The Sun.
London, England, 1870-10-12 00:00:00

TB it, SUN, LON DOT, WEND ES DA V, OCTOB 12, 1870.

illness of three days. His lordship was uncle of the preset
Duke of Northumberland.

THE LIMERICK HARBOUR:;COMMISSIONERS
AND THE DOCK LABOURERS.

The Limerick Harbour Commissioners have resolved to
employ a permanent staff of workmen to load and unload
the vessels in the port, in order to relieve the mercantile
community of the tyranny of the labourers, who they
think have gained complete control over the trade by com-
bination, intimidation, and demand of extravagant rates
of wages. Messrs. Spaight and Russell, large shippers,
stated that it would be impoesible to carry on a competi-
tion with Cork and Waterford, if the labourers were
allowed to levy black mail as they were doing. Aldermen
Tinsley and Quinlivan, while opposed to the measure on
principle, admitted its necessity,

THE ARMY OF THE RHONE.

The correspondent of the Standard, writing from Besan-
con on the 7th inst. says :—I wrote you from Lyons that
the arrest of General Mazure by order of the prefect, in
whose hands all power, military and civil, was concen-
trated by order of the Government at Tours, would
not turn out seriously. Allow me now to recall
that opinion. It is turning out very serious, not
indeed, for General Mazure, who will only suffer a brief,
if unpleasant detention, but for France. We all-know
Sidney Smith's saying of Lord Russell that he would at
a moment's notice take the command of the Channel
Fleet, or perform an operation of lithotomy. This state
of mind is characteristic of your ardent Liberals
everywhere. They always believe themselves capa-
ble of anything—and so they are in one sense.
At Paris, General Trochu is so much master of the
sit!ation that, aided by the common sense of M. Jules
Favre, he is able to keep his Radical colleagues
in some sort of order ; but in the departments
it is different. M. Cremieux and M. Glais-Bizoin are
certainly working very hard ; but do they consider them-
selves, or their civilian colleagues, capable of heading an
army in the field? One would really think so by
the way in which they have conferred on
M. Challemel-Latour —an excellent official in civil
affairs—supreme power over the Army of the Rhone.
But more than this, he is supreme dictator in his depart-
ment. Neither of the Napoleons ever exercised power
given them by the nation with more confidence in them-
selves than M. Challemel-Latour. He has for some days
had an order from Tours to release General Mazure. His
answer is to remove him from the Hotel de
Ville to an ordinary prison. In consequence Admiral
Fourichon, who was administering both the War and
the Marine Departments, has resigned the former.
He knows what will come of putting supreme
military power into the hands of a civilian. But now,
as I hear, it is not only at Lyons that this system
is to operate. Here, everywhere, generals are, to
be subject to the orders of the local prefects, who
may pretty well remove them at pleasure. What can
any reasonable man think of such doings ? Is it not equal
to adding 100,000 men to the Prussian army ? One
could try to understand it if the prefects were men of
military training. As it is they are very often mere
political hucksters whom the Radical section of the Go-
vernment wished to reward. Ido not say this of M.
Ordinaire, the prefect of Doubs, who has kindly served me
in every way in his power, which was not much indeed.
He is a modest and diffident man, who is frank and
willing to accept the judgment of those who are better
informed than himself ; but I cannot include in this
exception either of the other Prefects of Jura and
Haute Saone, which with Doubs make up the old
Franche Comt6, or any half dozen of the prefects
north of Lyons. They all shew a tendency, encouraged
at Tours, to dominate the military authorities. What
General Trochu will say about this, when he comes to
know it, is easily guessed. Meanwhile, I can see that it
is paralysing the efforts of France here in the south-
east. I have been north of this for a few hours yester-
day; and I must not say all I have seen. But this
much I may say—there is at present really no
attempt to stop the free progress towards Lyons, probably
by way of Dijon, of the Badois column which took posses-
sion of Altkirch yesterday morning. General Cambriel,
commanding at Belfort, and senior of the officer in com-
mand here—who is, I hope, more able than he
is civil waits for a movement from Lyons.
That movement will not be made for some days to
come; meanwhile it seems to be thought enough
that Belfort and Besancon should be taken care of,
leaving the district to look after itself. The district
will consequently suffer the fate of Alsace, and Lyons
will not be defended where it clearly ought to
be defended—on the spurs of the Jura mountains,
and in the valleys of the Doubs, where the vines
have just been despoiled of their luscious burthen
to make wine apparently for tho Baden troops to drink,
and where the vine leaves begin to assume the ruddy hue
that may only by a few days anticipate the blood with
which they will be sprinkled. I was led to believe at
Lyons that the headquarters of the army of the Rhone,
with a considerable portion of its strength, would be
found at Besancon. It is not so. The Army of the
Rhone has no commander except the no doubt clever
politician and able administrator, but certainly amateur
soldier, who holds the prefecture of Lyons. The 12,000
troops that I saw on Sunday at Bourges, " leaving for
Besancon," have not got here yet, and are not coming at
present. There are several regiments of regulars here—
I must not say how many—and a few Mobiles and Fram-
Tireurs. The National Garde is in good force, and on going
to one's hotel in the evening one has the honour of being
received by Monsieur the landlord in the full costume of a
captain in that distinguished body. But when one looks
for the headquarters of Besancon, and finds the house of
the commandant of the place, and learns from him that
no such thing as the Quartier General spoken of at
Lyons exists, except in the fond imagination of the
Lyonnais, really one begins to despair ; everything seems
at sixes and sevens, and the most positive information
received from one official quarter at Bourges, and
another at Lyons, turns' out to be pure delusion ,or
worse.

BELGIAN FEELING TOWARDS FRANCE.
The Brussels correspondent of the Telegraph writes as
follows :—" The change in public opinion here since the
fall of the Empire is so visible that I cannot help cal-
ling your attention to the fact. Two widely-
circulated Brussels papers, conspicuous for their
hostility to the ex-Emperor, have become so
entnusiastic in support of the French that the
impartial tone becoming the press of a neutral country
has given place to violent abuse of the fallen dy-
nasty, and exaggerated adulation of the Republican
Government. It is true that the writers affect
to separate the Emperor, his Cabinet and Parlia-
ment, from the French nation ; but every day re-
veals fresh proofs, if any were necessary, that the
war was undertaken with the co-operation of the
people ; and Count Bismarck has officially recorded his
opinion that the Emperor's assertion as to the fatal war
having been forced upon him by an irresistible pressure
from without, was a statement which might possibly not
be without foundation. Perhaps the distressed con-
dition of France, and the beleaguered situation of
its beautiful capital, may have contribused to
awaken a feeling of sympathy and commisseration which,
independently of any other consideration, may account
for the altered tone of certain organs in the Belgian
press. My experience compels me to state that the
educated classes in this country have been, from
the outbreak of hostilities, favourable to Ger-
many ; not only from their appreciation of
the aggressive character of the war on the
the part of France, but from their conviction that the
independence of Belgium might be imperilled by the
triumph of its southern neighbour. The publica-
tion of the famous Benedetti partition treaty con-
tributed in no small degree to confirm these alarms.
Whatever may be the opinions of the intellec-
tual classes, it can hardly be a matter of surprise
that the masses are in general more favourably disposed
towards France. This can be accounted for by the simi-
larity of language and habits, and, in the Flemish popu-
lation—to say nothing of clerical influences—by the
recollections of the events of 1814, when the Prussians,
exasperated by protracted insults and humiliation,
displayed in some instances a haughty and insolent
attitude when they invaded the Belgian provinces,
then forming part of the French Empire. As to the half-
educated classes, it is notorious that the extracts from
Parisian journals, and the productions of the French
drama supply the daily intellectual nourishment of those
who read at all or frequent the theatres. Nevertheless,
to thinking minds there is some danger in these pre-
dilections in favour of France. No one can foresee
what the ultimate issue of the war may be. The resto-
ration of the Empire, unlikely as it may appear, has been
seriously talked of as among the possible contingencies
of the crisis through which Europe is passing;
and more than one intelligent Belgian, whose
alarms, I trust, may be ascribed to excessive
patriotic susceptibilities, is not without anxiety
lest these imprudent predilections should be
interpreted as symptoms favourable to a sacrifice of Bel-
gian territory. as a compensation to France for the sacri-
fices which that country may have to make to indemnify
her victorious enemy. Such an arrangement, it is
feared, would be even more probable were the restoration
of the Empire to enter into the final settlement of the
crisis.

On no railway in England is there such a throng
of passengers as on the Metropolitan. Train follows
train in quick succession, and it would seem that the
carrying powers of the company are taxed to the utmost
to provide accommodation for those who wish to
avail themselves of it. Yet it is found to be
advisable to reduce the passenger fares to the
extent of about one-third. What an example
this to other companies running trains in the
metropolitan and suburban districts ! Half-empty car-
riages are the result of the high tariff; and persons who
would willingly occupy houses near the lines are deterred
by the addition of heavy fares to their rentals ; and in
that manner the companies deprive themselves of a vast
increase to their revenue. In this, as in other matters,
the Metropolitan shews the way to effect a beneficial
improvement Figaro.