The Sun.
London, England, 1835-12-24 00:00:00

capabilities, in order to lay the " flattering unction"
to the soul of those who dread their application. But
no fault of this kind deteriorates the merit of Russian

3tatesmanship or diplomacy. All the state papers of
Russia which have been lately published, whether of a
public or secret character, show she is aware of the
true wisdom of looking at the dark and bright side of
every subject. In the conflicts in which she prepares
to engage, it has been seen that she foresees and openly
states what she considers advantageous—what disad-
vantageous to her. own cause. , This line of conduct,
if that cause were good, would be true wisdom. Nor.
is it less wisdom on our part to admit that her diplo-
macy is conducted with an energy, a tact, and an in-
telligence which, while it embraces vast fields of action,
and an equally wide scope of calculation, distances and
baffles the minute and formal diplomacy of more ci-
vilised Europe. It has been the chief implement of.
her acquisitions, and, to understand it, is to understand
how to counteract her ambitious projects without
o.oino.s, to war. By so doing we shall solve the
problem mooted by the writer in the Polonais.
One proof of Russia's adroitness consists in her skill
of concealing her-real fear of war. Though fearing
it with the finesse of a practised gamester, a
threat of war has always been one of her great cards
for clearing the table, and carrying off the stakes. Is
her advance upon Constantinople arraigned ? Dare
not to interfere with my victim, is her reply ; or war.
Is her transmission of an auxiliary force to the Sultan
deprecated ? She has the same ready alternative—
war. A protest against her treacherous acquisitions
on the east of the Caspian is answered and silenced in
the same way. Poland is crushed, and the treaty of
Vienna is pleaded, and she answers the pleaders with
contemptuous frankness :—" It is my will, be silent,
or war." Thus has she extorted from her deluded and
browbeaten adversaries a silent acquiescenee with each
astounding accumulation of her pacific aggrandize-
milts. Meanwhile, as we have said, she would
tremble as much as the powers she threatens, in
engaging in that war, with the name of which
she has cunningly found that she can palsy their
sympathies and their exertions. Like Shakspeare's
Ancient Pistol, she has always fury on her lips, and a
rapier in her hand ; though she would yield to being
kicked down stairs at the sound of a threatening tongue,
or the sight of an opponent sword. But the game, when
detected, will not last. It is on record that she con-
fesses it to be an imposture. She has confessed that
she trembles at a war with England, on account of the
War of opinion which it would involve. We know her
weak place, and our statesmanship ought to avail itself
of that knowledge in counteracting the treacherous
warfare which she carries on under the mask of peace,
by means of an equally well-organized and ramified
diplomacy. Mr. Canning showed that he knew the
sore point when, in 'lB23—(while Russia was stimu-
lating the restored Ferdinand to demand, and the re-
stored Bourbons to grant military aid to absolutism)—
he made an announcement which was felt through each
susceptible fibre of her diplomatic web from circumfer-
ence to centre. He told Russia what she knew and
trembled to know, that England—as YEolus had power
to confine or loose the winds—had power to confine
or loose the free opinions and popular principles of the
world ; and to set them in fatal conflict with the un-
tenable principles of divine right and irresponsible
power. Such a conflict, it is quite evident, would not
terminate without sweeping every vestige of the thrones
of the absolute powers from the surface of the earth.—
Morning Advertiser.
It is with the. greatest satisfaction we observe our
well-meant observations have produced an effect in the
proper quarter ;—the Board of Admiralty has taken
up two ships, the Elphinston and Strathfieldsaye, in
every respect unexceptionable, for the conveyance of
convicts to our penal settlements.- These two vessels
stand A 1 in Lloyd's Register, and, being of great
height in the 'tween decks, will afford proper accom-
modation for the unhappy outcasts who are to be con •
veyed to the other hemisphere. Contrasted with the
ships which have been chartered by the Homc Office,
what a sad reflection do they cast on those whose duty
it has been to take up vessels for that employment.
We have complained of the ships that have been taken
up in a spirit of sorrow and grief for the loss of so many
lives—lives which have been spent in the paths of
wickedness, and :plunged into eternity, before sincere
repentrmee had obtained an influence. We have done
our duty in pointing out the errors that have existed in
the system of chartering these ships, and we hope
the Board of Admiralty, to whom the business has
been transferred, will conduct their labours in a ,satis-
factory manner. We shall ever be on the watch, and
should a ship of an inferior description be taken up we
shall not hesitate to censure 'as we have censured.
Even nor:, we hope orders will be, or have been, given
to detain the " Surrey." The very thought of send-
ing poor creatures the distance of 14,000 miles, in a
vessel twenty-four years old, and sending them in a
ship, which cannot, from its capacity, carry boats to
hold the. whole. number, in case of an accident occur-
ring, makes the blood run cold. If, after the warning
we have given, anything happens to this ship, we shall
not envy Lord John Russell his feelings. We have
received many letters upon the subject, some of them
reproving, others approving. Our course has been
direct. We have condemned the parties we thought
negligent in the public offices, and not the ship.;
owners, who naturally wish their ships, whether new
or old, to be taken up for the public.service.—Morn-
ing Herald.
Rumours have been afloat for the last day or two
that an attempt had been made by a section of the
Ministry, including the Premier, and led by him, to
effect a political junction with those members of Lord
Grey's Cabinet who are most inimical to the O'Con-
nell dominion, and whose recent conduct has entitled
them to be considered as the leaders of a very impor-
tant body of auxiliaries to the Conservative cause. We
know of no other foundation for those rumonrs than
certain visits which we announced in the regular course
in the part of our paper appropriated to such intelli-
gence, and which, for any thing that has yet appeared,
may have been paid in the ordinary interchange of so-
cial courtesy. It is remarkable, indeed, that so much
attention should have been attracted by circum-
stances apparently of so trivial a nature, and that in-
ferences so important should have been deduced from
them. To account for this, it is however only neces-
sary to refer to the situation of the Administration,
which everybody perceives to be desperate, and to its
character, which leaves no room to doubt that it would
be just as ready to abandon its Popish allies and to
renounce their schemes for the robbery and destruction
of the Church, as it was to embrace the former and to
adopt the latter, the prevailing motive now, as before,
being exclusively the meritorious and honourable de-
sire to get good places and to keep them. Nobody.
believes that any Member of the present Government
would think of making an overture either to Lord
Stanley or the Duke of Richmond, which did not include
the specific condition that the Chinch spoliation pro-
ject of the Melbourne-O'Connell confederacy should
be absolutely and finally given up. And let us stop
for one moment to ask in what estimation the people
of this country must hold the present Ministers of the
Crown, when they have very generally given credit to
rumours which imply the utmost alacrity on the part of
those Ministers to abandon, for the sake of retaining
office, the measure and the principle by means of which
they forced themselves into office a few short months
ago ? Are Statesmen of whom it can so easily
be believed that they are ready to embrace and to
repudiate for their own purposes, and in alter-
nation as frequent and rapid as those purposes
may require, a question so deeply affecting the peace,
welfare, and security of the State as that which formed
the groundwork of their disgraceful compact with Mr.
O'Connell—are the statesmen, we ask, whose characters
are not such as at once to put down and utterly discredit
so odious an imputation—fit men to govern the British
nation, or any other civilized or intelligent commu-
nity ? We are no advocates for obstinacy in error, or
what is sincerely believed to be such, by the party re-
nouncing it. The most conscienticus statesman may
sometimes, no doubt, see good reason to modify or
even to reverse his former opinions. But the flexibility
which the common rumour of the moment imputes to
Lord Melbourne and his colleagues, without a single
man being heard to say that it is improbable in them, is
of a kind which the utmost latitude that can be claimed
or imagined for conscientious conviction will scarcely
comprehend. It would -require extraordinary charity to I