The Sun.
London, England, 1859-11-09 00:00:00

THE ADMIRALTY.

(From the Times.)
We have recently from time to time announced
the appointment of officers to various ships about
to form part of the expedition to China. It may be
presumed, therefore, that the time is approaching
when the squadron is to put to sea, and that the cap-
tains are at this moment engaged in fitting out
their new commands. If this be so, we desire to
put a few words upon record. It is always an un-
welcome task to direct the public notice to the ac-
tion of the Admiralty. In the first place, the secret
wheels of this piece of mechanism are so well hid-
den that no one can guess with much confidence
what is going on ; and, secondly, this department
hates all suggestion from outside its office even be-
yond the abhorrence of all other official men.
Then there is no season at which a word of warn-
ing or expostulation can be pertinently offered. If
•the expedition be still unformed, it is an indefen-
sible intermeddling with the business of persons
who are by education and experience the best pos-
sible judges of the exigencies of the occasion. If
failure has happened, and lives have been sacrificed
by reason of these men of special education and ex-
perience, the cry is "Let bygones be bygones ; the
sacrifice of a victim will not recover the loss sus-
tained. We must not be vindictive. We will re-
form the system." It is always too early or too
late to say a word about the navy or the army.
Yet failures do occur—rather too frequently, and
results are very
.prompt to make it appear that
absolute wisdom is not everywhere present in either
department. We have no actual knowledge of
what may be taking place in the fitting out of this
China squadron, and therefore we have no accusa-
tion to suggest and no shortcomings to reveal ; but
we all have some idea of the usaal routine which
takes place on these occasions, and we all have some
knowledge of what has happened from following
that routine upon former expeditions. The expe-
rience of the past seems to justify es in risking the
imputation of presumption, and in asking for a
little special attention to the requirements of the
particular service to which the ships are destined.
Something more than the regular and ordinary
equipment of a man-of-war is necessary for a naval
force about to act in Chinese waters. You are send-
ing the men to an unhealthy climate, where the
' sun rains down shafts much more terrible than the
arrows that are sped from Tartar bows ; where the
rivers give out miasmas which slay much more cer-
tainly than the enemies dwelling upon their banks.
It is not a cruise in the Mediterranean upon which
these men are going. A berth in a gunboat in a
run round the Cape is nearly an amphibious state
of existence. There is decidedly an unfair prepon-
derance of the denser element about it. Not one
seaman in ten who has had his run on shore has, or
could, in the last China expedition, obtain clothes •
sufficient to keep him from shivering in the
cold blasts off the Cape. Arrived in the hot
latitudes, double awnings and rain awnings were
talked about only as things to be wished for,
but which had either been refused by the Admiralty
or not thought of at home. Gunboats carry no sar-
geon, and the lieutenants commanding are very
wisely intrusted with only -a few of the more harm-
less and simple medicines ; but this is a weighty
reason why we should double our preventatives
when we are obliged to diminish our means of cure.
From the little matters that have caused great sick-
nesses and sore trouble, and sent many a good fel-
low most unnecessarily into hospital at a moment
when he was most needed, we strongly suspect that
this equipment must be a piece of cut and dried
official •routine. There must be somewhere or other
a clerk with a book—a very honest, well-intentioned
man, no doubt, but a man whose business it is to
copy, and not to think. We cannot expect him to
go out of his nature and think. If binnacles were
not in his list, binnacles wouldn't be allowfd.
Perhaps this clerk, or this class of clerks, may have
a naval superior whose mind is like the old prece-
dent book—always wants posting up, always ten
years behind the present state of naval tactics. The
natural tendency of such a mind would be to stick
as closely.as possible to the old system. He has never
thoroughly learnt the value of the maxim that pre-
vention is better than cure. Even thebfortifying
the men by unlimited supplies of quinine, and pro-
tectinm them by canvas, hardly commend' them-
solves to his cordial approbation. There should be
a civilian and an unprofessional eye to investigate
these matters of naval physical comforts ; and we
commend this necessary labour to the First Lord.
We do not venture to specify what may be required
that may probably have been omitted. Ask any
sailor who has been one in that very Creditable ex-
ploit of carrying out all the gunboats now in the
China Sea.

it is to be hoped, moreover, that we shall not
have our official people, like a Hamiltonian school
class, spelling in chdrus that dreadful word " Im-
possible." We have been talking of our improve-
ments ; this is to be a sample expedition—a test
of what we can do. We have been voting money
with lavish hands for our dockyards and arsenals ;
we are now about to see what we have bought. We
have been reading all sorts of accounts of expri-
ments in Woolwich Marshes, but as we did not pro.
pose to spend our millions in fireworks, we are now
about to test these things in serious warfare. It is
a capital opportunity for the test and confirmation
of new inventions. Those Taku Forts cannot be
attacked in front without serious loss, but the new
rifled cannon which our ships will carry wilL shell
out the defenders at long range and from outside
the bar. There is a particuiar invention for de-
stroying obstructions in rivers. It is not so novel
but that the last expedition might have been
equipped with it, It is to be hoped that inquiry
will be made next session whether Admiral Hope
was in a position to avail himself of it, and, if not,
by whose fault this happened, and what influence
that fault had in causing the disgrace that be-
fell our arms and the loss of our 4571 countrymen.
This time, however, the ships that go out to force
their way up obstructed rivers are, of course, fitted
with these aids, and with plenty of rockets to keep
the banks clear. Upon the last occasion our tars
envied the French their light field-pieces, which a
couple of men could carry over, swampy ground,
where our heavier guin could not be safely landed.
This hint has, of course, been-taken. The principal
feature, however, of this new expedition will neces-
sarily be the rifled cannon. Whether the French
go with us or fallow after us, the two squadrons will
be patterns of what Woolwich and Toulon can do.
There may, perhaps, be something even more than
emulation in the feeling with which these two
squadrons will regard each other, and measure the
force of their respective armaments.
Oae word more, and upon another topic :—There
lave been differences of opinion as to whether we
should declare war against the Emperor of China.
The dispute is really unworthy of practical men.
It is a diplomatic pedantry quite outside the pre-
sent circumstances. The Chinese Emperor de-
stroys our fleet and kills our people, but he doesn't
declare war against us. If we were to make a
solemn declaration of war, withdraw our Consuls,
stop_ our trade, and generously hand- over all our
commerce to the Americani, the Chinese would
simply think we were demented. They neither
know nor care for these niceties. But, although
we do not declare war, we are, in fact, as much at
war with Chiffa as we Were at war with France
when we fought the Battle of the-Nile. ' Upon this
distinction, however, it is possible to raise a mise-
rable and dishonest quibble—a quibble which would
be disgraceful to any honest man, and which it is
impossible that any gentleman could ever put for-
ward. But still it is a possible quibble, and Jack
is a suspicious creature. Some one has put it into
his head that. he will not get his Chinese prize-
money because "we were not at war ;" that he
will not have certain allowances " because we were
not at war ;" and that the absence of- this declara-
tion of war to him is a matter of material impor-
tance. This belief, which we hope is as certainly
as it is .apparently preposterous, is operating to
make the present expedition unpopular with the
men who have served in China before, and who are
the most useful hands to have there again.. They
care little for the climate, and nothing for the hard
knocks; but they have not had their prize-money,
and they spoilt all their clothes without any re-
compenv.

Nothing would satisfy us so well as to be not
only accused, but actually convicted, of a most
unnecessary intermeddling in this matter. We
should be glad to see it proved against us that all
our suggestions have been already foreseen, and
that all our suspicions are baseless. We would
willingly undergo the triumphant retort that every
captain gets everything he asks for which he be-
lieves to tend to the efficiency of his ship and the
comfort of his men ; that the squadron is equipped
with armaments of the latest and most improved
weapons ; that arrangements have been made to
secure that the men have plenty of warm clothing
when they go on hoard ;_that officers and men hive
all received their prize--money months ago, and
that both soldiers and sailors have been assured
that no technical diplomatic matter, such as a formal
declaration, of war, will have any effect upon their
profits or comforts. If we could obtain such
assurances as, these, they would very much, tend to