The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1844-09-17 00:00:00

TO CORRESPONDENTS.

We hative to the ay no means at ha
Bond of ascertaining the particulars re-
l town of lton.
Actumn Reflections in our next.
The alleged neglect noticed by a Layman is rat! er mare app,
rent than real.

Eibr Ktberpool &talt?)arb.

TUESDAY MORNING, SEPT. 17, 1814.

His royal highness, the Prince de Joinville, proved
himself recently so very desperate a fellow—upon
paper—that we were prepared to see him perform
miracles of devastation against the poor feeble foe
whom he had selected to encounter him upon his
own element. The man who could whip the fleet
of Old England, drive her steamers from the seas
and blockade us with his preponderating force, we
concluded could demolish the crazy forts of Mo-
rocco with a broadside; and we positively trembled
for the fate of Gibraltar herself, upon whom he was
reported to have directed some very appalling looks.
We were agreeably relieved, however, by what we
then thought his merciful disposition, as evinced
before Tangier ; and quite ourselves again when he
withdrew himself from before Mogadore, without
doing , that quarter of the globe more set ious de-
struction.
With this impression previously upon our mind, of
the Prince's great talent as a seaman, and the powers
of the fleet under his command, so fearfully painted
in his own never-to-be forgotten pamphlet, we must
take the liberty of expressing the same surprise
which has been felt by a contemporary, the London
Times, at the publication, in the Moniteur of Tues-
day last, of a description, by himself, of his achieve-
ments throughout this naval campaign, in which
every nautical reader must acknowledge that he
seems to have met with some unaccountable mis-
haps. To begin with the operations before Tangier ;
his Royal Highness says—
" On the Gth, (August,) at day-break, the steamers
Velooe, Pluton, Gassendie, Phare, Rubis, and Var came
and moored alongside of the Jemmapes, Suffren, Triton,
Cassard, and Argus, in order to be ready to tow them to
the posts assigned them. The calm, which generally pre-
vails in the morning in the Bay of Tangier, rendered this
necessary. About eight in the morning the squadron was
in motion. I prescribed that they should take their sta-
tions running from east to west, mooring with two an-
chors, one with a strong warp to the east, on account of
the bad quality of the ground and the east wind, which
had for some time blown with violence in the day. The
Jemmapes was the first to come into line, but, after her
first anchor was fast, her tow-boat was not able to stretch
her chain to its full lenoth. The Jemmapes, however,
succeeded in bringing her broadside to bear upon the
place within four cables' length. The Suffren and Pluton,
perfectly directed by Captain Lapierre and Bouet, also
took up excellent positions. The Argus found a compen-
sation for her long and painful winter station at Tangier,
by laying herself to at the extremity of her draught at
water in a position where she could give much and had
mach to receive. The Cassard placed herself so as to
play on the scarp marked L, on the map I send you, and
whose fire enfiladed our line. The weakness of the tug-
ships, added to the force of the currents, prevented the
Triton and Belle Poule from immediately fixing them-
selves at their posts. The Triton came up with her sails,
and the Belle Poole, after being ably extricated from a
critical position Captain 3lassin, of the Gassendi, came
into line about ten o'clock, but, as the fire of the town
was nearly silenced, the presence of these ships became
useless, and I sent them to cannonade forts Abdel Selim
and El Arbi-el-Saidi, which fired some balls upon us.
All our movements were made without any opposition
from the enemy."
Now this description does, we must confess a little
startle us with respect to the extent of the power, to
be exercised in future by Steamers in Naval engage-
ments, if we can take French steamers, manned and
officered by Frenchmen, as affording a fair example of
such power. The Jemmappes line of battle-ship comes
first into action hut her "tow boat was not able to
stretch her chain to its full length." Her effective-
ness was then in part botched. The Suffren and
the Pluton got into good position, but the Argus
got into one where she had " much to give and much
to receive"—a rather doubtful recommendation, if
she had been opposed to good gunnery. The Triton
and the Belle Poule, however, could not get up at
all until too late to be of service; and the former
had first to be " extricated from a critical position !"
And all this bungling when their movements " were
made without any opposition from the enemy ! !"
Why, an opposition anything like effective would
have placed the whole squadron in very critical
positions indeed !
For am ttser specimen of seamanship, we turn to
the Prince's description of the operations before
Mogadore.
" On the 11th, he says, the squadron was assembled be-
fore Mogadore. New difficulties, and of more than one
kind, here awaited us. For four days the violence of the
-wind and the roughness of the sea prevented us from com-
municating with each other. Anchored upon a rocky
bottom, our anchors and cables broke, and the loss of
them deprived us of resources which were indispensible
in order to obtain cur object. Some vessels had only one
chain and one anchor, and the latter deprived of one of
its flukes. We could not think of maintaining ourselves
before Mogadore under sail. The violence of the currents
and of the gale would probably have carred us too far,
and we should have lost the opportunity of acting. Be •
sides, in causing the steamers to get ready to proceed
with us, they would have consumed their fuel, and in
leaving them by themselves they would be exposed to run
short of provisions and water. It was therefore neces-
sary to remain at anchor."
Pity that such steamers, so short of fuel and provi-
sions, could not have been taken on board and
stowed away till they were wanted ! But it seems
a bright idea had occurred to his Royal Highness
that steamers are too brittle things to be used for
serious fighting ; for he remarks, when describing
the subsequent operations :
" I could not think of employing the steamers to take
the ships of the line to their post. The preparations which
were being made on land proved that we would not be
permitted to approach as easily as at Tangier. A single
ball could put the engines of a steamer out of order, and
force it to stop in a critical position, (.9 from which we
might not have been able to withdraw it, and where it
could not defend itself.
After this very novel discovery, it will surprise us I
much to see the French admiral ever going to sea 1
again v ith such troublesome toys as French steamers
appear to be.
It cannot but be highly consolatory to the British
nation to have this incontestible voucher, under the
hand and seal of an admiral and prince of France,
that that gasconading people are still—as they ever
were and ever will he—no match for John Bull
upon his own element- For years past France has
been constantly strengthaning this arm of warfare ;
and especially she has paid attention to the forma-
tion of a powerful steam-marine. She has got one
in her possession ; and, if these operations be a fair
specimen of her ability to snake use of it, she may
as well menace England with an army of hobby-
horses, as attempt to fright us from our propriety
by even such a steam force as she possesses now, or
can raise in a dozen years, which with such hands to
man and direct its operations, resembles, more than
anything else, Jew watches, made to look at, and
warranted not to go. Poor Joinville; what an ex-
hibition bast thou made of thyself!

The question of questions which, for a centur
past, has presented itself to every British statesman,
and every successive administration was probably
never more urgently required to be solved than et
the present moment. " What is to be done with
Ireland?" By what policy is the cause to he re-
moved, which keeps that fairest portion of our em-
pire ever wretched, ever hindmost in the march of
civilisation, ever steeped in poverty, in crime, and in
debasing ignorance ? She possesses within herself
vast national resources ; but they remain unde-
veloped. She possesses in the character and habits
of her population—in their industrious energy and
their unequalled powers of endurance—the sources
of wealth and national progression. And yet she is
doomed to witness those great resources wastefully
and madly squandered in the pursuit of chimeras,
impossible of attainment, and worthless if attained.
Other nations advance in civilization, in power, in
happiness ; Ireland alone,—unhappy Ireland,—
stands still!
_ Whence is this strange anomaly, and how is it to
be provided for ? We need not travel a street's
length without finding at least a dozen empirics
who are ready to prescribe their infallible nostrum
for its cure. Nay, the certain remedy" has been at
least a dozen times applied already • and yet Ireland
is precisely where she was, turbulent, ignorant,
wretched as ever. Catholic relief, tithe abolition
acts, municipal acts; "heavy blows and great dis-
courageMents" to Protestantism, accompanied with
ample concessions to Popery, have failed to amelio-
rate her condition or the temper of her people. We
have given up to her powers and immunities which,
in other hands, would have been largely productive
of advantage and blessings; she applies them, how.
ever, only afKt. the fantastic fashion of wayward
childhood,—pi '-s with them in dsJight for a mo-
ment and .theo pquts for more, to misuse them in
the same insane way. With what confidence, then,

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