The Sun.
London, England, 1862-01-11 00:00:00

THI SUN, LONDON, SATURDAY EVENING, JANUARY LI, 1862.

been on the verge of a war to save a pair of persons
wherse life object is to secure the power of breeding
and selling human beings.
Our readers should not forget the main features of
the—infernal—law of which Commissioner MASON
was the parent ; to secure which he submitted to
protectionist tariffs; while, to procure the tariffs
Northern Representatives and Senators, Mr.
SEWARD not opposing, we believe, aiding, carried
this accursed law. It was one of the foulest,
basest transactions in legislative history ; although
Mr. LINCOLN would ratify it, if the South would
but come again under his rule, First, the law
denies the poor slave who is claimed by, the South,
a jury. Next, it gives a judge summary juris-
diction ; then it gives him ten dollars if he sends
him back to slavery, only half that sum if
he liberates him ; and we know what
Yankees will do for the Almighty dollar. Again it
refuses the alleged slave's evidence of his own free-
dom, while it makes that of the alleged owner
conclusive. It has a wholly deceptive method even
for proving that the claimant has lost a slave at
all:; one which here would not prove the loss of a
gold pin. It levies ruinous fines on all persons
harbouring or aiding the fugitive; and if the
marshal allow the alleged fugitive to escape or
refuse to act, he too is enormously fined. We
need not go further into details—these are a few
specimens of the deserts of Messrs. SLIDELL and
MASON, at the hands of a slavery-hating nation. Not
only under this infernal legislation have number-
less human beings who sought freedom by flight
been dragged back from the recreant North, but it
is certain that very many men who never were
slaves at all have been carried off to slavery, and
young women to something far worse than slavery.
No men on earth more richly deserve, as a provi-
dential retribution, the fetters from which they
have just escaped, with hard labour, under the
dread of the lash added, than do Messrs. MASON
and SLIDELL. These men are, indeed, worse than
the LEGREES—for it is by the help of their brains
that the system which makes a LEGREE is upheld.
We have said little of their other political de-
merits in regard to ourselves—these are, as it were,
more personal. Theirs is the party which for the
last forty years has been dominant in America.
They have been the leaders in insults to England,
and in aggression on other States. They have not
wished to destroy their own cotton market, but
they have believed that so completely had they us
in their hands through their cotton, that they
could kick and abuse us as they pleased. Man-
chester would put up with anything, and English
Governments dared not on trade questions quarrel
with Manchester. Such was their creed in regard
to England; what it was in regard to Texas, to
Mexico generally, to Cuba, and to Central America,
those countries can but too sadly tell. No thanks
to the South, as a whole, though we must not in-
clude Virginia, and if it was impossible
to put down the slave trade after all
our efforts, the SLIDELL and MASON sec-
tion of the old Union has been the chief hindrance.
The kind of ovation deserved by these persons is,
therefore, plain enough ; but we trust they will be
only consigned here to political contempt.

The advance of Civilisation into the very heart of
the Chinese Empire is henceforth, we take it, a fact
visible and undeniable. Not only have the armed
forces of England and France together been known
to have penetrated to the walls of the hitherto all-
but mythical City of Pekin—not only has her
Britannic MAJESTY'S Ambassador to the Court of
the Celestial Empire taken up his abode in that
once inaccessible and sacred capital, a capital
sacred from and inaccessible to the desecrating
footsteps of the Outer Barbarians—but actually
Pekin, of all places in the world, has but very
recently indeed endured the shock of a genuine
coup d'etat. This incident, the tidings of which
have within the last few hours been brought to us by
the Massilia, is the grand jumble of the Calcutta,
Chinese, and Australian mails—at once, if we may
but adopt here in a passing way the lax diction of
Sir BOYLE ROCEIE, of Ridiculous memory, at once
admits China within the pale of European civiliza-
tion.

It is not of course to be supposed for an instant
that political changes of an abrupt kind have not
been effected before now in the alternate organisation
and disorganisation of the Chinese Government.
There have been there rare and exceptional changes
of dynasty even—there have been frequent
but intermittent changes there of Ministry time
and again. Europeans know enough of the
history of that wonderful and still, it must
he allowed, for the most part, inscrutable
race, to know that much of them perfectly well.
For those who are acquainted with no
more than the alphabet of the Asiatic
annals—that alternation of rulers at Pekin is a
matter so far known familiarly. But reiterated
though the Ministerial changes have been that
have taken place ere this in the capital of the
Chinese Empire—Pekin has never had experience
of one so peculiarly and essentially of an European
character as this last one. Of course, it must be
admitted—with peculiarly Asiatic variations! It is
a coup d'etat is its general outline—such as one
has read of before now, as taking place at Paris or
at Vienna—with (added to this) a few Chinese
embellishments. In other words it is—the same
—with a difference ! The Cabinet is suddenly
overthrown. But—following hard upon its over-
throw—the Ministers composing it are impri-
soned. Nay, we recently learnt that his Celestial
MAJESTY had been rather seriously in earnest in
his attentions of late to several hitherto powerful,
but latterly disgraced and even doomed personages.
Unlike his brother autocrat of Constantinople, the
SULTAN CALIPH, who in the like circumstances
finishes the career of his fallen favourites (with a
more dreadful significance than is understood
amongst ourselves in the familiar phrase) by giving
them the sack—the Celestial Emperor of CHINA
removes all difficulties from his path in that way,
by literally giving hie fallen Ministers or dis-
graced representatives rope enough to hang them-
selves ! Sending them silken cords together
with intimations which—ridiculously enough they
most meekly comply with—to go and hang them-
selves ! Occurrences or this kind, we learn by our
last advises from China, had not long since taken
place there, as they had so often done before. And
we learn in addition to this that those very pointed
attention from his Imperial MAJESTY had been
rapidly succeeded by a genuine coup d'etat at Pekin.
A new regency, the telegram intimates has been
thus established under—mysteriously enough—the
two Empresses. The intelligence reads like the
adoption of a hint frcm the duplex system of Go-
vernment flourishing now for a long while past
both among the Chinese and among the Japanese.
But—added to these rather tantalising fragments of
information----comes what we cannot but feel dis-
posed to regard as the most propitious circum-
stance yet recorded hi
,the
that reference to
Prince
o t el a t
KUNGe coup
hasd'e beentalin
Pekinmd y ,he f
appointed President of the New Ministry,
among the membersof which Ministry, by the way,
are enrolled both KWELIANG and HWALIANG. Now
our diplomatists saw quiie enough of Prince KUNG
during the course of the last campaign in China to

know that he is about the least prejudiced, and
we believe it may be added, without much fear of
exaggeration, about the most enlightened of the
great men:of China.
It is satisfactory in itself to know that
the head of the present Chinese Adminis-
tration is one who has himself personally
been brought into communication with the
diplomatists of the two great European nations
of the West—with the emissaries and representatives
of Queen VICTORIA and the Emperor NAPOLEON.
Prince KUNG is a man,at any rate,who cannot act in
the dark in the future relations of his Government
with the Governments of France and England. He
himself witnessed with his own eyes how much was
accomplished by a numerically insignificant force
of Englishmen and Frenchmen, and accomplished
by them with the utmost ease, rapidity, and preci-
sion. The smouldering ruins of the stupendous
Summer Palace told him more plainly than any-
thing else could possibly have told him, under the
circumstances, that neither England nor France, no
matter how remote their position geogra-
phically, was to be trifled with, even by
a vast empire like that of China, an empire
embracing within its circumference in round num-
bers almost one-third of the human race. There
cannot be much doubt of it, that in the ruthless
destruction of the treasures of ages accumulated
under the roof-beams of that gigantic Summer
Palace near Pekin, we justified as far possible the
application to ourselves by the Chinese of the old
accustomed epithet of Barbarians. Still—admitting
that—it ought in justice to Lord ELGIN'S decision
at that moment of supreme emergency, it ought in
justice to him, to the Allies, and especially to the
English, who were chiefly conspicuous among the
destroyers, that there was absolutely, so far as human
reason and foresight could decide, no alterative
whatsoever. It was a matter of life and death. A
lasting example had to be made—then—and with-
out delay. A lesson had to be burnt into the
Chinese remembrance—such a lesson as they should
not be very likely to lose the recollection of. It
was essential, It was unavoidable. The people
there had been so cruel, so faithless, so entirely un-
reliable in every way, that it became an imperative
necessity that, for onse and ft r all, they should learn,
in a manner that they should never be likely to
forget, that thenceforth, under the direst penalties,
Good Faith would have to be kept with the Euro-
pean Governments. That wholesome knowledge they
have now obtained thoroughly. Not by the whole.
sale destruction of human life, but through the more
humane medium of the wholesale destruction of
property. And one of the first to come within the
influence of this same wholesome knowledge—it is
satisfactory to remember this now—was the Prince
KUNG, the President of the new Ministry of the
reorganised Government of the Chinese.

Ii.R.R. THE PRINCE CONSORT.

A PHOTOGRAPH BY MAYALL.

Memorials are now being everywhere talked off
in token of the national gratitude and affection
cherished towards his late Royal Highness. Mr.
Mayall has here placed within reach of us all, one
of the most charming memorials we could possibly
obtain—one that, we doubt not, will hang upon
many a home-wall, in the midst of the households
where the death of the gentle and gifted Prince
has been so recently, still is, and long will be
lamented, almost like a domestic affliction. Mr.
Mayall has often before achieved wonders in this
way in his magical art—an art of which he is one
of the most accomplished masters. But he
has scarcely ever been more delightfully
successful than in the present instance.
His late Royal Highness is here before us as if
in life—seated, and in profile. His singularly hand-
some face appearing as statuesque in expression as
ever—but more than ever thoughtful, serious, al-
most sad it seems to us. But then we look at it
now through the haze of our own sorrow and through
the pathos of his premature disappearance. Among
the numerous portraits of the Prince published either
during his life time or since his death, at various
ages and in the most diversified garbs—as a Robed
Knight of the Garter, as a Field Marshal, as a High-
land Chieftain, &c., Mr. Mayan's present photo-
graph of his Royal Highness in his ordinary morn-
ing costume as a private gentleman, precisely us he
appeared very shortly before his lamented demise,
is about the very best and happiest and most life-
like any where procurable.

Her Majesty, it is understood, will make a much
longer stay at Osborne than was at first expected. The
grounds and roads were laid out under the late Prince
Consort's superintendence, and many of the shrubs and
trees planted by his directions, and some, indeed, by him.
The Queen spends much of the day in the grounds, and
nothing that the lamented prince took an interest in is left
uncared for,

The Queen and Royal Family remain at Osborne
in complete retirement.

His Royal Highness the Duke of Cambridge is
quite recovered from his attack of gout, and has been in
daily attendance at the Horse Guards since Wednesday.
The Special Portuguese Embassy, consisting of
his Excellency Dom Manuel Camara, Chamberlain to the
King of Portugal; Dom Sampayo e Pina, aide•de-camp;
and Viscount de Tore, aide-de-camp to the Prince Regent,
have left Claridge's Hotel for Southampton, to embark on
board the mail steamer Oneida, for Lisbon.

Maria Marchioness of Ailesbury has arrived in
town from visiting the Marquis and Marchioness of Bath, at
Longleat.

The Earl and Countess of Dalkeith have left
Dalkeith Palace for Broughton House, Northamptonshire,
where his lordship is entertaining a shooting party.
Mr. J. Sheridan Knowles has arrived at Queens-
town, where he purposes spending the winter.
CABINET COUNCIL.—The Cabinet Council sum-
moned for Tuesday next, by Lord Palmerston, has been
countermanded.

Sir Harvey Bruce, Bart., the Conservative can-
didate for Coleraine, will be elected without opposition.
A farm .house and buildings at Teille, near Nantes,
were set on ire, three days since, in a singular manner.
The farmer's son, a boy, six years of age, was eating a
piece of cake in the chimney corntr, when a cat attempted
several times to take it from him, and at last, in a fit of im-
patience, he threw her on the fire. The animal immediately
rushed out with some of the embers adhering to her fur,
and took refuge in a barn full of straw. The whole place
was soon after in a blaze, and the house and dependencies
were entirely destroyed.

THE FATAL ACCIDENT AT ST. MARTIN'S HALL.
—Yesterday afternoon, Mr. St. Clair Bedford, the coroner
for the city of Westminster, resumed the inquiry at King's
College Hoepital, into the cause of death of the three men,
Patrick Coglen, Walter Sabey, and Richard Wood, who
were killed by the falling of a scaffold in St. Martin's-hall,
on Friday afternoon last. At the conclusion of a lengthened
examination, the jury, after half an hour's consideration,
returned a verdict—" That the deaths of the deceased had
been occasioned by a fall from a scaffold in St. Martin's-
hall by the breaking of a ledger."

OXFORD COUNTY ELECTlON.—A'numerously at-
tended meeting of the Oxford electors was held at the Mitre
Hotel, Oxford, yesterday evening, The chair was taken
by Mr. Walker btrickland, of Cokethorpe-park, who was
supported by the ex-Mayor of Oxford (Mr. C. J. Sadler).
Sir Henry Dashwood, who has agreed to come forward as
candidate, was present. lie said he would like to see a
moderate extension of the suffrage,but the recent outrages
at Sheffield, and the combinations of workmen in London
served to show him how dangerous too great a reduction
of the franchise would be. Considering all that he had
seen of Lord Palmerston, he could. safely promise to support
him.' He could not pledge himself to support the ballot,as at
present he had not seen any good results from its operation
in other countries. He thought, however, that if church-
sates were dependent up,,,n private contributions we should
shut the doors of the Church to the poor man. Sir Henry,
before concluding his remarks, stated franklytthat if they
could get a candidate who might be more in accordance
with their views, he would retire at once. The ex-mayor,
Mr. Alderman Sadler, said Sir Henry Dashwood did not
come up to the mark, but that as he was a good man, and
had informed them that he was for progress, he would sup-
port him in the absence of a better Liberal. The question
of expense having been mooted, Alderman Towle sug-
gested that the city of Oxford should not put Sir Henry to
a farthing of costs, and a resolution to that effect was
unanimously agreed to. Another resolution calling on the
public for subscriptions was adopted, and numerous sums
were put down by gentlemen present.

LATEST NEWS.

THE NONITEUR ON THE DESTRUCTION
OF THE PORT CF CHARLESTON.
PARIS, JAN. 11.

The Jfoniteur, in its bulletin of today, says :
" A feeling of profound regret and indignation has
been aroused in England as well as in France by
the vindictive act of destroying the port of
Charleston."

CADIZ, JAN. 10.

The American Consul has received orders to pro.
test against the admission of the Sumter into the

port.

It is said that Spain will protect the prisoners
brought by the Sumter.

THE DISTURBAN CES IN SICILY.
TURIN, JAN. 11.
An official report of the disturbances at Castel-
lamare, in Sicily, has been published.
Some rioters shouted " Down with the conscrip-
tion," and, among many other acts of atracity,
killed the captain of the National Guard, plundered
his home, and also one belonging to a merchant
known to entertain liberal opinions.
The troops who were despatched to the scene of
the disturbances succeeded in re-establishing order.
Five individuals, who were found plundering, were
shot. The soldiers were well received by the po•
pulation.

TURIN, JAN. 11.

The Paha of to-day says :—" It is rumoured
that the Ministry will shortly present to
the Chambers a bill authorising a loan
of 130 millions of lire, in obligations for 100 years,
to be secured on the State railways. Nothing,
however, has yet been resolved upon.
" Count Bastoji, Minister of Finance, has an-
nounced that the Minister of Pubic Works will
shortly present a special bill providing for the
expenses of the railways, which will require 60
millions."

DRESDEN, JAN. 10.

At a quarter to four yesterday afternoon a violent
shock of earthquake, accompanied with a rumbling
noise resembling thunder, was felt in Saxon
Voigtland, in the district of the Erzgebirge.
The shock extended as far as Leipsic.

CHINA.

PEKIN, Nov. 11.

A coup d'etat has taken place here, resulting in
the overthrow of the Cabinet and the imprisonment
of the Ministers composing it.
A new Regency has been established under the
two Empresses.

Prince Kung has been appointed President of
the new Ministry, of which Kweliang and Hwa:ian g
are members.

The state of affairs at Pekin is encouraging.
CANTON, Nov. 30.
There is no news of importance from the
Northern ports.
The rebels are in the vicinity of Shanghai. The
foreigners in that city are prepared for an attack.
At Hankow trade is flourishing. Ningpo is still
in "a state of alarm, owing to the vicinity of the
re bels.

According to the latest advices, Japan was quiet.
Mr. Alcock has left Yeddo, to return to his post.
The Japanese Ambassador and suite were to
embark for Suez in January.

NEW ZEALAND.
SYDNEY, Nov. 21.

Advices received here from New Zealand an-
nounce that Sir George Grey and Mr. Fox had
accepted the invitation of the native chiefs to a con-
ference.
His Excellency and Mr. Fox were well received.
Affairs wore a. peaceful aspect.
Trade at Sydney is improving.

AUSTRALIA.

MELBOURNE, Nov. 25.

The departure of gold ships since the last mail
have been—the Moravian, with 47,698 oz.; the In-
demnity, with 12,447 oz. ; the Monarch, with
42,585 oz.; the Clutha, with 22,660 oz.; and the
Lightning, 24,040 oz.—total, 149,430 oz.

SOUTHAMPTON, JAN. 11.

The Peninsular and Oriental Company's steamer
Mooltan has gone on shore near Yarmouth, isle of
Wight.
A telegram has since been received from Hurst
Castle, stating that the Mooltan is off, and now on
her 'way to this port.