The Sun. — 1847-02-20 (London, England)

CONSULATE AND EMPIRE. A Sequel to his " History of the French Revo7utlon." Translated by D. FORBES CAMPBELL, Esq. With the sanction and approval of the Anther. " The publication of M. Thiers" History of the Consulate and Empire' Is an event of an interest not confined to the world of literature. The charms of so facile a style, the method of so lucid a narrative, and the abundance of its authentic and hitherto unex,lored materials place this work among the most Important productions of our times."—Times. Henry Colburn, Publisher. 13, Great Marlborough-street.  Vedras. Are our intentions towards the belligerents in Portugal strictly neutral ? Then let neutrality be preserved in a manner becoming the dignity and honour of Albion. We confess our willingness to afford protection-to the yOung QUEEN, supposing her Majesty to require shelter from the storms of the revolution ; and yet— coupling this with an avowal of our neutrality—we are to look on with indifference at the perpetration of a crime towards the insurgents of which history scarcely furnishes a parallel! Surely this is a most questionable neutrality, a most odious and dastardly neutrality! SALDANHA commits a political offence, not justified- by the usages of honourable nations, and certainly not exceeded in infamy or treachery by the most barbarous states : he formally and deliberately signs a stipulation with a portion of the troops of the Conde I3ompim that they shall be allowed to depart with all the honours of war, on surrendering the impregnable castle of Torres Vedras to the royalist commander; and, on the fulfilment of the latter portion of that engagement, he formally and deliberately acts counter to his most solemn promises. Instead of receiving all the honours of war, the officers of the duped insurgents are first conducted to captivity in the metropolis, and are subsequently sentenced to be• banished to Angola, one of those terrible settlements in Africa, which, like Sierra Leone, has deserved the appellation of the "White Man's Grave!" Was ever conduct more infamous than this? The crime of SALDANHA is such as to almost justify an armed interference and a summary vengeance. It is a crime which can find no palliation, excepting upon the most diabolical system of Machiavellism. When NAPOLEON BONAPARTE ordered the massacre of the troops at Jaffa, he was impelled to that rigorous act by the execrable dupli • city of those soldiers of DJEZZAR, in having broken the solemn oaths which they had previously taken ; by their murdering the French messenger carrying a flag of truce, in defiance of the holiest laws of nations; by the dearth of provisions in the desert, and the impossibility of granting such scoundrels their liberty without unnecessarily risking the lives of his own men, for the preservation of which he was responsible as Commander-in-Chief. In the proceeding of SALDANHA towards the prisoners of Torres Vedras we find no encitements of this kind, and beyond that we find, what there was not in the massacre of Jaffa, a sacrifice of all honour in the non-fulfilment of deliberate stipulations. SALDANHA, moreover, has not the manliness to have the prisoners of Torrer Vedras fusiladed at once; he kills them under a subterfuge, be poisons them atmospherically, he sends them in a dastardly spirit of assassination to Angola. it is the recurrence of such ferocious acts as this that justified Lord ELLENHOROUGH in saying that "greater violations of constitutional principles and of personal liberty were committed by these new constitutional Governments than under the harshest despotisms that ever existed." And it is this also which justified the Noble Earl in intimating that the British Government should be prepared to make a strenuous and not a merely vague representation to the Government of Portugal. If our ;fleet is to remain at Lisbon and Oporto, our character of neutrality must he preserved w ith dignity by the prevention of such flagrant violations of the laws of humanity and religion.