The Sun.
London, England, 1854-03-28 00:00:00

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LONDON, TUESDAY, 'MARCH 28, 1554.

England and France are at length at war with
the Russian AUTOCRAT. Yesterday the announce-
ment of this important event was made at Paris
and at London simultaneously—to the Lords and
Commons by a Message from the QUEEN-to the
Senators and Legislative Body by a Message from
the EMPEROR. According to those memorable
documents, every effort to bring about a pacifica-
tion has utterly failed, and there is, actually, an
end of mere negotiation. A collision has, there-
fore, become inevitable, and the responsibility of
that collision rests, of course, notoriously, not
with the French, or English, or Turkish, but
entirely and exclusively with the Russian Govern-
ment. It rests thus entirely and exclusively with
the Russian Government, because, from the first
step to the last in these deplorable transactions,
the Russian Government has been the aggressor.
It is a fact, patent to the knowledge of the whole
world, that with the Chief of that daring and flagi-
tious Autocracy, the cause of quarrel now about to
be committed to the dread issues of battle, origi-
nated. It originated in his insatiable cupidity,
in the lust of his ambition, in his greed of ag-
grandisement. As far back as the time of PETER
the GREAT, the policy of the Russian Cabinet has
been directed towards the absorption of the Otto-
man territory and the ultimate seizure of Constan-
tinople. During the reign of the present ATTTO-
ORA.T, that lawless policy began to attain at last its
point of culmination. Nay, so long ago as ten years
from the present date, in 1844, circumstances so
propitious appeared to indicate the approach of
this point of culmination, that the Czar NICHOLAS
deemed it advisable as a preliminary movement
to visit this country himself for the purpose if
possible of securing the complicity of England by
secret consultations with the heads of the then
dominant Administration. Thwarted for a while
by unavoidable incidents, the Emperor NICHOLAS
deemed it advisable to postpone the attempt at a
consummation of his wishes, consoling himself,
however, for the delay by embodying the rosult of
Ilia adroit machinations so far, in the ingenious
and confidential memorandum, penned by the
hand of the astute and experienced NESSELRODE.
Subsequent efforts were made to bring about the
desired arrange
but e ment as to the partition of Turkey,
ach, of those efforts in succession as ineffec-
tually as the one already particularised. It was
in this manner, for example, that the Russian
troops were Conducted across the river P ruth,
marched i
and n-t° the heart of the Danubian Pro-
vinces in 1848, during that ••
agitating pen( xl of
revolutions. Occurrences multiplied ; the hour
was not encouraging ; the
Cossacks were -with-
drawn into Bessarabia ; the
aggres • sive polity of
the Czar N
IcHoLts was again doomed to am . un-
willing postponement.

At length the hour so long, 0
hitherto so vainly looked for, a eagerly, and
appeared to have
arrived. The Cabinet of Vienna had
been
bound over by ties of gratitude to the CZAR,
hose
Forces had trampled out the flame whia, had
threatened to conaune the throne of the Hap; tlburg
Dynasty, the flame kindled in Hungary b 3 , the
genius of KOS'SUTIE into the conflagration o f the
War of Independence. Austria was, more, ever,
apparently at the moment, pre-occupied by the
agitation among the marauding people of Mo nte-
negro. The Cabinet of Berlin was well knows ito
have been pledged by family bonds to an obseq i-
ons compliance with whatever imperious man, Jait 0
might emanate from the King's imptz ria 1
brother-in' -law
th at St. Petersburg. Austi ia
us at
by
gratitude and Prussi aby nics r"

reign) to the French and British Legislatures

stated thus as recently as yesterday. So that,
to-day at last, for the first time for nearly
forty years, we are brought face to face
not merely with the dread. necessity, but with the
actual fact, of war—and no little war either, but a
great European conflict : on the one side Russia,
on the other England, France, Turkey. A war,
too, not coming, but actually arrived. Arrived,

moreover, with intelligence as startling and inc.

ingas the advance ofa Russian army 30,000 strong
across the Danube, opposite Ibraila, in pursuit
of the Turkish forces, then retiring upon Adrian-

ople. Intelligence such as this, coming to us at a

moment like the present, cannot but act as a
timely incentive to the allied Governments. It
cannot but impel those Governments upon a course

of action so prompt and energetic that the grew

war, entered upon by them with such humane re

uctance, may, with corresponding rapidity, be

gloriously and brilliantly consummated.

The QUEEN has announced to both Houses of
Parliament the termination of negotiations with
the AUTOCRAT, and that " she feels bound to
afford active assistance to her Ally the SULTAN
against unprovoked aggression." Her faithful
and efficient collaborateur the Emperor NAPOLEON
111. has made similar declarations to the Corps
Legislatif of France, so that at this moment we
are in a state of war. The Temple of Janus has
thus been re-opened after the thirty-nine years
during which its gates rusted on their hinges.
We must now be prepared for an arduous struggle,
on the results whereof depend the destinies of
civilisation. It cannot be a "little war" in which
the principles of liberty and despotism are engaged,
and each struggling for existence. We cannot
doubt the result, nor do we feel the slightest
hesitation in accepting the unprovoked challenge.
Boldly we enter on the contest, which we spared
no effort, becoming men of honour, and lovers of
peace, to avert. But while we shrink not from
the encounter, it would be an act of the most cul-
pable folly to undervalue the enormous powers
and almost miraculous resources of the adversary.
Let us not lay the " flattering unction to our
souls," that we can "double up Russia like a
sheet of paper," that a single campaign will decide
the contest, or that the increase of the income
tax for six months will be the only primary sacri-
fice necessary to the honourable solution of the
great problem. No, we must be prepared to
strain every nerve—to spare no exertion to bring
matters to so auspicious a conclusion. But we
must, at the same time, while making those
vigorous efforts, act as if hostilities should be pro-
tracted for an indefinite period, and should husband
all our resources, so as to render them available
for the grand struggle in which we are embarked.
Our attention, then, is specially directed to the
state of the Money Market, and the position of
the nation with respect to " the sinews of war,"
the great means of carrying on our operations
vigorously and efficiently.
When, then, does the Chancellor of the Ex-
chequer mean to do to arrest the stream of bullion
departing from our shores ?—to prevent a monetary
crisis of unparalleled magnitude ? We know to our
cost what he has done to strip the Exchequer of
the large balances that would, at the present
moment, be of such peculiar value. We know
the direct loss he has occasioned to the nation by
the attempted conversion of the South Sea and
other Stocks, despite of warnings that might have
deterred any man of ordinary prudence from ven-
turing on so hazardous an experiment. We are,
therefore, entitled to ask, what he means to do
to repair the enormous damage lie has inflicted
on the country by the ill-advised and injudicious
attempt. It is, indeed, time that the currency
question should be ventilated in Parliament, not
merely by a casual allusion flung forth during
a debate on another subject, but by a sub-
stantive Diction. The question as to the ap-
plicability of the Bank Charter Act of 1844
—while we are engaged in hostilities with such a
nation as
Russia—while the Colossus of the
North is defying the mazitime Powers—must be
calmly debated,
and seriously considered. It
requires no extreme views, no strong opinions in
favour of monetary reform, to perceive that the
time has arrived When
must be done.

riage—there remained only for the consideration
of the CZAR, among the great Powers of Europe,
France and England. And France and England
seemed to be at loggerheads. There appeared
at least t‘.o be every cause for estrangement be-
tween their Governments. NICITOTAS knew very
well that England was agitated from one end to
the other by the dread of a French invasion—that,
in consequence of this panic, there had been
effected in the national system of the militia a con-
siderable extension and a thorough reorganisa-
tion. He knew, moreover, that while the
must friendly feeling was maintained between
the British Court and the Orleans Princes,
several of the members of the British
Government had so far forgotten the dictates of
prudence and of statesmanship, as to vilify at pub-
lic dinners and from the elevation of the hustings
the thrice-elected ruler of the French population.
Everything, indeed, seemed to intimate the abso-
lute impossibility of a cordial alliance being
brought about between the two Governments.
Besides, the CZAR manifestly observed, with no
common degree of satisfaction, at this most de-
sirable moment, the installation of the complaisant
Foreign Secretary of 1844 as the Prime Minister
of England, the chief of a powerful Coalition.
Evidently at that moment the pear was ripe, ac-
cording to the belief of the Russian AUTOCRAT. It
was so ripe that it had only to be shaken down with
one bold move by the rude and daring hand of a
Russian noble of the old school like Prince MENS-
CHIKOFF. The question of the Holy Places had
just been settled amicably--in consequence of the
magnanimous concessions made, at the instance of
the Cabinet of St. James's, by the French Im-
perial Government. Nevertheless, NICHOLAS was
resolved even then to bring the aid of religious
fanaticism to bear upon the development of the
designs of his political enterprise. Thereupon
arose his demand of the Protectorate. Prince
IVlENscuncorf was sent to Constantinople. The
dream of PETER the Great was at last to be rea-
lised. The project of 1844 was, before the
arrival of 1854, to be fulfilled. Again—but this
time not as hesitatingly as in 1848—the Cossack
hordes were led across the Pruth into Moldo-
Wallachia. Thereupon the European Powers
interposed, by their emissaries, between the as-
sailant and the assailed. In the desperate hope,
even then, of preventing the horrors of a general
war, after nearly forty years of almost uninter-
rupted tranquillity, they exhausted every de-
vice of diplomacy, every effort of negotia-
tion. During the course of which protracted
endeavours more than twelve months sped
by—twelve months not altogether lost, how-
ever, seeing that within the interval, for the
first time in the history of the two countries, a
really cordial alliance was effected between France
and England, while gigantic and almost un-
paralleled efforts in the way of warlike preparations
both by sea and by land, were being made simul-
taneously by their respective Governments. It is
at that moment that we have now arrived.
That is literally our present situation. The
twelve or thirteen months spoken of, have
just now elapsed. The last device of diplomacy
has failed signally and definitively. The nego-
tiations so long persevered in have at length ter-
minated. The fact of their having terminated,
no less than the consequent fact of open war being
the next necessity, has been formally stated by a
Message addressed (each by its respective Sove.