The Sun.
London, England, 1854-12-02 00:00:00

ALLIANCE BETWEEN ENGLAND AND

FRANCE.

Not among the least remarkable, but certainly
among the most agreeable results of the present
war, is the tone which the greater part of the
French press has taken with regard to England.
It is becoming more evident every day that the
alliance is not a mere political league between-two
Governments formed for purposes of momentary
expediency, to be dissolved as soon as that mo-
mentary expediency shall have passed away, after
the heartless manner of such engagements—not
merely the mutual esteem of two brave armies,
emulous without being envious, and doing that
high justice to each other's merits which none but
those conscious of high desert can render—but a
sentiment which is taking possession of the minds
of the eo le and seems likely to endure long after
tie am ion of The Emperor of has been
chastised, and the balance of European power been
redressed. The two great nations that inhabit the
opposite sides of the British Channel have at length
discovered that the endless wars of eight hundred
years have only served to retard both in the march
of civilisation and improvement, and to fritter
away in objectless contest that strength which, if
united can give laws to the world, and accelerate
in an incalculable degree the march of human pro-
gress, the development of commerce, and the
spread of enlightenment. Esto perimtua ! May
this auspicious sentiment of union grow into a
fixed principle in their nation, and so completely
inoculate their public policy and private opinion as
to make them regard a return of hostilities between
them with no less horror than a civil war ! We are
bound to admit that the most glowing eulogium on
the institutions, the conduct, and character of
England which the present glorious crisis of her
destiny has called forth has not been traced by an
English hand. If any one who would wish to see a
thoroughly just appreciation of England's present
position, he must seek for it, not in the Euglish
press, nor in that portion of the French which is
devoted to the support of the present order of
things, but in tke Republican Siecle, which is not
probably influenced in its appreciation of the ally
of the Emperor by any peculiar affection or par-
tiality. While the Legitimist organs strive to ex-
clude all mention of the English from a battle in
which they lost six generals, one hundred officers,
and two thousand five hundred men, being about
one-third of the force they bad on the field,—while
the Orleanist papers give them but a grudging and
sullen commendation, the Siecle deals with us m
a tone of warm and genuine approval, which well
entitles it to the grateful acknowledgments of the
nation, and those on whom devolve the task of
giving utterance to national opinion. Our Parisian
eontemporary has clearly seized and forcibly ex-
pressed a great truth, whick the advocates of the
Russian system of government often find it con-
venient to forget,--"-the truth that free government
has its strength as well as its weakness, and,
if it often fetters the discretion of an Executive, at
other times arms and urges it forward with irre-
sistible power. The enemies of England are wont
to expatiate on the obstacles which a Parliamentary
Opposition, a free press, and the unrestricted right
of public meeting offer to the action of our Execu-
tive, and maintain that the same jealous care which
makes our Government powerless for much evil has
also made its powerless for much good. But they
omit to notice what the Siede so ably points out,—
that when public opinion supports the Government
of a free country the impulse to action becomes irre-
sistibly powerful. Individual selfishness is lost in the
general contagion of public spirit, courage rises to
heroism, the discharge of duty to noble self-sacrifice;
and men ordinarilylcalculating, cautious, and cool-
headed, are surprised into an enthusiasm of which
they did not probably believe themselves capable.
The romantic element introduces itself once more
into the prosaic transactions of daily life. Every
class in its own way, andaccording to its powers,
strains every effort to secure the general object.
If blood be shed like water, our people do not re-
pine ; if money be insufficient, any sum that can
be asked for is ready, and, not content with paying
heavy war taxes, private benevolence feels it a re-
lief to raise enormous sums for the benefit of the
wounded, the widow, and the orphan, and finds
agents for its bounty no less able than noble and
disinterested. These things the Siecle traces to
liberty. The knowledge that people are allowed
to differ invests their agreement with irresistible
force, and the reflection that our unanimity is
spontaneous gins the influence over friends and
'enemies which it is difficult to exaggerate ; and all
this is not said by England of herself, but is the
spontaneous verdict given by one of the most intel-
ligent organs of a nation against which we have
fought countless battles and waged innumerable
and bitter controversies. Nor is the benefit we
derive from such a tribute confined merely to the
gratification of our self-love or the inflation of our
pride. Such cordial appreciation of England and
her institutions opens to us a new avenue of self-
knowledge. We have many faults, which, though
we may partly guess ourselves, appear much more
clearly to the eye of a neighbour than to our own.
Hitherto, when reminded of them by our contem-
poraries on the other side of the Channel, we have
been in the habit of consoling ourselves with the

reflection that the critic was hostile, and disinclined
to do us fair and ample justice. But, after the
manner in which we have been treated in this in-
stance, such an excuse will be no longer open to us
and we shall be forced to admit the justice of a
charge to which judges so fair and so candid give
the sanction of their authority.
It is worth while to go to war with Russia, to
interrupt the pursuits of peace and the rapid ad-
vance of prosperity, to shed our blood on a remote
and barbarous shore, to strew the sea with our
wrecks and the hospitals with our sick and wounded
and our mutilated soldiers, if by so doing we can
expel the mists of prejudice that have so long
darkened the eyes of both nations, and, forgetting
the traditions of mutual jealousy and animosity,
learn to consider each other as we really are. Here
is a result of the war which neither the rage of man
nor the elements can deprive us of, and which is
well worth all the sacrifices we have made. Never
did meu fall in a nobler cause, never with more as-
sured profit to their fellow-creatures, than those
gallant Englishmen and Frenchmen who so dearly
sold their lives at the Battles of the Alma, Balak-
lava, and Inkerman. They have maintained the
superiority of the civilised Westover the barbarous
East ; they have taught Russia that against them
no attainable numbers will secure the victory ; and
in the last battle they saved, by unheard-of efforts
of heroic valour, the united armies from imminent
destruction. But they have done more than this.
In their blood has been sealed a bond of union be-
tween England and France which we may well
trust will , bind long after the survivors of these
glorious actions shall in a ripe old ago, follow their
heroic comrades to the dust. The nations which,
placed front to front, could see each ether only
through the distorted medium of prejudice and
animosity, once placed side by side have been able
to form a truer estimate of each other's qualities,
and to learn the lesson of mutual respect and
amity. That the present struggle will fill an
ample space in the page of history, we fully
believe ; but it will, we apprehend, be remem-
bered, not so much for having put bounds to bar-
barous and domineering violence, for having
opened Asia to Europe, and the finest countries of
Europe itself to commerce and cultivation, as for
being the era from which will be dated that auspi-
cious union between England and France, fraught,
as we fondly believe, with such incalculable
benefits, not only to both countries, but to the
whole human race.—Times.

WELLINGTON STATUE IN LEEDS.—It has been deter-
mined to place the Leeds statue to the late Duke of
Wellington (by Marochetti) in the Leeds Infirmary
gardens until the Town Hall is erected, the area in
front of which is to be the permanent site of this
monumest.
THE WEATHER.—The weather is alternately frosty and
wet—the frosty weather being dry and very cold ; the
wet weather, for the most part, windy and compara-
tively warm. The roads are very unpleasant for
walking or driving, and in the country, many. of the
highways are heavily covered with metal, in anticipation
of the winter thaws,—lnverness Courier,