The Sun.
London, England, 1861-07-12 00:00:00

ARMY PROMOTION.

PRIVATEERING.

ow Dickens' All the Year _Round.)
Can we wonder at the general exclamation of
horror which arose in England when it was re-
ported that the Southern States of America were
about to let fly their privateers at the North, and
all without even a special protest from England on
the folly and inhumanity of the act P Any attempt
to partly blockade a Southern port, and keep in
her cotton, England would not allow; but to let
a swarm of pirate ships, many of them chartered
by the scum of the North—men who would dive
into an Atlantic full of blood, to pick out a dollar
—is not even to be protested against. We no
longer poison bullets or stab prisoners, yet we
allow legalised pirates to pursue their devilish
calling, merely because those pirates choose to
hoist a Southern flag and call themselves Southern
privateers. Yet do not think that in future wars
the toleration of such inhumanity will not recoil
on us. Who is there who can sow the wind and
yet refuse to reap the whirlwind ?
Yet, that statesmen should tolerate such things
is no wonder. Those great-minded helmsman are
too busy in keeping their legs to trouble themselves
about ideals. They have to laugh away popular
wrath, to smile away oppsition, to scoff away attacks,
to badinage away reforms they do not themselves
originate. • They do not want vexatious debates on
abstract subjects. Wars are bad things, but they em-
ploy officers and encourage promotion ; they keep the
opposition quiet, and are excuses for taxes ; they
postpone reform, and increase ministerial popularity.
But the bayoneting, the shooting, the burning, the
ruining of women, the defacing God's image ?
Yes, all inconveniences—undeniable inconveni-
ences, but not to be thought of when national wel-
fare requires war to express its anger, to assert its
right, to retrieve its honour, to extend its territory,
or to augment its glory; and of this justifiable war,
in a good cause, privateering is a necessary volun-

teer adjunct. _
evils re-
sulting from this determination of the South
But let me sketch the probable
to let loose her privateering murderers. As soon
as this news is telegraped from Montgomery
the rich rowdies, and old
t
to the Southern seaports, that instant the worst of
the bankrupt merchants,
slave dealers, will rake up every possible old schooner
and raking clipper they can find to scour the seas,
for rapine and plunder.
.ey will buy some old
dram-shops, and collect
will get rifted • theywill lay in
guns, ay in
grape-shot shot and
iwnhtiheehbtarhe-yrooms and d.
50d round , then put up pla-
cardsget ? The patriot—the
honest—the merciful—tha brave ? N • the thiev-
ingo .
drunkard—the
sailors. And whom will they
homicide—the gang-driver--
the slave-hunter —the runaway-convict.— the
swindler—the murderer—the Seven Deadly Sins
for
for officers, all the Passions for crew, and Apol-
lyon
himself for sailin master._
And what will they (lg. first ? These men are mere
midnight murderers o .
• they will steal up creeks, and
float withmuffled 'round
seize free negroes, and send them to die in the rice
swamps round Savannah River; they vill cut
brave men's throats in their sleep, and beim unsus-
pecting fishing-boats, burn quiet seaside villages,
seize outlying barques, do the devil's wor'it in God's
name, and go home and exult over their patriotic
labours, and thank Heaven for making them other
men than those proud Pharisees of the 3gorth.
The motive of a privateersman is pleader. He
comes out to steal—to fight and steal—?but not to
fight if he canngt steal. The privateersn lan is the
common enemfbf mankind, as the pirate is, and
he should be treated as such, and hanged by whom-
soever can get a rope on his neck. Ti to laws of
God and man are against him.

FREE LIBRARY IN THE ClTY.—Yesterda y, a re'
solution to carry out Mr. Ewart's Free Library Act was
'agreed to at a numerous meeting held in the Chuii ihall.

IMPERIAL PARLIAMENT.

HOUSE OF LORDS.—(YESTERDAY.)
ROYAL COMMISSION.
The Royal assent was given by commission to the fol-
lowing bills :
Cork Infirmary.
Now Provinces (New Zealand).
Offences in Territories near Sierra Leone Prevention.
Public Offices Extension.
Guildford Hospital.
Landed Property Improvement (Ireland).
Holyhead Road.
Portsea Gas.
North British and Peebles Railway. •
Shireoaks District Church.
Weston Super Mare Gas.
Lambeth Bridge.
London and North-Western Railway (Eccles, Tyldesley,
and Wigan).
Kingstown Improvement.
Wivenhoe and Brightlingsea Railway.
Dublin and Antrim Junction Railway.
Cheshire and Midland Railway.
London and
.North-Western (Chester and Holyhead)
Railway.
Penarth Harbour, Dock, and Railway.
Thames Haven Dock (Abandonment).
Westminster Improvements.
Bognor Railway.
Sittingbourne and Sheerness Railway.
London and North•-Western Railway (Liverpool Lines).
Downpatrick and Newry Railway.
North London Railway (Widening).
Metropolitan Railway (Improvement).
Fife and Kinross Railway.
North Eastern Railway (Castleton Branches).
Birkenhead Railway.
Rhymney Railway (Additional Capital, &c.),
South Essex Water.
Glasgow (City) Life Assurance.
Enniskillen and Bundoran Railway.
Midland Railway (Otley Extension).
New Ross Harbour.
North Eastern Railway (Extension).
Parsonstown and Portumna Bridge.
West Cheshire Railway.
South Staffordshire Railway.
Staffordshire Potteries Water.
Great Southern and Western Railway (Extension).
Great Southern and Western Railway (Capital).
Greetwell District Drainage.
Manchester and Milford Railway (New Branches),
Grand Junction Water.
Wolverhampton New Water.
Great North of Scotland Railway.
The Royal Commissioners 'were the Lord Chancellor,
Lord Sydney, and Earl St. Germans.
Their lordships then adjourned during pleasure.

The LORD CHANCELLOR took his seat on the woolsack
at five o'clock.

THE ROYAL NAVAL RESERVE.

Lord HARDWICKE made an explanation with refe-
rence to a speech he lately made on the subject of the Royal
Naval Reserve. His observations had been misinterpreted
in a sense that might be calculated to give offence to the
Merchant Service. As he had no intention whatever of
doing anything of this kind he explained his meaning.
LOCOMOTION BILL.
The Earl of CAITHNESS moved the names of Earl
Ducie, Lord Boyle, Lord Redesdale, Lord Llanover, and
some other noble lords, to be the committee on this bill.

PRIVATE BUSINESS.
The Lords' amendments to the Trent, Ancholme, and
Grimsby Railway Bill were considered and agreed to.
The Blackburn Water Bill (Lords) was read a third
time and passed.