The Sun.
London, England, 1859-11-17 00:00:00

Stage Manager. Mr. R. Phillips

CANTERB UR V HALL CONCERTS.-
EVERY EVENING.—The Music of Verdi's Opera of
MACBETH (now first made public in England at these Con-
certs).
-

And a Grand Selection from Meyerbeer's new opera of
DLNORAJT.
- -

Comic Vocalists —Messrs. George Flo !son (the Irish Come-
dian and Mimic), W. P. Critchdeld, and E. IV. Mackney.

Several interestinc,r, Pictures are added to the Fine Arts
Gallery. The suite of Halls have been re-decorated and
beautified, and constitute one of the most unique and brilliant
sizhts of the metropolis.
ROSA BON FI FUR'S celebrated PICTURE of the HORSE
FAIR is now added to the already magnificent Collection of
paiatinzs in the Canterbury Hall Fine Arts Gallery. The
gallery is open from 9 a in. till 1i p.m. Admission, Six-
pence.

TIIE WEATHER.—SuN OFFICE, NOVE3IBER 16.
THERMOMETER, IN THE slur's.
48 —highest since noon yesterday.
42 —lowest this mozaing and during the night.
45—this day at noon.

BAROMETEIt-30.15.
WIND, North-Westerly; rather light, with dull, cold,
weather.

HIGH WATER AT LONDON BRIDGE.

THIS DAY.-I‘lorning, 6h. 21m.—Afternoon, 6h. 52m.
To-Mohnow-Moming, 7h. 27m.—Afternoon, Bh. Gm.

44.

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THE SUN.

TITURSJAY, NOVEMBER 17, 1859

THE EDITOR of the French Press seems not
pleased with the Duchies. They have acted inde-
pendently, when he meant then only to be indepen-
dent, or to be called independent. They have
done unwisely, we are now told ; first, in voting
annexation to Piedmont, and, secondly, in voting
the Regency of Prince CARIGNAN. And even the
Prince, His IMPERIAL MAJESTY THE EDITOR says,
has not hearkened to the wise counsels of France,
"as expressed in the letter of the EMPEROR to the
KING."

The double vote, the Constitutionncl tells us,

means simply this :

" That Italy no longer confided in the wisdom
of Europe; that she even distrusted her decisions,
since she forestalled them ; and that, having be-
come mistress of herself de facie, she would, if neces-
sary, dispense with the sanction of international law.
But nothing, absolutely nothing, justified that distrust of
the future resolutions of the Congress. Let Italy be Con-
vinced of this fact—that the Congress of which she is tow
advised to decline the jurisdiction can alone achieve and
sanction her deliverance. The Congress alone has the
power of consenting to the territorial arrangements which
may be useful to her new organisation."

But we may well ask, what reason has Italy to
confide in a Congress ; or, indeed, what title has
any Congress to demand the confidence of Italians ?
Have these Italian States the rights of indpendent
nations, or have they not ? No one is hardy
enough to deny them such rights, at least none but
the merest thorough-bred tyrants, who hold that
nations were made for Sovereigns and dynasties,
not Sovereigns for nations. Once allow, however,
the principles by which the Sovereigns of the
mightiest peoples both of the Old World and the
New now occupy 'their thrones or their Presiden-
tial chair, and it is properly no business of a Con-
gress at all to tell the Duchies who shall rule over
them. They cannot properly acknowledge the
right of such a court. They may, if they please,
imitating weaker countries—Belgium, Greece, the
Danubian Principalities—ask the intervention of .a
combination of the Great Powers ; but, unless they
ask it, "the Powers" have no more rightful con-
cern with settling the Government of the Duchies
than a highwayman has in settling what I shall do
with my purse. He may extort my purse from
me for his own use, and " the Powers" may wrench
the rights of Central Italy from her for their own
use, but the latter deed is but the political counter-
part of the former—it is political highway robbery,
and, like the Treaties of 1815, could have no
binding force on the peoples.
And the people of the four States show, we are told,
" a want of confidence" in a Congress by their vote.
Good—and never was a vote of want of confidence
better justified. We are now told that he of Naples,
and he, the Arch-Shepherd of Perugian fame, are
claimants for a seat in Congress—and of course the
"Great Powers" are all to be there. England will
surely be absent, unless it be previously declared
that the four States had a right to vote as they
pleased,—that, in fact, they were not called on to
" confide in a Congress." Now, how on earth could
any man in his senses ask the States to trust such a
precious Congress as this—Sardinia, alone, avowedly
in their favour; France avowedly desiring them to
take back their detested despot ; Russia and
Prussia looking, no doubt, most lovingly- on States
who had kicked out detested despots; Austria, of
course, dead against them; England standing aloof
because she will not compromise the primary rights
of Central Italy—so a precious jury they are asked
to confide in. A jury of despots, on Liberty—rather
say of wolves, on_ sheep. VICTOR E3I3IANUEL WEIS
wrong in the first instance, when he referred him-
self and them to a Congress. They did not want

him to plead their cause before a tribunal they
could not possibly trust. They wanted him to take
their cause into his own hands, and it was his duty
to have done it. Count CAvourt -would have coun-
selled him to do it. GARIBALDI would have coun-
selled him to do it. And once done, Austria might
have gnashed her teeth, she dared not have moved.
Again, we are told from Paris that " it is ques-
tioned by what right Sardinia undertakes to pre-
judge the decision of the Congress in naming a re-
gent for Central Italy, and thus by his nomination
assuming that the Duchies were already annexed
to Sardinia. This proceeding is contrary to all cus-
tom and not in accordance with the rights of the
people." This refers, of course, to the nomina-
tion, by Prince CARIGNAN, of the Chevalier
BUONCOMPAGNI as his Vice-Regent, as we may
call him. We are glad to see this. It gives some
hope that BUONCOMPAGNI will be no mere tool of
the Great French EDITOR. The Chevalier, indeed,
though not a MAzzim or a GARIBALDI, has won
his administrative spurs in the cause of Italian
liberty. As commissioner for the King of SAR-
DINIA, till the imperiousness of France compelled
his recal, he managed so well as to incur the dis-
pleasure of the Marquis of NORMANBY and of all
the admirers of the Dukes in Italy and elsewhere.
He goes to his Regency as an Italian, we may
therefore presume, and so far, the counsels of the
Autocrat of France are foiled. We are again, how-
ever, told that this is " prejudging" what ought to
come before a Congress. To which the reply is, as
above, that the Italians are the only leg,itimate judges
of the question ; LOUIS NAPOLEON, who has no right
to prejudge, did so by his letter to the King of
SARDINIA; the Italians, who have a right, do so by
their double vote. We accept the representation of
the meaning of the double vote. We affirm that it
is exactly what it ought to be. Instead of not be-
ing " in accordance with the rights of the people,"
we may challenge all Frenchmen who, six or seven
years ago, elected their own Emperor, to deny the
same right to the free States of Central Italy. And
the same fact assuredly furnishes an answer to the
observation that the conduct of the Duchies is
"contrary to all custom." It is not contrary to
the custom of France, who will surely think that
she may settle the propriety of political customs, as
well as the proprieties of crinoline and bonnets.
France chose her Ruler in 1852, and told the
Powers of Europe it was hers to choose, theirs to
acknowledge the chosen. Why may not the
Italians follow in 1859 the example set by France
in 1852 ?

Since the above was written, we have received
the following telegram from Mr. REUTER'S office :

PARIS, TIII:RSDAY MORNING.

" ThG Constitutionnel of to-day, in an article
signed by its secretary Boniface, announces that
the French Government, true to the principles of
its policy, has recommended to the Cabinet of
Turin to annul the appointment of the Regency which
the Government of the King of Sardinia has dele-
gated to Chevalier Buoncompagni, as such appoint-
ment would prejudice the questions brought be-
fore, and encroach upon the competency of, the
Congress.
The Constitutionnel says :—' This advice must be
considered as a proof of tho solicitude of the Em-
peror for the Italian cause, which cause he made to
triumph on the field of battle, and the final set-
tlement of which awaits to-day only the decision of
Europe.' "

Instead of the above being considered as a proof
of the solicitude of the EMPEROR, for the Italian
cause, it proves very clearly quite the reverse, and
exposes NAPOLEON'S hypocrisy to the contempt of
Europe, and the well-merited detestation of the
Italian people.

Who bas not a word of praise for his Royal High-
ness the General Commanding-in-Chief? This new
military reform of H.R.H., issued by his orders,
and signed by his Secretary, amounts, really and
truly, to nothing less virtually than the Abolition
in the Royal Army of England of the degrading
punishment of the Lash. Henceforth every recruit
tying the particoloured ribbons in his hat, and
slipping the QUEEN'S shilling into his pocket, may
pass through the whole period of his military ser-
vitude afterwards without being from first to last in
any way not only liable, but capable even, of being
subjected to the ignominy of Corporal Punishment.
SHAKSPERE
,has written, oracularly, "the cat
will mew, the dog will have his day." But from
this day forth the cat in the Royal Army of Eng-
land is virtually a thing non-existent and abolished.
It is a reform for which we ourselves have for years
and years past loudly and earnestly argued, almost
we had said clamoured. The evil of the lash was a
part of the military system, regarded, for that
matter, by the whole mass of the community with
unmitigated abhorrence. There was nothing to
redeem it. It was worse than a crime against all
the nobler feelings and honest self-respect of our
soldiery—it was a mistake, and a mistake the most
egregious. It was a part of the system, moreover,
that always worked ill. It hardened and brutalised
the offenders themselves, and excited far and wide
only sentiments of the profoundest indignation. It
was literally a betise, a positive stupidity. For
among other (almost we might say inevitable) con-
sequences, the lash in a manner as it were by magic
instantaneously, at every singing of the thongs,
during the cruel torture of the flagellation, trans•
formed the Culprit into the Victim and Martyr, as
it were, of a detestable tyranny. 'Whenever a sol-
dier was flogged of late years, no matter what his
offence, the sympathies of the public fell to his lot
and not to the authorities—environing ;the offence
and not the punishment. The Press, as a body,
has for a very considerable time past been strenu-
ously and most energetically opposed to
ait. Some
of the wisest and most heroic of our great Captains
have expressed their detestation of the lash as an
instrument of punishment for the British soldier.
One of them the most dauntless and gifted of
all the great English Captains of modern times,
the man who, as a conqueror, is second only
in the role of the Royal Army of England to
ARTHUR, Duke of WELLINGTON ; we mean, of
course, it is needless to say, the late General Sir
CHARLES NAPIER, the Glorious Victor of Scinde,
who was dead against this degrading system
of corporal punishment in the army. No man was
a keener or a more sagacious disciplinarian than
Sir CHARLES NartEtt—but it was precisely be-
cause he was that—because he had really
at heart the well-being and the perfect
subordination of his troops—of the troops to every
man amongst whom he was at once the Friend and
the Model, the Protector and the Paragon—because
he was such Sir CHARLES NAPIER was heart and
soul for the abolition of the lash as an abhorred
and barharous institution. Against it he used his
pen-as powerfully as ever he wielded his good
sword against the foe ! And now, the lash, thanks
to the wise councils and benignant resolution of
Mita the Duke of CAMBRIDGE, is a thing virtu-
ally abolished. By this one act, if by nothing else
—and it is not the least of the Duke's military re-
forms—H.R.H. has earned a right to the baton of
a Field Marshal. The remembrance of this act—
and it is an act that will be long and gratefully
borne in remembrance—will be the gl.;ry of
H.R.H.'s career• at the Horse Guards as the General
Commanding-in-Chief !

After commenting upon the long-notorious, and