The Sun.
London, England, 1862-11-27 00:00:00

IVES of EMINENT STATESMEN,
1-4 in PUN, every week. One Penny

:Now Ready, handsomely bound in Magenta cloth, gilt, price
45. 6d. ; post free, 55., the
SECOND half-yearly VOLUME of FUN, with
numerous Engravings by talented artists, and humor-
ous Articles by the following distinguished writers :
W. Bailey, Esq. W. S. Gilbert, Esq.
W. Barber, Esq. T. Hood, Esq.
E. L. Blanch trcl, Esq. T. S. Jerrold, Esq.
G. W. Bridgeman, Esq. , W. J. Browse, Esq.
F. G. Burnand, Esq. Godfrey Turner, Esq.
H. J. Byron, 141 sq. &n, &e. &c
Office, 80, Fleet-street, London.

kaATURDAY NIGHT.
kJ A Weekly Journal of Literature.
Conducted by Tnos. HOOD.
One Penny.
80, Fleet-street

*. For lull particulars 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, DEAF AS A POST. After which,
OUR AMERICAN COUSIN. With DUCK HUNTING.
And JACK'S RETURN FROM CANTON.

Commence at 7.

NEW THEATRE-ROYAL, ADELPIII.
This Evening, THE GREEN BUSHES. Followed by
ICI O Y PARLE FRANCAIS.

Commence at 7.

ROYAL PRINCESS'S THEATRE.
This Evenino., THE TRIPLE ALLIANCE. After which,
ONE GOOD TURN DESERVES ANOTHER. To conclude
with STAGE STRUCK.
Commence at 7.

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

Commence at 7.

W. S. WOODIN'S CABINET OF CURIOSITIES,
Polygraphic Ball, King Williani-street, Charing-cross.
Commence at 8.

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

CANTERBURY HALL.—EVERY EVENING.—
Grand Selections from Verdi's "Boccan9gra," maciarten,s
Cantata "May Day," and Locke's Music of "Macbeth."--
The Etoile Family - Unsworth, Eugene, and Duley, &c,
Commence at 7.

THE OXFORD, 6, OXFORD-STREET, EVERY
EVENlNG.—Donizetti's "Don Sebastien," Verdi's " 11 Cor-
saro" and "Nabuco, and liffacfarren's "May Day," with full
b.nd and chorus.—Drew Dean, the great Flautist—the Nea-
rolitan Minstrels—the comic performance of Miss Caroline
Pax,,es— Xi r. Maclagan's Entertainment —Unsworth the
original of " Or any other man," dre. ,
Commence at 7.

ROYAL ALHAMBRA PALACE AND AMPHI-
TIEATRE.— Ohnar every Evening. —Grand Musical En-
tertainment, 60 performers.
Commence at half-put 7.

THIS NEWSPA,PER,
"THE
SUN,"
To be SOLD by A 'ZICTION, by a Decreeof the Lord
Chancellor and witt the approbation of the Master of the
Rolls, on THURSDAY, the 4th December, 1862, at the
AUCTION MART, London, unless previously disposed of
by Private Contract.
The property may be viewed by cards, to be obtained from
the aucticteer, Mr. Edward Lumley, of 67, Chancery-lane,
London, W.C., and of the undersigned; of each of whom
printed particulars may also be had, and to whom proposals
for purchase by private contract may be made.
ADAM RIVERS STEELE, Solicitor,
44, Bloomsbury-square, London, W.C.

HIGH WATER AT LONDON BRIDGE.
Tins DAY.—Morning, sh. 48m.—Afternoon, 6h. 12m.
To-xotutow.-Morning, 6h. 40m.—Afternoon, 7h. 10m.

-44 -
" °
r,04

THE SUN.

LONDON, THURSDAY, NOV. 27, 1862.

The condition of Lancashire must enforce atten-
tion to the International Law of Blockade. The
distress there arises so directly and with so many
aggravations from it that the question will be asked,
more loudly than ever, Is the existing law right•?
It is acknowledged that we cannot raise the blockade
to avert a cotton famine, as we repealed the Corn
Laws to avert a famine of bread ; but we can open
our eyes to the lesson of this dreadful calamity, if
indeed it has a political lesson for us. We could
not with a spark of honour, after having always
haughtily insisted on our right to blockade a belli-
gerent's commercial ports, refuse the Federals that
right when we, contrary to their wish at the time,
acknowledged the South as a belligerent. Had we
not done this we might have insisted on their ad-
herence to their own refusal to admit that any
power could blockade its own ports. In which
case, however, they would doubtless have refused to
continue the Southern ports as ports of entry. So
that complications would have arisen in that way.
As the matter stands we have no decent alternative
but to feed our people, starved by the blockade, as
best we may.
For ourselves, we must confess that we desire
time for the most careful and impartial considera•
tion. As no one contemplates breaking the:present
blockade, there is time, ample time, we hope, before
the question of another commercial blockade will
arise. Let the subject, therefore, be discussed both
in and out of Parliament. It is comparatively new
to the country, and it is not easy yet to hold the
balances impartially. The very calamity which
raises the question—Are " commercial blockades"
requisite to the safety of our homes ar,d firesides ?
is apt to bias our judgments. When such a blockade
has filled so many homes with untold misery, it is
natural to ask whether their safety really requires
such suffering. It is useless to dogmatise on such
a subject. No one can pretend that he has yet fairly
appreciated all the probable consequences of either
course. The journals and the statesmen who at
present are most positive for either view will be
held by impartial men to have judged from old pre-
possessions, or one-sided pondering of facts_ For
ourselves, we may own that the scale preponderates
in favour of abolishing " commercial blockades "
but we see so much to be alleged on the other side,
that we would on no account, yet, give unqualified
judgment against them.

It is, indeed, a case of nearly balanced advan-
tages and balanced evils. To an insular, commer-
cial, manufacturing country, one-third of whose
fuod is imported, and bought with the manufactures
we export, what advantage can equal that of being
certain that no war between other powers, and no
war between ourselves and them, could interfere
with the inflow of our food and the outflow of our
means of purchase ? But, on the other side, sup-
-1)°86 we were at. war with any other country, rela-
tively small
as our large army is, what advantage
could he greater to us than the power of destroying
the corenaeree
of o
Powers, to ur rival. As the greatest of naval
"veep the commerce of a rival from the
ocean, and to Close
means his ports, is one most efficient
of compelling him to Come
are the two great advantages, to terms. These
implying correspond-
ing evils, of the old syateln and the proposed new

One.

The advantages of the new system
ah are so obvious
that it is only requisite to
ow that they
are not
neutralised by those of the old one.
overlooked ; the
Consideration be sideration must not, however, ne grand
sAvantages of abolishing commercial blockades re-
late to cases which must happen with In
'''anY times
greater frequency than those of retaining them.
They are advantages to he enjoyed in the ease of
every war conducted by any naval state against
another, when we should of course be neutrals, as
yell es when we were ourselves at war. The ad-
vantages claimed for us by the old system would
only be felt when we ourselves were at war. We
are surely not so pugnacious, but that we may hope
that we shall be neutrals many times where we
should bo once belligerents. It certainly ought to
be so. As we now see, also, one of these blockades
during which we are perfectly neutral may bring
liPou us more misery than perhaps we ever inflicted,

or ever shall inflict, by bloc lird n
Blockades, ordinarily, could exclude other nations
from luxuries only—they exclude us from our life
itself, as " that by which we live."
The serious question then arises, and on the
answer to it everything hangs, are " commercial
blockades" necessary to our security ? If they are,
all discussion is at an end. We must be safe. The
argument is, that if we are so unfortunate as to go
to war with a great Power, we cannot invade it
with a large army—we could only distress it by
destroying its commerce. It should be observed,
first, that this argument relates only to offensive
war, which is by far the less serious question. We
should, under the new system, be even better pre-
pared to blockade all the ports and arsenals whence
an invading army could sail, since we should need
no ships away to protect our commerce. Are we
willing, then, to retain blockades like the present
one, not to de/end ourselves, but to attack others ?
Secondly, the blockade, except of America, must
now be at best imperfect. Railroads have so far
altered the relations of Europe that in almost any
war some neutral Power would enable a continental
enemy to reach the sea. He would suffer, but not
as he would have suffered before the construction of
railroads. Thirdly, as we are by far the greatest
commercial nation, our own blockade would hurt
ourselves as much at least as the nation assailed,
' probably more. When these consideratious are
added to the one exemplified by Lancashire, suffer-
ing during our present neutrality, they surely de-
tract very largely from the value of commercial
blockades as a means of safety from invasion. In-
deed it would almost seem as if they, in connection
with the always associated right of seizing pro-
perty of belligerents at sea, facilitated invasion ;
we mean, from the circumstance above mentioned,
that the present system abstracts so many of our
ships from their proper task of shutting up the
enemy's men-of-war and transports in his own war
ports.

We think but little of some secondary arguments.
It is said that if neutrals are distressed by the war
they will compel the belligerent nations to peace.
This seems at best far-fetched and problematical,
while the evils of the old policy, as English and
French workmen toe well know, are but too certain
and at hand. France, England, and Russia do not
in any case think of compulsion ; and two out of
the three are unwilling even to offer mediation.

Agai❑ we are told that the new system will equa-
lise the power of small States without a navy with
that of large States with one. Are then the states-
,
man who are always talking of the " balance of
power,' afraid of the reality when it appears in
sight ? But the argument is not founded in fact.
We, for instance, could do what FARRAGIIT did at
New Orleans—we could enable a small body of
troops, protected by the fire of our gunboats and
ships, to hold a large city. At present the chief
questions before the public seem to be, are the value
of a powerful means of aggression—not of defence—.
and the power to distress an enemy's commerce
more or less worth the suffering which commercial
blockades bring upon us either as neutrals or as
belligerents ?

Although every now and then some wretched
assassin and poisoner is undoubtedly hung for
murder at Newgate and elsewhere, it would cer-
tainly appear that through some singular flaw i❑ our
criminal code the majority (and those among the
guiltiest) of these wretched creatures contrive to
escape all adequate punishment. CATHERINE
WILSON, for example, has expiated her frightful
series of cold - blooded crimes very recently
upon the gallows. Others, from time to time,
have gone the same awful way to their doom.
But, in spite of such instances or the law
still, occasionally, dealing rigorously -with the
convicted murderer or murderess, the present age is
essentially one in which men and women, clearly
proved to have been guilty of slaying their fellow-
creatures under circumstances of peculiar atrocity,
have every imaginable and unimaginable chance
of passing acathless not only through their public
trial and deliberate conviction, but from under the
solemn sentence of death formally pronounced upon
them by the learned judge who may have presided
over the proceedings. Dr. SMETHURST, found
guilty and sentenced to death for the poisoning of
Miss BANKES at Richmond, is not only released from
prison after a brief interval, and placed thenceforth
at complete liberty, but is enabled eventually to claim
the property left behind her by the unfortunate
lady whom the law has emphatically declared to be
his victim. Several years back there was that so-
called Irish Gentleman--who was tried for murder-
ing his wife one fatal day (for her at any rate) o❑
the "sea-beat promontory, or stretch of land called
Ireland's Eye—whowas found guilty and sentenced
to death as formally and deliberately as ever was
Dr. SMETHURST, and who nevertheless was after-
wards (with not one iota of better reason) snatched
from the fate to which he had been thus formally
condemned.

In the recent instance of SAMUEL GARDNER,
the sweep, there was, it must be allowed,
every conceivable reason for the commutation of the
sentence—a commutation of the sentence eventually
decided upon in an hour of more than his customary
sagacity b 3 the right hon, the Home Secretary.
The jury, it will be remembered, had strongly re-
commended the unfortunate man to mercy when
delivering in (after much hesitation) their verdict
of guilty—a verdict that they would hardly, by
any circumstances, have delivered in at all without
much hesitation.

In the case of JESSIE XPLACHLAN the
circumstances are in every way different. And
here, in the instance of this execrable murder at
Sandyford-place, Glasgow, Sir GEORGE GREY has,
from first to last, blundered—flagrantly, notoriously,
egregiously ! Never, perhaps, was there a more
brutal murder—a more treacherous murder—a
murder more clearly brought home to the ac-
cused by every imaginable circumstance! By her
own perjuries and contradictions. By her posses-
sion, after the crime, of the goods stolen from the
deceased herself, and from the keeping of the
deceased ; goods belonging to herself and her
master. By the clothes of the accused herself
being found hid away in a secluded field, saturated
with blood and torn to pieces. By the accused
pawning the stolen property directly after the
murder, and doing this in an assumed name.
By the accused totally failing in what
was shown afterwards to have been
her lying attempt to prove an alibi on
the night of the murder! By these par-
ticulars mid by a mass of other corroborative evi-
dence, all
clearly fixing the guilt upon the prisoner
at the bar_ JESSIE INPLACHLAN was pronounced'
guilty by a jury of her countrymen (without the
faintest hint of any recommendation
or
e anof
the to
Jury
mercy
t h eF m
ho handed ;
-n the wchomen.
ing from the lips of
death by the • verdict), and was sentenced to
judge who tried her in language of
the strongest condemnation t.,
from the bench upon perhaps, ever heard
is the wretched woman w similarha occasiono
! Yet this
the gallows by the How has been snatched from
Home Secretary—becauee, in addition to the atrocious murder •
of which she was
proved to have been guilty—and
for which (having
been so proved) who was wolenuily condemned to