The Sun.
London, England, 1856-12-02 00:00:00

TILE SUN.

considera,ble. Thirty-two transports, exceeding '
30,000 tons in the aggregate ; nearly 6,000
troops ; and, according to Esst ern custom, a
numerous attendance of camp folio wars ; niue first-
class war steamers, and six smaller vessels—
making forty-six ships in all, constituting a
formidable demonstration, which ought to be
quite sufficient to overawe the SCILA H, unless he be
is stimulated by secret promises of support by a
Power whom he deems sufficient to cope on at
least equal terms with Great Britain, and which
exercises extraordinary influence over the Court
of Teheran. This decided mcriement may be
regarded as a mere beginning, It will lead either
to an immediate settlement or to a fierce and
sanguinary contest ; and the event will mainly, if
not altogether, depend on the course adopted by
Russia, and how far it may suit the policy of the

CZAR to take an active part in the proceedings.

" England can wage no little war." If this be
generally true (and we have the high autho-
rity of " the Iron Duke" as to the fact), it is
peculiarly so in our Eastern empire, where
British supremacy rests chiefly on the prestige
attached to our name, and the certainty that we
shall be ready to repel any attack and to avenge
any insult offered to ourselves or those under our
protection or in alliance with us. Any submission,
or even hesitation, would be fatal to our interests
as well as to our honour, and would entail the
necessity of far greater exertions and a much
heavier outlay at no distant day. In place of
one, we should have many wars, and would have
not only to resist foreign invasion, but to put
down domestic insurrection. We cannot, there.
fore, concur with some of our contemporaries in
thinking the Persian onslaught against Herat a
matter of trivial importance, or as to the wisdom
'of what is termed the policy of abstention under the
circumstances. On the contrary, we joyously hail
the vigour and energy displayed by her MAJESTY'S
Government, and we are convinced that the
People generally will coincide in the opinion, and
feel grateful to the English Minister, Lord PAL-
MERSTON, for so fully acting up to the principles
which he so boldly enunciated, and which elicited
the warm and all but unanimous approbation of
the community. If we desire to avoid war, it is
essential that we should not only have made
ample preparations, but that we also be prepared
for any alternative, or, in the words of the Scot-
tish Knight, " Ready, aye, ready for the field."
Had similar promptitude been displayed towards
Russia, when she first sent her armed cohorts
across the Pruth, or, still better, when she
declared her intention of so doing, we
should have averted hostilities that cost
the lives of fifty thousand Englishmen, and the
useless expenditure of one hundred millions of
English money ; and if the present Eastern diffi-
culty can be averted we shall be indebted to Lord
PALMERSTON'S unflinching resolution for that au-
spicious result.

We cannot agree in the geographical difficulties
suggested by a contemporary as to the situation
of Herat. It is by no means a terra incognita.
Its latitude and longitude are clearly laid down
on every map, and the name that it has acquired
as " The Gate of India " sufficiently proves its
paramount importance. There can be little doubt
as to the quiver from whence the envenomed
shaft has been drawn. Russian inspiration is A
manifest in every Persian movement since the
commencement of the late War. To that was
ascribable the insults offered to the British Minister
at the Court of Teheran, which compelled him to
strike his flag, and suspend diplomatic intercourse
with the Scathaf s advisers, to the wanton aggres-
sion on Herat, the territory of a friendly, and,
in this instance, at least inoffensive Sovereign.
The ignominious desertion of Kars and its gallant
defenders confirmed the Muscovite influence.
The invincibility of the AUTOCRAT was univer-
sally credited throughout Persia. His slightest
word had the force of a command, and thus had we
remained quie4cent under the insult the way
would have treen paved for the invasion of the
Anglo-Indian Empire, and there would have been
plenty of adventurers ready to make the attempt.
Our friends would have deserted us, and we
should, single-handed, have been compelled to fight
the battle, in which we shall under the
most untoward circumstances have Allies
convinced of British fidelity and resolution, 1
and prepared to fight on behalf of those
so well prepared to defend their friends and to
.aim formidable blows against their antagonists.
If there be any portion of the proceedings which
we are disposed to criticise it is that which makes
'he expedition nominally one by the E Ist India
Company, sustained by its own troops and its
own navy. In such a cause the parent state
should unequivocally avow itself—the question
chiefly to the quarter on which the expense will
fall; but the pecuniary interests of British India
are indivisible, and it signifies little whether the
costs be defrayed from one pocket or the other.

Surely Prince ALBERT will require Lord PAL-
MERSTON and Lord CLARENDON to bestir them-
selves. The rights and dignity of Prussia are at
stake ; and with Prussia degraded, England is
degraded too: Will the English nation endure
that the PRINCESS ROYAL should not be Queen or
Protectress, or Patroness, or something or other,
of Neuchatel ? Is she to marry a clipped and
mutilated Crown Prince ? Let Lard PALMER-
STON look to it, 'or it may tell seriously on the
next election. We have lost Ruatan and our
Mosquito honours to be sure ; but are we to
tolerate the King of PRUSSIA'S losing his Neu-
chatel honours ? Would it not be a fair ground
to set aside the match, that the PRINCE had lost
the titles which he was heir to when it was
made ? We have, to be sure, long ceased to quar-
ter the arms of France on our shield, and our gra-
cious QUEEN does not hold a title which half-a-
dozen revolutions would have rgadered somewhat
inconvenient. But Prussia is not England ; for
her to lose parchment claims on a Swiss canton is
a serious thing. Who can tell which of the terri-
torial fragments composing the assets with which
her royalty is credited might not soon turn out
bad also? When we last trie I to put Prussia
together on the map we gave up the attempt in
despair. The larger portions, chiefly robberies
or frauds from someneighbouring power, were easy
enough to find of course, but it was a chase which
only German patience could sustain to find out
every capital 6`l2:narked here and there all over
kingdom hardly big enough to hold the
Prussianthe map of 0
any on little patches of the
letter. It was much like sorting bullocks by their
brands when hopelessly intermixed in the Metro-
politan Cattle Market.

Now, seriously, is itrtioneessuscehs ? A
kingdom of
a koidnegrdno mh
is
ttohrayt
we are to marry our p
shreds and patches, and all whose m
is a history of weakness and cowardice ; of selling
allies to save herself, and kissing the feet of the
strongest in succession. To us it seems a dis-
grace to be married to a country Which became
the common carrier of Russia during the war,
and which may well be suspected of having
aspired to that lucrative and noble
labour, when it refused to aid in
putting the break on the wicked ambitioi of
bizosoL4u. We do know that Prussia acknow