The Sun.
London, England, 1858-07-14 00:00:00

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LONDON, WEDNESDAY, JULY 14, 1858.

Happily we have now heard the last of Mr.
OTTO MIINDUER, the tr:velling a,:.;cut, for the
National Gallery. Henceforth 3001. a-year will
not be fooled away, under the very extraordinary
pretext of sending forth, upon a vague mission of
search after artistic treasures, a gentleman (we
doubt this, at least, not for one instant) remark-
able for his very rare accomplishments. Mr.
11117NDLER, Herr MIINDLER, Monsieur MUNDLER
--however he may be designated—is, of course,

a person of very refined taste, a capital judge of
pictures, one " up" in all the schools, and so
forth. We have not a syllable to say against him
individually. We never had. But we have
always protested as strongly and urgently as pos-
sible against the fully of squandering 3001. a-year
upon a wild-goose chase, as absurd, in its way, as
that of the celebrated Dr. SyxrAx: in search of
the.picturcsque. For several years we have in-
sisted upon the absurdity of keeping up the farce
of•this Travelling Agency. • 'Without the smallest

pezional feeling one way or the other, in regard to

the particular individual selected to be the red-
•pient of this snug little salary fur Heaven knows-
what, we have set our face against the thing,
as in its.way a 'natter altogether frivolous, fruit-
less of anything at all beneficial one way or the
elber—in short, as Mr. SNAGSBY might say—
" not to put too fine a point upon it," really

and truly quite nonsensical. The majority of
those who voted last night upon the subject
thought upon it at last as we have long thought
upon it (and written about it) ourselves. The
amendment moved by Lord ELcuo in a House of
.238, was carried, we are delighted to observe, by
a majority of eighteen-128 voting for and 110
against, this same most rational amendment. The
Travelling Agent is, therefore, no longer num-
bered amongst the salaried employees of the Na-
tional Gallery Establishment. We dare say the
avt treasures of the nation will increase and mul-
.iiply somehovr.or other, as the lawyers phrase it,
• nevertheless, notwithstanding. At any rate, we
shall not present to astonished Europa from tbis
time forth the extraordinary spectacle of a Ger-
man gentleman maundering hither and thither all
over' the Continent, with the wealth of England
mysteriotisly trailing after Lim as he travelled—
& Quixetio agent of art, vaguely roving here,
there, and everywhere, in a wild search after
Something (he couldn't say exactly what), in
search of Something, Anything in the ehape of a
Picture.

The returns supplied, at the instance of Lord
ELLENBOROUGII, afford very valuable information
respecting the East Indian Army, or, as it was
termed, the troops of the Honourable East India
Company's Service. The recant state of affairs,
00,jugina from the mutiny of men who were re-
ceiving handsome pay and allowances, the valuable
lives that have been sacrificed, and the amount of
money expended in quelling the insurrection,
render everything relating thereto deeply icterest-
to- the people both of England and of India.
Besides, if we are desirous of profiting by our

-dearly-bought experience, wa should institute a
stringent and searching investigation into every:
thing that could, by auy possibility, cast addi-
tional light on the subj3ct.
The.total military force of India, including all
the greSidencies, was in round terms 280,000
it-had been 287;782-in 1852, but bad been re-.
„weed, by some 10,000 men between- that and
1357, the time of the c-rtbrr:als:, cf which some-
thing more than 100,000 constituted tho

"Bengal Army," amongst whom the mutinous
epidemic chiefly prevailed. Of these there
were 83,000 regular native infantry, 14,000
regular native cavalry, and 27,000 irregulars.
There were also some Company's Europfaw, nire
battalions, about 8,100 in all ; of which only
three battalions, or 2,700, were in Bengal ; and
nearly 15,000 QUEEN'S troops, about three-fifths
of the entire Briti:h forces in India.
Such was the state of affairs at the time of the
outbreak. The Native Regiments were officered
by Europeans; but a large proportion of the best
and most efficient men were appointed to civil
situations, which being very lucrative were
anxiously sought after. There were nearly 500
officers (493) thus habitually absent from their
regimental duties last year, and some 160 more
on leave of
.absence; so that 650 officers were
away from their regiments at the time of the
mutiny. In many instances there were not more
than five or s;x officers to a regiment, who,
being juniors, cou'd scarcely be expected
to discharge all the pressing dutics of their ardu-
ous positions. Much responsibility consequently
devolved on the Subadars and Jemadars—as the
native non-commissioned officers were termed—
and these were appointed, not from superior quali-
fications, but from mere seniority, and were im-
bued with all the prejudices of the private Sepoys,
with whom they had been long and intimately
connected. These favoured individuals were,
generally speaking, the ringleaders of the rebellion.
They found an immense amount of power in their
hands, but they had no hope or expectation of
further promotion, and therefore they were the
first to increase the irritation which it was their
duty to alleviate and repress.

Many think that the native army, in place of
being a help and protection to the Angle-Indian
Government, was a standing cause of difficulty
and danger. Much may be said on both sidts
of this vexed question, but it certainly appears
that the authorities did not maintain a proportion
of Europeans sufficient to check any manifestation
of insubordination in an armed, drilled, and dis-
ciplined body more than eight times their num-
ber. We must still maintain native troops in
India, hut certainly it would be most unwise and
dangerous ever to allow so great a predominance
of the native element as there has hitherto been
in the army of India at any of its Presidencies.

' Some discussion was raised last night in refer_
ence to a sum of 8,8361. expended in the exami:
nation of the plan propounded by the Board of
Works for the main drainage of the metropolis.
It certainly appeared a large amount of outlay for
a mere inquiry and report. And such as it was,
it was certainly attributable to the late Govern-
ment, by whom the expenditure bad been sanc-
tioned and authorised. But we must consider
the magnitude of the interests, and the large
amount of money concerned. No public officer
would be justified in giving his assent to such a
scheme without ascertaining, on the best possible
evidence, its practicability and expediency. It
was therefore the duty of Sir BENJAMM HALL,
then Chief Commissioner of Public Works, to
obtain the best assistance. Even 8,000/. or
9,0001., large as it may seem, was but a small
per tentage on eight or nine millions of money
that might have been improvidently expended.
It would be well that there should be a per•
manent head of the Board of Works. There is
really nothing of a political character about it.
As it is, " the new broom," in seeking to sweep
clean, too frequently sets aside that which had
been carefully and elaborately prepared. The
management of Public Works should be put into,
proper hands, and they can never be properly
controlled until the heads of the department hold
their offices during good behaviour, and without
being liable to eviction at every change of
Ministry.

M. ALEXANDRE DUMAS, Marquis de PAILLE-
TERIE, has found his match after all ! Not in
the person of Mr. G. P. R. JAMES, with his
modest contribution of from 100 to 200 Bvo.
volumese—ranged (quite as a small library in.
themselves) among the treasures of imaginative,
literature. Not, for that matter, indeed, in the
instance of any novelist whomsoever. ALEX-.
ANDRE Dtmtas Pere has found his rival at last,'
his superior, his undoubted vanquisher, in the
person of a popular English Drathatist. Tv e
must never have any more vaunting in reference
to those colosial and portentous stage effects pro•
duced by the great feuilletonist through histrionic
productions extending through fifteen acts, and
requiring a series of nights for the purpose of
completing their consecutive performance. Mr.
BUONSTONE has, by ore extraordinary feat, effectu-
ally extinguished the glery by eclipsing all the
many past, and some of them prodigious, suc-
cesses of the Marquis do PA.ILLETEP.IE. What
does M; DUMAS the Elder think of Oue Dramatic
Triumph requiring for its completion, not a single
week, but Five Years consecutively ? Tnis un-
paralleled histrionic performance, in Five Great
Acts, has,
,in simplest truth, been but just now 1
brougheto a close triumphantly. The precise date 1
of its completion, indeed, was the night of
Saturday last, the 10th of July, 1858—the exact
locality in which this peaceful victory was achieved
being the stage of the Little Theatre of the lEfay-
market. The incident we do honestly conceive
to be one in every way so entirely without pre-
cedent, that we are solicitous to direct to it here,
through our leading columns, the particular at-
tention of the public at large, if only in grateful
tribute to one who has catered so well for the gene-
ral amusement, and of unaffected admiration for
the skill with which he accomplished a success in
every way so remarkable.
Mr. &OILSTONE'S management certainly marks
an epoch in the Haymarket.- Already it hes ac-
complished far more than this—it has effeated: a
triumph in every way so entirely without a
parallel that it serves of itself to repudiate effectually
the old calumnious notion about the Decline of the
Drama. Upon this subject, in truth, Mr.
BUCXSTONE was himself sufficiently outspoken in
the facetious and sparkling harangue with which
he brought his five years' season to a close on
Saturday evening last so very pleasantly. Nothing,
indeed, could well have been more genial, More
neighbourly, or, in every respect, more magnani- 1
mous, than his complimentary allusion to the other i
leading theatres of London, each under its exist-
ing
o
management : among others, to the Adelphi
Manager (Mr. BENJAMIN WEBSTER), SO far from
bankruptcy that he is actually engaged in rebuild-
ing his theatre from the foundations—to the
Priucess's Manager (Alr. CHARLES KEAN), with
the hitherto undreamt-of splendour of his various
Shaksperian representations. And now, side by
side with these facts, disproving so very signally
the old balsble about the decline of the drama, ;be
:,
rStVelbsion of this enormous season of five year;,'
higr4tipn at the Lit'lo Theatre in the Haymarket.

Such, according to literal Matter of fact, wi
the wonderful performance, in Five Grand Acts,
brought to a triumphant conclusion on Saturday
evening, and
_then virtually announced, or we are
much mistaken, "for repetition' by the.....Auttit r
of it.: un A ,ithor who—more aneurately than
Captain ,ILsou'rE--:.1 really; in point of fact, as

Mrs. MALAPROP would wonderingly remark, " like
Cerberus, three gentlemen at once"—Actor,
Manager, Dramatist. To him, in all three capa-
cities, say we, right cordially, a renewal of his
past successes in each— as a Comedian irresistibly
humorous—as a playwright to whom we are in-
debted for dramatic productions like "Green
Bushes" and "Victorine"—as a Manager, in
fine, whose last extraordinary season has literally
shed a lustre upon the National Drama !