The Sun.
London, England, 1862-07-24 00:00:00

THE NEW CHINA WAR.

With reference to the urgent demand for troops
from India, which is said to have been conveyed
by the last China mail, the Bombay limes of the
27th ult. says :

We have repeatedly warned the home public
that there would soon be a fourth China war upon
our hand-g, from the nature of our conduct towards
the Taepings around Shanghai, and advices of its
commencement are already on their way to Eng-
land. Urgent demands are said to have come for-
ward from China to the Indian Government for
troops—to do what ? To meet an aggression we
have wantonly provoked, on the part of men who
sincerely wished to be at peace with us, and to en-
ter upon the conquest of the Chinese empire. For
that is what is really before us. The events of the
last two years have made it clear that all material
power is on the side of the Taepings, and if we de-
stroy that power, we must hold the country our-
selves to find it at no distant date a ground of
conflict with Frarlee—or abandon it to the worst
excesses of anarchy. If, instead of madly warring
upon the Taepings, we had placed ourselves in
friendly relations with them, Shanghai might now
have been a free port, and the Yangtse Kiang
throughout its length as safe to European com-
merce as the Thames. We have deliberately
espoused the cause of the most corrupt, weak,
and cruel despotism the world has ever seen—
a despotism hopeless of reform or regeneration,
and are about to reap the bitter fruits of
our policy. Our conduct towards these Tae-
pings has been so wholly inexcusable, that were
they to hang every European who falls into their
hands none could justly blame them. What offence
have they committed against us that our cannon and
fleets are to be employed in destroying them, and
our soldiery in capturing them and handing them
over to the tender mercies of Mandarins to be dis-
embowelled ? Have the Taepings no atrocities to
avenge, that all our sympathies are with the bloody
crew of whom Yeh stands out in our time as the
type ? Here, as elsewhere, it is the undue prepon-
derance of our supposed commercial interests that
decides our policy; and without staying to inquire
what natural right and justice demand of us, we
plunge headlong into a guilty strife, flattering our-
selves that the "general interests of humanity"move
us. We do trust this Taeping war will rouse the
country to a searching and adequate inquiry into
the matter. The Taepings are not the monsters
they have been declared to be, and were European
influences brought frankly to bear upon them, we
might check their excesses at once, and lead them to
the establishment of a settled and peaceful rule.

VARIETIES.

(From Punch.
PETTICOATS AND PICKPOCKETS.

What is enough for one is enough for two, is a saying
supposed to warrant any man in marrying who is able to
live. Whatever truth there may once have been in that
maxim, there can be none now when wives have become so
expensive as they are rendered by their excessive drapery.
Of that, to be sure, it may safely be said, that what is
enough for one is enough for half a dozen. No wonder that
the Employment of Women question presses, and that
young ladies are singing " We've got no Work to Do,"
and " Nobody Coming to Marry Mt." This excess of
apparel threatens to be a s everlasting as the income tax;
which it sorely aggravates. It is really a great bore. In.
every thoroughfare it establishes an effective blockade. It
constitutes the fuel of that fire through which. Fashion
passes her children to Moloch. That may serve them
right, and be of no more consequence than tl..e moth's ex-
tinction in the candle; but it is too bad that redundance of
petticoats should bring a respectable DIP.n into trouble, as
it did one day last week. A gentleman, called in a police
report " A Member of the Society of Friends," in
business with his father at Macclesfield, was pulled
up before Mr. Dayman, at -Westminster, on a
charge of having, at the Bror_apton Exhibition, at-
tempted to pick a lady's pocket. Chowne, Sergeant E. 5,
"' had his attention directed
a detective in plain clothes,
to the prisoner," who was in the machine room among
some ladies looking at the machinery, Chowne saw him
there by the side of a v:roman " whose pocket it was his im-
pression he was trying to pick ;" and accordingly the officer
took him up. He was walked off to the station, searched,
taken before the magistrate, remanded for a week on bail in.
two sureties of £250 each, and reappeared on remand.,
when—

" Mr. Smyth, on the part of the prisoner, stated that his
client had only come to town a day or two previously, and
was there on the day in question with his sister, brother,
and friends, to see his brother's machinery. His client
could have no motive for committing a robbery, as he pos-
sessed considerable property, and bore at Macclesfield a
character unimpeachable for integrity. At the time alluded
to by the officer his client was pushing aside the hoops of
the lady's crinoline in order that he might have a better
view of the machine."

The evidence of Mr. Cobden and several other members
of Parliament, and gentlemen, as to the character of the
accused, fully bore out this defence, and the worthy Quaker
left the Court. as Mr. Dayman said, without a stain on his
reputation. Yes; but not without a scar on his feelings,
left by acven long days' anxiety and fear. And all this
grievous annoyance this gentleman incurred merely by
pushing aside the hoops of a walking nuisance, and un-
punishable social evil.

All men visiting the Brompton Exhibition, unless they
want to be arrested for picking ladies' pockets, should keep
their hands carefully in their own. How to dispose of year
hands in an omnibus, where the muslin of your female
neighbours extends over your stomach, howeN er convex, is
a hard matter. Entirely to preclude suspicion, you may
perhaps resort to the expedient of holding them up over
your head, and then you had better tell the passengers why
you do so, lest they should think you a fool. A better plan
will be to carry about with you a number of Punch, and,
as soon as you have seated yourself, take it out and read.
Everybody will allow that nobody can read Punch and pick
pockets too. Crinoline makes it necessary for you to guard
yourself against imputations which may be cast upon you
by any officious observer or malevolent woman. No doubt
the huge hoops and enorraous skirts of women do afford fa-
cilities to pickpockets. That would be a good thing, be-
cause it would very goon reduce petticoats within compass,
if ladies' pockets, as fast as emptied, had not generally to
be filled by their husbands and fathers.

LATEST AMERICAN DESPATCH.
By Horsemarine Telegraph.
" Camp, Chickabiddy Chokee, Monday afternoon.—The
Federal troops have won another splendid victory. Seeing
that the rebels were approaching in great force at 6 a.m.
this morning, I issued my directions for a general advance,
an order which our brave fellows were prompt to carry out.
The advance was made in the identical direction as that in
which the rebel army were pi oceeding, and was achieved, I
need not say, with the most complete success. Astonishing
to say, the whole of our front line escaped without a hurt;
and with the exception of a few slight wounds and bruises
in the rear, I really have no casualties worth mentioning to
report. A good deal of our baggage and some few hundred
stand of arms we left upon the field for a strategic purpose,
and we likewise abandoned about a score of field-pieces
which were found to impede the rapid movement of our
troops.

"My next despatch will probably be dated from Rich-
mond, which I intend to sack at half-past five o'clock on
Saturday morning next,

" (Signed) BUNKUM,
" General-Commanding.

" To the Secretary of War."

A STREAM OF ILL-LUCK.—The Metropolitan Railway
has been inundated so often that it is a kind of misnomer to
talk of it as the underground railway. A mare fitting ap-
pellation would certainly be, The Underwater Railway.
A SILK GOWN THAT IS ONLY WORSTED.—It is not
only unfair but
and ludicrously laboured and evasive;
ungeneroussimplybecausto
ecointdheampnpeMnsrt.oEbde
wj
extremely James
lfaomr heiasnddefeimUcpeo,tent,
for it is very clear, says Barou Bramwell, ever since the late
M.P. for Marylebone has been disbarred, that his argu-
ments can be little better than ex-Q.C.'s (excuses).
CHANGE OF NAME.—If the Board of Works deal in such
dirty jobs as this Montagu-house business, we shall have
to make an addition to their title. "The Board of Works
of Darkness" would be highly appropriate.
TRY AGAlN.—Punch is excessively glad that Grand
Duchess Constantine and her baby are going on as well as
could be expected. But he does not know why the latter
is to be called Waclaw. The infant's birth was to be a good
omen for Poland, but the name certainly does not set out
such omen. Whacklaw, which must be uncommonly like
Clublaw, is what the Poles have been receiving at Russian
hands too long. Eh, Duke ?
AWFUL EFFECT OF FISHING ON THE HUMAN MIND.—
Pherkins—" It has occurred to me, Sam, that throwing in
ground bait is nothing mole or less—as it were—a species
of advertising I
WHAT MR. LAING DID WHEN HE BOASTED OF AN IN-
DIAN SURPLUS,._ Hallooed before he was out of the Wood.

The " Xeres Comida Sherry " at 20s. per dozen, which We
can honestly recommend as a sound Dinner Wine, of excel-
lent flavour, considerable body, a fine colour, and thoroughly
wholesome.—Patriot [This wine is exclusively imported by
the Vintage Wine Company, and can only be had at their
West End offices, 14, Bloomsbury-street, near Oxford-street.
Gold, 18s. ; Pale, 20s. per dozen. Port, 2Ps. Samples, is. 6d•
Two dozen tient carriage free.]—Ady.