The Sun.
London, England, 1867-04-17 00:00:00

can. Mdlle. Christina Nillson has already cre-
ated a furore at the Theatre Lyrique of Paris,
where she made her first appearance three years
ago. She is of Swedish origin. Possessing a
voice of unusual compass and pleasing quality,
and the charm of great personal beauty, there is
but little doubt as to her ultimate success. Mdlle.
Übrich, prima donna from the Grand Opera of

Hanover, .will be remembered as a concert singer
of decided reputation. The other first appearances
are Mdlle. Amalia Giacconi, prima donna from
the opera at Genoa ; Mdlle. Eracleo, prima donna
contralto, from the Theatre Royal, Madrid ;
Mdlle. Martelli, prima donna contralto assoluto, from
the San Carlo at Lisbon ; and Signor Pandolfini,
primo baritono assoluto, from the Theatre San
Carlos at Naples. . The latter is announced as
Guillaume in " Guillaume Tell." Amongst the
tenors Signor Gardoni is one of the most accom-
plished artists and singers of the pure Italian
school—a school which, unfortunately, has but
few representatives at the present day. One of
them, perhaps the most delightful, is Mdlle.
Sinico, the sweet, sympathetic-voiced Sinico, who
is an artist in the truest sense of the word, and
who, in the first act of " Fidelio," always creates
such a pleasing impression. The name of Mr.
Santley speaks for itself, and Signors Tasca, Gas-
sier, and Herr Rokitanski are invaluable artists.
Every one will welcome the reappearance of Signor
Arditi, to our thinking the first conductor unques-

. _
tionably in England. There is poetry in Signor
Arditi's conducting, and if it is a symphony, as

lately during his concerts, he tells you the whole
story almost as if it were written. Moreover, he
has thoroughly conquered the difficulty (and what
a difficulty !) of taking an orchestra, that exceeds
fifty or sixty in number, plays delicately and in
subdued tone when necessary. Nothing conveys
such an idea of grandeur and strength as a big
orchestra playing under its breath, always suggest-
ing what it could do if unrestrained. Signor
Arditi has made his band almost perfect if not
actually so. It is rarely that one hears such a
splendid performance asthe overture to " Fidelio "
at Her Majesty's. The corps de ballet is under the
superintendence of M. Lauri, matre de ballet ; and
the names of Mdlle. Maria Gosselin and Mdlle.

Lanza are announced as the principal danseuses.

The scenery is under the direction of Messrs.
Telbin and W. Telbin, and Mr. Jarrete is the

acting manager. One of the revived operas, " I
Lombardi," will be given on the opening night,
Saturday, the 27th inst.

RECONCILIATION.

The action and re-action of the Northern and

Southern States on each other, is perhaps more fully

seen from Europe, than in Anierica. A violent and
unscrupulous opposition begets a violent and un-
scrupulous determination ; strong and unconstitu-
tional measures of suppression, give rise to an illegal
and irritated resistance. - In the North, the Legis-

lature has been supported and urged to acts that

would better become a despotism;•thatt a Constitit-
tiQnal Republic,while these acts have been grounded
on, and justified, by the attitude assumed in the
South. In the South, these acts have been de-
nounced as unconstitutional—the proceedings of a
Rump Parliament—not only unjustified by law, but

so opposed to the written constitution of the coun-

try, that the duty of all good citizens is, •to resist.
Thus the war which had ceased on the battle-field

was transferred to the platform and tribune, to
keep alive the most bitter feelings, and to rend the
country almost as effectually in peace, as during the
conflict in arms. So long as the South maintained
its determination, actively to resist the measures of

the North, or, with a still more embarrassing, sullen,

and impassive defiance, there was little hope of any
effectual reconstruction of the Union. The very
attitude of the South gave to its bitterest opponents
their strength and vitality, while these bitter
opponents gave to the South its reason and excuse
for the attitude assumed. Thus the one reacted on
the other ; the Southerner of extreme views, playing
into the hands of the ultra-Radical, and the ultra-
Radical playing into the hands of the strong rebel

sympathiser. Thus, too, all advocates of moderate
measures were confounded, and their efforts neu-
tralised. In this game, as usual, the weakest went

to the wall ; and the South have to thank the ill

advised violence of its extreme partisans, for the
legislative power of the country falling so entirely
into the grasp of its enemies. A marked change
is now taking place in the feeling of the South.

It tried arms, and fought the battle out, to its las'
man and musket. When conquered in the field, ii

renewed the fight in the Senate and in the Cabine
—a battle, even more hopeless. The war gave the
ascendancy to the Republicans; the political con-
test which followed, secured that ascendancy. Now
the South is about to change its tactics ; to try the
effect of frankly accepting the conditions of defeat,
and yielding to the terms proposed. This has been
the policy of the most distinguished Southern leaders
from the close of the civil war—those who were the
first, freely to risk life, limb, and property in the
cause, who were the last to surrender, have been
the foremost and the frankest to accept the con-
ditions of defeat. The reputation of General LEE
is almost unequalled. His is a name that can gild
any page of history, no matter how crushing the
defeat it records. His opinions are well known, and
were openly enunciated, immediately on the close of
the war. Had the South, followed his counsel, as it
followed him in the field, the question of Recon-
struction would, ere this, have been settled. Among
his most distinguished lieutenants was General
LONGSTREET, the successor of a soldier whose memory
is everywhere held in veneration. "We made,"
said the General, " an honest, and 1 hope I may say
a creditable, fight, but we lost. Let us come for-
ward, then, and accept the ends involved in the
struggle. Let us accept the terms, as we are in
duty bound to do, and if there is a lack of good faith,
let it be upon others." This is the counsel given to
the South by the men recognised from D IXIE'S line to
the Gulf States as its true and well-tried cham-
pions. The effect, of the South accepting this ad-
vice, is seen most curiously in the North. A large
section of the Northern people are at once satisfied,
and return immediately to a critical examination of
the measures of which the South complains :--
" Two years ago," says the Round Table,
should scarcely ourselves have believed that the pre-
sent time would have found us occupying so un-
generous an attitude towards our subjugated
brethren. We would not have believed that, fight-
ing as we avowed for liberty, sacrificing our child-
ren in hecatombs for the sublime cause of human
enfranchisement and equal rights, we should find
ourselves to-day proceeding to rule a gallant and
half-ruined people, by a system, which, if not a posi-
tively unmitigated despotism, requires the acutest
sophistry of its apologists to prove it otherwise."
The Round Table belongs to no party ; and in
speaking out a well-considered view of any subject
it handles, enunciates opinions, which, though they
may be little heard, are very widely felt. So
long as the South, backed by the PRESIDENT
and the Democratic party, presented a for-
midable opposition, the North rallied to the
support of the extreme Republican party. But
when the South shows a disposition to accept
the terms on which the Northern mind is fixed,
the indications of its victory—the props, which
had kept up the Radical ascendancy, are cut away,
and that party will soon swing down to its
proper level, which' is, and ought to be,
one of a fair balance, in the scale of the nation.
The extreme Republicans will have done good ser-
vice in bringing the South to a just sense of its
position. The Southern oligarchy had been so
accustomed to domineer, that it.could not refrain,
even after a defeat, that would 'llse crushed to the
earth any other people. It is to be hoped that this
second lesson will prove sufficient ;—that the change
in Northern sentiment will be received as the
evidence of a kindly and brotherly feeling ;—that
the concessions will be accepted as concessions, and
the feeling reciprocated. Then, indeed, the Union
can be reconstructed without the aid of bayonets !
and its greatest danger, which might become chronic
so long as the wound remained open and unhealed,
will disappear in peace and reconciliation.—Anglo
American Times.

" we

Letters from Italy state that Garibaldi is con-
fined to his bed at Calanlo with the gout.

SPIRIT OP THE PUBLIC JODRNALS.

- - 41.

TIMES.—If M. Rattazzi has not yet made us ac-
quainted with the views and purposes of his new
Cabinet, it is not because he has wanted good op-
portunities for explanation. He introduced his col-
leagues to the House of Deputies on Thursday last,
on which occasion he delivered a speech intended as
a Ministerial programme. Three days later he had
to unfold his policy in answer to a question put by
the Milanese Deputy, Giuseppe Ferrari, and ingeni-
ous but eccentric member of the Extreme Left, who
must not be confounded with Francesco Ferrara, a
Sicilian, the new Minister of Finance, or with the
Piedmontese Ferraris, a gentleman belonging
to
that municipal faction which has lately contracted
an unnatural alliance with the so-called Party of
Action. Ferrari asked first of the late, then of the
present Premier, some information respecting the '
causes which had led to the late Ministerial changes.
Baron Ricasoli drily answered that "he had no
account to give." M. Battazzi more courteously
but no less firmly refused to enter into any expla-
nation. All this seems to be perfectly consistent
with constitutional usage in Italy, where five
years ago we had the precedent of another non-
Parliamentary crisis, also terminating in a sub-
stitution of the same Rattazzi for the same
Ricasoli. On that occasion also the parties con-
cerned intrenched themselves behind a barrier of
impenetrable mystery, upon which, as was natural,
the worst construction was put. A sufficient majo-
rity, however, rallied in that instance round the
Rattazzi Ministry to enable it to carry on the
Government, till it broke down in consequence of
the affair of Aspromonte. The analogy between
the crisis of 1862 and that of 1867 could not fail
at this moment to give rise to sinister surmises,
and, independently of the underhand manceuvres
to which Rattazzi is always supposed to owe his rise,
the present change, like the former, is ascribed to
Ricasoli's stubborn resistance, and Rattazzi's ready
obsequiousness, to the will of the Tuileries. The ;
" thunderbolt from a clear sky," which struck
Ricasoli, was, it is stated, determined by a shift
in the King's policy from Berlin to Paris ; and it
portended a resolution to make common cause
with France against Germany in any outbreak of
hostilities. On that point, we are happy to see,
M. Rattazzi deemed it expedient to undeceive the
country and the world. "We are," he said,
" without any engagement whatever towards
foreign countries. Nothing can withdraw our
attention from the exigencies of our internal
situation." He further stated that the men of the
present Administration were bound to the same
general political principles as his predecessors.
Evidently the new Premier will lie on no bed of
roses. He is a man of rare tact and dexterity ; he
has a long experience of public business ; he has
ready wit, a happy versatility, a well-assumed
vehemence in debate. He is easy and winning,
open-hearted and open-handed in private inter-
course. His friends are few but stanch ; foremost
among them is the King. In the same Cabinet
with Ricasoli, Rattazzi would have been a godsend
to Italy in her present straits. Alone, this will be
the third time that he takes the jlestinies of the
country in his hands. Let us hope that present
success may efface all recollection of past feilures.
THE " WESTMINSTER GAZETTE " ON PEACE AND
WAR.—This week has been crowded with news 01
the gravest character. It shows us that we are
living in times when it is quite possible for Europe
to lie down at night in peace and to wake up in the
morning and find war. This unfixity of tenure
which peace has now in Europe is the result of the
abandonment of the principles of national law hi
favour of the passions and the dictates of the Re'
volution. The war of interests, which Napoleon
now seems ready to provoke, may be followed
by a -War of principles incited by the revolu-
tionary party throughout Europe. The vanity
of France, wounded to the • quick by the
military predominance of Prussia, has seized the
opportunity which the pecuniary necessities of the
King of Holland offered, of endeavouring, by
the purchase of Luxemburg, to indemnify bile"
self for the aggrandizement of Prussia. It can
hardly be possible for Napoleon, at any rate, with,'
out risking his hold upon France, to put forward
such a pretension, and to shrink from the conso-
quences, which he cannot but have foreseen,
of Prussia's refusal to consent to an inch
of German soil being alienated from Ger-
many. Diplomatic discomfiture or a war with
Germany, united to man in defence of German
territory against such overweening pretensions/
is no pleasant alternative for Napoleon. But,
as it is inconceivable that he could have coulte
another diplomatic defeat at the hands of Prussil
without some motive, we must suppose the:
France is either more prepared for immediate
war than is generally supposed, or else th 3
Napoleon wishes to make Prussia appear so ne"
reasonable and unconciliatory in its conduct 11'
regard to France as to excite the country to so°
a pitch of indignation as to make war at no dis-
tant period unavoidable. The break up of thei
Italian Ministry and the substitution of Ratazi
for the unpliable Ricasoli, seems to favour the OP:
position that in case of war with Germany, Franc'
may count on Italy as an ally. Austria, however'
is said to be in favour of peace; as a possible mean;
of reconciling the conflicting claims of France aer
Prussia as to the possession of Luxemburg k.
,
von Beust suggests the razing of that formidabwo
fortress. The idea of consulting the Powers wh
signed the Treaty of 1839, as to the dispositioicl
of Luxemburg, is an expedient to gain time, an_c
time, at least, may lead to a peaceful solution !-'1;
this awkward question. Our demand upon SPa.h
to make amends for its illegal seizure of Enghs
vessels, and the reported ',answer of the SPitn-
ish Minister that he will cause the Spanish tribe;
nals to be respected, add to the troubled asPec
of European affairs. The vigilant attitude f
Russia, the disturbed state of Turkey and It,
Christian provinces bid fair, in case of an o'l,
break of war, to precipitate the long-peach"
Eastern question.
All these complicated relations, and the 1111;0
settled state of the principles on which Europei.i,
governed, cast a shadow which no Universal Es-P..0.
bition at Paris, no sham debates in the ChambelLe:
no speculations in the Bourse can clissipa..„'
France with its revolutionary ideas, its wars of r
terests, and its wars of principles—always so dgito
gerous to the peace of Europe—and now with of
wounded vanity, with its growing jealousYttef
Prussia what is France brooding over ? A-
the Exhibition is over, after the Chassepot Ae4
are prepared, what will France give to Europe
Peace, or War ?