The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1877-07-30

| the cause in which they believe they are to
act and the allies with whom they suppose
they are to fight for one of the comfortable
attributes of our nature is the common
ability to make virtue Of necessity
Terrible indeed would be the lot OF
soldiers forced to stand shoulder to
shoulder with an Ottoman army and to un-
dergo the degradation Of laying down their
lives in the Turkish cause if they could see
the one and the other in the plain daylight
Of common sense Any sentiment on the
subject, any poetical delusion that puts
their allies in picturesque or heroic light
and enables them to get up an enthusiasm
and to cheer in such a cause; any fancy or
conception that renders palatable orders
that must be obeyed, should be regarded in
such case as one Of the conservative forces
Of nature.
Soldiers cheer their colors, and the cause
they are raised in they leave to those above
them. In the news from Portsmouth on
this subject we see therefore no great signif-
canoe, for the temper of the English army
is of comparatively little consequence. If
the troops like the Turks, SO much the
worse for their taste; if they do not like
them they will have to fight for them
all the same if the government has de-
cided ON that step. Neither does the
fact that these cheers were called for de-
termine that the government has so de-
cided; and this point is the great doubt
of the day in European politics. The
significant point in the embarkation OF the
troops at Portsmouth is that soldiers,
equipped for war, are leaving England in
the whole British public believes, covers
their point of destination by false state
ment. John Bull is already in lamentably
false position when he dares not tell the
truth in case where deception is not the
necessity Of a strategic purpose. How many
volumes have been written upon the
bluff honesty of our worthy cousin!
How he has praised his own frankness
and open nature for generations! With
what love Of the subject he has contrasted
his plain ways with the devious and subtle
transactions and left-handed devices of the
adroit French and the deceiving Italians!
Yet here is John Bull shipping troops,
which he says with wink are going to
Malta, and that all the people understand
are to land on Turkish territory shipping
troops for point he dares not name prac-
Using deception that does not deceive
cheating with an imbecility that betrays
itself and does not accomplish its purpose.
Englands difficulties multiply as the war
goes on The obstacles to her interference
between Russia and Turkey increase as the
necessity for such interference becomes
more urgent. Only great and sudden sue
cesses on the part Of Russia can make i'm
minent the danger to avert which England
would take arms; but for England to defer
her interference until such successes are ac-
tually achieved and to interfere then would
be to put her handful Of troops on the
anvil upon which the Ottoman forces
had been destroyed without the chance to
come out with credit to herself or advan-
tage to her allies. Her half-hearted states
manship dares not venture war while there
is the remotest possibility that the Turk can
get on without her yet it dares not face on
the other hand the facts that will probably
present themselves with the Turk fairly
out of the way. How far this shilly-
shallying with great occasion will continue
is not altogether clear, but the appearances
indicate that decision will soon be forced
upon her by the Russians. They haveswept
forward with great strides within the past
ten days, and it would not be an extreme
speculation to suppose that in ten days
more the activity now shown between Adri-
anople and the Balkans will be shown be-
tween Adrianople and the capital. With
enterprising audacity the Russians have
fairly knocked out of the game the greatest
apparent difficulty in 1.-THE Balkans. It
has been shown that the difficulties of Rus
sian armies in that country were never due
to the mountain. They have passed
it in previous wars in all directions
and with equal facility for troops
Of all arms yet it has fingered
as a constant tradition that the passage of
this range was an almost insurmountable
obstacle. In England this delusion was
cultivated; for it was pleasant to believe
that there was something That would save
the Turk and thereby save England the
trouble and expense of interference, or the
chagrin of seeing the Turk 60 down if she
did not interfere. But the Russians once
over the Danube swept up to the
mountain and over It, and were
on the way to Constantinople almost
before the Turks knew it. Behind
the troops that have gone so far others are
pressing on in great numbers; and if the
measures so well begun beyond the Balkans
are continued with the same energy it is
pretty certain that England cannot get to
Turkey in time even to modify the terms
that her ally will be forced to accept
At the same time that these successes of
Russia make English interference q