The Sun.
London, England, 1867-12-31 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS,

Referring to the mismanagement which has characterised
the initial operations in Abyssinia, the Post asks if it is a
melancholy fact that incompetent men in office are inevi-
tably seized with a species of insanity whenever a crisis
occurs in their affairs which gives them real service to do.
It is impossible to read, without surprise and shame, after
the fatal experience of Balaclava, what is now doing for
the second time :—" The departments," we are informed,
" are as antagonistic as usual." " Troops daily arrive a
month before the commissariat are ready to receive them ;
and every hour makes confusion worse confounded." The
position has been aggravated by the advance of Colonels
Merewether and Phayro to Senafe. Red-tapeism is so
rampant in the Commissariat Department, in precisely
the same manner as it was in the old raw c >flee days of
the Crimea, that although there were, up to the latest
advices, more than twenty medical officers at the camp of
Koomaylo, there were no medical stores ! This is our
last written intelligence. We have advanced high above
the sea level. There is no village or human habitation
there but the few tents which compose our encampment,
and: the commissariat depot. The chief feature of the
place is a romantic watering gully. In front rise barriers
of precipitous and inaccessible rocks ; around are thou-
sands of thirsty animals waiting to drink, some patiently,
some stamping with the madness of drought upon them.
Thirst in this place is said to be a disease among Euro-
peans, so fierce and imperative are its demands. Fortu-
nately, however, the rations of food are excellent, and
after the first sixty miles to Senafe are once sur•
mounted there may be better hopes ; so with this
gleam of comfort we draw the curtain over a picture
which suggests grave food for reflection, though not foi
despondency.

In speaking of the Emperor Napoleon's desire to
increase his army, the Daily News thinks that nothing
could be more natural than that France should take a
lesson from the battle of Sadowa, and should perceive
what great things a national army, moved by a national
spirit for a national cause, might accomplish. But this
lesson her own annals might have taught France ; the
annals of the First Republic compared with those of the
First Empire. This united Cermany is but the tardy and
logical consequence of the battle of Leipsic. The Second
Empire has not paid without knowing it the still unex•
hausted penalty of the First, for it has favoured thE
creation of great agglomerated Powers. But having
assisted in the creation of Italiax unity without meaning
it—not for the sake of Italy, but against Austria ; having
encouraged the designs of Prussia in Germany, not for the
sake of Prussia, but in the hope of her defeat, and of an
armed, but amicable intervention between the exhausted
combatants, with Austria as an accomplice in demanding
territorial compensations from her rival—having, in short,
united Italy and Germany, in the hope of disuniting them
again under French auspices, the Second Empire must
resign itself to the loss of military supremacy, or it must
learn to its cost the difference between overrunning and
conquering a divided Germany and a divided Italy, and
imposing the law of the strongest upon seventy millions of
people leagued in mutual self-defence.
The Telcoraph, would have us bear in mind that Cork ha.
just furnished another illustration of the mode in villa
Fenian audacity reckons on the prevalent feeling of con-
fidence between man and man which is one characteristic
of civilisation. While the good folks of the city were
following their usual vocations, eight men entered a gun-

maker's shop in Patrick-street, and, presenting revolvers
at the gunmaker and his shopmen, held them in dread of
death while sixty revolvers and fifteen hundred rounds of
ammunition were seized and carried off. The short space
of ten minutes sufficed for the accomplishment of the out-
rage and the escape of the plunderers, who got safely
away, although there were a good many people in the
street. Now, Patrick-street is one of the chief thorough.
fares, and the enterprise could only have been undertaken
by men who had calculated on that absence of suspicion
which prevails everywhere, and who had made up their
minds to take a skilful advantage of it. This, the second
exploit of the Cork Fenians, shews that they have not
made England the only scene of operations, and that they
are extremely well organised. No practical result of any
magnitude can possibly be achieved by the desperadoes ;
but one effect they are certain to produce—the arming of
every man's hand against them. The incidents at Man-
chester, Clerkenwell, and Cork suggest the doubt whether
anyone is safe ; and society may think fit to take precau
tions of its own, in addition to those adopted by the Impe
rial Executive and the municipalities.
The Star feels convinced that her Majesty's letter to the
authorities at West Cowes will awaken a profound echo
everywhere over the country. The English public are far
lees afraid than some of their so-called instructors woul('
have them to ha, and will w,ilconic,‘ the firm and tram-nil
confidence expressed in the Queen's reply. The example
is very encouraging. Let us all take courage and boldly
confess that we are not afraid, and have not been afraid
from first to last. A week ago a journalist who ventured
to hint at such a thing was pretty sure to be set down by
some other journalist (who in his heart was not one bit
afraid all the time) as an evil-minded, un=English, and

disloyal sort of person. It was the thing just then among
newspapers to declare that life in England was not worth
an hour's purchase, that society was falling to pieces, that
our population was permeated by Thuggism and devilry,
and that our only chance of saving anything wa:
to keep shouting to each other that all was
lost. Perhaps the Queen's letter may, among other
good results, have the effect of putting a final extinguishe'
on this real or simulated rage of terror. Our institutions,
we may rest assured, will quite survive the present crisis.
The persons who are " making war against society "—that,
we think, was the regular phrase—will find society a good
deal too strong for them. A system of assassination will
never have a good time of it in England, ar.d, if such r
game really begins, Messieurs the assassins will soon ly
glad enough to give it up. Every reasonable precaution
will doubtless be taken by our authorities, now that it is
seen Fenianism really does mean mischief, and the best
that ordinary individuals can do is to follow the example
of their Sovereign, to be of calm mind and of good cheer.
When the Gordon riots were at their height, and timid
magistrates shrank away from danger, George 111.
offered to put himself at the head of his Guards and re
store order. Such service is not required of her Majesty ;
but she has in one sense put herself at the head of het
Guards by shewing so capital an example of composure and
courage.

The Times, the Herald, and the Standard devote their

leader columns entirely to a review of the events of the
year 1867. Some of these are of great length, thS'.f-of the
Herald, for instance, extending to fourteen columns.