it been announced that the squadrons would enter the Black Sea the moment the Russians crossed the Pruth, we believe that that passage would not have taken place, and in that menace we are confident that France would have joined us. On perusing the despatches published by the French Government in its official organ, we have been particularly struck by the clearness of views and the intrepidity, mingled with good sense, which pervade them. From the moment that the question assumed a more general character; when it ceased to refer exclusively to French interests, we remark the masterly view which the Emperor’s minister of foreign affairs took of the whole question as it then stood; of the accuracy with which he judged of the future conduct of the Czar, and the marked line of conduct which he proposed to follow. Yet the difficulties in the way of the French Government were great. With the cunning which distinguishes the policy of Russia, this power had the tact to present the Eastern question, from the outset, in a light most disadvantageous to France; and the excessive zeal and indiscretion of M. de Lavalette indisposed the other powers, and afforded a pretext to our own Government to stand aloof. In this country the policy and person of the French Emperor had been unpopular. With the prejudice, mistrust, and ill-feeling which his name inspired, it is not to be wondered at that all his acts were viewed with suspicion; and the question of the holy places was at once, and as this result has shown, unfairly interpreted as the forerunner of new and more important pretensions,—as the continuation, in fact, of the plans of his uncle, whose hostility to England he was supposed to have inherited with his crown. It was at the moment of the invasion panic—which was so far useful that it roused us to strengthen our defences, and organise a naval and military force which we then little thought would be employed against Russia—that the French minister at Constantinople succeeded in obtaining immunities in favour of the Latin church, of which France assumed to be the protector. We will not now examine whether these privileges were of the exorbitant and unjust character ascribed to them. It is sufficient that they were so considered by Russia, and that the advantages extorted from the Porte for the monks of the holy cities were understood as placing the Greek communion in a condition of relative inferiority, and as realising a triumph over Russia in those places where she had long reigned supreme, and where she would brook no rival, much less a superior. From such a quarrel between rival churches, with the dogmas of which we had nothing in common, England properly kept apart, and France was left to find her own way, unaided, out of the unpleasant position in which her agents had placed her. No moment could be more propitious to Russia, ever watchful as she has always been of dissension between the Western powers, and ever ready to take advantage of it.