The Sun.
London, England, 1854-12-29 00:00:00

LONDON, FRIDAY EVENING, DECEMBER 29, 1854.

MONT BLAN.C.- CHRISTMAS HOLT-
DAYi. —During the Chrktinas Week Mr. ALBERT
3IXI ITH will give his MONT BLAN.C, HOLLAND, and wp the
It'ljlNE, every niorninq• and evening, at Three and Eight (oxvept
Saturday evening.) Si'aliff can be• taken for any of the repreaenta-
tens at the Egyptian HAT!, every day, trona Eleven to Four.

pLYMPITTH GIN--This pure and wholesome
spirit is offered to the public free to the l'addingtou Station,
in I , 2, and 3 dozen hampers (hampers and bottles included), of 32s
the dozen, by BENJAMIN VICKERS, spirit merchant, Newton
Bushel, Devon. Cheque or Post-otrce order, payable at Nevrten
Abbott, to accompany the order.

TO LOVERS OF FISH.-
100 real YARMOUTH BLOATERS for Gs., pac,kaga included.
('he above forwarded to all parts on receipt of penny postage stamps,
or P. 0. 0, (preferred) for the amount. Send plain address, county,
and nearest station.—Address, Thomas Lettis, jun., Fish-curer, Great
Yarmouth.

COMMERCIAL TRAVELLERS' SCHOOLS
for Orphan and Necessitous Children, Wanstead.

PRESIDENT 1.4011/4" .MASTERMAN, Esq., M.P.
A GENERAL COURT et this Institution was held at the London
Tavern TIII4 DAY (Iliiirsday, the 28th inst.),
GEOEPE:IIIOOItEr Elq:, in the

at which an election of sixteen Children for admission into the schools
took place. At the dose of the poll the result was declared as
follows :

SUCCESSFUL CANDIDATES.
BOYS.
Stimson, Charlet Baynes.. 9,130 Keens, Gehrge 11[..• • ..... 6,462
Cane, Frederick William.. 8,35 I Baddams, John William .. 5,689
Stevens, Douglas Blount.. 6,759 Whilling, William.... •• .. 5,513
Tomlinson, Chas. Banbury 6,701 Johnston, Joseph W. .... 5,179
Bedwell, Alfred Jame 4.... 6,664 Swindell, Charles
GIRLS.
Carter, Catherine
6,375 I Taylor, Caroline King .... 5,316
Naylor, Maria Olivia 6,092 Hore, Agnes Briddon 3,933
Patten, Jessie.. • . 5,64 & Evans, Sarah Ann 2 972
UNSUCCESSFUL CANDIDATES.
so".
Eastwood, John Kirkham 2,943 Addyman, Robt. Fawcett 938
Patterson, James ........ 1,353 Davis, Albert Thompson.. 389
Lloyd,- Herbert . .
Barraclough,Zdwin 1,194

GIRLS.

Owen, Janet C. ........ • • ..... 1,070
Harrison, Louisa .7. 597
Gillird, Clementina E 559
ALFRED LENCH SAUL, Secretary.
81, Cheapside, Dec. 28, 1854.

NAVAL AND MILITARY INTELLIGENCE.

The Nile, 91, Captain Mundy, left Spithead yesterday
morning for Plymouth.
The Hogue, 60, screw-hlockship, is ordered to refit at
Portsmouth, and will go into harbour as soon as she has
discharged her powder and shell.
The Imperi4use, 51, screw-frigate, Captain R. B.
Watson, C. 8., steamed into Portsmouth harbour from
Spithead yesterday, and hauled alongside the

•a6tted,

Tice schooner Iris, of Plymouth, William Gent master,
from London with a general cargo, has been assisted
into Sheerness in a very leaky state, and laid on the bank
alongside the pier, after having been on shore.

APPOINTMENTS.
Captain George E. Patsy (1846), to command the
Monarch, 84, at Devonport.
Naval Cadet David Littlejohn to the Euryalus.

THE MILITIA.
Arrangements have been made for the Bedfordshire
Militia to leave Berwick-upon-Tweed, where they have
been in garrison for several months past, for the purpose
of proceeding to Bedford to recruit their strength, 150
men having lately volunteered to Line Regiments. The
regiment is commanded by Colonel Gilpin, M.P. for
Bedford.

UNIVERSITY INTELLIGENCE.

OXFORD, Dec. 28.

The examiners in the schools of classics, mathematics,
natura: science, modern history, and jurisprudence,
have this day published the list of classmen and passmen,
according to the statutes ; for which we find that the
classes have been awarded to the various colleges and
halls as follows, viz. :

THE _NAVVIES IN THE CRIHEA.

(Prom the Times.)
No doubt the slow progress of our arms in the Crimea
will force on the people some troublesome reflections.
The turn of those reflections is indicated by the eager
glance of expectation cast at that reinforcement of
"navvies" now on its way. It is the bit of novelty, the
little leaven of the nineteenth century in an otherwise
old-fashioned legacy of the times gone by. One of
Scott's characters says that be never despairs of a sky,
however murky and thick, if he can see a bit of blue
enough to mend a pair cf breeches. These " navvies"
they may not be sacrificed on the instant of their arrival
are the bit of blue sky, and all we have to hope is that
to the stupidity or insolence of some officer of Engineers,
who may think it quite a feather in his cap to send the
whole lot to perdition. What is more likely? The thing
can be done, not only with much plausibility, but with
actual grace. Let the "navvies" be landed, and their
material let go to the bottom, like the cargo of the ill-
fated, or rather, not to throw the blame on Fortune,
much-injured Prince. Or let the "navvies" be put into
a barrack at Balaklava, surrounded by pestilence, filth,
and rum—the only article which appears never to have
run short yet in the Crimea. Let them be desired to
wait till Sir J. Burgoyne has selected some one to make
a report on the proper line for the railway, or the practi-
cability and use of a railway at all, and till that report
;s made, and the line marked out by the military autho- '
rities. These successive operations, taken with military
composure, may easily be spread over a month, ilhl/40
the first of them need not be commenced till a
week after the arrival of the " navvies." When
everything at last is tevly for the "navvies,"
perhaps a third of them dui be dead, a third in
the hospital, the remainder so attenuated that
their friends svonld(net. knOW them, and their
material, plant, and tools may be, as we suggested, at
the bottom of the sea. In that case there could either
)e another report en the then state of affairs, or, what
would answer the purpose quite as well, the above at-
tenuated remainder of the " navvies" might be set to
work in the mud, put on half-rations of biscuit and meat,
double rations of rum, and be speedily added to the soil
of the Criniea. Seriously, we wonder whether the line
A the proposed railway has been marked out, or will be
marked out by the arrival of the " navvies" and their
material ; or whether it will then be marked out within
a fortnight, or ever at all. There was no such thing as
a railway in the Peninsular war. There was not even a
macadmized road. M'Adarn and Stephenson have both
come up since 1815. That is what we mean when we
say that this war will force on the people some trouble.
some reflections. The first of them is, that this war is
managed, and this nation to some extent governed, by
:nen whose experience is not that of the present age,
but that of the past.
It is said that it must go ill with a generation that
allows itself to he ruled entirely by the past. Heaven
certainly intended every generation to govern itself,
making ii responsible for its own actions, and giving it
sufficiency of all things requisite for goodness and
happiness. Let us use the past as we think proper,
but not be tyrannized over by it. The country has long
since acknowledged this maxim in its extreme jealousy
)f institutions modelled and bequeathed by the past. If it
accepts them, as it must do, it treats them as an evil or
suspected inheritance, and qualifies them accordingly. It
would be a still greater misfortune, were it possible, if
the men of the past—the old men of the past—the
Jld men who never were young—could rise from their
craves and undertake to manage for us the new resources
of our own age. Dr. Samuel Johnson, for example,
was a very wise man in his day ; bet, unless we wished
to go down by the head altogether, we should never
liink of resigning into his hands a single affair of church
it of state. Now, here are the men of the past, whose
,oast is that they got all their ideas in the Peninsular
war, in command of an expedition as different as possible
rem the operations of that war, and different in no cir-
cumstance so much as in this, that the Peninsular war
was over in 1814, and the expedition to the Crimea is
begun in 1854. There is not a single work of peace that
would not now be done in half the time, at half the cost,
and twice as well, as in 1814. In fact, all the instru-
ments and materials at the disposal of these men are-in-
finitely more efficient than anything which existed at the
Milner date. But every workman will tell you that a
good tool requires a good man, and that, unless a man
either understands a tool, or takes kindly to it, he had
better nut be permitted to touch it. All the vast facili-
ties afforded to us by our command of the sea, the use
A steam, and such a fleet as the world never saw, are
lost on men who imagine themselves waging war in the
interior of Spain, and have settled in their minds that
dysentery, half-rations, incessant exposure, nakedness,
tbandonment of baggage, frightful mortality, the utter
absence of roads, and general disorganisation are the
.Lormal conditions of war, and need excite no concern

.men in advance of their times. Alexander was not a
one of
the first
'mere ingredient
l a
rnn of h
Macedoniane
ia
day,
phalanx
literary ;
and
he was
accomplished, surrounded by philosophers and
?awns, and always ready to profit by their sug-
Testions. Hannibal's versatility and ingenuity are
notorious. Caesar was always in advance of his foes,
and made a point of arriving earlier than even his
friends expected. With twenty days' notice he made
an earthwork as many miles long, which answered its
purpose, and survives to this day. He was always look-
ing to his commissariat in time, detecting conspiracies
long before they ripened. He was the best engineer of
his time, no one knowing better the construction of such
engines of war as were used in those days. He con-
quered a nation of pirates on their own element, and,
when they thought to steal a march on him by cutting
the tackle of his ships, he disconcerted them by the use
of chains, instead of ropes. Had he waged war only as
Scipio Africanus, or Alaries and Sylla, or even Pompey
had done, be would soon have succumbed to a world of
roes and rivals. But ho beat the age by being always
is advance of it. That is still the only way.
How is that, with the most practical science and tie
best men in the world, we turn neither to account ? At
The battle of Inkertnan we male the bodies of our
Guards do the duty' of earthworks, and all this time our
nen aro rotting by hundreds for want of a few ship-
loads of proper food, clothing, and housing. Nay, the
shiploads are there, or only a few days' sail off, but
there is not the head to get them up in proper place and
time. The British Tantalus in the Crimea has all the
necessaries al.d comforts of life within sight and reach,
but is never permitted to grasp and enjoy them. The
Russians—serfs, brutes, savages as we are accustomed
'0 think them, and borrowers, as they notoriously are,
in all arts and sciences —heat us at every turn.
They have dominated us with their artillery, and
overreached us in earthworks. They move armies in
carts for lack of railways, and, according to the testi-
mony of all the prisoners, have actually made better use
Of their steam transports than we have. Whatever may
be pre' ended at home, it is certain that whole regiments
arrive in the Crimea without a single Minie musket,
and other regiments with only a small proportion. so
armed. We are trusting, not to science, but to men.
There is this difference, however, between mechanism
and men,—that the former is of iron, tough wood,
earth, or stone,—the latter of flesh and blood. Ac-
cordingly, the latter wears away much faster than the
former ; and all that can be said of the men is that they
have been excellent, but no longer exist. ' The Guards
certainly were magnificent soldiers. Had they been
earth, they could have been repaired in a night; but,
being men, they could only be buried, or sent to the
hospital. All this, doubtless, is according to rule. It
was so in the Peninsular was. The Duke of Wellington
was always complaining in his letters, and therefore
the evils he complains of are inevitable to all war, and
utterly incurable. Had it been so, the Duke would not
have complained. Nobody knew the difference so well
between war carried into the interior of a country and
war upon seas or rivers within the reach of our navy.
Therefore he left in office a memeraadum for the guid-
ance of our Indian authorities, warning them never to
send an army far from the sea !ier a navigable stream.
We have now the position he se much desired, and
make no use of it, any more than we do of the resources
of the nineteenth century. What does this show but
that we want, not the wealth, the arts, the steamers,
the weapons of the nineteenth century, but the men
also of the century ? Thus far we have given the Czar
the advantage of the century ; and, with his own ad-
vantage in respect of numbers, this new difference in
his favour makes him too much for us. We can only
match him by making the century our ally.

THE SIEGE OF SEBASTOPOL.

CAMP OF THE LIGHT DIVISION, DEC. 11.
The failure of the means of transport has con-
tinued to engross a large share of attention among
the British troops in camp, and is still a serious
difficulty both as regards feeding the men and
horses, and also in respect to carrying on the siege
operations. When the carts failed, dependence
was placed upon bat horses'; the greater number
of these are now so footsore and worn out as to be
unable to move, and the men themselves have to
be sent in to Balaklava from the camp to bring
the every morning.
2 2
out rations. A certain proportion of each regiment
issent in
doesto
not townexceed
20 or pounds Theweight
of biscuit
carried
and pork, and yet so weak are the men that many
fall out, unable to march 14 miles and to carry his
burden 7 miles, while others have to be taken into
hospital on their return to camp on account of
illness. The 90th regiment, attached to the 2d
Division by general orders of the 6th December,
and 34th regiment, have been prevented from
taking their share in the work at the trenches, and
so relieving their comrades who are suffering from
prolonged exposure and labour, because, if brought
to camp, there are no means of bringing food to
them, they have therefore been detained and en-
camped at Balaklava. The Cavalry Division has
•ulso been brought as near Balaklava as possible,
and an excellently protected position has been
found for it in a deep mountain dell close to the
little village of Kadikoi near the entrance to the
port. The dell is *early- triangular in form, the
mountains rise precipitously upwards on three
sides, the small plain enclosed by them is soft
and when first occupied was covered with
grass, and excepting at the entrance communi-
cating with the village is sheltered on all sides
from high winds. At one of the angles opposite
to the opening to Kadikoi is a narrow winding
gorge, and along this mountain pass is a road leading
up to the plateau on which the allied army is en-
camped. There could not be a more favourable
position for a cavalry bivouac in a cold season.
But at present its most favourable aspect is the
facility afforded by its nearness to the port for ob-
taining the necessary hay and corn for the horses,
and the rations for the men. When reflecting on
the very serious evils which have been experienced
from a comparatively short prevalence of bad wea-
ther, and those too in the very first and most es-
sential article of food, we have indeed reason to be
grateful for the verylong season of propitious wea-
ther which preceded it. At the same time it is
difficult to avoid the consideration whether such
evils are a necessary consequence of the change in
weather, whether the exercise of a certain amount
of forethought and precaution might not have ob-
viated their occurrence. We have ocular proof
around us that they are not inevitable ; we see the
beneficial effects of a different system pursued else-
where. And it happens from no want of forewarn-
ing. Attention was called to the unprotected state
of the British right long before the fatal sth of
November ; and had that warning been heeded—
had a simple breastwork been then constructed, and
a few guns mounted such as aro now placed in front
of the 2d Division—much bloodshed might have
been prevented, and many very valuable lives
spared. In like manner the formation of commis-
sariat depots was suggested, and had these sug-
gestions been carried into effect, much loss of
life, both of men and horses, would by so doing
have now been avoided. But many of the most
obvious exigencies have not been provided for.
No arrangement has ever ever been made, nor is
even now made, for shoeing the public horses, and
this circumstance alone has led to many being 'dis-
abled. In Bulgaria, after a long time had elapsed,
and much inconvenience endured, native farriers
were brought, and a price fixed at which the bat
animals could be shod. No such plan has been
adopted in the Crimea, nor any alternative provided.
It was only only on the Bth inst. that the follow-
ing appeared:—