The Sun.
London, England, 1853-10-22 00:00:00

~~L

LONDON, SATURDAY, OCTOBER 22, 1853.

It is undoubtedly true that the AUTOCRAT has
still to announce his definitive determination.
Already he has done so, plainly enough, by his
acts—acts of warlike audacity and insolent aggres-
sion. But his words have yet to be heard—the
words of that final resolve which must either give
the signal for battle or stabilitate the general
tranquillity by a solemn treaty of pacification.
We must hearken, therefore, eagerly at this junc-
ture for the voice which must solve the problem
of this momentous alternative—the voice which
must in a few hours become audible in the intelli-
gence received from St. Petersburgh.
The situation may in a few sentences be clearly
indicated. Turkey has at length broken through
the irksome restraints put upon her councils by
the timidity or over-caution of her allies, and has
assumed an attitude befitting her dignity and her
independence. She has proclaimed her inflexible
resolution to vindicate by the sword as well as by
the pen the insulted honour of her Crown and the
violated rights of her nationality. She has as-
serted this boldly, and simply, and altogether un-
answerably in that noble Manifesto by which the
turpitude of Russia has been laid bare to the
scorn of Christendom. Moreover, the Sublime
Porte has proceeded yet a step further
—has come at once courageously to the point—
has demanded the immediate evacuation of the
Danubian Principalities by the Cossack forces
under GORTZCHAKOFF—has requested, through the
British and French Ambassadors, the passage of
the Combined Fleets from Besika Bay to the
waters of Constantinople. The withdrawal of
the Muscovite troops from Moldo-Wallachia has
been evaded, if not openly refused by the Russian
Commander-in-Chief—while the naval armaments
of France and England have at length passed
through the Channel of the Dardanelles. Where-
fore, it is obvious from all this, that Turkey has
at last chivalrously brought mutters to a climax,
by proclaiming that the sword shall be drawn or
that the Pruth shall be recrossed by the Russian.
That is the situation. Turkey has submitted to
the CZAR the choice in the great alternative.
England and France have revealed their deter-
mination to support Turkey in this proceeding by
sending their vessels-of-war to the Bosphorus.
Prussia and Austria have already virtually with-
drawn from the contention. It remains for Russia
alone, therefore, to assume her position. It re-
mains for the Emperor NICHOLAS to decide in the
emergency. And what will be his decision ? It
is the question every one asks at this crisis—and for
the answer to which every one looks eagerly to the
next advices from St. Petersburg. Will the
Russian Arrroe
RAT withdraw his demands, or will ,
he persist in their enforcement ? It may be readily
conjectured. Even. in his silence it may be con-
jectured from his acts. And what are the latest
and most significant of those
acts ? The placing
of the whole army of
Russian Poland on a war
footing—the concentration of more and more
troops upon the Danube—the sudden order trans-
mitted to the Baltic Fleet at Cronstadt to
prepare
immediately for sea, and to proceed
forthwith to
Revel ! These are the latest and most significant
indications that Russia also is prepared for the
struggle, and that, as we have already maintained
so often, war is indeed at this moment really
imminent.

Some degree of alarm has been excited by the I,
Bank Return for the week ending the 15th Octo-
ber,
which will be found in another part of this
day's impression. The habitual croakers look only
to the actual items, without in any degree consi-
dering the causes that may lead to a temporary
depression. Other interested parties, who take
advantage of every opportunity to depreciate pub-
lic credit, and to injure the property .of their
neighbours, exhibit:extraordinary activity in circu-
lating and commenting on the various features of
the return—of declaiming on the serious falling
off, under the several heads, of " Public Depo-
sits)" " Rest," " Other Securities" and " Notes ')

Unemployed." It is desirable, therefore, that the
true state of the case way be fully and clearly
understood, so that the apprehensions might be
allayed, and fundholders and shareholders pre-
vented from sacrificing their property at inade-
quate prices.
The dividends on the Government Funds and
Bank of England Stock became due on the 10th
instant to the amount of between seven and eight
millions sterling. The quarter's salaries to the
Government employees were payable on the same
day, so that the demand on the resources of the
Bank amounted to at least eight millions, for which
provision was then required. When interest is low,
and there is no great demand for money, a large
proportion of the dividends frequently remain
some weeks without being called for. It is different,
however, when there are great temptations either for
the temporary use or the investment of capital.
Then the payments are actively pressed for, and
what usually takes two or three weeks is per-
formed in little more than as many days. That
such has been the case on the present occasion
will be manifest from a close inspection of the re-
turn which has caused so much unnecessary excite-
ment. We may, therefore, fairly anticipate that
we have seen the worst, and that the tide will
forthwith turn, and that funds will flow in with
more than ordinary rapidity.
The items which exhibit diminution are as fol-

lows
Public deposits £3,156,539
Rest 529,958
Other securities . 1,516,460
Notes unemployed 1,349,410
Bullion 477,615

Total £7,029,982
From this may be deducted the increase
in other deposits £1,030,539
Government securities 116,078

Leaving a balance of..

£1,146,617

..£5,883,365

To which may be added the increase of notes
in circulation, 826,820/., which should be placed
to the debit side of the account, and we find a
total of 6,710,1851., which has been drawn from
the Bank, and which has liquidated the greater
portion of the claims usually divided at quarter
day. This general view will suffice to show how
totally devoid of foundation is the panic which
the Bears have attempted to excite, and a closer
inspection will confirm the impression thereby
created.

The reduction in the rest 529,9581., proves
that almost the entire of the dividends on Bank
Stock had been claimed on or previous to the
15th instant. It was payable on the same
day as the Government Stocks, and we may
reasonably assume that equal diligence was
exbibited by the Public Creditor as by the Bank
Proprietor. The full amount withdrawn will
thus be fairly accounted for, without ascribing
any part of it to a steady drain. Indeed, it is
probable that but for the elements above referred
to the matter would appear in a very different

The public deposits, it will be seen, are much
lower than they have been for some time. This
is the result of Mr. GLADSTONE'S tampering with
the public debt, funded and unfunded. That un-
fortunate and expensive experiment has reduced
the national balance to 3,700,8591., an amount
lower than it has stood at for many years. The
reduction in the other securities is ascribable to
the repayment of the loans effected on Stock, while
the transfer-books were closed, and which, of course,
were withdrawn, when high premiums were paid for
the loan of, in place of interest for, advances on
stock. The notes unemployed still amount to
5,012,4901., more than a anillion beyond the
sum required by the Bank for carrying on its or-
dinary business, and the stock of bullion exceeds
fifteen millions and a quarter, an amount which
would formerly have been considered sufficient to
justify the greatest liberality on the part of the
Directors, and an ample supply for all possible
demands. There is still five millions of specie
—more than was available on. the 23d October,
1847. There are three millions mole of notes
unemployed than there was at the same period,
and we now find that there is abundance of cash
in Lombard-street, while there it could scarcely
be obtained at any price or on any security.
Let these pints, then, b e borne in mind.
Let the true state of affairs be known, and there
will be no necessity for apprehensions which are
as injurious as they are discreditable to the par-
ties that indulge therein.

The season is come, or rapidly coming, when
Sabbatarianism will be almost compulsory. The
great mass of the working classes will have neither
means nor inclination to quit the precincts of their
habitations, or, at least, of their neighbourhoods.
Sunday excursion trains will answer but in very
few instances till far on in the spring. The
bright frosty days of winter will be too few and
too uncertain for pre-arranged open-air pleasure ;
and the short days of midwinter, and the fogs of
November, and the slop and mire of February
will compel most to while away their leisure time
as they best may in the scene of their six days' toil.
But what, then, will myriads of our fellow-men
in large towns and cities be doomed to in the
hours of suspended labour ? The cholera alarm
answers that question for us. It is needless to
copy from the columns of every paper the details
of stench, atmospheric stagnation, accumulated
filth, indecent and disease-breediug over-crowding,
and unventilated, undrained alleys and rows of
houses, in which numbers of human beings live,
and that, too, almost on the skirts of our squares,
certainly within miasma-range of our cleaner-
washed dwellings. Live, we have said, we should
rather say die, of typhus, of diarrhoea, of cholera,
or linger the pallid sickly victims of impure
air and noxious exhalations ; and there, alas !
they might die, or linger out existence, did not
an inscrutable PROVIDENCE compel us to explore
and attack their uncleanliness in sheer self-
defence. However, we now know by repeated
warnings what are the houses, the homes, and
the localities in which the Sundays of thousands
must be spent, where the want of means or the
season of the year dooms them to leisure hours
in town.

Now, it certainly is not the proN ince of a
newspaper to read homilies to laymen, or to de-
liver " charges" to the clergy on their spiritual
duties ; nor shall we trespass beyond our appro-
priate domain. It strikes us, however, as incum-
bent upon us to remind our honest and sincere
Sabbatarian friends, and there are many such,
and our merely bigoted or misled Sabbatarians,
and they are too many, of the opportunity which
u
they now have for displaying their utmost zeal,
and, we will add, the vast benefits which their
zeal might unquestionably confer upon the
weather-bound denizens of filth and demorali-
sation. Our appeal is to the zealous ad-
vocates of Sabbath observance of every &-
nomination, for we are no respecters of sects at
any time, and, least of all, in the present crusade;
and we ask of them to use their opportunity while
they may, and while their efforts would be of tem-
poral service assuredly, whatever their religious
success. The tenants of a comfortable pew, with
every convenience for following at ease some po-
pular or favourite preacher, listening, it may be,
to ardent declamation on the sacredness of Sunday,
and the blessedness of keeping it sacred--these
well-dressed and well-accommodated recipients of
their weekly spiritual stimulant perhaps never
even glance in thought at the circumstances under
which their neighbours we have adverted to must
pass their Sabbaths at this season of the year. Or
if they do,
a contribution to some clerical society,
a town mission, or pastoral aid society, banishes
all further thought on the matter. It is quite
clear, however, that next to nothing has yet
been done by existingreligio agency
to make the Sunday
of the smallest
chapels, and meeting-hou. Our ordinary churches,
ses
happy classes in questionuse whatever to the un-
are quite out of their
line. Neither the buildings
nor the attendants in
them would place them at ease ;
they are utterly
They never think of unattractive to them.
en-
tering them. All is too formal, too elevated, for
their tastes. The very language of most of our
regular sanctuaries is one they can hardly under-
stand ; or where it might be intelligible, it ia ut.