The Sun.
London, England, 1865-03-18 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

TIDIES.-If there be a subject which a wise Assem-
bly might well desire to avoid, it is that of Poland.
The mere recollection of it must humble the pride,
prick the conscience, and excite the grief and com-
miseration of every thinking man. For the third of
a century the two great nations of Western Europe
have been engaged in impotent demonstrations in
favour of this unhappy country. In England people
have made speeches, signed petitions, questioned
candidates, voted, joined processions, subscribed,
dined, and danced, for the benefit of Poland. But
Poland has gained nothing. The gathered anti-
pathy of many years did, indeed, burst forth in 1854,
but the Crimean war did not wrest a single mile of
Poland from the power of its oppressors. Fortu-
nately for our own self-esteem, we have not been
alone in this weakness. France has been still more
conspicuous in her inability to deliver those whose
freedom she demanded. The only article of the
Orleans faith which the present Empire appears to
have adopted is that France is the natural ally of the
Pole against the Russian. The demonstrations
which were repeated year after year under Louis
Philippe seemed likely to be followed in 1863 by
some more effective policy, but all has come to
naught. Poland has fallen, and who shall say that
she will ever rise again ? The course to be taken
by an honest and reasonable Englishman can no
longer be a matter of doubt. Whatever continental
nations may do, it is our part to abstain from rous-
ing again the national hatreds which divide two
races, one so exulting and powerful, and the other
so utterly ruined. For this reason we can hardly
listen with patience to Mr. Hennessy when he asks
the House of Commons to show its reprobation of
the Czar by resolving that the annual payment con-
nected with the Russo-Dutch Loan ought not to be
continued. Mr. Hennessy's resolution declares that
the Russian Government ' shows its determination
to set at naught the engagements it contracted in
1815 respecting Poland," and that the respect of
those engagements was the condition on which
the Powers of Europe consented to recognise as
lawful the possession by Russia of the greatest part
of ancient Poland. What can be the object of thus
returning to the old discussions, which were diploma-
tically exhausted two years ago ? Mr. Hennessy
gives us a review of the late rebellion, and the course
taken by the British Government, prefacing it with
on account of the shortcomings of England as far
back as 1831. At that time, we are told, France
asked England to join in an intervention. England
refused. At the time of the Crimean war we were
asked by the French Emperor to make the indepen-
dence of Poland one of the conditions of peace. We
refused again. In 1863 it was our fault that the
insurrection was not successful, for, according to
Mr. Hennessy, Lord Russell had the power to save
Poland without even going to war. One would
think that these instances should have been enough
to deter any member from re-opening the subject.
Such repeated declarations of unwillingness or ina-
bility should convince him how hopeless is his task.
In what a position would the adoption of his-resolu-
tion place the British people ! They who, to accept
Mr. Hennessy's facts, would not move a finger in
1831, when the newly enthroned house of Orleans
was ready for a popular war, and the whole body of
the Poles werein arms—they who would not extend
to Poland the discussions whichpreceded the peace of
1856—finally, they whose Minister chilled the zeal
of France two years ago, and encouraged Prince
Gortschakoff to a more haughtytone, are now asked
to show their powerful displeasure by declining to
pay the sum of £70,000 a year. This important ad-
dition to the Russian revenue was looked upon, we
are told, by Lord Castlereagh as a security for the
due observance of the engagements of Russia. We
have it therefore in our power to hurl a thunderbolt.
The late Czar did not quail in 1831, his successor
stood firm in 1863, even though it was doubtful for
a time whether the strength of this empire might not
be measured against his own. But now we can utter
a threat which will bring him to his knees. We can
declare the Russo-Dutch Loan to be forfeit! It has

only been paid for 50 years; it has 50 years more to
run. An actuarywill easily calculate the loss we could
inflict on the Russian Empire by withholding it, and
the immense value of the security for Russian good
behaviour which was taken by Lord Castlereagh
when he devised this unparalleled system of payments.
It is almost incredible that any politician should
desire to place the House and the country in such
a contemptible position as they would occupy were
they to accept and act on this resolution. We may
presume, however, that Mr. Hennessy is not serious
m demanding that we should show our humanity by
repudiation, and atone for our former selfishness by
putting the Russo-Dutch dividends into our pockets.
He simply desires the vote of the House as an ex-
pression of feeling, a " demonstration," a proof that
Englishmen have not forgotten Poland, that they
feel for her wrongs, and in some vague way wish to
redress them. But it is just against these " demon-
strations" that we are bound in honour and con-
science to guard. We have had more than enough
of them, and ought to be ashamed of any repetition
of the unmeaning and cruel farce. We and the
French, and the European Liberals generally, have
been demonstrating for upwards of thirty years, and
the end of it all is that the yoke is more cruelly
pressed down on the necks of the Poles than ever.
Nor is it only our own self-respect which should
prevent us from resuming the agitation of Polish
politics. It is not as if the speeches were heard and
commented on nowhere but in this island. Every
word that is uttered in the House of Commons, or
even on a London platform or the hustings, in favour
of Polish nationality is likely to be repeated with
exaggeration among an oppressed people, and to ex-
cite hopes which we, at least, have no power of rea-
lising. Mr. Hennessy, it must be admitted, is not
alone in his efforts to revive these discussions. The
Marquis Townsend had a meeting the other day,
which, it appears, came to the conclusion that Eng-
land ought to have gone to war for Poland ; and
Lord Amberley at Leeds, though as his father's son
he could not go this length, yet is happy the meeting
proved that sympathy with Poland had not died out.
Lord Amberley sympathises with the Poles, and ear-
nestly trusts that at some future day their efforts on
behalf of freedom may be attended with greater suc-
cess. Though he thinks the Government ought not
to have done more than it did, yet that little appears
to him well worthy of Polish gratitude, for " al-
though the representations of the English Govern-
ment may not have produced any immediate or pal-
pable effect, I believe that they will be gratefully
remembered by the Poles in after-times." The
differences between the so-called friends of Poland
show how utterly they are without a conception of
a policy. Some would " go to war" at some un-
certain time ; another is for representations which,
though not immediate and palpable in result, may
entitle us to the gratitude of the Poles when they
gain their liberty ; another is for punishing the
Russian Empire by withholding a paltry payment.
All these recommendations are equally futile, but
they may not be the less injurious in their effects
on the Polish people. Unless these are now com-
pletely undeceived, they may still fancy they have
something to hope from British interference, while
we well know that they must hope for nothing. Is
it, then, aught but cruelty to maintain these dis-
cussions ? If by some mighty and unexpected revo-
lution the Polish nation were to be once more re-
stored, Englishmen might rejoice at the result; but
while European events keep their regular course,
and no deliverance appears possible, it is as well
they should hold their peace. The horrors of 1863
ought not to be lightly renewed. Some 30,000 Poles
killed in battle or executed, twice or three times that
number deported to Siberia, such is stated to have
been the result of the last rebellion. It is notorious
that it was protracted, if not begun, through the
hope of a European interference, which interference
never came. To have provoked one such catastrophe
in a genepation ought to be enough.
POST.—It is acknowledged that the world is the
best school for politics, and Lord Amberley was
prompted by an honourable and sagacious instinct
when, to fit himself for the career of a statesman, he
chose rather to become an oratorical citizen than a
meditative student. He might be worrying his
brain over deep political problems still had he pre-
ferred the latter course. The temptations of a stu-
dent, moreover, are such as in no degree affect the
public man. The student, having nothing but his
own ideas to contend against, does not allow them
to baffle him for long. His combats are rude and
serious, but in the end he learns effectually to sub-
due them ; 'and seeing that he has it all his own
way, it is not astonishing that he should grow
opinionated. The political voices which issue from
the closet are intolerably dogmatic and arrogant.
They have no doubts. They deal in first prin-
ciples, and understand no scheme that is not com-
prehensive. Mankind can never move fast enough
to satisfy them ; opposition is their deadly anta-
gonist ; they have a contempt for details ; and
special interests are matters to be put aside with a
sweep of the arm. It is our public life that makes
Englishmen of us. In the closet we are theorists
and only half insular. Great credit is due to Lord
Amberley for perceiving so early in his career that
books must be thrown aside, speculation trampled
under foot, and the world fairly met. A perusal of
the speeches he has already addressed to Leeds and
his countrymen will show that he is not a student.
A man less opinionated it would be hard to find.
He is so amenable to hostile ideas, that they have
only to be put to him in a certain shape to-day, and
to-morrow he will adopt them and make them his
own. There is a German tale of a man who sud-
denly became somebody else. Lord Amberley ap-
pears to have the power of becoming somebody else
at a very short notice. Whether he is as amazed as
that hero was, when greeted by total strangers with
an overwhelming familiarity, and preserves the same
sort of lingering consciousness of a quondam indi-
viduality, we are not accurately led to divine from
his remarks ; but we observe a growing hesitation
about them, as if he partly began to fancy that the
Amberley of the 31st of January was not the Am-
berley of the 15th of March, and still less
he of the transforming 16th. When a .woman
changes her mind rapidly and frequently, censorious
men declare that she has no mind at all. There is
little doubt that they speak in their ignorance of the
sex ; and as much may said of those who would
charge the same upon Lord Amberley. That he
has not yet discovered his right mind is quite evi-
dent, and he is at no pains to conceal the fact ; but
that he is making honest and laudable efforts to
identify and overtake it, is also plain, and should
win for him more toleration than he is at present
receiving. The truth is, that Lord Amberley made
the capital mistake of commencing as a teacher and
not as a pupil in the world. His instinct was cor-
rect in propelling, but his ambition counselled him
badly. He began as an oracle, and while no ques-
tions were put to him he had no stammering fit.
When the questions came the Delphic utterance
ceased at once, and he was a simple pupil of the
men of Leeds. Liberals are, perhaps, as easily to
to be had ready-made as Conservatives. But be-
tween a ready-made leader of the former party, as Lord
Amberley. was bidding to be in his January speech,
and a full-grown Conservative, a marked difference
exists. A Conservative has little else to do save to
march monotonously up and down the castle wall, and
show the top of the musket over the battlements.
Different qualities are demanded from a Liberal
chieftain. Lord Amberley has evidently been think-
ing over the distinction. The responsibility of at-
tacking institutions he now perceives to be infinitely
more serious than that of defending them. So, he
is " not quite sure" upon certain points with which
his pertinacious questioners harass him. Anticipat-
ing, we may presume, that the question would come,
he gave himself grace in an opening survey of our
foreign policy, wherein he is quite at one with
Leeds and the English public generally. This was
given, modestly enough, in the teacher's vein, and
sounded like the speech of the man we had known.
But the fatal moment came at last, and we fear it
brought a melancholy lesson for the youthful as-
pirant to political honours. Leeds had no objection
to a young gentleman who is pleased to hear , his
oratory, and to his teaching all that he knows—
and more ; but what the electors chiefly require in
their representative is one who will engage to stand
for their opinions and interests in Parliament. Lord
Amberley's views of foreign policy gave satisfaction.
His answers to what we may truly call the home-
thrusts exhibit the most,striking picture of the Re-
former Reformed that we have beheld in recent
days. To inform his hearers that " the state of the
Church and State in Ireland is a very great anomaly,"
if the phrase provokes a transient applause, is a poor
way of silencing men in earnest about what they
ask. To tell them that he is against the punishment
of crime by death, " so far as his present opinion is
concerned," imposes too tremendous a weight on
the reality of that "present opinion." But the
terrible ordeal and crucial test was proposed by
one of the electors with a definite formality almost
too severe. " Would Lord Amberley in the present
House of Commons, vote in favour of Mr. Baines's
Borough Franchise Bill ?" We can make every
allowance for Lord Amberley's incapacity to reply
to it on the spot. His emotion must have been
painful at the dead silence following his announce-
ment that he conscientiously could not put his entire
adherence to this bill upon record. A Mr. Joseph
Lupton, who expressed the feelings of the meeting
so fully when he said that Lord Amberley, by his
latest observations on the franchise, had " taken the
breath out of him," was prophetic in adding that
the day was probably not far distant when Lord
Amberley would feel it his " bounden duty to sup-
port such a franchise " as this devised by Mr.
Baines. In fact, the next day Lord
.Amberley was
prepared to support it. He had in the interval re-
flected, and some members of the working classes
_ in whom he had been taught to place a perfect re-

Hance, and he was ready to give a voice for the
bill of Mr. Baines as an earnest of his desire to ob-
tain the honour of a twinship of election with that
gentleman. The world must not be too hard on
Lord Amberley. He has displayed a praiseworthy
ambition and an unerring instinct—he has only
been too hasty. The offspring of a luminary may
have worse faults. In his first speech we saw the
" young moon, with the old moon in her arm," too
faintly adumbrated. The ring of parental light IS
much clearer about him now. One whom the months
do so much to brighten and make various, should
inspire hope rather than disapproval. Whatever the
electors of Leeds may think of Lord Amberley,
the politicians of Great Britain must feel that he i.s•
We do not imagine for one moment that he wlll
remain subservient to their impositions on his
volatile judgment. He has a larger career before
him. The peril of a mind so rapid in changing, and
honest in confessing the change, is, that his reputa:-
tion will be wrecked with the public before his
opinions have become fixed and his ideas have
arrived at maturity.

Metropolitan Board of Works.
This board held its usual weekly meeting at the
offices in Spring-gardens yesterday. The president,
J. Thwaites, Esq., took the chair at 12 o'clock.