London, England, 1865-04-25 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

TIMES.—Among the saddest of spectacles is that
of youth stricken down by an untimely fate. Still
more is the imagination affected when Death knocks
at the doors of Kings and summons away the inheri-
tor of a mighty name, unbounded power, and untold
wealth. The untimely decease of the young Czare-
witch will not only throw a great Empire into mourn-
ing, but will call forth regret and pity wherever the
news is heard. In the first freshness of youth,
betrothed to a Princess whose qualities promised
him every happiness, with a Throne for an heritage
and the half of two continents as a dominion, he has
died at the early age of 21 years. Nicholas Alexan-
drowitch was born on the Bth (20th) of September,
1843, and was named after his grandfather, then
themost powerful Sovereign in the world, and the
accepted arbiter of Central and Eastern Europe.
His short life has been divided into two periods by
a great war and by a social and political revolution.
His earliest lessons were those which every Russian
Prince or noble was taught during the reign of the
late Czar. An iron rule at home, a high-handed
and domineering policy abroad, both founded on a
belief in the irresistibility of the Imperial power,
must have filled the delicate child with strange
notions of the destinies to which he was called.
But he had grown from boyhood to manhood
under milder auspices. Russia, worsted in a con-
test with Europe, has been engaged for the last ten
years in effecting those internal reforms which
Nicholas despised, but which a wiser, because a
more humane, policy has now accepted. In his
father's Court he had all the advantages which able
and zealous instructors could confer, and might
have learnt the art of government by watching his
country while passing through the most momentous
change in its annals. To his temperament the new
state of things would have been more fitting than the
old. He was little qualified to wield the power which
his grandfather loved, to face Europe with his hand
on his sword, ready to throw it into the balance
whenever any one dared to measure rights with him.
But such an Emperor as his father is the young
Nicholas might have been. An Emperor of Russia
is not necessarily a barbaric chieftain who must hold
sway and awe mankind by the sternness of his
aspect or the obstinacy of his will. The progress
from military despotism to civilisation and to the
rudiments of constitutional freedom which must be
made by Russia during the next generation might
have been, perhaps, advantageously effected under
the sovereignty of this Prince. Power might have
naturally been transferred from the Throne to the
people, and the cause of good government might
have been advanced by the reign of one who had not
the energy nor the taste to be a stern military ruler.
But all speculations on the talents and character of
the young Czarewitch are now at an end. For some
time his recovery had been hopeless, and such have
been the sufferings of the patient that it is almost a
relief to know they are over. His death has been
accompanied with the most touchingincidents. From
his northern capital, the Czar has hurried across
Europe to his son's sick bed. He arrived in Paris,
attended by the chief dignitaries of the empire,whom
the solemnity of Muscovite traditions required to be
present at the closing scene. In profound depression
he met the French Emperor, exchanged with him a
few words of courtesy, received the condolences
which Napoleon offered in his own name and the
name of France, and then without delay continued
his journey to Nice. He arrived in time to see his
son alive and to be recognised by him. The Princess
Dagmar, who, with her mother, the Queen of Den-
mark, had repaired to the bedside of her betrothed,
was also able to take a last farewell. It seems but
the other day that among the instances of good for-
tune which had occurred to the Danish family the
prospective union betty een this young lady and the
heir to the Russian throne was recorded. Since that
time fate has borne hardly upon her father, and now
it has struck at her own hopes. There are few in-
stances of such bright expectations so suddenly
clouded. The heir to the throne is now the Grand
Duke Alexander, who was born on the 10th of
March, 1845. This Prince is said not to have robust
health, and it is no secret that for sometime there
have been speculations as to the probability of the
claims of both the Czar's elder sons being postponed
to those of the Grand Duke Vladimir, the third son,
who is just eighteeen years of age. In Russia the
claims of birth have never had that sanctity which
belongs to them in Western Europe. Like the
Eastern nations generally the Russians have an
extraordinary reverence for the reigning house or
race,but little care about setting aside an individual
member of it. Not to mention the revolutions and
dethronements of former times, there is a direct
precedent for passing over an heir in the succession
of Nicholas, in 1825, in preference to his elder
brother, Constantine. But there is time enough for
these considerations. The present Czar is in the
prime of life, and we may hope that long before the
Empire need think of his successor the new Czare-
witch may have outgrown any feebleness which at-
taches to his youth, and have gained health and
strength for his high functions. For the present we
can only express our sympathy with the afflicted
Sovereign and his family. Neither the rivalries and
distrust which have marked the relations of Eng-
land and Russia, nor the war in which they were
engaged a few years since, can blind this nation to
the greatness of the Russian people, the power of
their ruler for good, and the praiseworthy objects
which the present Czar has desired to accomplish.
For one of the most meritorious Sovereigns of
Europe, governing a race which is rapidly advancing
in civilisation and power, the English people must
feel due respect, and the death of his son will bid
them lay aside international jealousies, and join the
remotest populations of Asia in their condolence.
Judging by the past, Russia will never want a ruler
capable of the arduous duty of governing her. Ex-
traordinary men and even more extraordinary
women have attained to the throne and have done
their part successively in bringing the most secluded
races of the world into the light of knowledge and
civilisation. Whatever ill-fortune may fall upon
the Imperial family, there will be always some scion
found to continue its magnificent traditions. This
is the best consolation that can be given to a pa-
triotic and high-spirited Prince. One child may be
taken from him, but the stock is not likely to fail.
The present loss may be hard to bear, but the
father's grief need not be mingled with fears for the
future destinies of the State.

HERALD.—The surrender of Lee is not only the
greatest misfortune that has yet happened to the
South, it is the crowning disaster, in which we seem
to see the end of all. The tumultuous wave of

Northern aggression has at last swept down before
it that proud and towering cliff against which for
four long years it has dashed itself in vain. At the
close of the fourth year of the war the North has
prevailed—as we all along feared it would, but
hoped it might not. And is it, then, all over with
the Southern people ? Have all their sacrifices, all
their heroism, all their long-drawn agony of four
years past, been in vain ? The very thought is
enough to call up a blush of shame into the cheek of
a man who is accustomed to boast of his age, who
believes in the march of mind in the 19th century.
The spectacle of the fall of a brave nation which
has struggled for its independence as the South has
struggled is a sight at which angels might hide their
faces, at which ineri might shed tears of blood. It
is one thing to admit that the Confederates have
been worsted in battle, it is quite another thing to
allow that they have been subjugated. The Indian
Prince refused to believe in ice, and according to his
light was justified in his unbelief. Until the matter
has received the most absolute demonstration we

refuse to accePia;aifa- ct--whca is contrary to our
experience and subversive of all the lessons of history.
A great nation never seems so great as when in the
hour of its triumph it knows how to extend mode-
.

ration to a vanciiiished enemy. It is by following
such a policy that the great nations of Europe have
more than once in late years secured at the same
moment the fruits of victory and the profit of mag-
nanimity which is to make friends of foes. The
French and English, after the fall of Sebastopol,
offered terms to Russia which she could accept with-
out humiliation. Napoleon 111., after the crowning
victory at Solferino, gave everything back to Axis-.
tria except the half of Lombardy which she could
no longer defend. It is neither the duty nor to
the interest of the North at this juncture that
it should press hard terms upon its enemy.
The choice is open to it of accepting a com-
promise of some sort, or driving the South to a point
of desperation in which it will call to its aid all the

resources of despair to enable it to prolong the con-
test on the most unequal terms. There is still left a
Confederate army, which is said to number as many
as 150,000 men in the field. That army may retreat
beyond the Mississippi, and carry on the war in
Arkansas, Western Louisiana, and Texas: If the

,
worst comes to the worst, the defenders of the lost
Confederacy may cross the Rio Grande and offer
their swords to the Emperor Maximilian in Mexico.
Armed bands of guerillas, sallying forth from the

mountains, finding a refuge in the swamps, be-
friended by cottagers and planters in every State of

the South, may 'Trey upon- the Federal Commerce,
cut off in detail the Federal garrisons, and keep up
the war in a desultory and predatory fashion. The

opportunities of Southern 'resistance are not yet
over, and by continuing the war in some fashion or
another the South may yet succeed in tiring out its
foes. The President of the North will now probably
issue a proclamation and an amnesty, and attempt
to dictate, after the lordly fashion of a conqueror,
the terms on which the Southern States may re-
enter the Union. The attempt at reconstruction is,
nevertheless, Quixotic and absurd. The difficulties
of the North, so far from being at an end, are but
beginning. The very idea of a Federal Union places
all the States which compose it on a footing of