London, February 9. Following their acceptance of new mi- 
nisterial posts, Palmerston and Sidney Herbert have to submit 
to the formality of re-election to their parliamentary seats. For this 
reason both Houses were yesterday adjourned for a week. The 
statements by Lord Derby and the Marquis of Lansdowne in the 
House of Lords concerning the secret history of the ministerial 
crisis merely retold an oft-told tale.* "The sole item of importance 
was a remark by Derby which contained the key to Lord 
Palmerston’s position. Palmerston is known to have no parliamen- 
tary party behind him, or any clique masquerading under that 
name. Whigs, Tories and Peelites regard him with equal 
suspicion. The Manchester School’ is in open conflict with him. 
His personal supporters among the Mayfair Radicals (as distinct 
from the Manchester Radicals) number a dozen at the most. Who 
and what, then, enables him to impose himself on the Crown and 
on Parliament? His popularity? No more so than unpopularity 
prevented Gladstone, Herbert, Graham and Clarendon from again 
seizing the helm of state. Or is the man who never belonged to a 
party, served all of them alternately, deserted them all in turn and 
invariably held the balance between them, is he the natural leader 
of defunct parties which seek to stem the tide of history by 
forming a coalition? This fact proves nothing at the present 
moment, since it was insufficient to put Palmerston rather than 
Aberdeen at the head of the coalition in 1852. 

Derby has supplied the answer to the riddle. Palmerston is 
evidently Bonaparte’s friend. His premature recognition of the 

were reported in The Times, No. 21973, February 9, 1855— Ed. 

coup d’état in December 1851 was then ostensibly the reason for his 
expulsion from the Whig Ministry.? Bonaparte therefore regards 
him as persona grata, and a_trustworthy man. The alliance with 
Bonaparte is therefore decisive at the moment. Palmerston has 
thus used foreign affairs to tip the balance of ministerial 
groupings—and not for the first time, as closer examination of 
the history of British ministries between 1830 and 1852 would 
show. 

Since at present the situation of the Crimean army can no 
longer be exploited for the purpose of cabinet intrigues, Lord 
John Russell went back on his pessimistic opinion in yesterday’s 
sitting in the Commons, allowed the strength of the British army 
to grow by some 10,000 men and exchanged congratulations with 
the God-fearing Gladstone.* Despite this “parliamentary resurrec- 
tion” of the British army, there can be no doubt that at the 
present moment it has ceased to exist as an army. Some few 
thousand are still listed as “fit for service” because there is no 
room in the hospitals to receive them. Out of 100,000 the French 
still number some 50,000, but what are 50,000 or 60,000 men to 
hold Heracleatic Chersonese through the winter, to blockade the 
south side of Sevastopol, to defend the trenches and to take the 
offensive in the spring with those who are left? The French may hold 
in readiness fresh divisions for embarkation in March, but they are 
busy preparing for a spring campaign on the continent, and there is 
every probability that their shipments will be too few or will arrive 
too late. 

That the English and French governments are helpless, indeed 
have given up the army in the Crimea for lost, is apparent from 
the two measures to which they have resorted in order to remedy 
their misfortunes. 

In order to make good the error of having undertaken the 
expedition four months too late, they are committing the 
incomparably greater error of sending to the Crimea, the only 
remnants of the Turkish army that are still serviceable, four 
months after their own arrival and in mid-winter. This army, already 
broken and in the process of disintegration at Shumla as a 
consequence of the neglect, incompetence and corruption of the 
Turkish government, will in the Crimea melt away with cold and 
hunger to an extent which will even surpass British achievements 
in this field. 

* Lord John Russell’s speech in the House of Commons on February 8, 1855. 
The Times, No. 21973, February 9, 1855.— Ed. 

As soon as the Russians have attained their full concentration 
and the weather permits field operations, they will probably first 
attack the Turks under Omer Pasha. This is expected by the 
British and French. Thus conscious are they of the unenviable 
position they have assigned to them. Thus clearly do they show 
that the strategic error of now throwing the Turks in on the 
northern side was committed with open eyes. The Turks would 
only be able to save themselves from ultimate destruction by the 
most incomprehensible errors on the part of the Russians. 

Secondly, the Anglo-French have hired 15,000 Piedmontese for 
the purpose of swelling the sparse ranks of the British; they are to 
be fed by the British Commissariat. In 1848 and 1849 the 
Piedmontese showed themselves to be brave and good soldiers. 
For the most part mountain-dwellers, their infantry surpasses even 
the French in skirmishing, sniping and fighting on broken terrain. 
The plains of the Po on the other hand have produced a cavalry 
which bears comparison with the British Horse Guards. Finally, 
they have had a hard schooling in the most recent revolutionary 
campaigns. These fleet-footed, mobile, adroit little fellows are fit 
for anything, but not to be British soldiers, which is what they are 
to be turned into, nor for the direct, ponderous frontal attacks 
which are the only tactics Raglan knows. And on top of that, to be 
fed by a British Commissariat whose only previous experience was of 
feeding itself! The 15,000 Piedmontese will therefore probably 
prove to be a further blunder. 

British reinforcements: have been suspended for the present. 
Raglan himself appears to be refusing them, as he cannot even 
cope with the remnants he still has. It is hardly believable that the 
more the British camp is afflicted with disease, overwork and lack 
of rest, the more prevalent becomes the admirable practice of 
corporal punishment. Men who are fit only to be sent to hospital, 
who for weeks have slept and been on duty in wet clothes and on 
wet ground and have borne all this with almost superhuman 
tenacity —if these men are caught dozing in the trenches, they are 
treated to the cat-o’-nine-tails and the birch. “Fifty strokes for 
every vagabond!”—that is the only strategic order that Lord 
Raglan occasionally issues. Is it any wonder then that the soldiers 
of the perpetrator of the famous “flanking-march” to Balaklava 
follow suit and evade the birch with a “flanking-march” to the 
Russians? Desertions to the Russian camp are becoming more 
numerous every day, as The Times correspondent reported.* 

“ Report by W. H. Russell in The Times, No. 21971, February 7, 1855.— Ed. 

All the big talk about storming Sevastopol has of course ceased. 
The Russian army would first have to be beaten in the field. Thus 
Wellington twice raised the siege of Badajoz to march against a 
relief army. We have furthermore already seen that the newly- 
erected Russian defence works make it impossible for the place to 
be taken by storm.* Finally, the most recent Russian sorties prove 
that the allied army is at present superior to the Russians only in 
artillery. As long as sorties cannot be prevented, any idea of 
storming is absurd; besiegers who are incapable of confining the 
besieged to the area of the actual fortress are even less capable of 
seizing the fortress in hand-to-hand combat. Thus the besiegers 
will continue to vegetate, confined to their camp by their own 
weakness and by the Russian army in the field. They will continue 
to melt away, whilst the Russians bring up fresh forces. The 
prelude to the European war being enacted in the Crimea will end 
with the destruction of the allied troops unless some completely 
unexpected resources, which cannot be foreseen, are discovered.