The Sun.
London, England, 1859-06-03 00:00:00

THE SUN.
FRIDAY, JUNE 3, 1859.

We referred yesterday to the conflicting state-
ments respecting GARIBALDI. One announced that
he was at Como, another that he had been at
Varese, where a strong Austrian force had appeared
before the town, and that he had ordered the Na-
tional Guard not to'resist, and that he then fell
back, on the Lago Maggiore. Another that they had
made an attack on Laveno—a strongly-fortified
town on the Lago Maggiore ; that it was maintained
the entire night and repeated in the evening, but
without result. This day, however, we have
what we believe to be the correct account
of his position. It is said that he was in
the vicinity of Sondrio, the capital of the
Valteline, which is in a state of general
insurrection, and which has proclaimed VICTOR
EMMANUEL. The dashing Republican leader was,
however, driven to take refuge in the mountains,
closely pursued by General URBAN and an over-
whelming force. It is said that the only issue for
him is the Stelvio. This is given as official news,
and it is but 'just to say that there has been far
greater accuracy and less exaggeration in the tele-
grams from Vienna than from those which hale
come through Turin, Berne, or Paris.
It would be very deplorable if one who had
already so greatly distinguished himself by his
brilliant exploits, should, by being compelled
to take refuge in Switzerland, a country resolved
to maintain a strict neutrality, be prevented from
taking any further share in the war. The law of
the case is simple. _ It would become the duty of
the Swiss authorities to disaim and make prisoners
of the entire party, and to retain them in some
secure position, until they had bound themselves
by solemn obligations not to take any further share
in the war on either side. We can fancy what
would be the chagrin of the guerilla chief if reduced
to a state of inactivity, and prevented from taking
share in the contest gathering around him, or
acquiring a portion of the laurels now free for any
hand.

It is not always, however, that law is strictly car.
vied into effect. Should he be compelled to cross into
Switzerland he may not feel disposed to lay down
his arms and surrender at discretion. The entire
Population are friendly not only to the cause in
which he is engaged, but to himself personally,
and before a sufficient body of troops- could be
assembled to take forcible possession of his arms,
and make prisoners of his troops, he will receive
full information of their movements, and have
abundant time to return to the seat of war, and
escape from the district the neutrality whereof he
had violated. Nor does it follow by any
means that he will be compelled to cross
the Stelvio. He is in the mountains, and
there he will find a fortress in every rock. His
troops will be recruited and strengthened in every
mile of their way, and he will obtain the most will-
ing_ assistance and co-operation from every in-
habitant. It will not be easy then to dislodge him
from such a position, or compel him to encounter
the liabilities of entering on the Swiss soil. They
may anticipate it at Vienna. General URBAN may
fondly anticipate that the partisan Chief will be
Placed hors de combat in one way or another, but
7e have still faith in GARIBALDI, and believe that
in one way or the other he will continue to evade
the party in pursuit.
Next to GAB IBALDI the public interest is cow-
centred on yin TOR EMMANUEL himself. He has,
unquestionably, performed acts of brilliant gallantry,
such as will c:lcite the enthusiasm of the troops
under his corm nand to the highest degree. It is
not always that ; a commander participates in all the
dangers of the :soldier, nor is it right that he should
do so. His life may be too valuable, under exist-
ing circumstanci ):3, to justify him in incurring any
unnecessary per 11.. But when he cax do so—know.
ing that compel ent men will remain to direct the
strategical move lients,there is nothing that excites
the zeal and eneri ry of the soldiers to such a pitch.

Here is a commander, nay, more, a crowned monarch,
one possessing the most ancient blood in the entire
family of Sovereigns, who showed as much hardi-
hood, as profound a contempt for danger, as the men,
from highest to lowest, in his service. The soldiers
will follow him anywhere—will pass through
blood, fire, and water, in obedience to one who will
not merely be their chief but their idol.
The Italians, together with the battalion of
Zouaves associated with them, have unquestionably
gained the chief and the most important triumphs
of the war. The battles of Palestro produced
much more important results than that of
Montebello. Indeed, the effect of the latter
is by no means clear. The Austrians declare that
they accomplished their object, which was merely
that of making a reconnaissance, and thereby
ascertaining the strength and position of the allied
troops. The first serious opposition which they
met with was from the Piedmontese cavalry under
General SONNAZ, who really changed the fortune
of the day from defeat into victory. But it was the
Sardinians and Zouaves who forced the passage of
the Sesia and captured Palestro, and afterwards
succeeded in defeating the attempt made for its
recapture ; at a most critical period followed up
the retreating enemy, capturing eight pieces of
cannon and 1,000 prisoners, and driving 400 into
the canal, where they one and all were drowned.
This will enable the Sardinians to effect a junction
with CANROBERT'S corps, and thus be very advan-
tageous to the allied cause.

A few days ago the oracle of the counting-house,
and the Jupiter of humble journals, coolly an-
nounced to us that it was a settled thing that Lord
DERBY and all pertaining to him were to be sent
across the floor of the House at the shortest possi-
ble notice after the reading of her MAJESTY'S
Speech. "My Lords" the leaders of the Lower
House had agreed to differ in private and to unite
in public, to shake hands in the House, and to shake
fists outside of it, and so the " Great Liberal Party"
was to be led to the promised land.
Somehow a hitch was suspected, and in a few
days both the quarrelling Lords were threatened
that, if they did not agree—woe betide them. They
might escape in this life—but there is a purgatory
for political reputation. An impartial posterity is
the Minos there. No account would be taken there
of a few years, more or less, of Premiership ; but
terrible would be the castigations of the man of
Premier grade who was unwilling to be anything
but Premier when his country—i.e., the Whigs of
the Kidderminster and Calne genus—want him
and another to be in one Ministry, when of course
both could not be, nominally, first. He of the two
Lords, be it which it might, who could not be satis-
fied with a substantially equal position—he who
would not toss up for it—or he would not
refer the matter to the arbitration of her MA-
JESTY—he must look forward to seeing his
memory lashed without mercy by every Whig
historian for a century to come. " Vanity of
vanities," saith the Times, all your squabbles " are
vanity and vexation of spirit."' History is the great
reality. Be wise, my Lords, betimes. Agree—
re-open the path to office for your subordinates—let
them not shiver through another winter ; if you do,
not only will history rack your reputations, but
the Liberals may combine to instal more placable
leaders, and storm the Treasury benches without
you.

Surely they have listened to these entreaties and
threats, and all is arranged. But—and who would
have thought it—that Marplot, ROEBUCK, will be
no party to the bargain ! PALMERSTON on no
terms—a clever fellow, but not my man. Lord
JOHN RUSSELL might have been, possibly, but he
gave the go-by to Mr. ROEBUCK, and Mr. ROEBUCK
Will give the go-by to him. What right had he to
interfere? He to want to be consulted ? Well,
we predicted a few days before that he would think
he had a right to it. Vanity it might be—crotcheti-
ness it might be. Abuse it how you will, he yet
would not think he was fairly used if two men, not
his intellectual superiors certainly, his superiors only
by the.luck of aristocratic position, and by having
trimmed twenty times to purchase official status as
he would never have done—if two such men pre-
sumed to give their real superior the cold
shoulder. He knew there was no need for it
if their purposes were honest. He knew that
they knew, that if they had fair proposals
to make on behalf of the public, proposals
really better than those of the present Ministry,
that JOHN ARTHUR ROEBUCK was not the man to
refuse them. He would, therefore, have nothing to
do with helping them across the House. They
might sit on the Opposition benches till they grew
to them for what he cared, and he intimated pretty
plainly that he was not alone in his views. Of
course all the lightnings of the Thunderer fell next
day on his devoted head, which he, of course, inno-
cuously transmitted to mother earth.
But now for.another change ! It is now dis-
covered that Liberals may, with consistent dignity,
be a powerful opposition. Their great Corypheeus
Fox was in that position nearly all his life ; it is
something worth sitting in Parliament for, as a
party, to leave the initiative to Government, toitake
the measures as they come from its hands, and to
mould them into a shape worth having. The Tories
bear now merely a conventional name ; the reality
is, a House of Lords consisting almost entirely of
one party, and an active united body of three hun-
dred in the House of Commons, to oppose which,
the Liberals have almost no strength in the Lords,
and a wavering majority which can never be relied
on, of which one part deserts to the Tories, if the
Government proposes anything really liberal, and
another part deserts to the same side, if a party
move is made by those who want the Treasury
benches only. Of this temper Mr. ROEBUCK
declares himself to be. Mr. BRIGHT said much
the same in his speech to the working men
of Birmingham ; he would not ally himself
to any Government which would give the people
an unsubstantial Reform only ; and we know
what his ideas are of substantial Reform. And as
for Mr. COBDEN", we all remember that he publicly
professed his repentance for a vote once before,
which turned out Lord DERBY. Mr. MILNER
GIBSON has always shown the same dislike of
Whig party moves.
Of all this our great contemporary seems now to be
aware. It is actually discovered at length that the
two rival Lords may have lived too much and too
long in the atmosphere of office, and beneath the
sun of Royal favour, for their political health, and
that they may be as useful, and even perhaps more
so, in the bracing air of Opposition, as they could
be in the more luxurious atmosphere of office.
When RICHARD COBDEN was assailed by some
troublesome Chartist orator at an Anti-Corn Law
meeting, and the cry arose, "Turn him out,"—
"No, no'!" he would exclaim, "keep him in, and
we'll convert him." And it seems to be at length
discovered that Conservatives are capable of
honest conversion ; and that when the re-
sponsibility is thrown on them of devising
measures which will satisfy the people, they actu-
ally, by a few trials, cem find out what the people
want. And—herein very much like Whig Liberals
—though not disposed to proffer too much at first,
they are by no means disposed, when in office, to

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•-•

fight the people. The 'Times has, indeed, found
out, at last, that Cons..er vatives are mortal politi-
cians, have the failings" mid the good qualities of
other mortals, and that cane of these better qualities
—one which does so much towards making us all
" kith and kin"—is that they really do covet the
approbation of their fellow-mortals. What they
obstruct in opposition, to annoy political rivals,
they pass, when in office, to please those whom it
is. pleasant to gratify, and would but indicate
sourness, not firmness, to resist.

For our part, we frankly confess that we do hope
more from a Government still in the positioD to
need popular support than from one which has got
the habit of thinking :it confers a boon on the
people by taking office. Even the Times now con-
fesses that Lord JOHN and his rival have acquired
too much of the feeling that they are indispensable
to the Liberal party. Till they thoroughly unlearn
that notion, they will be of no use to it. The real
Liberals have more hope of the Tories than of them,
and we shall not be surprised if events do not
speedily justify that hope. Of course, to our
haughty Whig leaders, as well as to Conservatives,
the door of repentance is always open. Cheerfully
should we welcome them if they came to us confes-
sing their errors, and pledging themselves to
amendment, but it must be amendment worth ac-
ceptance before the country will ever give them its
confidence and a majority which could make itself
respected. _ _

The Whigs must see their two great faults. They
have enslaved the counties, and they have given
representation to the absence of population. By
their Reform Bill they have made a small minority
of electors masters of the House of Commons—•con-
verted landlords, and lawyers, and bankers into
political slaveholders, and the tenants and depen-
dent classes into political slaves. Till the Whigs
consent to emancipate the counties by the Ballot,
and to give representation to boroughs in some fair
proportion to population, they may keep in Opposi
tion with our most cordial goodwill. We want
our measures, but we do not want one set of men
more than another, if neither will carry them.

It is certainly very amusing to observe the ex-
traordinarily ingenious proposition thrown out by
excellent Mr. SCHOLEFIELD down at Birmingham,
with a view to the reconciling, at the very last ex-
tremity, of all the notorious differences at present
dividing and subdividing her MAJESTY'S Opposi-
tion.

If, says Mr. SCHOLEFIELDI the two noble lords,
the rival chiefs of the Opposition, should prove to
be still incapable of making up their long quarrel
with each other satisfactorily—THEN—says Mr.
SCHOLEFIELD—Iet us choose another leader of the
Great Reform Party—let us choose a man, for
example, like my honourable colleague, and under
his guidance transform the Liberal Opposition into
a Liberal Government.

The proposition, you will observe, is so practic-
able from first to last! It is so reasonable on the face
of it ! It is so very rational a scheme throughout!
Precisely because the Opposition has already
too much in the way of. leadership Mr.
ScHOLEFIELD argues, of course, that they must
have—a little more of it. There are too many
heads of parties already on the left hand of Mr.
Speaker—therefore, says Mr. SCHOLEFIELD, we
must have yet another head of another Party, and
so solve the difficulty. " A DANIEL, yea! a -very
DANIEL come to judgment !" And that new leader,
who is to outshine Lord JOHN RUSSELL and
Viscount PAL3rEnsTox —who is to rally all the Great
Liberal Party in its various sections harmoniously
under his banner—is, of all men in her MAJESTY'S
dominions, Mr. JOHN BRIGHT', M.P. for Birming-
ham. It is so likely that the haughty Whig aris-
tocracy, with their sympathetic following, would
throw Lord JOHN over, and take up with Mr.
BRIGHT instead. It is so probable that the be-
lievers hitherto in the firebrand of Europe, the
./EoLus of Christendom, would give the go by—of
all moments, at the very period of a great war in
Northern Italy—to Lord PALMERSTON ! And that
in place of the old, heraldic, emblazoned oriflamme
of the most chivalrous among all our great chiefs of
diplomacy, these believers hitherto in Lord PAL-
MERSTON should now march through the Coventry
of Quakerdom under the twopenny-halfpenny
white pocket-handkerchief stuck at the
end of a rattan—the meek little snivel-
ling type of the policy of the Peace-at-any-
price Party ! A most wonderful conception, truly.
If these are the happiest projects that can be con-
cocted on the side of the Opposition, there is but
small chanceindeed of our witnessing any speedy
installation in Downing-street of a strong and
united Liberal Administration. Mr. ROEBUCK has
a tolerably fair prospect before him of surpassing,
by the triumphant success of his political predic-
tion the happiest among the many ingenious
failures of all the brilliant race of racing prophets,
in regard to the recent Derby. Others have been as
confident as you may please in the happy fortunes in
store for the old time-honoured favourite, " The Pro -
mised Land" of Whigdom—Lord JOHN RUSSELL.
Others, again, have set their heart in implicit
reliance upon the triumph in store for that wonder-
working, self-reliant, self-glorifying " Trumpeter"
—Lord PALMERSTON. A few have looked hopefully
askance, even at au impracticable Australian
importation like " Balnamoon"—otherwise Moon-
shine, by Calne, out of Kidderminster. Hardly
any among all these loud-speaking prophets
has had a good word to say for the Oriental
" Musjid," who has nevertheless kept high on the
list among all the fluctuations of the betting, in
spite of all the sneers of his depreciators—in de-
fiance of the heavy odds offered against him by the
Particularly Knowing Ones—and who is yet com-
ing in with an easy stride ahead of them all, hardly
before Mr. DENISON can well settle himself com-
fortably down in the umpire's chair. Mr. ROEBUCK
is the only one among all the prophets who has
had the skill and the courage to pick out the win-
ner in defiance of those who had no faith in him at
all. True-Blue Jacket has already turned the
Tattenham Corner of the Parliamentary Course, and
the favourite and his fellows are fast falling back
into the ruck—to find themselves just nowhere at
the resettlement of the Derby—Government. In
sententious comment upon the triumph of Musjid,
it has been remarked that—" The Ring will be the
sufferers." For " the ring"—read the Magic Circle,
the proud, exclusive circle of the great Whig
party :
those, above, all will certainly prove
the sufferers by reason of the triumph of that most
unexpected Winner of the Derby, the right hon.
gentleman the Chancellor of her MAJESTY'S Ex-
chequer, against whom the odds at the very last
toas30:11.!
ROEBUCKAnd
foretoldi s y t
he ,m,
oodmdel
yn were
comig 353
in,
would—first past the post of the leadership of the
House of Commons.

The Address in answer to her Majesty's Speech
will, it is stated, be moved in the House of Lords by the
Earl of Pais.
The Queen will hold a Privy Council on Monday
next at Buckingham Palace.
The Duke of Atholl has arrived at the St. George's
Hotel,
The Earl and Countess of Scarborough have ar-
rived at the St. George's Hotel.
The Earl of Danoughmore arrived in London
yesterday from Portsmouth.

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