HOUSE OF LORDS, 27th FEBRUARY.

Daily Southern Cross, Volume XI, Issue 723, 2 June 1854, Page 3

HOUSE OF LORDS, 27th FEBRUARY.

The Earl of Ellcnborough rose to put a question in reference to the general orders issued from. St. Petersburg for the preparation for sea of twelve frigates and corvettes on the breaking up of the ice. Pie wished to ask whether Her Majesty's ministers do intend, if they can, to prevent those frigates and corvettes from leaving the Baltic ? It is impossible to entertain the smallest doubt that the intention with respect to those twelve men-of-war is to send them out of the Baltic b( * fore our vessels arrive at the entrance of the Kattegat. If they leave the Kattegat and reach the Naze of Norway before the 21st of March, they may take the north-west passage, and go round by Scotland and Ireland ; and, before five weeks have elapsed from this time, the tranquility which has lasted so long at Lloyd's may be suddenly disturbed by the notification of the capture of unsuspecting British merchantmen in the chops of the channel or to the north of Ireland, and the feelings of all England would be distrcted by the capture of British artillery in sailing vessels, without convoys, by Russian men-of-war on their voyage to the Mediterranean. I infer that this is the destination of these ships from circumstances which I shall mention. There are not less than eleven Russian men-of-war, that I know of, distributed in different positions on foreign stations. A frigate and a brig are at Manilla, flanking the China trade ; and we have a5O gun ship, which was lately iv a state of mutiny, at Hong-Kong. There is a 60 gun frigate off Australia, where we have only a 28 gun frigate, which is ordered to be relieved by another frigate of the same calibre. The whole Australian trade will, therefore, lie at the mercy of this nianof war. At Rio there is a 44 gun frigate, the Aurora, which we, in the exercise of a generous hospitality, recently repaired at Portsmouth, by artificers who were required in constructing or repairing ships for our own pur* poses. That vessel is now at Rio ; and I believe the whole number of guns which we have now at that station is not equal to the number of guns mounted by that one ship alone. There is also a schooner at Madeira heavily armed. Two heavy frigates were seen, on the 9th November, off Capo de Verd, and from the direction they were steering, and from the circumstance of our not having heard of them since, my impression is, that these frigates have gone round Cape Horn. Again, iv the Adriatic, there are three Russian frigatesy in an Austrian port, fomenting the Greek insurrection. All these vessels are unwatched, and may all pounce upon our trade in different parts of the world. The Emperor of Russia is quite at liberty to give orders to that effect, because what we have done is war. We may take it as war or not, as we please, but it is war, and justifies him in giving instructions to the commanders of these vessels to act aceurdingly. The ships in the Baltic, to which I have alluded, may be met with an equal or superior force, to keep them out of the Kattegat; but if they are not prevented from leaving the Kattegat three times the number wi 1 not be sufficient to protect our trade ; and therefore it becomes a matter of absolute e*nefgencj that Her Majesty's ministers should make up their minds what they mean to do on the subject. The orders should be given immediately j not a day nor an hour should be lost. It will not do to issue instructions to each ship which may be sent to the Kattegat at an interval of three of four weeks, to send about to each Russian ship that may be met with, that she must go back to her own port or go into an English port The sending of such a message is extremely inconvenient. It embarrasses extremely all the operoperations of the English vessels, for at the very time she is sending a boat, perhaps, she ought to be firing her guns double-shotted, and thus her movements may be materially impeded. I trust, therefore, that that course will not be adopted. I conclude that it can never be considered possible to attack without notice ; and therefore I conclude that notice must be given to the Emperor of Russia as to the intentions which we entertain : and as these vessels may be a!; the mouth of the Kattegat before ours may meet them, in three weeks, not an hour nor a day ought to bo lost in giving that notice. And therefore I ask my nobie friend if Her Majesty's government are prepared to stop these frigates and corvettes from leaving the Baltic ? The Earl of Aberdeen hoped the noble Earl would give the government credit for possessing somewhat of the activity and watchfulness which belonged to himself. He declined to answer a question, the reply to which could be only useful to the power against whom we were about to act; and henceforth, he begged to say, he would consider it his duty to give no information on the subject of our naval or military preparations. The noble Earl, however, made a grievous error if he supposed that the Russian forces which) with more or less accuracy, he had described as stationed in different parts of the world, were uuwatched. The Earl of Ellenborough contcded that he was perfectly justified in not giving the government credit for activity and watchfulness. He gave them every credit for a knowledge of political economy and finance, but they certainly had not commenced the preparations necessary for tho great war in which we were about to be engaged soon enough. They had rather endeavoured to persuade themselves that this was to be a little war. The Marquis of Lansdowne agreed that the wa? could not be a little war. If the noble Earl knew more of our preparations than he appeared to do — " of the magnificent fleets now preparing to sail, anl the admirable army now preparing to be sent out" — he would acknowledge the zeal, the activity, the foresight, and the determination of Her Majesty's ministers; and be the first to acknowledge that their watchfulness spread over every portion of the globe. The Earl of Ellenboruugh said in reply, tl d noble Marquis has particularly adverted to the "magnificent fleet" now in preparation. That fleet, my lords, consists, I believe, of eighteen vessels, out of which eighteen, seven only ha^e ever been at sea; and I do say that that state ci: things, with the chance of their being engaged with the enemy in a fortnight or less — eleven untried ships with eleven untried crews, is not a proof either of foresight or watchfulness. After a few remarks from the Earl of WicklpWj the subject dropped.

, Russian —Our facetious friend, Mr Punch of London, suggests the propriety of re-naming the capital of the Czar. Salt Peter's burg, instead of Saint Petersburg.