NEWS OF THE WEEK.'
Tin sequel to the conquest of Bomarsund is not yet known. Imme- diately after the reduction of the fortress, it was stated that the English Secretary of Legation and an Aide-de-camp of General Ba- replay d'Hilliers at once proceeded to Stockholm : but on what errand? It might be to offer the group of islands to Sweden their old sovereign ; or to negotiate accommodation for the Allied fleet during the winter; or to report the capture merely, as a matter of formal courtesy. -_ That Sweden neither accepts the recovered ,territory, nor undertakes to occupy OP support it, is rendered probable by the announoement in the Moniteur, that "the Governments of France and England have resolved that the fortifications on the Aland Islands shall be destroyed and the islands evacuated." What does that mean? Is the process of destruction rather than occu- pation to be carried forward upon Sweaborg and Cronstadt, strip- ping St. Petersburg of its granite mask ; or are the Allies winding up for theseason, and about to retire in ordinary, rather than run a chance of a hard winter, a frozen sea, and the conversion of the Baltic into firm ground a-vailable for an overwhebnieg Russian land force ? The policy of unmasking is supported by a fact strikingly confirmed at I3emarsund—that the progress of military scienee,Whicli in the Middle ages left the absolute advantage to the besieged, now transfers it with continually increasing power to the assailant i though the consideration would also tell in pro- viding against the chance of a hard, winter ; and an expression in one of Sir Charles Napier's despatches—" the rest of the season, which will not be long"—implies that business is nearly over for this year. The uncertainty which seems to hang over the future of Bomar- sund surrounds the entire masts Of the Baltic. If we have learned to refrain from counting on the old national feeling of Fin- land as opposed to RuSsia' Prussia has taught us that even pledged allies cannot be trusted ; the people of Denmark are, with what chances we know not, still struggling to force their court out of its Russian courses; and Sweden does not seem yet to have gathered heart to commit herself against that-formidable neighbour whom England permitted to retain Finland in a former war. The shoals or narrows of the Baltic are not nearly so uncertain as the political -shoals that surround the whole situation; but hitherto the Allied Powers have sufficed to themselves, and have suffered
but little from any kind of shoal. , ,
In the Emit; we learn true character and power of our chief enemy when it is in retreat. "The cholera is abating it the army, and its worst seems to have passed over the fleet "—but that worst haabeen terrible. The army has beenenfeebleid in numbers by death, and in bodily strength by the attacks of disease even where the cholera has been surmounted. In the fleet, where the progress of the epidemic could be more easily hushed up, its ravages turn out to have been far worse. Our Admiral's ship had lost from eighty to a hundred men: ',Nor has the British lass at all equalled that of the French, whose dead in some ships doubled t 6 miximnra, ill ours, 4 while,the- cirraY. him- been 'rkore /thin •Ideti tedl The -Virulence of the disease. is said to babeting ; . lint e nOW may see that neither army nor fit couldf,haye move.dito esebastopol„ had diplo- matic prelimlnatids' teen ever. so', Miaplete : the forces were in the
haspital. ' '
4n41/whi1l the Allied powers, ,havet- kepi it-eld back by disease froni,ge.tti4 at their laiunaireneniy,:.the.T*ts have, been under- going a wholesale. deteatin Asia- appears' te leave the Rue- slate 'Misters of the field. AS Aocheyond the 'range of Lord Aberdeen's diplomatic notion, we cannot ascribe this Russian 'vic- tory-to him. ' It is also beyond the range 4)f-direct European co- opera:Lion ; and hence we must infer that modern Turkey derives her NO strength from the European agencies and influences that have.so :large ashen in her recent movements,—her„ep ,nnsellers European ministers, her engineers European, her commander-in-
chief European. Her very success, thus far, brings her into the European system ; and where she stands outside of it, she is powerless against the European enemy.
Should Sir Charles Napier's hint have the meaning we imagine, it might apply in the stormy Euxine not less than the frozen Bal- tic, and "the season" might close without another great blow. More "delay," then—more of vexing disappointment for those who at the commencement of a war involving the most complicated relations expected great victories by return of post. Not that We can jolt in blaming those who manage, and whose plans are in fact not yet divulged, for the excellent reason that to state them to our OWI3 talkingrpnblic would be to state them to the enemy. We can suppose it possible that there may have been excellent reasons fir not moving faster in advance. This is not a war in which indivi- dual heroes can be free to make "dashing" exploits, at the risk of defeat : the Western Powers, engaged in war on no venture of their own ambition, but as ministers of justice against a public offender, should not hazard a chance of defeat in any quarter— they are bound to accumulate means sufficient for rendering success as certain as possible, and to keep together the parts of a great com- bination which takes in the whole extent of Eastern Enrope. Those who are intrusted with the management certainly have better means of judging at present than we have—a more comprehensive knowledge of facts ; and they also have stronger motives than any other men to do their best, by the sense of a heavy respon- sibility. It will, some day, be incumbent upon them to render a full, a strict account ; and then we shall be able to judge whether the sickness, which was inevitable in sending British troops to such a climate, has been aggravated by unnecessary delay in sending them forward to possibly a worse climate but to active combat ; whether action has been put off, or only awaited until essential preparations were completed; in a word, whether there has been. any " delay " at all. The season, however, -will not have closed without one result of great magnitude. At this time last year Russia gave the law to Continental Europe—insolent in the possession of all-pervading influenee, enjoying high credit in finance, and with the prestige of irresistible .power see her/militia* raw'
