The Sun.
London, England, 1870-08-09 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON, TUESDAY MORNING, AUGUST 9, 1870,

OPERAS, THEATRES, AND AMUSEMENTS.

PRINCE OF WALES'S—A 7.30. Quite by Accident. M.P. Dearest
Mamma.

QTTEEN'S—At Seven, Hy Wife's Dentist. 'Twist Axe and Crown.
VAUDEVILLE—Cupboard Love. Two Roses. Don Carlos.

CHRISTY MINSTRELS, St. James's Hall, Every Night, at 8; Wed-
nesdays and Saturdays, at 3 and 8 all the year round.
Zo LOGICAL GARDENS, Regent's-park. Open daily (except Sun-
days). Admission, ls. on Mondays, 6d. Children under
twelve, 6d.

MADAME TIISSAUD'B EXHIBITION, Baker-street, from 11 a.m. till
3.0 p.m., and from 7 till 10 p.m. Admission, ls.; extra
6d.

HIGH WATER AT LONDON BRIDGE THIS DAY.
Morning ..... after Afternoon ........30 after 0

44. ,
rj"4l-' Wilsg 4i* Sitil
4,-;\

MORNING EDITION.

round Metz at a radius of from thirty to forty
miles. Three Prussian armies were advancing
in a sort of outer circle, the CROWN PRINCE being
on the left (the French right) and isolated
from the others. Surely the French would have
done better to have further concentrated their inner
circle, turning it towards the right, so that by yester-
day (probably) a greatly superior force might have
been gathered and shot out at the isolated CROWN
PRINCE. The position would then have been thus :
MACMAHON with (say) 120,000 men would assail the
CROWN PRINCE, and probably overpower him on the
right. On the centre and left the main French army
would have been opposed to a greatly superior Ger-
man force. There would, however, be
no need for fighting this superior host.
If the main army fell steadily back, taking
care only to cover MACMAIION'S flank, that would
have been sufficient, no advance of the other two
German armies could have availed aught, unless
the CROWN PRINCE had won his battle.
By fighting MACMAHON on unequal terms
he has won it ; the only chance of
obtaining a different result was to take care that
this first invading German army was outnumbered.
Moving as they did, on an inner circle, the French
generals ought to have been in a position to accu-
mulate the needful force. If they were not, their
abilities and state of preparation must greatly resem-
ble those of poor BENEDEK in 1866.

THE complications not unlikely to occur as the
result of this formidable war, are, some of them at
least, sufficiently portentous. There is a jealous
watchfulness of each other, not unnaturally obser-
vable among the chief powers pledged to neutrality.
That neutrality is, in each instance, only preservable
contingently. If Austria or Italy, but
still more it both together, were to

side with either of the belligerents, Russia, it has
been insisted all along, would be constrained in her
own interests to advance westwards. Each Power
has a cause to avenge, a memory to obliterate. Ever
since the Crimean War, for example, we may rest
assured of this—the Government of St. Peters-
burgh has been on the watch for some
more propitious opportunity than the last
for its movement in the direction of Constanti-

nople. Ever since the close of the campaign of
Sadowa, the Government of Vienna would exult,
we may be equally well satisfied of this, over any
prospect that might present itself for the avenging
of the deadly and disastrous fusillade of Ktininggratz.
The intimation coming the most recently from the
Russian capital is one full, as it seems to us, of
warlike significance. While Prussia and France
have been arming themselves to the teeth
during these last few years, not secretly or surrep-
titiously, but openly and in the sight of all Christen-
dom, Russia, less observed, but quite as systema-
tically, has been acting in like manner—multiplying
her forces, improving their discipline, securing at
any and at every cost the latest and most perfect
contrivance in the improvement of rifled cannon and
breech-loading arms of precision. Never—such is
the significant intimation now coming to us from St.
Petersburgh—never has Russia been more fully pre-
pared for war than she is at the present moment.
Supposing the Czatt were only in the humour to
avail himself of the opportunity now tempting him
to seize upon the Golden Horn (as the long-coveted horn
of plenty to the great Muscovite sovereignty), there is
absolutely nothing whatever to prevent him, upon
any day he pleases, from becoming at last master of
Constantinople. France and Prussia in deadly con-
flict with each other—Austria, eager but powerless
to move—ltaly, with an all but bankrupt exchequer,
precluded from increasing, unless constrained
so to do, her already formidable military
and maritime expenditure—England, reluctant to
forsake her neutral position, unless absolutely com-
pelled by some such flagrant goad to her sense of
honour, as the violating of the independence of
Belgium—there is nothing, literally nothing, in the
way of even any powerful prohibition from her
so acting, to prevent Prussia from seizing
at last, at her own free will and pleasure, upon the
sick man her neighbour, and, giving him at length,
off-hand, the long looked-for coup de grace. Among
the possible contingencies of the war, not the least
probable, strange to say, are these three—that the
HOHENZOLLERN may yet be enthroned at
Madrid ; that King WILLIAM may assume
the title any day he pleases of Emperor
of Germany ; and, finally, that while BoluAncx,
and BENEDETTI have been conferring together as to
the shameless bartering away of Belgium, the
Russian autocrat, without saying another word about
it, may some fine day seize by main force what his
predecessor made a premature clutch at sixteen years
ago, when the Allied Powers of Western Europe
were then prepared, as they are not now prepared
to, prevent his taking possession ,of it—that grand
imperial prize of Constantinople.

TOPICS OF THE DAY.

hastened from thence to London, and; on', to the
Continent. These personages were two generals of
the United States army en route to the respective
seats of war in fulfilment of an order from the Pre-
sident—to watch the different movements and the
tactics pursued by the rival commanders in the
Rhine struggle. General Philip H. Sheridan, whose
military exploits and strategical feats with the army
of the North in the American war gained him a most
enviable reputtion, is directed to attach himself to
the French army. The other officer, General For-
syth, will follow the Germans. It is not generally
known that the United States War Department
usually commission their generals to watch the
manner of the warfare of other nations. In the
Crimean war the representative from the American
War Department was General McClellan.

has been postponed. It has been found advisable
to adopt this measure in consequence of the confu-
sion created by the war. The Chairman and the
Secretaries have announced that the New York
managers believe if the Conference were held this
year, it could not be attended by many
of the delegates who might appear at a
more convenient season. In the first place
the German representatives could not proceed to
America to discuss the blessings of peace at a time
when their country is distracted by the turmoils of
war, and the same reason may apply to the French
representatives who would wish to be present. The
postponement of the Conference is a great disappoint-
ment to its projectors. It was originally intended to
rival the Ecumenical Council of Rome, and to repre-
sent a General Council of Protestantism, but the
unforeseen circumstance of Le great European war
has altogether disorganised the scheme.