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sity ; but it is known that her roubles are paper , and that her hard cash is becoming seriously deficient . She goes into the market , and finds herself in total discredit . She asks- the Princes to assist her , and they fail ; Austria cannot lend even underhand help in this direction . Naples is said to be acting as agent , and other German Princes to be borrowing for the same purpose . Hence a great draft of bullion in Central Europe , which is felt even in this country ; as -witness the raising of the Bank discount on Thursday last from 3 * to 4 per cent . But no " tightness" that we can fear , even prospectively , equals the excessive pressure upon our enemy and his allies . * It is ' quite possible that Naples may render real assistance to Russia ; althoug h King Ferdinand himself stands in no small need of support . His position is becoming more desperate than that of the potentate to whom he is subservient . This , however , arises from the morbid state of the Prince in possession . Naples is a rich country ; the people are naturally inclined to put up with much ; and any difficulty that the court can feel must arise from the simple madness which rules over it . Of this we have had occasion to notice frequent and recent examples . The poor King will not let well alone . He is so nervous with respect to the o dium that he may incur towards the Western Powers , by aiding Russia secretly—so apprehensive of the local hatred which he may incur by his unconcealable co-operation with the reactionary party at Vienna , that he is not content to be safe and quiet in his palace , but he must set . his police to be incessantly ascertaining whether or not each particular individual in the city of Naples remains loyal , or is rendered harmless . This goading with the royal sceptre in the hands of a brutal police puts the people in a humour extremely favourable to any revolutionary movements , and evidently some movement is in preparation , with Naples for its centre . Thus , while doing all he can to serve the purposes of the Czab as a spy , stockbroker , and general agent in the South , the King op Naples is practically undermining his own throne , and opening the road for a restoration of the Mdbat dynasty by rendering the present system absolutely unbearable to the Neapolitans . Finance has become the turning point even in Spain , and the telegraph announces the most hopeful movement that we have seen in that country . The Loan , although co npulsory to a certain extent , by no means vies with the French and English loans in the facility of raising . On the contrary , it is a kind of boast that the Government has at last obtained offers of about threefifths ! But a new step is taken , —it is announced that there is to be a general reform of the Tariff . The duty on cotton goods is to be lowered ; that on paper and wood abolished . The telegraph deals roughly with subjects like these : it may exaggerate ; it frequently underrates the importance of public measures But if the Spanish Government grapples with the Tariff that protects the smuggler to the injury of the Crown and the honest citizen , it may ruully have made the first move towards escaping from chronic bankruptcy to a renovation of its exchequer ; and , in that case , the Liberal Government of Espartbro has obtained a lease of existence that it may continue us long as it pleases . Let us welcome the illustrious volunteers who * have come forward to expose the British administration ns it has been , if not as it is . Sir Charles Napibr hns been publishing a correspondence , mainly intended to expose Sir Jamks Graham ' and his conduct , while he was Firsb Lord of the Admiralty . Sir Ciiablbs appears to bo innocently unaware how much the correspondence exposes both parties ; and Sir Jamks has boem lending aid , vied voce , to the exposJ . By this correspondence , whiclt wan not intended' fop publication , but does not pretend to be the more sincere on that account , we understand the reason -why Sir Charles Napier was chosen for the comrtiand . Sir JaMks Gbaii'Am evidently daw throug h ' tile old Admiral 8 duHcienciea ' and weaknesses , excusable to a certain extent on tho score of age , ' but for that very reason likely to grow woruo . Ifc
is , however , manifest from the whole tenor of this correspondence , that Sir James Graham was not looking for a commander who would go in and strike a blow at Russia , but for one who would l » e popular . He wanted , in short , an Admiral not for use in the Baltic , but for show in the Reform Club ; and the popular ex-Member for Marylebone , who had amused all and sundry by his naval sallies , his oddities , and his reckless writing , was a showy person for the purpose . Thus we learn the sort of Admirals that are chosen , and perhaps we ought not to limit the remark to the naval force . Land officers may be chosen for show as well as sea officers . Again , we have the Cabinet Minister exposed . Sir JFames Graham avows that he is " of all things the maiutainer of peace ; " he has always been so , and he means to keep so ; but he continued in command of the Admiralty during war , and appointed fighting Admirals for show instead of service , while he himself of course sat in his department for show instead of service He is accounted a clever administrator , and he is a clever manager . He can fit out . ships , and he can economise stores ; but he appoints Admirals not to do the duty , and ships not to fight . If the fxnminat ons which have been commenced in the admission of candidates for the artillery and military schools do their duty , they ought to give us better public servants . Hut how far are the examinatio is intended for show ? Some are ludicrously and extravagantly severe ; there have bfen others which were ludicrous pretences ; and even the best may be merely a mode of stocking the public offices , and the army and navy , with " good" schoolboys . Or there may be real methods of securing that manly , active , and intelligent youths find their way into both services . Experience only can tell us which will be the result . In the meanwhile the taint of humbug is so extensive , that we watch wi th doubt as well as hope . One of the best acts of the Administration was undertaken at the suggestion of Sir William Molesworth—the appointment of Mr . Francis Hincks , the late Prime Minister in Canada , to be Governor of Barbadoes . It is a great practical step towards the consolidation of the Colonial Empire . But will the Barbadians , the proud people of . " Little England , " tol .-rate the appointment of an unsuccessful Canadian Minister to be their governor ? For Hincks is a man who has so managed reform in Canada , that while he has helped the success of it , he has made everybody mistrust him as one pushing to gain his own ends ; and so he is driven from the head of the party which he has rendered successful . At all events , he understood colonial business , which is more than all governors do . We have a fresh example in Sir Charles Hotham , who succeeded so well as a peremptory negotiator in South America , and appears to be making a " mull" at Victoria . Finding the expenditure of that golden colony very high , he dapped on several taxes ; and when the colonists kick against taxation , instead of pushing his measure as he might , he cuts down the expenditure ; as if , sulky at the refusal of money , he would make the colonists feel the effects in stinted ptitilic ' works . That is his grand offence ; but he has ' been foolish enough to commit himself to a small and ludicrous private quarrel . One Cboons , a victualling contractor , was , it seems , invited to a ball . At the ball , growing thirsty with the delightful labours of the scene , he retires to take a draft of " the vice-regal beer . " We guess from the sequel that the audacious contractor had made a tender for boor of his own , and had boon rejected . At all events , it is hinted that the vice-regal beer " was sour and bad . This is nothing new in viceregal houses , or oven regal : the tea which Queen Charlottid gave was notoriously undrinkable , and in other courts the viands have been found worise thun thoHO which humble citizens demand . But Croons probably was moved by an animus ; and with a reckless disregard of tho sacred precincts in which he stood , he significantly exclaimed "OLord ! " This was construed to bo a direct insult to tho vico-regal beor ; and with an admonition from an official secretary that he hud violated tho etiquette of the court , he was dismissed from his poet as a victualling contractor . Whereupon Croons rushes into print , appealing from 1 Sir Cha ' rles Hotwatbr to the public , ana complaining that lie is not only dismissed , not only declared a violator of etiquette , but degraded before tho public as " a mini of weak digestion . "
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o . THE X . EADEK ,. [ No . 285 , Saturday , . oo 4 i —
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T HE W A R .
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: Since the commencement of the war , we have rarely had to record a week so barren of intelligence from the various seats of hostilities as the past has been . A vast deal of preparation—a great deal of expecta - tion with reference to the next blow , whatever that may be—and a small dropping tire of rumours ( though even of those there has been a comparative scarcity ) — such is almost the sum of the week ' s war news . The only intelligence of interest relates to a sortie made by the Russians from the Redan , and the destruction by them of some gabions . A despatch from General Simpson , and another from General Pelissier , dated respectively August 31 and September 1 , speak of this sortie as having occurred on the previous night , which would seem to indicate two separate attacks ; but , from the terms of both despatches being almost identical , we should judge that they refer to a combined and simultaneous action , and that there is some ambiguity in the term " last night . " The Russians , it is asserted , have made tjpo semicircular lines behind the Malakhoff Tower , which there is no doubt they will defend with the utmost tenacity . The bridge that is to unite the north and south' sides of Sebastopol , and to facilitate the passage of the Russians into the former , should the latter fall into our hands , is being actively constructed ; and everything seems to indicate that the enemy is beginning to despair of keeping us out of that ; part of the fortress . Still , the coming blow does not . come , though the Allies get nearer to the outer I works , and every day lose more and more men in the I trenches ; the Russians feel the deadly foe of hunger pressing them hard in the very midst of their de-1 lences ; and it would almost seem that the besieging armies calculate upon the issue being settled by that last and strongest ally . Touching the internal defences which the Russians are supposed to be constructing within Sebastopol , ; we read as follows in a Vienna letter in the Indeptndance Beige : — u If we are to give credit to the information received here , General Melnikoff , who has succeeded General Todleben as director of the defensive -works of Sebastopol , has had mines , fosses , galleries , small redoubts , and barricades made between the first and second lines of defence . Upon the eminence between Fort Paul and the bastion No . 1 , he has had a work constructed , which commands the towers of Korniloff and the Malakhoff to such an extent , that the Allies will be unable to establish themselves in these towers , even when they shall have conquered them . The Belbeu heights again are stronger than ever , and the entire park of field artillery previously at Sebastopol is also there . " Yet , side by side with all these anticipations , is the positive declaration of Prince Gortsehakoff . if we may credit a despatch from Hamburg , thai the fortifications have been greatly damaged , and that the garrison has suffered heavy losses . j It is suspected , however , that the enemy will make yet another desperate effort on the Tchernaya . The troops there have been kept , for many days and nights , in a state of incessant watchfulness ; but as yet we have no intelligence of any repetition of the affair of the 16 l 1 i . New works have been constructed by the French and Sardinians to protect the line of the Tchernaya ; and there is little doubt that another attack would be even more dieastrou 9 ly repulsed , if that be possible , than the former . In the meanwhile , according to a despatch from Marseilles , a great movement is observable amongst the army of the enemy on the Bui bee plateau . Omar Pacha is in all probability by this time on his way to Asia with his army . By the end of September , the reinforcements sent to Anatolia will amount , it is said , to 30 , 000 men . Kara and Erzoroum are effectually relieved ; f !> r , although the Russians still intercept the communications with the latter place , and have burnt tho villages round about , they have no means of attacking cither town . Another account states that the Rusfiians recrossea the Soghanli-Dagh , after a combat at Kopri-Ktui , in which JCorem I'acha greatly distinguished himself . LetterH from Erzeroum say that the Russian General fears that the army of Batoum , under Om » r Pacha , will cut ofF his retreat by advancing on Tiflis-Tho following bulletin is published by tho Ottomft " Government :---"On tho 4 th , ut sovon A . M ., tho lluasiana advancod with tho whole of their forces against tho intronchment * of Kara , mid made an attack on tho battory of Khnnly-Tabitt . A contest between tho artillery commenced . and lasted two hours . Tho HuBsiane , who loflt a B real number of men , rotreutcd . Bcsidca tho dead an < wounded , whom they took off , thoy left on the fl «" more than , one hundred men . " A RuBBian General , it is added , was killed , and one of tho enemy ' s guns was bo injured that u w " abandoned . Owing to tho position which tho lurn occupied , they lost but few men . From Trieste , under dm © of September r > th , > "
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Sept. 8, 1855, page 854, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2105/page/2/
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