NEWS OF THE WEEK.
Tms brief summer season in the Baltic is fast waning, and nothing has yet been done commensurate to our reputation and to our hopes. The fleet of screw-liners, the block-ships, the gun-boats, and the mortar-vessels—all, or nearly all, are mustered, and it will very soon be known for certain whether a great blow can and will be struck. On the spot it appears to be assumed that some wide revenge is to
be taken for Russian treachery ; but no one professes to be able to explain Where is the vulnerable point. Cronstadt, it seems to be -Tett,- well agreed, won't do, nor Sweaborg; and Revel is now
id to be nearly as hard a bargain. If need be, the nation will show patience ; but there is no great consolation to be drawn from next "year 'it hopes because Whatever we may do in winter, the Russians, we my be sure, will_ also improve the time. Subject to the contingency of our perfecting, for our
own exclusive use, some grand advance upon existing offensive means, it does not appear that the relative strength of the contending parties is capable of material alteration. We are more powerful this year than last, and so is the enemy_; and by next season it is most probable that both will be proportion- ately advanced. It has been said that the defence of Sebastopol marks a new tete in fortification, and reverses the superiority so long admitted of the besieger over the besieged. But if the efficacy of earth-works mounted with heavy cannon has been so great in the Crimea, do we not rather lose sight of the probability of our being met elsewhere with equal resistance by the , same methods ? Wherever the soil admits, mud batteries ' are easy to make and most difficult to destroy; and at.no point in the Gulf of Finland are guns and skilled artillerymen likely to be wanting. Such batteries are very troublesome to silence, and it costa little to renew them, so that no trace shall remain of a hard day's work of the attacking force. This observation, so often ap- plied to the proceedings by land against Sebastopol, may be ex- tended also to the expected operations of the Baltic fleet. This week we have accounts of an exploit judiciously performed by Captain Yelverton, of the Arrogant, against a fort near Frederick- shamm. Besides the Arrogant, two other vessels and a gun- boat shared in the attack ; and after an hour and a half's firing, the fort, which mounted six guns, was silenced. Troops were at hand in force sufficient to prevent a landing. The balance of loss in men was clearly against the enemy, but whether his bat- tery will cost as much to repair as our ships is perhaps doubtful. Now this is probably a correct miniature of what would happen whenever we brought our floating strength into array against either Of the chief Baltic fortifications. The honours of the day, it might be expected, would remain with us ; but they would be barren, and nothing would be gained towards compelling the ene- my's submission.
From the Crimea we bear of sustained hopeful preparation, and all accounts agree that another attempt on the Malakoff is near at hand, and that this time it will be both energetic' and well-consi- dered. The health of our own army is very good, and at last it has means of transport sufficient to take the field. The French have nearly finished their fortifications at Kamiesch, and may therefore be more free than they have been to detach a por- tion of their forces front the Chersonese. A great armament of light vessels is preparing in the Black Sea, and, whether the Ma- lakoff fall or not, some considerable enterprise is evidently con- templated against the hostile territory. Possibly it may be in- tended to assail Sebastopol itself; and, if gun-boats and mortar- vessels are thought capable of such great things, surely there can be no fitter time and place to prove their powers. Rumour, which takes little thought of means and seasons, sends a French army to the Danube ; and it should be noted that the same report pre- Tailed last year shortly before Austria signed the treaty of the 2d of December. After that it died away, and its revival may be taken to indicate that sooner or later German apathy will have to sustain the shock of seeing the French in command of the great German river, and that Austria will not be always left to make herself quietly at home in the Principalities.
The Russians send us a minute diary of their movements arounA Mars; and we have little on the other side beyond evidence that great alarm is felt at Erzeroum. But, so far as can be judged the Russians are not likely to take Kars, nor to advance far from their 815 own frontier, leaving the Turks intrenohed in that position in their rear. The manceuvres of General Mouravieff have been shaped so as, if possible to draw the Turks out into the open country, where his better-disciplined troops and efficient cavalry might have destroyed them ; but, thanks to the prudent counsel which is now respected at head-quarters, the snare was seen and shunned. A later report states that the mysterious Schamyl, who not long since was re- ported dead, had descended, in the nick of time, from his moun- tains, and recalled the Russians, as he did last year, from the hope of taking Kars to look to the safety of their own communications. So far, the Turkish army in Asia has undergone no defeat, and, looking to last year, it is a great thing to say thus much.
