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

LONDON, FRIDAY, DECEMBER 29, 1854.

We still carry on matters according to the jog-
trot system prevalent in " the good old times,
when GEORGE the Third was King." If a step
in advance be taken—if there is the slightest de-
parture from the specified course, it can only be
regarded as the exception to the general rule—
aud means are invariably adopted by those in
authority to render it, if not absolutely abortive,
as little beneficial as possible. Men in office will
not cordially co-operate with mere civilians, or
willingly assist in advancing an object, the success
whereof must cast a certain slur upon themselves.
In fact, as we have already urged, usque ad
nauseam, " Red-tapism" prevails in every de-
partment. The substance is sacrificed to the form.
The prolonged peace, in place of leading to improve-
ments, has only occasioned a more stringent adhe-
rence to established routine. Ameliorations which
the exigencies of a protracted war had produced
are now impossible. If the nation were so fortu-
nate as to have another WELLINGTON and a NEL-
SON in its service, neither could be placed in the
position where their exertions could be really bene-
ficial. The one could not obtain a command on land
or the other on water. If at the ages when
they achieved their highest triumphs they could
not now look for more than a Lieutenant-Colo-
nelcy in command of a regiment, or a Post-Cap-
taincy. The rues of the services, the regulations of
"My Lords " would forbid any more exalted
positions.

What avails it that the interests of the country
demand a change ? These interests have ever
been sacrificed, and will, we fear, for a long series
of years continue to be sacrificed to etiquette, or
red-tapinn, the demon which, although it makes
an excellent servant, invariably proves a most
imperious and inexorable master. We still re-
fuse to entrust men, in the pride and vigour of
manhood, with supreme command—we will not
place confidence in their efficiency until they have
fallen into the " sere and yellow leaf "—until,
in the language of the P. R., they have
become " stale and used up," when their
vigour has departed, and their science, once
of a high order, totally failed them in respect of
the more recent "dodges" introduced by younger
men, who started at the points where they had
left off.

The same thing is applicable to our Generals
and Admirals. We look not for a man in ad-
vance of the age, who knows more than any of
the present generation. On the contrary, we
seek a " laudator temporis acti"—one solely guided
by " the light of other days," who, although dis-
tinguished as a young man and in a subordinate
situation some forty or fifty years since, has suf-
fered the accumulated rust of nearly half a century
to impair the knowledge he once possessed, and who
has not kept progress with the advanced enlight-
enment of the age, and who is totally ignorant
of matters familiar to younger and more ener-
getic minds.
The chief care of men of this class is to fling
discredit ; or, according to the official sling, to
' "cast cold water" on every recent improvement.
And why ? The reasons are obvious. First, be-
cause any great improvement produced by a
GRIFFIN casts an implied censure en the " de-
partment" which, with superior advantages, suf-
fered strangers to take the lead. Secondly, be-
cause the additional element would render new
calculations indispensable, and all the knowledge
so painfully and laboriously acquired would go
for nothing. They would themselves be obliged
to continue students, still to learn in place of
resting under the shade of former laurels.
Now, this system is painfully perceptible
in the Crimea at this moment. Our men have
proved themselves fully equal to any that have
ever fought the battles of old England in all the
qualities of the soldier. But we regret to be
obliged to add that they have been very unneces-
sarily tasked—aye, alai many valuable lives have
been sacrificed, in consequence of the stub-
born adherence to precedent. We doubt not
that Sir JOHN BURGOYNE is a brave soldier,
that he is as willing to risk his own life, or the
lives of the officers and men under his command,
as any Englishmen have ever proved themselves to
be—nay more, we believe that he is an excellent
officer of the good old school—and that few men
could be found better acquainted with science as
it was known in 1815. Our quarrel is not with
the man but the system, and it is with
deep regret that we find ourselves obliged
to introduce his name into the controversy.
But, unfortunately, we are compelled to do so.
We cannot expose the evil without referring to an
example, and Sir JOHN B URGOYNE at present
constitutes one of the most striking illustrations
of the objectionable system, that gives everything
to mere seniority and nothing to merit.
In our impression of Tuesday we inserted a
letter signed " GunwooDlENsis." We did so
freely and willingly. It is always our desire
to give fair play to every man, and
to publish his defence against any attack.
Audi alteram partem is an excellent rule, which
we have invariably acted on. We, therefore,
gave the defence in the very words of the advo-
cate, in order that the public might judge for
itself of its validity. The chief point was that,
with other officers, Sir JOHN BURGOYNE had ren-
dered every assistance, and that the failure
of success was not to be attributed to him,
and, also, that he had been successful in
other important sieges. Now, this scarcely
merits the objection put forward by " Onsicron.',
This very praise of officers of rank is a portion of
the objectionable system. Every person in a cer-
tain position must be noticed, while those of in-
ferior rank cannot be referred to, however exem-
plary their conduct. We did Rot hear of Colour-
Serjeant Davis, or of other gallant non-
commissioned or even subaltern officers. Not
a word of encouragement could be bestowed
on their exertions. The General has not an eye
sufficiently " microscopic" to recognise any one
under the rank of a field officer. But those in
high position must be alluded to, and the extract
from the despatch referred to by " Gurwoodiensis"
seemed very like a" damning by faint praise." But
even were it otherwise, it would not meet the ques-
tion for although Sir J. BURGOYN E could not then be
in
held. responsible for the extraordinary and
unanticipated effects produced by the earthworks
so hastily thrown up, he ought to have profited by
the leason, andto have prevented similar defences by
the Russians-in 1854. That of 1812 was a sur-
priso7of WA an. error Let us hope that

the incubus may at length be shaken off, and
that we may be able to obtain the services of
men whose object will be to foster and assist, in-
stead of smothering and repudiating modern im-
provements.

Ministers have given the tax-payers of England
three or four weeks to think for themselves before
the bewildering conflict of Parliamentary debate
begins. 1!o the tax-payers of this country, there-
fore, with. Count VALERIAN KRASINSKI, in his
calm and well-reasoned pamphlet, " Russia, Po-
land, and Europe,"* we intend to address our-
selves. Do you mean, then, we ask, to see your
millions " muddled" away by official stolidity, and
by Holy Alliance politics ? The country shows
that it grudges no amount of money which is
spent directly, and without favour, to the despots, on
the great object of the War ; but let our Cabinet
know that we will not sacrifice our earnings in
income taxes and other taxes—first, to save super-
annuated and incompetent routinists from giving
place to men of capacity ; and secondly, to humour
Austria and the petty Courts of Germany. Bad
as the waste of money is through the first cause,
it is not to be compared with the sacrifice occa-
sioned by the second. Moreover, our contem-
porary, who sneers at the second, is just now in
its utmost wrath against official mismanagement,
and we leave it, therefore, to watch that half of
the business. Ia all probability it will work it-
self in time—too late, however, to save the loss
of oceans of money and blood—into a patriotic
advocate of the necessity of Polish independence.
This is the question which is now become the
great practical one of the War. It is no longer a
matter of noble aspirations, or sentimental dis-
quisition. If we apprehend it rightly, Poland,
and the course taken in regard to it, are now the
turning point of the War. The issue of the next
campaign, and indeed of the whole contest, de-
pends upon how Poland and the Poles are dealt
with. Count KRISINSKI well observes that if the
restoration of Poland to an independent State
were merely to be a passive result of the War, the
tax-payers of England might well hesitate in
prospect of the sacrifices which might be required.
But he desires, as we have done all along, that it
should be a prime agent in the War ; and as he
thinks, and we think so too, it must be a most
effective agent. It is not proposed merely to add
Polish emancipation to the objects of the War,
but to use it also to shorten its duration and to
lessen its cost in money and in life. It is at the
same time the only reasonable guarantee for Euro-
pean peace, or from disturbance of it by the bar-
barians on the other side of the Dnieper, and. the
most statesmanlike means of compelling the CZAR
to sue for peace. At the present moment, when
the whole country is heart-sick with the legerde-
main by which it was tricked out of a Foreign
Enlistment Bill, one step, and one only, can re-
gain any measure of the lost confidence (where
there was any to lose), and that is to turn it prac-
tically into a Polish Enlistment Bill. Could our
Premier and his Peelites but take that honest and
manly step, the country would forgive the secresy
and surprise, and begin to trust instead of sus-
pecting. They would try and believe that the
stealthy assaulL on Parliament was rendered ne-
cessary by "reasons of State," and console them-
selves with the near vision of a regiment or legion
of Poles leading an assault on Sebastopol itself.
Count KRASINSKI has his own modus operandi,
and it is a carefully-considered one. Ho thinks
Austria may be persuaded (if the Allies determine
on a free Poland) to give up Gallicia. There he
would at once establish the nucleus of a Polish
national Government, and commence the forma-
tion of a Polish army, taking its first soldiers and
officers from the Poles already in the Austrian
servics. To these, of course, would be rapidly

added all the exiles from other countries and the

deserters from the Russian army and Russian
Poland. In a war with Russia, Austria would
thus have all Poland with her, and the Poles in
Russian service, instead of being her enemies,
would desert to their own standard, and aid or
cover the advance of Austria. To effect this
would require a loan from the Allied Powers ;
but it would be a loan which would be doubly
repaid—first, in paralysing the legions of Russia
by the desertion of the Poles, and strengthening
the Allied Armies, and thus saving us both sol-
diers and money ; secondly, by guaranteeing it
on the future revenues of Poland, which when
freo could easily afford its interest, and in no long
time its principal too.
But there is another supremely important as-
pect of the case. Few of us but must have been
struck with Mr. LAYARD'S description of the ex-
posure of Turkey in Asia, in the next campaign,
to the arms of Russia. The picture was drawn by
one certainly not ignorant of Turkish resources in
Asia, of a Russian army advancing in that direc-
tion to the very shores of the Bosphorus. Now
the step which would weaken Russia most in Asia
would be the simple unfurling of the Polish flag.
The armies of the Caucasus are filled with
Poles, and the soul-stirring prospect of fighting
under their own colours, and against their hated
oppressor, instead of for him, would cause them
one and all to desert. Even the few, whom mili-
tary rigour might be able to retain in the Russian
camp, would be dreaded as spies, who at the first
favourable moment would carry fatal knowledge
to the enemy. Count KRASINSKI would collect
and discipline these soldiers to united action in
the Crimea, and would bring them to act upon
the southern provinces of Russia. He shows very
strong reasons for concluding that the greater part
of the Cossacks, whom Russia has lately subjected
to a galling deprivation of their rights and national
liberties, would gladly fraternise with the Poles
in that quarter, and thus weaken Russia on the
side adjacent to the Crimea. Perhaps the Count
has too much made the renunciation of Gallicia by
Austria the key of his plan, and he would even
compensate her by the gift of Moldavia and
Wallachia. This, we think, would be buying her
aid too dear. It is no point of honour, no in-
crease of military strength, but the contrary, for
Austria to retain Gallicia, and she has no more
right, to it than the other sharers of Poland. She
could not keep it if the Allies espoused the Polish
cause. She has reason enough to follow the wish
of METTERNICH, and to contribute her portion
towards an efficient barrier between herself and
the wrath of NICHOLAS and his savages. It were
madness, we think, to enslave provinces, free under
the SULTAN, to the leaden yoke of Austria.

* " Russia, Poland, and Europe ; or, the Inevitable
Consequences of the Present War. By Count Valerian
Krasinski." Chapman and Hall, Piccadilly.

--- -
An elegant and valuable service of communion plate
was presented on Christmas-day by Mr. W. W. Haw-
kins, M.P., for use in the parish church of Alresford.
The service consisted of flagon, chalice, paten, and alms
dish, silver gilt, of the Camden pattern, and each en•
graved with a Scripture text from the Latin. The ser-
vice was enclosed in an oak case, bearing the simple in-
scription—" Presented by William Warwick Harking
and his wife Harriet, of Alresford Hall, to the parish.of
Alresford, on Christmas-day, 1854."
INVERNESS AND ELGIN IZAILIVAT.—Great exertions
are being made at various places in the district through
which this line is intended to pass with a view to secure
subscriptions for the requisite capital, and to enable the
promoters to make the necessary deposit, in compliance
with the standing orders of Parliament. The landowners
are favourable to the undertaking. The promoters have
made satisfactory arrangements with the Great North of
Scotland Railway Company, so as to avoid all op-
position,

ENTERTAINMENT TO THE OFFICERS OF L. 4
.REINE HORTENSE AT SOUTHAMPTON. -

The commander and officers of the Emperor Napo-
leon's steam yacht La Reine Hortense, now lying at
Southampton, were entertained yesterday by Mr, Samp-
son Payne, the mayor of Southampton, at a grand de-
jeuner at the Audit•house of that town. Many of the
principal inhabitants were invited to meet the French
officers. The hospitality of the chief magistrate of South.
amption seemed to be most gratifying to the feelings of
these gentlemen. The sentiments interchanged, and
the speeches delivered on the occasion, typified in the
strongest manner a warm appreciation of the Anglo-
French alliance.

The following address from the Mayor and corpora-
tion of Southampton was presented to Count Excel-
mans, the captain of the Reine Hortense, previous to
the banquet :
"To M. LE COMTE EXCELUANS, CAPTAIN OP THE