The Sun.
London, England, 1851-09-23 00:00:00

TUESDAY

SPIRIT of the PUBLIC JOURNALS.
FROM TIIE MORNING PAPERS or THIS DAY.
TIMES.—The spectacle just witnessed at Ha-
vannah is one that must win some compassion from
the just as well as sympathy from the interested or
the weak. s A number of men, who had fought with
courage in the open field, and many of whom had
since wandered for days wounded and famished, have
been publicly executed as pirates, that is as robbers
and murderers, declaring with their last breath that
they believed they were assisting an oppressed and
indignant population in the work of their deliver-
ance. Such a spectacle is rare among civilized
nations and in civilized times, for the simple
reason that society is then too strong for buccaneers
and marauders to ply their trade with any hope of
success. 'When, then, such an incident does
actually occur the heroes of the tragedy gain some-
thing from the strange and incredible nature of
their crime. It is difficult to regard them as
enemies of the human race, for that is the
definition of pirates, simply because the class
cannot be said to exist, tied it is found more
easy to believe them something more familiar and
creditable—patriots, deliverers, Quixotic enthusiasts,
knights errant, or something of that kind. In this
instance the crime, for such it undoubtedly is, derives
some colour from the well-known character of all
Spanish government. It is a common belief that en
island rescued from the yoke of Spain and annexed
to the great American federation must be the better
for the change, and emerges, in fact, from darkness
to light, and from slavery to freedom. We may
charitably hope that a tinge of political romance
gilded the dreams of these unhappy adventurers, and
that they really imagiaed they were seeking a crown
of glory, as well as houses and lands, sugar mills,
live stock, negroes, and other valuable commodities.
But when the flimsy veil of political romance
has been withdrawn from the crime, it is evident
that our compassion, if we cannot withhold it, is due
rather to the folly than to the fate of the criminals.
Compassion is much more justly duo to the unfor-
tunate authorities who have been driven to a rigour
from which in the first instance they had recoiled;
who were made to suffer the penalty of their former
forbearance in the return of the very men they had
pardoned and released; who are kept on the tenter-
hooks of a fearful expectation, in the presence of a
vast and aggressive Power teeming with marauders
and sympathisers; who are compelled to maintain a
large naval and military force against unseen foes in
a time of peace; and who, having tried in vain the
alternative of mercy, were driven to the other alter-
native of justice, and so forced to endure the stigma
of apparent but unavoidable cruelty. What could
the Cuban authorities do ? What line of conduct
can the Americans themselves suggest to a State
condemned to suffer a periodical invasion by lawless
bands in a time of peace ? If the Governor of Cuba
and the Cuban authorities had no other interest to at-
tend to than the pleasure of the Americans, of course
they would disband the Royal forces, and leave the
island, with all its valuable property, to be shared
among the first body of American citizens that could
establish itself at Havannah. Or if this were
too manifest a treason, or too tame a surrender,
they might retain the island for awhile, just
as an arena for the display of American
valour, allowing a few hundred loyal soldiers to be
shot off at each successive landing of the invaders,
and invariably allowing the latter to retire unmo-
lested and recruit for another landing. It certainly
would appear that some of the American sympa-
thisers think themselves entitled to such treatment,
for their sympathy with invaders is partly founded
on the fact, that owing to their superior skill in sharp-
shooting or manoeuvring they achieved a fearful
slaughter of the Spanish forces. But it is evident
that the Cuban authorities land other duties to per-
form than complaisance to the sentiments of the
American public ; they had the island to keep for
their Queen, not to speak of the other interests at
stake ; and this paramount duty unfortunately in-
volved the necessity of making an example of the
invaders. Even in this extremity they seem to
have tempered justice, not to say the claims of self-
preservation, with mercy. The first batch taken,
while the great body of the invaders was still in arms,
they put to death. When the invasion was extin-
guished, and the danger was over for the present,
they assigned to Lopez the ignominious death of a
pirate ; they shot the principal officers under him, and
spared the lives of the remaining 150, not, however,
setting them at large to renew the attempt next
spring. The American journals, now that the expe-
dition has so signally failed, and the hostility, or at
least the indifference, of the Cuban population has
been so plainly demonstrated, condemn Lopez and his
dupes in unmeasured terms. They admit what every-
body knows, that a similar set of desperadoes would
meet with very little mercy from the President of
the United States if they fell into his hands when
engaged on a similar errand. We wish we could
persuade ourselves, however, that the principal
crime of these men, in the eyes of the Americans, is
not their failure. It is admitted to be piracy, simply
because like treason, it has not prospered. In the midst
of the grave censures which are pronounced on the
unfortunate scheme we find every now and then
some very suspicious prophecies of the fate of Cuba,
which it is said will be hastened by the late severities.
The Governor is told, not that be has exceeded the
law of the case, but that he has been injudicious,
though in the same articles it is said that the libera-
tion of Cuba is to proceed, not from without, but
from within. In the island itself these severities seem
to have been taken as a matter of course ; and they
could only hasten the doom of the Spanish dominion
by their effect on the irascible temper of the American
public. Perhaps after the fact of two large expeditions
having sailed from American ports for the conquest
of Cuba, with the scarcely concealed connivance of
the authorities, the second on so large a scale that
though only a part of it sailed it was able to keep the
field more than a week, the Americans would do well
to abstain from superfluous criticism on the conduct
of the Spanish authorities. If Cuba really is to be
American—if the pear must one day ripen and drop
into that capacious and fortunate lap, then there is no
necessity to hurry the day, either by invading Cuba
in a time of peace, or by abusing its authorities
when they are clearly in the right.
HERALD.—The latest news received from the
United States is such as the previous accounts had led
us to anticipate. The Lopez expedition has not only
signally failed, but its chief commander has been
taken, and has paid the penalty of his rashness with
his life. A loud outcry was made by one or two
journals here as to the sanguinary manner in which
the former prisoners were summarily shot by the
Spanish authorities of the island ; but it would not, be
difficult to prove that in acting thus the Spanish Go-
vernment only followed the practice of far more
civilised and infinitely less sanguinary nations. It
should not be forgotten, in considering the bearings
of this question, that this is the second attempt on
the island within sixteen months, and that Spanish
commanders, never distinguished for forbearance
and humanity, have been rendered more than ever
indifferent to human life by the long prevalence of
civil warfare on their own parent soil. It is not
from a Cbristino or a Carlist general of modern times
that enemies, invaders, or pirates, taken with arms in
theirhands, are to look for any tenderness or hu•
manity, or the least particle of indulgence. We
doubt, however, that any commander, be he never so
humane, could have spared the lives of the adventu-
rers who, for the second time within sixteen months,
landed in Cuba, or, that supposing it possible to have
done so, that such mistaken clemency would have
been, under the circumstances, wise or politic. By
the New Orleanists, who put the machinery of in-
vasion in action, it would have been received as a
confession of both internal and external weakness, and
far from appeasing the lust of acquisition, it would
only have whetted the American appetite to annex
and to incorporate by any and by every means. In-
dependently of these considerations the Spanish Go-
vernment is bound to show an example of energy
and decision to native proprietors—to many of
those Creoles supposed to have held out flattering
hopes to Lopez, and to those Mulattoes and Mestizoes
believed to be desirous of a change of masters. It is
also to be considered that at the period of the former
executions Lopez had not been taken—that he was
supposed to be sheltered up the country in some of
the plantations, and that it was under these circum-
stances directly imperative to make an example.
Add to this that the adventurers and buccaneers came
prepared neither to give nor to take quarter. In their
first encounter with the Spanish troops they exhibited
not merely courage but desperation, and that ener-
getic will which seems to be communicated to any
body of men with whom the Anglo-Saxon race are
largely intermixed. These are qualities not likely
to conciliate an opponent. The brave manner, too, in
which the first victims of their own recklessness met
the fate reserved for them produced no impression on
the Spanish authorities. The attempt was felt on
both sides to be a determined and a terrible one, and
terrible also was the retribution. Under these cir-
cumstances it is idle to declaim against the san-
guinary inhumanity of the Spanish Government.
The humanest Government the world has yet seen
would act apart not very widely different, and would
find warrant for so doing in all the recognised inter-
national jurists and authorities, and even by the latest
modern practice. At all events America is estopped
from all complaints on this head by the acts of her
own President, Jackson, in reference to Florida, a
very few years ago. It may be urged that the first
example having been made in the case of Crittenden
and his companions, there was no need for such seve-
rity in the case of Lopez. To this view we cannot
accede. Lopez, a native-born Spaniard, had lived
for years in the invaded island, and had possessed a
plantation in right of his wife, a Creole of Cuba.
Such was the man who placed himself at the head of
the marauding or buccaneering force, for we can
call it nothing else, Against an island which had