The Sun.
London, England, 1862-12-15 00:00:00

LIVES of EMINENT STATESMEN,
In FUN, every week. One Penny

Row Ready, handsomely bound in Magenta cloth, gilt, price
48. 6d. ; post tree, 65., the
SECOND half-yearly VOLUME of FUN, with
► numerous Eng,ravings b distinguishedsts, and humor-
ous Articles by the following writers :
W. Bailey, Bsq
W. S. Gilbert, Esq.
W. Barber, ..Eisq: T. Hood, Esq.
E. L. Blanca4ret, Esq. T. S. Jerrold, Esq.
G. W. Bridgeman, Esq. W. J. Prowse, Esq.
F. C. Burnandl Esq. Godfrey Turner, Esq.
11. J. Byron, Esq. &c., dm, &c.
office, 80, Fleet-street, London.

VIALF-A-DOZEN UMBRELLAS in the
Christmas Number SATURDAY NIGHT. Con-
ducted by
"vv.

** For full particulars of amusements see first page.
ROYAL ENGLISH OPERA, COVENT-GARDEN.
This Evening, Wallace's new opera, LOVE'S TRIUMPH.

Commence`at 8.

THEATRE-ROYAL, HAYMARKET.
This Evening, DUCK HUNTING. After which, OUR
AMERICAN COUSIN. With A DAY AFTER THE
WEDDING. And MY HUSBAND'S GHOST,

Commence at 7.

NEW THEATRE-ROYAL, ADELPHL

Thisrvenin —IE43 SPITALPIELDS WEAVER.
Followed by GREEN BUSHES. And A TICKET OF
LEAVE.

Commence at 7.

ROYAL LYCEUM THEATRE.
This Evening, IT MUST BE TRUE, 'TWAS IN THE
PAPERS. Followed by PEEP O'DAY. To conclude with
KILLAILNEY.

Commence at 7.

ARGYLL ROOMS, Great Windmill-street, Hay.
market. Open every evening for Promenade and Dancing,.

CANTERBURY HALL.—EVERY EVENING.—
Grand Selections from Verdi' "Boccanegra." M actarren's
Cantata "May Day," and Locke's Music ot "M
a,et
The Etoile Family - Unsworth, Eugene, and Dule &O.
Commence at 7.

THE OXFORD, 6, OXFORD-STREET, EVERY
EVENING.—Re-appearance of Unsworth. the original of
" Or any other man" -The Colleen Dawn, by Miss Caroline
Parkes—Mr. Maelagan's Entertainment Drew Dean, the
great Flautist—the Nearotita n Minstrels—Selections from
Verdi's " 11 Coraaro" and "Nabuco," Donizetti's "Don Se.'
bestial," &0., with full band and chorus.
Commence at 7.

HIGH WATER AT LONDON BRIDGE.
THIS DAsr.—Morning, 7h. 36m.—Afternoon, Bh. sm.
To-monnow.-Morning,fiBh. 40m.—Afternoon, 9h. 12m.

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4`,. 3., '_ -' .7
• L• . • ,JJP( II
,_, f

THE SUN.
LONDON, MONDAY, DEC. 15, 1862.

While King RADAMA of Madagascar is being
crowned at Tananariva with a diadem sent to him
by the Emperor NAPOLEON, the Emperor NAPO-
LEON himself is quietly continuing his minute re-
vision of the frontier line of France. Years roll on,
the first decade of the reign of NAPOLEON 111. is
already completed, war has alternated with peace
during the lapse of it—war with Russia, war with
China, war with Austria, war in Japan and in
Mexico—yet all the while the attention of the
taciturn ruler of France is steadily fixed upon the
line rigidly drawn in 1815 marking the boundary
of his dominions. Its extension so as to embrace
within it the whole of the provinces of Nice and
Savoy, with their million or so of live stock in
the shape of Nizzards and Savoyards, is of
course still pretty vividly within our re-
membrance. Besides a very flagrant extension
of territory by France under NAPOLEON 111., how-
ever, it should also be borne in mind, that there is
perpetually, though it may be almost imperceptibly
advancing, a cautious revision of that same frontier
line at other points. In the direction of Switzer-
land the latest and not the least satisfactory of all
these cautious revisions has just now been accom-
plished. It has been accomplished by the first out
of the nine articles of the Treaty (settling the
Dappes Valley Question) recently concluded be-
tween France and Switzerland. It is not an exten-
sion of territory, again we would especially rotify
—but a simple revision of the boundary line, and,
as it appears to us, a very equitable revision
altogether. The article of the Treaty, the
all-important first article (settling the long vexed
question), runs in effect as follows :—" Switzer-
land makes over to France that portion of the
Dappes Valley, comprising the Mont des Taffis and
its declivities, as far as and together with the road
from Les Rousses to Fauville, and to the eastward
of this road and along the same a strip of land 150
metres in breadth, or 500 Swiss feet (the entire ces-
sion consisting of 704 hectares). in exchange for
this, France makes over to Switzerland, that is to say,
to the Canton Vaud, a piece of land of equal size, ex-
tending from the junction of the St. Cergues and
Fauville roads, along the declivity of Norrmont to
the boundary of the Valley of Joux. The St.
Cergues-road (from La Cure) is included in the
cession." Bit by bit that old, yellow, all but obso-
lete, Treaty of Vienna is being mouldered away
by the sheer lapse of time and the mere passage of
events—unti 1 before long there will hardly be left
one shred or tatter of it relating to any re-
sult still enforced by common consent of
the Chief Powers of Europe. Bit by bit the Na-
poleonian policy is creeping round the frontier line
—extending here, revising there—until, Who shall
say that the hour may not strike when Fiance may
reclaim some portion at least of the Rhenish
Provinces ?

A few days ago we recalled attention to Mr.
CHARLES DICIEENS'S American Notes in their bear-
ing on the present struggle. We did so because
they gave the unbiassed observations of a traveller
whose ability and integrity no one could doubt;
and being made twenty years ago, they could not
be influenced by the passions awakened by the pre-
sent quarrel. We have said " unbiassed"—but
really there was the strongest temptation to a bias
the wrong way. Mr. DICKENS was so feted
throughout the Union, received everywhere with
such ovations, that there was some fear that he
would at least be. silent on slavery in the recol-
lection of his national reception in America. Many
people were even astonished when his notes ap-
peared, at his frank outspokenness on the -monster
crime of the monster Republic, and tliat she should
have been painstakingly colle'ating facts, such as
we quoted from him the other day to substan-
tiate his views.
If out lettao
a Will turn to the opening of his
last ohs but one, the ninth, they will find an
admirable and lifeliket sketch of he three classes of
the upholders of slaver
divides that unworthvetlßAY into which Mr. DICKENS
is obvious at first • 3in America. Its truth
"It* and it is well worthy of
attention at a time when many Englishmen are
almost seduced into as,lnPathy wi
represses more or less their natural i
are
represses ththeSouth
with the great atrocity, to perpetuate
Which is the
object of the rebellion, and whose corrupting in-
fluence saps the Christian and manly character o;
the entire South and of too much of the North.
Mr. DICKENS'
'- first class is the inher;.
of whom are `,,1 be
;elid:lrsil,aTvehs
—a class many e
more moderate and rat;
.aina,t
owners of human cattle
who have coma, into the posscsion of them as so
many e.,;, ins in their trading capital, but who admit
the frightful nature of the insiituti m in the
abstract and perceive the dangers with which
it is fraught." When the
"Notes"
America, doubtless most of Americans
oe
th r reached
cursed the English Prophet much as the
the Hebrew monarch cursed MICAIAII, because he
• prophesied only an evil future for slavery. They
will not now deny that he was right when he wrote
of its dangers that, "however distant or however