The Sun.
London, England, 1860-11-27 00:00:00

wan. Here it was within the walls of Chang-kia-
warn—a place completely looted by the Allied sol-
dieryl before they quitted it, that is to say sacked
and ravaged with a destructiveness as complete that
evidenced in a house gutted by a conflagration—
here„ at Chang-kia-wan, it was that the Allies
remained quietly recruiting their strength during
19th and 20th of September. Thence, on the 21st
(thelday of their next fierce struggle with the
Tartars) they moved forward in the direction of
the Canal between Tung-chau (or as Mr. Wyld's
map has it Tong-chow) and Pekin. At that
particular portion of the Canal, the seizure of a
stone bridge called Pa-lishian was entrusted to our
French Allies, the occupation of a wooden bridge
called Pu-si-tsa being undertaken by the English
soldiers. Both bridges were, as a matter course,
taken, though not until after some sharp fighting
—the Tartars having been driven at the sword's
point by our cavalry, led on by the British Comman-
der-in-Chief, driven on thus in irretrievable disorder
a distance of two or three miles along the banks of
the canal "from camp to camp," towards Pekin.
It will be remembered that the telegram yesterday
stated that the loss of the Allies from among the
combatants consisted merely of eighteen men
wounded. The detailed accounts now received show
this to have been only slightly underrated : our
own troops having suffered upon the 21st of Sep-
tember alone a loss of some twenty-five killed and
wounded. It was immediately prior to this that
while engaged in choosing an appropriate place of
encampment for the Allied Forces advancing to-
wards Pekin after them, that little cluster of Eng-
lish notabilities was adroitly surrounded by the
watchful Tartars, and carried off summarily as so
many "material guarantees," or as so many valu-
able hostages within the walls of Pekin ! There
they still were when our latest despatches left—
Captain BRABAZON, of the Artillery, Mr.
ANDERSON, of PANE'S Horse, Mr. DE
NORMAN, Attaché to the Embassy, Mr.
Lout, the Ambassador's Private Secretary,
Mr. BOWLBY, the Times correspondent,
and Mr. PARKES, her Britannic MAJESTY'S
Consul. The carrying away thus of Mr. BOWLBY
alone was an achievement on the part of the Chinese
of no little importance. It was equivalent to the
cutting of the telegraphic wires ! Until his return
we shall have all of us here at home to wait as
patiently as we may for the continuation of that
brilliant narrative previously contributed with
the utmost regularity to our chief morning contem-
porary, by the Times' gifted and most graphic Cor-
respondent. When that able Correspondent of the
Jupiter, as Mr. AN THONT TROLOPPE has dubbed
our dominant contemporary, shall at length have
been released, how profound will be the interest
with which everyone will turn to the renewal of
his descriptions ! Meantime, it is satisfactory, at
last, while we are waiting, to know that there, in
the heart of the great Chinese capital, there
actually within the walls of Pekin, the Chinese
have " a chiel amang them taking notes"—
if not literally, at any rate upon the tablets of his
memory—" and faith he'll prent it !" Lord ELGIN,
we trust, has long since hastened the date of his
return and of the return with him of his five asso-
ciates in captivity, within the sheltering boundaries
of the Allied Encampment. "No negotiation"—
that was the dictum of the Ambassador—" until
after the prisoners shall have been released." That
the Chinese should seriously hesitate about giving
them up under the circumstance, must be regarded
as, all things considered, in the highest degree im-
probable. What !—with Pekin itself only five miles
from the Allied Encampment—with the walls
of the great capital actually within range of
those terrible Armstrong guns—with the recollec-
tion of the 30,000 Tartar horsemen routed on
the 18th, and of the other 30,000 routed
on the 21st of September—with the Em-
peror HIEN-FUNG'S own brother seeking the
renewal of diplomatic negotiations in the name and
on behalf of the Imperial Government, as the
new, and, this time the really authorised Com-
missioner from that Government ! It would be
ludicrous to suppose that in such a plight—when
driven to such extremities, while standing thus
manifestly at bay before the strongly-armed and
highly-disciplined forces of France and England—
the Chinese Government would be so insensate as
not at least to make this one preliminary conces-
sion. When they have made it—it will then rest
with the Ambassadors and the Commanders-in-
Chief to bring the present war to a swift and
decisive conclusion. How they can do this other-
wise than by taking Pekin and there dictating the
final terms of peace to the EMPEROR and his ad-
visers appears to us incomprehensible.

Our neighbour, Mr. WILLIAMS, gave an account
of his stewardship last night—and not a bad one.
He could,,at least,, show a consistent course. In
no one point could any of his supporters say that
their member had deceived their expectations.
He did not indeed take his full share in the 10,000
speeches which Mr. BASS enumerated as having
been delivered last session. But he had a good
reason to give, both for his own conduct and for
that of his fellow metropolitan members who had,
as Mr. BASS thought, too large a share of the
talking. He judged it better for himself not to
talk about everything, but to stick to his point—
the extravagance of Government expenditure, and
to put in a speech, as opportunity required, on that
subject. And, as to his brother members for the
Metropolis, he could tell them that while Mr. BASS
was comfortably in bed they were at their posts
doing their best to obstruct,Government jobs, and
to prevent the unnecessary expenditure of public
money. He did his best, both in looking into the
items of expenditure and in contrasting it with the
expenditure of previous years. And, we must do
the hon. member the justice to say, that if he failed
it was . not for want of either work or wiil. The
times have been unpropitious to the humble
imitator of Mr. HUME. The current has run
strongly throughout the country in favour of what
can only be accomplished at enormous cost. It has
been a hopeless attempt to preach economy to a
people willing to submit to such an income tax as
the present, and even to see it doubled, rather than
not be secure against a neighbouring potentate
whom it could not trust. We do want, however,
some one who does " know about it" in all de-
partments, and we might then, doubtless, reduce
the cost of each very considerably.
With the Commercial Treaty Mr. WILLIAMS is
well pleased ; and so shall we be, if, though
violating abstract principle, it creates the trade
between the two countries which the numerous
deputations and Chambers of Commerce predict
—especially shall we be gratified, if we find,
what Mr. MILNER GlBsoNsaid w
to this time, that the reduced--
duty
theo
on French
caseFr up
e nc
h
I
givenobcucatsihas producedon to the 1 wines has not merely not
de-
mand for a larger Income-tau,
a largc.r revenue than the higher one. We
should not indeed be captious, considering how
many of our citizens must have had their plea-
sures of that kind augmented, if the revenue from
all foreign wities made, during the year, a fair
start towards equalling its former amount, since
we should, of course, feel sure that it would, in
‘ that case, soon exceed it, On this subject we
1