The Sun.
London, England, 1868-12-21 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS,

In commenting on the full text of the President's
Message, the Times remarks that the extraordinary
announcement that the Senate had refund to allow the
President's Message to be read assumes a different cna•
racter when the real circumstances of the case are
explained ; and the resolution affirmed by the House of
Representatives, protesting against repudiation in any
form, far from being an idle assertion of the honesty which
men of honour could not suppose would be impugned, was,
though vague in expression, yet a justifiable, we may
almost say a necessary, reply on the part of the Legisla-
ture to the sentiments which had been addressed to them.
The Message, it is explained, was read to an end in the
House of Representatives. In the Senate it was partly
read, but as the whole Message was a bitter attack upon
both branches of the American Legislature, it was moved,
after listening to the greatar patt of it, that the further
reading of the Message should be dispensed with. More
moderate counsels, however, prevailed. Mr. Wilson, of
Massachusetts, one of the strongest Republicans in the
Senate, confessed that he thought the Message " dis-
respectful and untruthful, and the acrid outpouring
Of a disappointed bad man ; . . but he was still
the President of the United States, and had
Bent in his annual Message, and it would be better to read
it." This sound advice was so well received that the
mover of the resolution for dispensing with the reading
of the rest of the Message asked leave to withdraw his
motion, and it would have been withdrawn bad not Mr.
Cameron, Mr. Lincoln's War Secretary, revived the flame.
A fresh debate ensued, until at last a senator suggested that
business would be facilitated by an adjournment, which he
proceeded to move, and his motion was carried by 2G to 22.
In regard to President Johnson's views on the subject of
the national debt, as given• in the text, it is remarked that
it would only be but charitable to suppose that the Presi.
dent did not understand what he was writing ; indeed, if
he did, why did he stop half way? Let us imagine
a person who holds a bond of the United States
for 1,000 dollars. It is an obligation to pay the
bolder 1,000 dollars at the end of twenty years from
the date of its issue, and in the meanwhile 6 per
cent., or sixty dollars, in gold annually for interest.
Mr. Johnson tells this person that he has already received
a larger amcunt than was originally given for the bond ;
and if the holder were to reply that he bad only bought
the bond a day before, the President would, perhaps,
rejoin that it was so much the worse for him, but that
some one had received from the United States in respect
of the bond more than had been originally given for it,

The Post remarks that the first cannon shot fired
in anger in the East has fortunately led to no imme-
diate disaster, and it is yet permitted to us to hope that
peace may be maintained. Hobart Pasha having folk,
across the Enosis, surprised her flagrante delicto in armet
blockade running. She not only paid no attention to hit
signals, but actually fired into him, and then, availing
herself of her exceptional speed, sought safety in
the harbour of Syra. Here the Turkish admiral
blockaded her, and, being heavily reinforced, he
might have claimed her surrender or laid the town in ruins;
but on the arrival of a Greek frigate, accompanied by a
French vessel, negotiations were entered into, and Hobart
Pasha, very wisely and diplomatically preferring to appeal
to international law rather than proceed to violent
action, however justifiable, permitted the Enosis
to be convoyed to the Piraeus, there to await the
result of judicial investigation by an impartial
tribunal. Speaking of the cause, or causes of
the quarrel, the Post goes on to say that
some will have it that the Porte is the catspaw of Count
von Beust, who, later, is to plunder Turkey of the Dantr
bian provinces. Others see in the whole affair the direct
and obvious action of Count Bismarck, who is, of
course, at the bottom of every plot ; and others, again,
still more wise, recognise the handiwork of Napoleon, anti
argue elaborately that the volcanic movement in the East
may serve as a pretext for an eruption on the Rhine.
Prussia, however, It is asserted, has nothing whatever to
do with the quarrel, and Napoleon, also, is exonerated
from all blame in the disturbance, which is said to arise
solely from the restlessness of the Greeks.

The Star cites the Maniteur as the authority for the
report that the difficultyis to end peacefully, but goes on to
state that Turkey and Greece are still at arm's length, or
at ultimatum's length, and the Great Powers who, we are
assured, are united in their efforts to conciliate, have to
accommodate a difference, of which this little sea fracas
is only a first and small result.

In defence of the rule that members accepting office
under the Crown ought to seek the approval of their con-
stituencies, the Telegranb lIU VW-OW(1 (Ind
Irnu cols ancient safeguard of the English common-
weal are either cunning or ill-informed. Such people are
ignorant of the circumstances which have occurred in the
past to make this proceeding no vain precaution—and
equally ignorant of the combinations and political
incidents which might render it a happy barrier to abuse
in future. But they are cunning —and cunning in a very
sinister way— if, knowing enough of the past to forecast
the future, they secretly desire to rob the people of a
power which might prove to possess incalculable value at
critical times. The result of the appeal at the present
crisis is known beforehand, and Ministers are promised a
cheap and easy return.

The Standard is very sore on the score of Lord Mayo's
and Colonel Wetherall's fitness for office being disputed,
and gives some severe strictures on the comments of the
Liberal papers. It is remarked that Lord Mayo and
Colonel Wetherall are to be disqualified because their
political opinions are not those of the Ministry which is in
rower. As to the public interests, they cannot have
Buttered, for the best of all reasons, because neither of the
two officers have had an opportunity of proving either useful
or useless in their respective offices. They can only be unfit
because of a foregone conclusion formed by their political
adversaries of their unfitness. But the force of this dis-
qualification depends altogether upon the justice or other-
wise of that opinion. It is probable that Mr. Gladstone
thinks himself a better judge of what is best for the
country than Mr. Disraeli—that the Duke of Argyll is
convinced that he knows more about India than the Earl
of Mayo. But this is only an opinion, after all, of .the
parties chiefly concerned in giving it.

In an ablpwritten article on the dangers of the season
the Daily News remarks : There are certain classes to
whom the season of Christmas and other holiday periods
are times of considerable risk as well as of enjoyment.
The pleasures of the poor are not unattended with draw-
backs almost as compensatory as those of the rich, and
Brown, the carpenter, who exceeds upon gin and goose in
the bosom of his family on the 25th of December, and who
may get drunk on boxing-night, is made to feel the bitterness
of dissipation as keenly as the revellers at the West-endwho
mqy be induced to make nights of it during this festive week.
But the greatest danger, it is pointed out, besets the class
of •milliners and ahoprls who have leisure at this season,
and who seek for excitement. It points out that Christmas
is the time during which the flirting toilliters are brought
nearest the verge of destruction. The theatres are
tempting, even the Music-halls possess attractions, and
these girls desire not only the delights of theatre or music-
hall, but the companionship of men who can pay for
their admission and treat them to a better style of conver-
sation than the wearisome vulgarity of the cad from the
counter.

-The Heralel says the annual report of Colonel Hender-
son, the Inspector-General of Military Hospitals, for the
year 1867 presents us, we regret to say, with a very
unsatisfactory account of the state of crime in our army.
Drunkenness, with insubordination arising from it, and
desertion, which in most cases may be attributed to over-
indulgence in the use of spirituous liquors, appear to be the
principal causes for which soldiers are subjected to punish-
m ent ; and the statistics embodied in the report bring to notice
some facts of a very unaccountable nature, which are well
worthy of a special and minute inN estigation. The aggre-
gate number of committals to the military prisons, which
amounted in 1859 to 6,343, in a force composed of 105,245
Men, are returned as 5,666 in a force of 80,907 men in 1863 ;
and in 1867 they had reached by gradual progression to
6;674 in a force of 83,231 men. Army reformers will not
be cheered by the causes assigned for this increase
of crime, for it goes on to say that there can
be but little doubt that this remarkable increase of crime
may be attributed to the additional means which the
augmented pay affords the soldier of indulging in his
vicious propensities, as well as to the total abolition of
corporal punishment, which acted as a far more powerful
deterrent from misconduct than imprisonment, which is
regarded by the more depraved as but an agreeable release
from the performance of duty.

SCIUn Mdlle. Sehno:der is going to
Egypt! Not fewer than 7,000 fellabs are engaged in
building a theatre on the Esbekich, opp4liite to Sliepperd's
Hotel, at Cairo. The teinple will soon be reared, and
Mane. F'chneiderwill then salty forth t,)resnnie Cleopatra's
sceptre. She is to reeeivt, .t 2,0 0 for fifteen representa-
tions, a subvention of 1.!5,0‘,:0, and carte blanche for the
engagement of a troupe.

SAINTLY —Of all the objectionable
forms of sentimentality, the following is one of the most
nauseous examples. A certain lady orator, in enumerating
the good deeds of a teetotal convert, an artilleryman in
the Crirman war, stated that, while serving his guns
under fire, " his heart was full of peace and joy." This is
thus commented on by a writer in the Saturday Review:—
"The notion of a gunner getting a good 'lay-on' with his
piece at a dense column of Russians, and feeling his heart
full of 'peace' and `joy' as he mowed them down, is pro,
bably unique among the records of Christian heroism."

CTEreER POLICE CAPTURE AT
SHEFFIELD.

In Sheffield a very clever capture has been made of a
notorious character named John Moore, who had been
long suspected by the police, but whom they had
failed hezetofore, with all their efforts, to bring within the
grasp of the law. For some time he carried on business
in Broad-lane, ostensibly as a dealer in earthenware, but
in reality as a dealer in spurious coin, many of the
"smashers " who purchased from him being detected and
punished. It was shrewdly suspected that he also acted
as a "fence," and, in fact, he was much " wanted "
by the police. Acting on " information he had received,"
Detective Officer Carswell hunted out the suspected
criminal, and found him residing in a court at Redhill.
On entering the place it did not at first seem
likely that the officers would find any proofs
to criminate the wily rogue, but on mere chance
Detective Carswell opened an oven door and dis-
covered two moulds for casting counterfeit coin. In a
moment he had the handcuffs on Moore's wrists, and the
search that was immediately made will furnish proof
enough to stop the rogue's career for some time at least.
Such, at any rate, seems to be the criminal's own view
of the case, for he remarked that he was "done for at
last."