The Sun.
London, England, 1854-03-09 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

BANQUET TO SIR CHARLES NAPIER.
( From the Times.)

It might possibly admit of a question among
the fastidious whether the departure of a gallant
Admiral to conduct against a powerful enemy a
dangerous and difficult war be a suitable occasion
for anything in the nature of a public demonstra-
tion, however natural and agreeable to private
friendship such a festival may be. It is wise in
all things to worship the goddess Nemesis, and to
remember the admonition of the wise man who ad-
vises that " he who putteth on his harness for the
battle should not exult as he who taketh it off."
But, waiving these considerations, the recent ban-
quet at the Reform Club suggests reflections which
may be a source of solid gratification, without
having recourse to premature anticipations of vic-
tory. There was no Reform Club in the last war ;
but, if there had been, it would not have met to
fete our Admirals or to wish success to our arms.
The Tories had in those days a complete monopoly
of military enthusiasm. The nation was divided into
two camps, almost as hostile to each other as to the
common enemy, and one of these parties so far lost
temper as to absent itself entirely from the House of
Commons, because it was unable to influence the
policy of Government. Where are those party
differences now ? Where is that portion of the
British nation to whom the Emperor Nicholas
can look for a favourable attention to his proposals,
or a friendly disposition to his claims ? There is
no such party. Those whose trade it is to find
perpetual sources of difference and division have
indeed brought forward accusations, and sought to
scatter animosities, but their attempts have been
fruitless, and the public mind has never for a mo-
ment been led astray from the fixed conviction
that this war is just and necessary, and that a
further continuance of peace would be impolitic
and unworthy. The nation, which it was supposed
could not be torn from its commerce and its mer-
chandise, is pervaded more than any other nation
in Europe at this moment with a martial ardour.
The parties which men accustomed to the monoto-
nous silence of despotism assumed could never
agree upon any anything are in perfect accord on
this subject, and the peace agitation, which was
foolishly assumed to represent popular sentiment,
is as futile as it is absurd. But that in which
the speculators on the weakness and wicked-
ness, the folly and divisions of mankind, have been
most egregiously deceived is the union which this
banquet so enthusiastically commemorates between
England and France. Should we be able to get
over our domestic discord, and silence the voice of
the Peace Society, still it was argued we never
could amalgamate with France—our rival through
so many centuries of discord and bloodshed—who
has met us in every sea and on every shore, and
contested with us foot by foot the varying fortune
of a thousand battles. Let those who have given
way at any time to doubt on this subject read the
following passage from the speech of Lord Palmer-
ston, no unapt representative of the feeling of Eng-
land on the subject :—" We have had," said Lord
Palmerston, " to do during now more than twelve
months of most difficult and complicated negotia-
tions with the Sovereign of France. We have
met, on his part, with the greatest straight-
forwardness, with the most perfect good faith,
with the most single-minded sincerity, and with an
energy of purpose and community of determination
which inspire in our minds that full confidence in
him which I am proud to say he has always ex-
pressed in us." How completely, notwithstanding
our military preparations, the arts of peace are, in
this our age, predominant over the arts of war can-
not better be illustrated than by the fact that great
as the material and immediate advantages derived
from the French alliance are, we rejoice still more
in the guarantees for future harmony between our-
selves and our neighbours than in their immediate
accession to our warlike power. Discord between
England and France is the greatest evil with which
the civilisation and progress of mankind can be
threatened, and to see that evil not only averted,
but becoming every day more remote and impro-
bable by the closer union of a common civilisation,
common interests, and common opinions, is the
most cheering spectacle that can meet the eye of
a patriot or a statesman. We trust that the ex-
pressions of
our Ministers will be read on the other
side of the Channel with the same feeling with
which they are here, and that from this day forth
France and England, abandoning in the spirit of
their more advanced civilisation, the worn-out '
and barbarous policy of aggression and conquest,
I will still be found ever ready to maintain the
integrity of the European system, and to recall
to its duty, by whatever force may be necessary,
any Power that abuses its strength, and claims to i
be superior to and independent of the reason and
conscience of mankind. There are few, if any,
living Admirals whose name carries with it so
much renown for the past and hope for the future
as that of Sir Charles Napier. A member of that
remarkable family, which, like the Fabii and.
Decii of ancient Rome, seems born to fight success-
fully the battles of the country, the Admiral has
obtained a reputation, by hard and dangerous ser-
vice, which may well entitle him to the mighty
confidence which the country reposes in him, when
placing in his hands and trusting to his judgment
the finest fleet that ever left these shores. He is
armed with agencies always formidable, but now
possessed of a power of self-originated motion,
which must give them an efficiency difficult before-
hand thoroughly to conceive. The power of
placing wherever you will, and whenever you will,
any number of perfectly well-served and efficient
batteries is one of the most tremendous that can
be conceived. No longer depending on the
caprice of the elements, but asserting our own
free will and control over our motions, we, by
virtue of these mighty machines, seem to have
become at last that which our poets have long
flattered us with being—the monarchs of the deep
Naval strategy will be just as amenable to criti-
cism as that of the land army, and the elements,
by ceasing to impede our motions, take from us all
manner of excuse. If we do not act, it must be
from the inertness of our commanders ; if we do not
combine, it is their want of tactical skill that must
bear the blame. The winds and waves must hence-
forth be exculpated. But, probably, among all
the advantages of our new armament, there is none
which the British public will appreciate so much as
its tendency to bring matters to a short and deci-
sive issue. Carried on in a sea from the narrow
outlet of which there is no escape, the conflict,
unless the enemy abandon the waves to us, must
speedily occur. We have not to look for the tedious
chase of Nelson, who followed the allied fleets to
the West Indies and back before he could bring
them to action. The Baltic and the Black Sea are
in the nature of two naval champs clos, where the
combatants cannot, if they would, long avoid each
other. The man selected for this perilous encounter
goes to it with the highest reputation and the most
glorious antecedents, and we heartily echo the
parting wish of the Reform Club banquet—that he
may speedily return to us successful from this new
and untried kind of naval warfare.

THE WAR IN THE EAST.
(From the Morning Chronicle.)
The overbearing insolence of Russia has fairly
roused the spirit of the French nation. The Czar's
allusion to the disasters of 1812 was intended as a
defiance, and the challenge has not been refused.
" We also," says the President of the Legislative
Body, in the address which we publish elsewhere,
" might appeal to glorious recollections ; but we
prefer to establish new claims to honour." The
whole Assembly, after unanimously voting the loan
required by the Government, proceeded to the
Tuileries to express their cordial concurrence in the
vigorous measures which form the sequel to long
and patient attempts to preserve peace. Both the
Allied Governments are entering into the war under
the influence of the same motives, and with the
same resolution to conduct it with energy. " I
hope," said the First Lord of the Admiralty, at the
Reform Club, " that the war may be short, and
that it may be sharp ;" and M. Billault, in his ad-
dress to the Legislative Body, expresses a similar
feeling—" The war must be vigorous, rapid, and
decisive." The preparations made on both sides of the
Channel abundantly show that these declaratioiare
no idle boasts. While the naval and military arma-
ments of our ally are proceeding with extraordinary
rapidity, Sir James Graham has known how to call
forth all the zeal of the department which he ad-
ministers ; and he has succeeded in manning and
arming, with unparalleled speed, a fleet which it
might have been thought impossible to collect,
when so large a portion of our naval force was
already employed in the East. Nor, we may be
assured, will Sir Charles Napier fail to do his part
when he comes within reach of the enemy. It is
only by an appeal to the text of pike and gun that
the official theology of St. Petersburg can be cor-
rected.
In the meanwhile, the position of the Austrian
Government becomes every day more clearly defined.
In the official manifesto just published at Vienna,
it is openly declared that the Imperial Cabinet has
never doubted that the demands of the Western.
Powers were just, and in accordance with the in-
terests of Europe. " Till the very last," it is said,
" the Government has obeyed the calls of duty to
Europe, and of friendship to its ally ;" but it
now only remains for the Emperor of Austria " to
maintain the interests of the 'nations under his
sceptre." It would be difficult, short of a declara-
tion of war, to speak in plainer language. The un-
hesitating rejection, by the Court of Vienna, of the
last Russian overtures was but a casual incident in
the course of a consistent and determined policy.