The Sun.
London, England, 1861-03-01 00:00:00

TILE NAVE

The Pigeon, 5, screw despatch gunvessel, having
completed fitting at Chatham for the steam reserve
ordinary, was undocked yesterday afternoon, and
will proceed to join the third-class steam reserve
under Capt. C. F. Schomberg.
The Isis, 44, sailing ship, having been completed,
was undocked at Chatham yesterday afternoon and
hauled out into the harbour opposite the dockyard.
She has been commissioned by Capt. Barnard, and
as soon as she has obtained her crew and received
her stores on board she will proceed to Ascension
and Sierra Leone, at the latter of which places she
will be stationed. Since she has been in dock she
has undergone the most complete repairs and has
been strengthened throughout. She has also been
newly coppered, and the whole of her interior de-
voted to the stowage of coals lined with thick sheet
iron.

The Gloucester, 50, which was partially fitted
some time since as a receiving hulk for harbour
service at Chatham, is now ordered to be com-
pleted for that service in lieu of the Hussar,
which goes into dock at Chatham to be fitted for a
target ship for the disposal of the Admiralty, and
stationed at Shoeburyness or any other place at
which experiments and trials are being made with
Whitworth and Armstrong guns. The Hussar is
to be strengthened, and will, it is understood, be
covered with iron plates, which will be ranged over
her sides to protect her from the shots.
The Flying Fish, screw, Commander Charles W.
Hope, steamed into Portsmouth harbour yesterday
from Spithead, and berthed alongside the Malabar
depot, to fill up coal.
Letters received by our Portsmouth correspon-
dent announce the arrival at Madeira, on the Bth of
February, of the Desperate, 8, screw, Commander
Ross, after a passage of 20 days from Plymouth
Sound, under canvass, experiencing tremendous
weather, and would require some six or seven days'
stay at Madeira for a refit before proceeding on to
Bermuda. The Barracouta made the passage to the
island in nine days under steam, and had left again
for Bermuda prior to the Desperate's arrival.
The Icarus, 11, screw, Commander Nowell Sal-
mon, V.C. is nearly cleared out alongside Ports-
mouth dockyard. Portions of her lining will be
removed, and the spaces between her timbers, &c.,
examined and cleansed out, for the purpose of as-
certaining whether any local causes exist on board
that may have caused or assisted the sickness which
prevailed on board to such a fearful degree while
the ship was on the West India station. One of

the officers of this vessel is absent from her under
very mysterious circumstances, the Paymaster, Mr.
G. Teait, having obtained leave ashore for 24 hours
on the 14th of February, and has not since returned
on board. A board of officers have examined the
missing officer's accounts and papers, but every-
thing has been found in the most perfect order.
Mr. Teait, while the vessel was in the Rio de la
Plata, was for some time in hospital, and since his
return to his duty has been observed by his brother
officers to have become of a decided misanthropical
disposition, and it is believed that a species of tem-
porary derangement is the cause of the absence of
Mr. Teait from his ship and his duties. The Ad-
miralty have appointed Mr. G. Grandidier, a gentle-
man lately serving in the office of the Commander-
in-Chief at Portsmouth, to succeed Mr. Teait as
paymaster of the ship.
The Princess Royal, 91, screw, Capt. Fellowes,
flag of Rear-Admiral Smart, K.H., is receiving her
final coat of outside paint in Portsmouth harbour.
She will adjust her compasses at the moorings of
the steam ordinary guardship on Tuesday next,
prior to going out to Spithead.
The Cossack, 20, screw, Capt. R. Moorman, at
Portsmouth, is getting up her lower rigging and
stays alongside the sheer jetty.
The Euryalus, 51, screw, completed masting in
the steam basin at Portsmouth yesterday, and has
been taken in hand by the riggers to complete for
the first class reserve. Her lower rigging and stays
will be of wire,

The keel and a portion of the floor timbers of a
new 17 gun screw corvette, to be named the Harle-
quin, and from the same drawings as the Rinaldo
and Chanticleer, bare been laid down in No. 2 slip
at Portsmouth. The greater part of her frame will
be of Italian oak.

The following appointments were made yester-
day at the Admiralty :--James Sangster, chief
engineer to the Asia, for service in the Retribution ;
Wm. Wotton, first-class assist-engineer to the Asia,
as supernumerary, for hospital treatment ; Charles
P. Turner, first. class assist.-engineer to the Icarus ;
Wm. H. Rundle, first-class assist.-engineer to the
Asia, for charge of the Rinaldo; William C. Brewer,
third-class assist.-engineer to the Asia, as super-
numerary, for hospital treatment; Matthew Coates,
assist.-surgeon, to the Recruit ; Edward Olive,
acting assist.-surgeon, to the St. Jean d'Acre ; and
Arthur C. Wells, master's assistant, to the Hero. •

TIIZ EMPEROR OF THE FRENCH AND
TILE BISHOP OF POITIERS,

Should the Emperor of the French ever ask
what he has gained by establishing himself in
Rome, and becoming master of the situation, he
may now accept an answer on sacred authority.
It is that he may become the Pontius Pilate in
the last drama, the last trial, the last agony,
and abandonment of the Church. When he
sent his legions to Rome a foolish vanity per-
suaded him, perhaps, that he was securing
the power which he might henceforth use to his
advantage. He could not be far wrong in the Capi-
tol. Holding in his hands the very key of the posi-
tion, he might admit or exclude as he listed, giving
laws and dominion at his pleasure. No doubt, the
situation is one to gratify a mind with the least in-
stinct of ambition. It was for the time to be Empe-
ror of the 'West, and all that is implied in that
noble denomination. V--.'et a time must come when
Rome must be eithel- retained or relinquished; and
when it will be necessary to determine in favour of
the one out of the many possible uses to which it
might b;e applied. 'When that time comes, as indeed
marry suppose that it has come, what shall the Em-
peror set down as the fruit of a policy that has
brought on him so many jealous reviews and un-
friendly criticisms ? The Bishop of Poitiers informs
the faithful in France that their Emperor has done
all this simply to do what nobody else could do, and
to give up Pio Nono to his enemies at the very mo-
ment when the game was about to be triumphantly
concluded. The Bishop has made it a labour of love.
The Emperor had zbosen, for his own convenience,
to express hie views of the situation in an anony-
mous par4hlet. No doubt, he found it much easier
to inepire, or even to indite, Rome, la France, et
l'ltalie, under the name of M. Lagueronniere, than
to state his intentions and offer explanations under
his own name, and in a direct manner. But if the
domino is convenient to him, so also is it to those
who differ from him and deprecate his policy. They
may attack the shadow with blows that reach him ;
and what is really a personal assault can in that
case only be reached and punished for its intrinsic
wrong. Hence we are favoured with a specimen of
political audacity to which no Bishop, or any other
subject, would be equal in this country.
The good Bishop luxuriates in the parallel. He
omits no detail that may establish the closest iden-
tity between the Pontius Pilate of the first century
and of the nineteenth. He proves the grandeur of the
crime and the supreme character of the infamy. It
is the Emperor who after scrupulous hesitation has
yielded to the demands of a besotted people. It is the
Empe-ror who has finally disregarded the warnings
of nis wife to do nothing to that just man. It is
the Emperor who has weakly attempted to wash his
hands, first of Francis 11., then of Pio IX. It is the
Emperor who has absolved himself in vain. So he
is " God-murderer." His name will ever stand
among the highest and greatest; and the fact will
be recorded in the very articles of the Creed In
vain does he apologize and explain. In vain does
he attempt to throw the blame on neighbours, on
nations, on princes, on his own people, on priests,
on all the world. The Creed makes no mention of
Annas and Caiphas, of Herod, of Judas, of Phari-
sees and soldiers; so also is it below the dignity of
the subject to insist on the crimes of Sardinia and
other actors or ministers of wrong. By his own
doing Louis Napoleon has been the chief personage
in the drama, and he must bear all the burden. The
others are but ciphers and counters. They have
done as they were bid, or as nature and circum-
stances led them. Not so the Emperor of the
French. He has assumed the responsibility of the
Italian Kingdom. Like Pilate, he has come for-
ward. He has wished to save the victim of popular
injustice. He has invited the attention of the
world to his humane endeavours, his lofty justice,
his self-vindication. He has ordered the water to
be brought, and then with all the pomp of inno-
cence he has renounced any share in the
crime. Yet he has permitted it, as he alone
could permit, and the Bishop of Poitiers accordingly
gives him a niche in the hagiology of crime. There
stands Napoleon 111., a recreant among the faithful,
a murderer among the saints, a self-banished
apostle. Tied to the skirts of Pontius Pilate, he
will pass with him through the mouths of true be-
lievers, and go wherever Pilate will go.
The Emperor is very naturally indignant at the
new species of honour provided for him by the
fathers of the Gallican Church. We are accus-
tomed to hear Sovereigns compared to David, to
Solomon, to Josiah, to Hezekiah, and such other
good Royal names, if there be any, in the Bible. An
official document,a 2nandenient,addressed by a Bishop
to his flock, and commended to the study of all the
clergy, elevates Napoleon 111. to the dignity of the
Roman Governor of whom the tradition is that he
wandered over the earth, asking the mountains to
fall upon him, and found apparently what he wished,
far away from Jerusalem and Rome itself, in the
mountains of Helvetia. We may pardon the indig-
nation of the Imperial pamphleteer on being
answered, not with argument, or with a trial, but
with summary condemnation. The bishop instals
the Emperor in a gloss upon the Apostles' creed.
In this country there are those who would smile at
the atrocity of the parallel. Indeed, Englishmen
feel that when a man compares an antagonist to
Judas Iscariot, or Pilate, or Herod, or Simon Magus,
or any other objectionable Scriptural character, the
charge answers itself, and there is no occasion to
reply to the man who proclaims his own folly and
shame by the very language he employs. In France
it is evident there is a very different estimate of
persons, of things, and of words. The Emperor, or
the faithful guardians of his name, tremble for the
consciences of the citizens. It is declared necessary
to protect the innocent French mind from offensive
allusions and improper ideas. The Council of State
is charged with the trial of this transgression, and
the precedents will have to be ransacked for the
right way of dealing with the episcopal fanatic.
Meanwhile the crime has been committed, and has
been stamped indelibly on 'the recollection of
France. The Bishop of Poitiers' parallel's will be
read at least as much as "Rome, France, and
Italy." It is indeed much easier to call a great
man a bad name, and pull down his reputation to
the level of a miscreant than to prove the error of
his policy. Under these circumstances we are pro-
mised an edifying conflict between the civil and
religious authorities. Liberty and plain speaking
are not extinguished in France. The newspapers
may not always say what they please, but the
Emperor may be lampooned in every church of a
diocess, at the same hour, at the most solemn act
of worship. We of this country have too much
respect either for Sovereigns or for churches to
gibbet the one in the other; and of all odious
things a sermon of personalities, or even a personal
denunciation in the guise of a charitable prayer,
is here the most odious. The Bishop of Poitiers,
therefore, will have few friends in this country,
and the value of his observations, if any, will de-
pend, not on the man or the office, but on the
statements themselves.— Times.