The Sun.
London, England, 1857-01-29 00:00:00

men were barbarously tortured and murdered

only three miles from the city, while seeking a 1,,
little fresh air out of the close factories. Ships
and brick walls are the only places, it would seem,
within which Englishmen may move or breathe
at Canton. In the interior, not long after, a
French missionary was barbarously murdered,
and three others barely escaped with their lives,
all in direct contravention of the last Treaty.
Now, there does seem no conceivable reason
why Canton should longer evade the fulfil-
ment of treaties and agreements any more than
the other four ports. One of them, Pow-Chow,
wished to play the same game as Canton, but it
was not permitted to do so ; and the result has
been that we have had peaceful relations there,
and both natives and foreigners have profited by
our firmness. At Canton, on the contrary, for-
bearance has received the only interpretation
which semi-barbarians, like Russians and Chinese,
always put upon it—that fear was at the bottom.
Henc© a series of unendurable insults and injuries,
till the English authorities apparently resolved
that the next must be the last. That next was
the boarding of the Arrow. Satisfaction was
demanded. It was granted in the style which,
if accepted, would only increase the radical
mischief ; and Admiral SEYMOUR, most properly,
we think, demanded that the haughty system,
directly in the teeth of treaties 'and subsequent
agreements, of refusing to foreign 'authorities
direct intercourse with Chinese officials should now
cease. Hitherto we must think the Admiral has
acted with equal humanity and courage. He has
destroyed nothing but forts built to protect vio-
lations of the treaty, and Government buildings
belonging to the obdurate and really guilty par-
ties. Canton, as yet, has been treated like Odessa.
Apparently with the same results, for YEn has
set fire to the factories though we respected the
Chinese private property.
We must continue also to lay the same stress, as
we have yet done, o'h the cordial acquiescence of
the mercantile community at Canton in the Ad-
miral's proceedings. Both public and private in-
formation show that all the merchants approve
the measures taken. When we consider the ex-
traordinary sensitiveness of trade to any inter-
ruption, this circumstance has the greatest weight.
Merchants and traders generally are prone to bear
with too much for the sake of peace and quiet.
They are not the men for merely political wars or
revolutions, except under the most pressing neces-
sity. Think of the BRIGHT and COBDEN class
endorsing an Admiral's acts ! We may
be sure when this is the case that
they were indispensable ; that the interruption
of trade itself was better than the continu-
ance of injuries and insults which longer forbear.
ance would engender. The time was come
to put a stop to all that—to demand that fo-
reigners should be treated as equals of the
Chinese ; at least that they should enjoy at
Canton the reasonable privileges which they pos-
sess at the other Chinese ports, and to which
they are entitled by treaty.

We want the War Income Tax repealed ; and
have, therefore, as little desire as any can have
to incur the cast of needless Eastern wars ; but
the "Arrow" case is a very different one to the
great "Mrs. HA.SHEM case." We hope, too, that
YElf or his master will be made t. pay the cost
of war if he force it on us ; indeed this seems
likely, since China had to pay before, without any
regard to her EMPEROR'S " dignity.' It is only
the dignity of political felons of far deeper dye,
such as Czars who iiivade other rulers' territory,
to save which we must pay a War Income Tax in
time of peace, instead of making the arch-burglar
bear the expense of expelling him from his neigh-
bour's dwelling. Now, however, the time is
come to compel the Chinese Government to grant
all reasonable facilities to Europeans for trading
with them. The people generally wish it, for
they avail themselves of all that we have gained
from the EMPEROR and his mandarins. We
hope therefore a better treaty than before will
now be exacted.

H.M.S. The Royal Frederick—a glorious man-
of-war, carrying 116 guns, having aburden of 3,100
tons, and constructed at a cost to the country of
upwards of 100,0001.—is just discovered to be
very seriously affected by the dry-rot. Observe !
—this magnificent three-decker is only just now
discovered to be very seriously affected by the
dry-rot, after having remained actually seven-
and-twenty years on the stocks, never having yet
to this very day been launched ! It is only
another illustration, we are perfectly aware,
of a well known and even notorious grievance.
But it is a very striking illustration—an illus-
tration so peculiarly significant in its way, that
we cannot but regard it as one entitled to a few
moments deliberate consideration. There are
many other ships of war, besides this one, lying
idle in our dockyards—many others that have been
lying idle there for years past, rotting away iu
like manner upon the stocks, and destined, so far
as one can at all calculate, to remain there for
yet many years longer, until they shall at length,
in the fullness of time, be broken up at hit, and
carted away as rubbish by a remote posterity !
There are absolutely, in some of our dock-
yards, men-of-war situated like this by twos
and by threes " all of a row"—fastened like so
many village varlets " in the stocks"—fixtures as
inexorably bound there, apparently, as ever
THESEUS was bound to the Chair of Hell ! But
the Royal Frederick, although in no respect an
exceptional case, is, at the same time we must
admit, a very startling one. One so startling, so
strikingly illustrative of the monstrous evil doings
of the Admiralty in this particular, that we do
seriously think it is an example not to be passed
by as of no peculiar significance.
What are the simple facts of the Case ? Here
—in H.ALS. the Royal Frederick, of 116 guns,
of 3,100 tons burden, built twenty-seven years ago
at a cost of more than 100,0001.—is a magnificent
man-of-war which has never yet been launched,
and is only now, at the close of the January of
1857, found to be very seriously affected by the
dry-rot ! The keel and other parts of her are so
far injured as to be, to all intents and purposes,
utterly worthless ! Literally, the vessel we are now
writing about is what we may call an "artificial ruin'
of a very noble specimen of maritime architecture.
As a noble specimen of her class, beyond all doubt,
this vessel must still be regarded ; but then, as
has been recently remarked in commercial phra-
seology, and remarked, too, be it observed, very
judiciously, it is a class of vessels latterly placed
at a discount by the modern tendency to con-
struct ships-of-war not merely of a heavier ton-
nage, but ships all but endowed with vitality by
being fitted up with the screw-propeller ! Where-
fore it is not to us the least bit in the world
surprising to learn now that it is intended that
the Royal Frederick shall, in the twenty-eighth
year of her existence, be treated as so many
other vessels of the same class have already been
treated in slow succession ! It is only hearing
the same old story all over again when we are
told now, as we actually are told, that it is con-
templated in regard to the Royal Frederick to
cut her in,f
I
to lengthen her—and to fit her )