The Sun.
London, England, 1859-12-07 00:00:00

THE MUTINY ON BOARD THE

PRINCESS ROYAL.

That the greatness and even the safety of this
country depend on its fleet is a proposition shish
no one is likely to controvert ; but there is a matter
which some of our professional men seem to forget
—namely, that the Navy must rely, like other in-
stitutions, on its own merits for support, and that if
under the volunteering system men are to be induced
to enter her Majesty's ships, it must be by the offer
of a proper remuneration, and by treating them as
reasonable beings while they are on board. The
character of the English seaman is too well known
to require comment. He is impulsive and thought-
less, easily moved by kindness or wrong, but habi-
tually obedient, laborious, and cheerful. It has
always been a maxim in the Navy that the crew is
what the captain makes it, and that while one man
will be willingly and faithfully served, another suc-
ceeding to the command will turn the ship in six
months into a perfect den of mutiny. The great
fault in these cases is not strictness, it is not even
severity. Officers severe even to cruelty have been
among the most popular, and have exercised the
most complete influence over their crews. The most
dangerous fault in a commander is capriciousness.
This is sufficient to neutralise any number of good
qualities. The soldier or sailor who finds him-
self the sport of another man's will, who must
continually obey one who cannot direct or con-
trol himself, is naturally made irritable, and, in
time savage. What a man chiefly loses by enter-
ing either service is liberty of action; this loss
he feels, and it is part of the English character
to feel it very deeply. If our present system of
recruiting for both services is to be continued,
it should be the duty of every one in authority
to lessen as much as possible the irksomeness of a
soldier's or a sailor's life. The latter more especially
is entitled to a reasonable amount of indulgence. He
maybe, and often is, kept at sea for months together,
engaged in the monotonous duties of a ship of war,
and cooped up in a narrow space with several hund-
reds of companions. What can be more reasonable,
and, indeed,more desirable, than that when he comes
into port he should have a proper amount of leave,
and be allowed to forget the weariness of a long
cruise Sailors are but men, and it is not to be sup-
posed that when they look out upon the streets of
Portsmouth or Plymouth, and see their officers
going daily on shore, they would not long to
have something like the same liberty. At all
events, one thing is certain—that if, in addi-
tion to other attractions, the merchant ser-
vice allows Jack to have a run on shore every
time he comes into port, while the Naval service
keeps him within the bounds of a discipline need-
lessly and foolishly severe, the question of manning
the Navy is not likely to approach a solution.
The case of the Princess Royal seems to have been
one in which this kind of caprice has been produc-
tive of serious consequences. We have no inten-
tion of making a charge ourselves, but it would be
affectation to ignore the rumours which are circu-
lated as to the cause of this event. The details are
well known. The crew of the Princess Royal,
which had recently returned from the Mediter-
ranean, applied for leave ashore from Saturday to
Monday morning. The Captain and Commander
Jesting assented, and the former sent the petition to
the Port Admiral, who granted leave at first for half
the ship's company, but when the men had actually
got to the gates of the Dockyard countermanded
the permission, and had the men marched back.
It is, we think, but right that some inquiry should
be made into this transaction, and that we should
be able to learn from Admiral Bowles and Captain
Baillie the particulars of their interview. Should
it prove that Admiral Bowles, merely from the
querulousness of an octogenarian, stopped the
leave—though the injustice and danger of such an
act were urged by more than one officer—it would
appear that nothing happened between the grant-
ing and the rescinding of the leave) to justify the
change of resolution on the Admiral's part, it will
be a question how far the interests of the Navy at
our first seaport can be entrusted to such weakness
and caprice.— Times.

FATAL ACCIDENT AT NEW WESTMINSTER
BRIDGE, THIS DAY.—This morning another fatal accident
occurred at the works now in progress for the completion of
the new bridge at Westminster. It seems a number of
men were engaged rivetting the iron work of the ornamental
parapet when a portion of the stage gave way near the
centre of the bridge, and three men were precipitated into
the water, two of them named Jones and Edwards clung to
the piling and were rescued; upwards of 21,P minutes however
elapsed before the body of the third poor allow named James
Collins, residing at 33, Con% die-street, Pimlico, could be
recovered, when it was immediately taken to Westminster
Hospital. The efforts to restore animation all failed.
SOUTH EASTERN RAlLWAY.—Revenue, receipts,
and expenditure from the Ist Aug. to the 19th Nov., 1859,
fifteen weeks and six days :—Rsceipts for four weeks ending
Nov. 19. Gross traffic—passengers, parcels, mails, goods,
&c., £79,018 10s. 2d. ; less—collecting and delivering goods,
&c., £1,190 118. 4d. ; total, £77,027 18s. 10d. ; rents and
sundries, £1,756 4s. 6d. ' • steam-packet service, £3,525 los.
; 10d. total receipts, £82,309 19s. 2d. ; receipts for the 15
weeks and six days ending Nov. 19, £409,053125. 7d. Ex-
penditure—including rates, taxes, tolls, government duty,
and expenses of steam-packet service, for the four weeks
ending Nov. 19, £37,716 9s. 4d. ; ditto, for the 15 weeks
and six days ending Nov. 19, £149,257 7s. ; net, for four
weeks ending Nov. 19, £44,593 9s. 10d.-' ditto, for 15 weeks
and six days ending Nov. 19, £252,79655. 7d.
ANOTHER TERRIBLE ASSASSINATION.—ThO fol-
lowing communication from the county Westmeath appears
in Saunders' News Letter this morning :—" Our county
has bees. again disgraced by a most barbarous and atrocious
murder, committed on an old and inoffensive farmer named
Kelly, residing near Drumraney. Kelly had taken five
acres of land which adjoined his farm, and from which the
late tenant had been ejected. On Sunday last he returned
from prayers at his parish chapel, and had just sat down
to his dinner, when his servant, from an adjoining apart-
ment, was startled at hearing the report of a gun; on en-
tering the room she found him lying dead upon the floor,
and his brains scattered over the food he had been eating.
The assassin must have been close to his victim, as the hair
and skfill were burned by its close proximity to the muzzle
of the gun."
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The Geographical Society of Paris has just pro-
' posed a prize of 6,000 fr. to the first traveller who shall per-
form the journey from Algeria to Senegal, or vice versa,
passing by Timbuctu.