The Evening Star WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 24, 1873

Evening Star, Issue 3384, 24 December 1873, Page 2

The Evening Star WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 24, 1873

The slow process of change ia the ideas and characteristic* of a nation is strongly exhibited in the passing history of Prance. When first the charge of treachery was brought against Marshal Bazaink v/e were inclined to believe that it was only a political expedient, intended to divert populai indignation from the Emueror, who pos ibly might contemplate resuming his throne when opportunity offered. Sacrifices of this sort have not been uncommon in the history of European wars. Our own country has been disgraced by Ministries throwing the blame of their incompetency upon unsuccessful naval or military officers ; and either exposing them to almost inevitable death if they did their duty, as in the cise of Sir John Moore ; or to trial and execution as in that of Admiral Byno. Incredible as it may seem, there are no facts better established than that both those commanders were sac rfficed bv the Ministries of the day, through being expected to effect specific objects with very inadequate means. Moore fell honorably on the field after achieving a victory which was nearly as disastrous as a defeat ] while Byno returned to Britain after a gallant effort on the part of his fleet, although it was said it was weakly participated in by his own vessel. One of his biographers informs us that popular “clamor, raised at Home, was more directed against the Ministry, who had neglected to tit out the fleet properly, than against the Admiral, who had fought languidly,” “The intrigues of his political e emics” prevailed ; the Press was employed against him ; Mallet, an able but venal writer, led the van ; and, in spite of many representations in his favor, Bynu was sentenced to be >hot, but unanimously recommended as a proper object of mercy!” The parallel between his case and that of Bazaine ceases with the sentence passed. By Ml acted under orders in opposition, to the unanimous opinion of “a council of war” that it was impossible thj object of the expedition the relief of Minorca —could be effected by the force under his command. He did attempt what proved impossible. But Marshall Bazaine has not been able to prove that he acted so straightforward a part. The accounts of the trial published in the leading journals, Dad to the irrisistible conclusion that he preferred his own aggrandismeot to that of the Empire that he served ; and to advance his own interests he sacrificed the Emperor, his army, and hia country. We do not suppose that the political result of the war, so far as Germany is c ncerned, would have been materially different had he faithfully and gallantly fulfilled hia duty. The contest might have been prolonged, and Par s might have been more cnstinately »ief*ud-;d. ,b . u consequence would have been a greater sacrifice of Go man lib- in the reduction of Metz and Paris ; but it is also probable there would not have been a red revolution, and that fewer political perplexities would have arisen than have since been found so difficult of resolution. The whole history of the war proves that the Govermra nt of Louis Napoleon was a most hollow affair, and that he himself was surrounded by insincere, eelf-seeking, unscrupulous m-n, ready to sacrifice everything to secure their own ends. The Emperor commanded an array, the chief use of which, during a great part of his reign, was to keep in checd the elementof disorder at Home, ready to burst their bonds as soon as the pressure that kept them down was removed. *> is commissariat, that he thought so well organised, proved corrupt enough to wink at contractors substituting .artridges of sawdust for gunpowder, and thus exposing gallant men to inevitable defeat or - eath through depriving them of the very means on which they relied fo victory : and he entrusted oih of the most important commands to a man ready to risk honor, fame, army, and Empire to his own personal ambition. We do not believe that the Emperor of hia own wi 1 would have enter* d ui on a foreign wars but no glory is gained by an army maintained merely for purposes of repression, and glory is the god of a military commaud*r. “ o war, no glory” is his motto. The traditional policy of European Governments to become great by crushing a neighbor no doubt had something to do with the matter, but we cannot conclude otherwise than that Napoleon’s chief object was to attach the army thoroughly to his dynasty, in the hope that no difficulty would* present itself to his son’s accession to the throne. We are inclined to this vDw from the following remark ible pannage in the ‘ Gnion Medicale’ of July, 1870 : “I'nJuly I, 1870, the Emperor Napoleon feeling very ill, a consu tation took pi -ce between doctors Nblaton, Biuord, Ravel, Con vis art, and Sck Their diagnosis was that of stone, and an immediate operation was recommended. But from political cons'derations ‘ the disease was allowed to go on for two years and a half.’” The Emperor sacrificed himself to the interests of bis son ; Bazaine sacrificed all—Kmperor, empire, army, to serve himself. Condemning war as the greatest curse that can fall upon a nation or the world, so long as that erase endures, it is aggravated by treachery, Soldier is dependent upon soldier for even the trilling chance of escape from wound or death that modern warfare affords, and desertion or cowardice by privates is punishable with death. We know no reason why wholesale de sertion like that induced by Bazaine should be more leniently dealt with, or why greater consideration should be shown to the great delinquent than to the small: the selfishness in each is parallel, although one exhibits it in an endeavor to escape from military service, the other in sacrificing friends and comrades to personal ambition.