The Sun.
London, England, 1856-04-28 00:00:00

LONDON, MONDAY, APRIL 28, 1856.

"The Precious Treaty" has been duly ratified
in all its details. At three p.m. yesterday, a day
later than the time limited by the Plenipoten-
tiaries, the Peace ' was formally confirmed, and
will this day be officially communicated to the
Senate and Legislative Body. We may assume
that it will also be announced in both Houses of
Parliament, and that the terms which, with the
exception of four missing Articles, were on Wed-
nesday published in the daily journals, will 'at
length be made known to the Hereditary and
Representative branches of the Legislature.
Even of those articles the substance has already
been ascertained, so that the intelligence will have
lost the charm of novelty ; and, as we already
stated, those who should have been the first to
obtain authentic information will be the last to
receive it. It is for the parties themselves to
show whether they will tamely submit to this
gross and unwarrantable insult ? Whether they
will assent to this abdication of their constitu-
tional functions, or manifest the well-founded in•
dignation which such an unwarrantable coarse
has eminently merited ?

We may now refer to the missing Articles,
having already noticed the other points. They
are not, we regret to say, of such a nature
as to create exultation in English hearts, or to
enable the Chancellor of the Exchequer to afford
relief to the overburdened tax-payers, by modify-
ing or reducing the Income Tax, or striking off
some of the impolitic and onerous additions to the
indirect taxation of the country. They do not
give the• slightest hint respecting. a Russia in-
demnity for the expenses of the War, even to the
extent of paying for the expenses of the Naval
Review, or even the miserable and parsimonious
arrangements made for the entertainment of Noble
Lords and Honourable Gentlemen. The 'Ts. 6d.
a head contracted to be paid to the purveyor will
not come from the Russian Treasury, or the
8,0001. to be expended (without the assent of the
guardians of the public purse) for the quasi re-
joicings--" rejoicings !" GOD save the mark—for
the most lame and impotent conclusion of the War.
N., the pocket as well as the pride and substantial
power of Russia has been carefully preserved. Poor
JOHN BULL has to pay for all, and his only gain
in this truly German arraigement. is "his un•
diminished power and resources !" The Treaty
is silent on this essential point, and the People
•are therefore comparatively indifferent on the
other matters contained in that which they feel
will be at best neither more nor less than an
armed truce of brief duration.

The substance of the missing Articles, 5 to 8,
are asserted at Berlin, where the national anxiety
to obtain full information is apparently more
thought of than in England, to be as follows—.
Vi :-

64 An amnesty for compromised subjects (01

Russia ?).
" The admission of the Ottoman Porte into the
Concert of European States.
" The guarantee of the independence and in-
tegrity of the Ottoman empire.
" In differences between the Putt° and the
other contracting Power (Russia ?), should the
other Powers intervene, an additional article pro-
vides that the D trdanelles shill not be closed for
ships introducing troops."
These are well enough in their way ; but we
should like to know what guarantee there will
be for the bona fides of the so-called amnesty.
Will the victims who have already been torn from
their homes and families, and banished to the in-
hospitable interior, be restored to their afflicted
friends, with ample compeesation for their suffer-
ings t Will those who have perished on the scaffold
or by the fusillade, who have writhed beneath the ,

knout, be restored to life or health ? How can it
be ascertained that there is a real amnesty, while
parties may -be executed or expatriated by thou-
sands and tens of thousands, without any cause
being assigned for the punishment ? It is ob-
vious that there can be no adequate security
for these unfortunate persons, who may have
bitter cause to deplore their intercourse with the
troops or seamen of the Allied Powers.
It was thoroughly understood that the
Ottoman Empire was to be admitted into the
European system and its independence and
integrity guaranteed. There is, therefore,
nothing in these provisions to render the
Treaty more satisfactory, and the stipulation that
in caseof differences between.the Porte and Russia
the Dardanelles might be opened for the admis-
sion of vessels bearing troops, was one that could
not possibly have been overlooked by any per-
sons assuming the diplomatic character. We
must, thereforelperforca content ourselves as we
best can with the inauspicious termination of
what was once deemed a just and honourable war,
and swallow our respective leeks with what appe-
tite we may, and as few wry faces as possible
under the infelicitous circumstances.

Parliament has still one chance of redeeming its
own reputation—but it is its last. The " light
cloud is already passing from the face of the
moon," and those who neglect this opportunity
will have a heavy account to render to their dis-
appointed constituents when answering for the
manner in which they have acted in their respec-
tive stewardships, and seeking a renewal of the
trusts which they have deliberately violated.

Now that: the War has terminated, that the
ratifications have been duly exchanged, and the
rejoicings (0 for Peace are about to be celebrated
by the German party, there can no longer be any
pretext for withholding a stringent and rigid in-
vestigation into the causes that led to the sacri-
fice of so many thousands of lives and so many
millions of money. The whole of the gross mis-
management that prevented the glorious victories
obtained by the allied troops from being actively
followed up to their legitimate results may now
be disclosed without any possible "injury to our
arms " arising from the publication. Secrecy
now can only be observed for the purpose of
screening the wrong-doers from well-merited

obloquy, or maintaining a highly objectionable and
defective "system " unimpaired. It cannot lea
for the interests of the People that the grave
delinquencies which occurred should be hushed
up, or the serious mistakes committed by those-
placed in authority concealel It signifies little
whether those errors arose from incapacity or from
even more objectionable causes. It is essential to
the welfare and security of the nation that we
should profit by the dearly-bought experience of
the past, ,f,to as to guard against similar mistakes
for the future. No spurious sentimentality should
be allowed to prevail—no arguments that, now
that the matter has terminated, we should avoid
anything that may lead to unpleasant inquiries or
cause additional indignation to excite, or rankle
in, the public mind. It is the privilege
of the people that they should know not
only the truth, hut the whole truth ; that they
should learn through what influences incapable
Generals were appointed to vitally important com-
mands, and what were the nature of the instruc-
tions they received ; whether they were to spare
Sebastopol as Odessa was spared, and merely to
make hostile demonstrations, which, like the
wooden cannon of the Chinese, might terrify their
opponents. All these are matters that must now
be ascertained beyond the possibility of dispute or
difficulty, so that Parliament and the people may
be prepared to act energetically and decisively on
the information so obtained.

Everything tends t) prove the accuracy of that
repeatedly asserted in these columns, that if the
advice of poor General OATUCART, himself one of
the victims to its disregard, had been taken, and
the Alma followed up by an immediate onslaugh t
on Sebastopol, while its garrison was panic-
stricken and down-hearted, we should have gained
a victory, and the Russian stronghold would have
fallen into our hands almost without resistance.
We have the unequivocal testimony of Rus3ian
officers, who witnessed our extraordinary and in-
explicable apathy, on the point. The unexcep-

tionable evidence thus obtained corroborates and
confirms the views of some of our most effi,Aent
officers, of all indeed ctpsble of forming a sound
judgment on the point. Sebastopol WA3 regarded
as untenable. It contained brit few troops, who
were dispirited and demoralised, prepared to yield
at the first onslaught, if not at the first summons.
Our negligence and apathy, the free ac3ess allowed
to the uottlurn forts—which enab!ed then to

throw in troops and supplies aul to erect fresh
defences—occasioned the protracted siege, the
fearful mortality and suffering among the Allied
troops, the enormous outlay of money, and the
preservation of the Crimea itself to the enemy.
A daring activity on the part of the Allies might
have led to the complete submission of the CZAR—
to an honourable and satisfactory peace, not like
the thing that has been improvidently agreed on.
We fear, however, that instructions from home
paralysed the energies of our commanders,
such as they were that the deliberations
of the ABERDEEN-COBURG Government, which
derived its inspiration from unconstitutional and
anti-Engliali sources, was the chief cause of the
terrible mistake or treason ! Lord RAGLAN was
compelled to act as a drag on the Allies, to prevent
the glorious consummation that could S 3 easily be
achieved. Valuable time was wasted in the
diluted operations about Balaklava, and the tardy
opening of the trenches, there being no attempt
made to cut off or even impede the communica-

tions between the beleaguered fortress and the
relieving army. The dash was wanting that

would have insured success. The Russians took
advantage of the unexpected loophole for escape
—their spirits were elevated, while those
of the Allies were proportionately depressed. The
Austrian occupation of the Principalities—the re-

fusal to permit the Turkish troops to march
through the Turkish territory, gave the required
opportunities, of which the enemy did not hesi-
tate to avail themselves. Hence the mischief
that followed. We trust, however, that Parlia-

went will, even at the eleventh hour, be true to

itself, and adopt decisive means to trace these
enormous evils to their sourco and origin.

A powerful journal,
which can argue well, but,
unfortunately, equally
well foi any side, has
lately been returning to a Peelite view of the
present Peace. It presses strongly several oft-
reiterated arguments—arguments not the worse
for that were they really valid, and, did they not,
many of them, tell with equal force the other way.
For instance, the favourite one of Windsor Castle
and the Tuileries, against humiliation of Russia
--sometimes defined as needless humiliation ; it
is urged that treaties which rankle in the bosom
of a nation soon right themselves ; and the ex-
ample of France is adduced, where, after all the
wars to exclude the dynasty Of NAPOLEON, a''
NAPOLEON is now the absolute lord of the
nation. 13# the) revly ia obvious. To deprive a ,

conquering country of ill-gotten territory is not a
humiliation in the ordinary sense of the word.
What cannot be held with honour, it is no humilia-
tion to lose. The thief who has broken into our house
and taken our plate is in no ordinary sense of the
word humiliated merely by being compelled to re-
turn it. That is regarded as simple justice, and
the humiliation begins with the penal servitude
and a prison. To have compelled the restitution
of Poland, and of all Bessarabia for instance,
would have been no humiliation. Had Russia
been brought to the slightest sense of justice she
would have proffered restitution. The error was
twofold, first in assuming that such an aggressor
ought not to be humiliated ; next, to applying
that word to compulsory restitution of stolen ter-
ritory.

Then, as to the example of Prance. Had we
attempted to overthrow the Romanoff dynasty,
not a very likely thing, since we also are the sub-
jects of a purely German dynasty, it were reason..
able to expect that " all the Russias " would make
it allpoint of honour to restore the expatriated
family to their throne. The illustration, how-
ever, tells altogether against the argument it is
quoted to support. France has acquiesced in
being stripped of all her European conquests—
Italy, Spain, Belgium—even the Rhenish pro-
vinces—everything wrongly gotten she quietly
leaves, and some of it in worse hands that her
own, too. Russia, also, should be conscious that
Poland, Bessarabia, Finland, arc., are not lawfully
hers. Had the illegality of the thefts been pro-
claimed by Europe, had she been required to sur-
render all at the peril of Eoglish gun-boats and a
Polish invasion, she was not in a condition to
1 struggle on, and she would never have dared to
repeat a theft for which she had been tried and
convicted. No, there were other reasons which
decided the Courts of Paris and London to leave
Russia all her stolen territory. -It was not that
they could not have compelled its surrender,
not that they feared it would ever revert to
the aggressor, but that despots trembled lest
nations, unrepresented now by crowned heads,
should regain their rights. The down-trodden
countries are but countries. No exiled despot
claims any of the Thrones. How different would
have been the tone had each of these nationalities
banished or beheaded some counterpart of the
BOURBONS, aAPSBI7RGS, or STUARTS.

There is another entirely one-sided argument
put forward. "No peace ought to rankle in the
bosom of any of the parties to it," and " it ought
to be one which all sides are concerned in main-
taining." Suppose we accept the argument—
who then are the parties to the peace ? who, all
sides concerned in it ? Are the Royal families
who met by deputy at Paris the sole parties ?
Were they there as individuals, or as the repre-
sentatives of their respective peoples ? If the
former, then they were bat a wicked conspiracy
against Europe—if the latter, the inquiry arises
whether their subjects are ALL concerned in
maintaining this peace. We doubt that truth
must choose the more unpleasing side of the
dilemma. That, in fact, the oue thought way
that from the Atlantic to the Caspian ; from the
Baltic to the Adriatic no people should dare " to
peep, or mutter, or move the wing." Diplomacy
talked not of suppression, ipsissimis verbis, but it
well knew how to arrange so that every despot
should be pledged by his own necessities to sym-
pathise with the necessities of his neighbour des
pot. Had Russia been made honest she would
have sought her revenge by making others honest.
Had she been compelled to give Poland its rights
her agents would have reminded Hungarians of
KOSSITTIt and Italy of MAzzINT, and Russia, with
all the oppressed for her allies, would not be the
party asking for peace.

The result is this plain one, that fully half the
peoples of Europe have no concern whatever in
maintaining this peace. Humiliation is tenderly
warded off from a guilty CZAR, but as carefully
perpetuated for his innocent victims. Poland is
still to be before all Europe script of her nobles, of
her franchises, of her independent adwinistrAtion,
of her national existence itself ; no ignominy is
too great for her, but the least, too much for her
oppressor. It is a Peace of Potentates, not of
peoples ; a Peace to subjugate the millions to the
few, to humiliate liberty and to corroborate
tyranny. We are told that had Russia beeti ren-
dered harmless we should soon miss her. No
doubt we should ;----lout, —miss her in the C. 11133
of European order ! and we are told this by an
English journal of reputation ! Englishmen who
remember the order restored in Hungary, in Ger-
many, and the Principalities in 1849 ; the order
for which the Pruth was crossed to bestow that
Rusiian blessing on Turkey—Englishmen who re-
member the order e3t Colished in Poland by Ni-
caoLks in 1833—will surely blush that such
sentiments should enter the news-rooms of the
continent in their own tongue.

ARRIVAL OF THE RATIFICATION OF
THE TREATY OF PEACE.

(From the London Gazette Extraordinary.)
FOREIGN OFFICE, APRIL 28.
The Honourable William Stuart, First Attache
to ber Majesty's Embassy at Paris, arrived this
morning at the Foreign-office, being the bearer of
the Ratification by their Majesties the Emperor
of Austria, the Emperor of the French, the
King of Prussia, the Emperor of all the Russias,
the King of Sardinia, and the Sultan, of the
definitivo Treaty for the restoration of Peace, and
for the maintenance of the integrity and inde-
pendence of the Ottoman Empire, which was
signed at Paris on the 30th of March last.