There seems to have been really some kind of fighting
in Crete, though the reports received via Athens are of so vague and ques- tionable a nature that we are not sure of the business-like character of the engagement. It is quite certain there are not 30,000 fighting men among the Greeks of Crete, as the report of the battle would imply. Probably the Cretans are still a little disposed to the art for which they were famous in the days of St. Paul, and the Athenian medium through which the news passes is not exactly a filter. The rising, however, is clearly this time serious. The Cretans have appealed to Mr. Johnson for aid, on the double ground that they are of " the land of Jupiter and Minos," and that they would be glad to gain a very trifling pro- portion of the freedom which Washington gained for the United States. We are not sure that either consideration will seem very impressive to Mr. Johnson. As to the last, he will probably seek a ray of light from Mr. Seward, who may explain to him that Jupiter, born in Crete, became afterwards the president of a democratic assembly on Mount Olympus, and that Minos was a judge of a sort of Supreme Court, which overrules the decisions even of Chase or Taney.
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