English and Foreign.

Lyttelton Times, Volume VI, Issue 35, 22 March 1856, Page 3

English and Foreign.

ENGLAND.

SIR OHAKLKS NAPIER. Sir Charles Napier was elected member for the borough of Southwark on the 20th November unopposed. We extract the following from bis address, in returning thanks:—" There was one part'of the writ to which he was afraid the electors-had not paid much attention. They were desired to send to Parliament a disci eet man. He was afraid that in this particular respect the electors had made a bad choice; because, before now, he had been charged with indiscretion. He should endeavour, however, to mend bis ways, and to prove to the people of Southwark that' they had chosen a " discreet" man, if nob die right man. (Cheers.) He had been complimented in the course of his canvass a great de il too much upon what he had done in "the Baltic. ("No, no.") There were possibly many officers in the navy who, if they had been in his position, might have clone a great deal more than he done: but he had done what he thought was right. He had done what he believed to be within the range of possibility, and as much as be bad thought that British seamen were capable of accomplishing. (Cheers.) At the same time, he boldly stated that there was not one man or officer in that fleet who would not have given him three cheers if he had offered to take them under the walls of Sweaborg and Cmistradt. (Cheers.) Every one knew that we were engaged in a wir which he had almost called " a disastrous war,'' seeing the immense amount of life and treasure which had been sacrificed in it ; but it was not to be supposed that we were, therefore, not to prosecute it with vigor; a.id he was convinced that no money for which the crown might ask would be refused by the House of Commons, if the House were convinced that the Ministry would cany on the war as it ought to be conducted. (Cheers.) Until recently he could not say that the Government has carried on this war as it ought to have been carried on. It had not been carried on in the B.iltic as it should have been. He did not blame his successor, Admiral Dundas, in the smallest degree, because he had done his best with the means at his disposal; but he blamed the Admiralty of the day who had planned the campaign in the Baltic. They had sent an insufficient quantity of gun-boats and mortars, and, instead of assembling the fleet in front of Sveaborg, they—greatest fault o f all—allowed it to be scattered about over the whole of the Baltic. (Cheers.) He spoke advisedly when he said that if the mortar boats had not failed, some splitting up and others bursting—and if there had been 100 there instead of 15 or 16, supported by the fleet, we might have destroyed Sveaborg entirely. Had such been the case, lie was satisfied Sveaborg would have been destroyed after two days' bombardment. F<>r whatever had gone amiss therefore in the Baltic he did not blame the Admiral, but the plan. Parliament would meet probably in about two months, when all these things would be considered, not only by able naval and military officers, but also by learned and acute civilians; and if the Prime Minister or " First Lord" should talk to him and say, "It would have cost so much money to do so and so," he would answer him that the country would have given any amount of money that might be required in such a uiuse. (Applause.) But up to a certain point the Government had acted in an imbecile manner. There was no excuse this year. The Government had been warned in June, 1854, that Sveaborg could not be taken in two days, and yet, with Sebastopol staring them in the face, after eleven months' siege, and upwards of one thousand guns and mortars blazing away at it, one might hare expected a little more patience and reason from them."