The Sun.
London, England, 1861-08-17 00:00:00

1A NiERBURY

OXF O R D

6.. OXFORD-STREET.

The architectural beauty, elegance of ornamentation, and
brilliancy of lighting of this noble building, render it one of
the sights of London. Open Every Evening.. The pro-
gramme is varied, and includes Selections from " La Tra-
viat ~" "Un Ballo in Maschera," (to., (by a full company of
principals, powerful band, and chorus). Solos by Miss Bryant
en the Plano Forte, and by Mr. Russell on the Trombone.
Old English Ballad, by Miss Green, cotch Duets by the
;Misses Stuart, and other vocal and instrumental music of the
highest order. Conductor, Mr. F. Jong,hmans. The. C.2mie
portion of the entertainment is supported by Mand
Foster (in his " Life Sketches"), Sam Collins, Harvey,
French (the Nerves), E. Marshall, and W. Randall.
sixpenee ; Balcony and Stalls, one shilling. private Boxes,
10s. 6d.

- -
HIGH WATER AT LONDON BRIDGE.
Tme DAY.—Morning, 11h. 24m.—Afternoon, b. in.
To-momeow.-Morning, 12h. 6m.—Afternoon,' 12h, 36m.

THE WEATHER.—SUN OFFICE, AUGUST 17, 1561,
THEILMONETBB, IN THE SHADE.
72—highest since noon yesterday.
52—lowest this morning and during the night.
69 —this day at noon.
BARONETEII-30.08 ;

7 0 .
WIND - South• Westerly rather fresh ; with heavy,
cloudy weather.

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THE SUN.
LONDON, SATURDAY, AUGUST 17, 1881.

Under any circumstances it was recognised to be
little more than an instalment, at any rate to be
merely a commencement of a good work, this new
Bankruptcy Law, introduced into the House of
Commons this last session by Sir RICHARD BETHELL
SS Attorney-General, and carried through the
House of Peers by Lord WESTBURY, as Lord High
Chancellor. Supposing the bill to have been car-
ried through the Lords without aRy modification—
it must even then have been accepted by the Legis-
lature, and handed over to the public at large, simply
as a commencement. It happened last year that a
much larger measure of reform in regard to the Law
of Bankruptcy and Insolvency was submitted to
Parliament by the same great lawyer. That more
comprehensive measure, however, was too big to
be carried. The late-Attorney-General, the now
Lord High Chancellor of England, recognising
the cause of that failure, modified his
views, as we all very clearly, and let
us add, a-ery gratefully remember—introducing, in
lieu of his gigantic bill of the previous Session, one
of much more moderate scope, almost immediately
after Parliament was again brought together in
February. Without relaxing his energies he wisely
determined at once to lower his ambition for the
moment as a Law Reformer. His proposition to
Parliament, therefore, while becoming " small by
degrees" became also, in the best sense of the words,
" beautifully less," inasmuch as it increased the
probabilities of immediate success following these
diminished efforts of the First Law Adviser of the
Crown. The Commons appreciated the force of this
almost upon the instant, and passed the new Bill
through its several stages with all convenient speed.
A first and second time it was read—it passed
almost scathless through Committee—it was carried
in all essential respects unmarred from the Lower
to the Upper House of Parliament. There, in the
Lords, it met with very different treatment indeed.
Instead of being welcomed with cordiality as a step,
and a very notable step, too (though an exquisitely
cautious one) in the right direction—it was viewed
with suspicion almost from the instant of its
arTearance. Party spite, it was thought, would
'Yet scatter to the winds all the fair promises
afforded to the author of the measure during its
rapid transit through the Commons. That sus-
picion being awakened not unnaturally among
Government men by the apparently significant
fact that it was the noble Earl the leader of the
Opposition, and no other than Lord DERBY, who
moved that the new Bankruptcy Bill should be
referred to a Select Committee of the Lords for
more careful and deliberate examination. One
consequence of its being thus subjected
to the scrutiny of that (so far as the public
Were concerned) inaudible and invisible Com-
mittee was soon enough beheld and appreci-
ated. The measure upon again coming before the
Lords in Parliament assembled, was found to haye
passed through a series of frightful alterations.
It was not only that it had a limb lopped off here
and there, but its very head was clean gone—the
projected new judge of the Court of Bankruptcy.
The Bill was fairly decapitated. It came forth
bleeding from the ordeal. It then had to be either
rejected altogether or accepted for what it was
actually worth. No longer, of course, in the eyes
of its original fabricator a finished work of art—a
work of art perfected so far as it went—it was
sti.;l thought better (even by the Attorney-General,
newly transformed into Lord Chancellor) that
the measure in its stunted and splintered form
should be preserved for future completion rather
than thrown aside petulantly as no longer worthy
01 preservation. The work of art, with its hands
ankfeet broken away, and even its head struck off,
was still preserved as a sort of Torso. A Torso—
rag;,-,estis-e, by the lines of beauty still left, of the
manner of its future completion. Is it not notorious
—the advocates of the new Bankruptcy Bill might
have argued
within themselves is it not
'Dot orious that that
aL. that Boast and Triumph of
the sculptor's art, the " Venus de ATEDict" now de-
lighting all beholders from its pedestal in the
Tribune at Florence,
("t soveerrmyenlotnogf
many
when brought to light froraits
interment
centuries,
a headless fragite::eb,
oe
ft. bereft a
ionf,
_a,
ens s armtha
n?
And
s,,t_a skill of hand, of
attained by the practi'ed genius of
rHIDIAS or
PRAXITILES has since then brought that work of art,
apparent difficulty, to .
in spite of every app its present

state of completion ? .V? itlk Lord WESTBURY still on
the woolsack, still the presiding authoritj, among the
law reformers of our age, there cannot remain one
instant's doubt but that the measure marred during
this last session by the Secret Committee of the
Lords may be readily mended next session and
finished more to its author's satisfaction, The'
Head we still cannot but regard as all essential to
its symmetry. That, we are yet sanguine, may
be restored to it before next session shall have very
far advanced. There are minor improvements,
however, that have but to be pointed out, we
feel satisfied, to be at once adventured
upon. Amongst these must be mentioned one
suggested by the recognition of a grievance pointed
out only this very day by a correspondent of our
chief morning contemporary. " A few days since,"
writes this correspondent, "I received a dividend
warrant from the Liverpool District Court of
Bankruptcy on the Accountant in Bankruptcy
here for a considerable sum ; but on its presentation
I have been informed that the office where it is made
payable on demand is closed, and that its coffers will
not be re-opened till after the sth of October next."
And the writer adds, very judiciously, " The ab-
surdity of such a custom as connected with pecu-
niary commercial transactions requires no comment,
as it is obvious that many persons similarly cir-
cumstanced may not only be greatly inconve-
nienced, but possibly be ruined—at all events, in-
evitably inflicted with the loss of two months' in-
terest on a document which entitles the holder to
payment as promptly as that usually expected by
the holder of a banker's check." Here there is just
one important mem. to be jotted down by Lord
WESTBURY upon his note-book under the head of
—lmprovements imperatively required by the Act
of 1861 for the reform of the Bankruptcy Law.

M'CLELLAN seems to be the man. If the disas-
ter of Bull's Run be retrieved it will be his doing.
Already he is infusing into his mob army a sense
of the value of soldierly discipline, and necessity of
thorough drill ; he is setting the vain civilian
officers also the example of simple unostentatious
habits, of thorough sympathy with the men, of
' caring for their eomfort, and of sharing their pri-
vations when privations must be endured. From
the time when the Poet Warrior of Israel refused
to drink the water which might have cost the lives
of his men, and poured it before the " God of
Battles," to the last campaign of GARIBALDI—such
has been the spirit in leaders which has commanded
victory. " Want of confidence in their officers,"
we are now told, is the reason why great numbers
of the volunteers refuse to re-enlist ; it has even
been affirmed, but we have neither seen it con-
firmed nor denied, that the first fugitives at Bull's
Run took to flight, because they thought them-
selves surrounded, but soon found that the fire on
one flank and in the rear was from Federal
regiments ! They accordingly lost all confidence
and ran, to save their lives from the fire of their
own comrades. Even if this were not true,
its belief, and the possibility of its belief, by the
men, shows a state of things amongst the officers
which would demoralise any army.
The notorious fact is, that politics have officered
the American Northern army. The PRESIDENT
and the Commander-in-Chief have been aware of
the folly, but have been unable to resist !t. Even
since the late rout the politicians have had the
audacity to press their pets on the military autho-
rities. The PRESIDENT, adroitly and wisely
intended to anticipate them by handing over every-
thing to M'CLELLAN; but, even after that, the
selfishness and vanity of his political supporters
endeavoured. to overreach him. Looking on the
war and its administration from a distance, it
appears to us that all depends on placing everything
on the line of the Potomac under the absolute con-
trol of such a man as M'CLELLAN. Between him
and his only superior, General SCOTT, the most
perfect understanding exists. The latter must com-
bine the operations of the far West, and of the East at
Fort Monroe, with the long centre, but in that
centre M'CLELLAN must shape and train his army
for himself. From Western Virginia to Acquia
Creek, on the Potomac, where the railroal to Rich-
mond begins, is, in fact, the scene for the operations
of one grand army and its co operating corps. And
its commander must be able to confide in every
officer and in every man of it.
In his own former corps M'CLELLAN can trust.
His officers and his men, whom he left behind,
to proceed himself to Washington, are carrying
on his work. Our readers may remember that
after his brilliant victories in Western Virginia he
and his generals were manoeuvring to drive out
General WISE from the Valley of the Kanawha.
This General WISE, the same braggart who paraded
his tens of thousands of Virginian militia round
the scaffold of the noble old JOHN BROWN,
has been obliged to flee, much in the style
of the Bull's Run gentry. General ROSEN-
CRANTZ, whom M'CLELLAN left to deal with him
writes that he had fled precipitately, destroy-
ing a bridge to prevent pursuit, leaving a thousand
muskets, and kegs of cannon powder. And the
New York Tinges adds that he has been pursued
from place to place, till at last the Federal troops
are almost certain to catch him. This looks as if
M'CLELLAN were the kind of general to inspire
his subordinate commanders with his own spirit,
We have little doubt that he is ; and that if he have
time and be not interfered with, we may yet see an
advance from the Potomac as successful and decisive
as that from Ohio into Western Virginia. But, all
depends on the reversal of the vain boast of the
Roman Orator, and as a sensible American cor-
respondent remarks, it must now be Cedunt togae
armis.

Warm work is still going on in Missouri. Gen
FREMONT is there, and has of course a reputation
to sustain, and a hearty zeal on the right side.
But the Secessionists are evidently almost, if not
quite, as numerous as the Unionists. The State
which furnished the Kansas Border ruffians may
beexpected
give some' trouble. Gen. PILLOW
is a
on the Mississippi, about 50
tNew
Madrid, to
miles from Cairo, which the Federalists held, and
at which they prevent all down traffic to the
Confederates. He is said to have mustered 50,000
men, but if they be of the class described by Mr.
RUSSELL, they ought not to give Gen. FREMONT,
who is at Cairo, much trouble. Gen. PILLOW has
at least fired off a proclamation that he intends
"to drive all invaders out of Missouri," but his
artillery firing must be very different from what
RussELL saw if it i, to effect that objccl.
The city now seems to be safe. Pickets are
stationed from Washington to Harper's Ferry, and
steamers command the Potomac below the city; and
Arlington Heights and Alexandria are still the
Federal positions on the right bank of the river.

Congress has been deliberating therefore in safety.
Whether it be an affectation—like that of the early
days of the French Republic—of imitating Roman

classical antiquity, or whatever be the reason—a re-

solution was "introduced in the house and passed,
of thanks to the oflicars and soldiers of the army,
and of sympathy for those who suffered bereavement
in the late battle !" There is certainly truth enough
in the old exclamation, " No accouuting for tastes."
It was a poor parody of the Roman thanks for
not despairing of the Republic after an enormous
slaughter of brave men ; in this ease there had been