The Express.
London, England, 1865-04-25 00:00:00

TELEGRAPHIC INTELLIGENCE.

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THE KING OF THE BELGIANS.
BRUSSELS, Area 24.

An official bulletin issued this morning announces
a satisfactory improvement in the King's health.
The improvement continued this afternoon.

THE ITALIAN PARLIAMENT.
TURIN, Arun. St.
To-day the Chamber of Deputies approved the
bill for reducing the salaries of the prefects.
In the debate upon the suppression of religious
bodies, the Minister of the Interior appealed to the
chamber to vote the bill, and stated that if any
agitation existed in Sicily, it was precisely at Pa-
lermo and Girgenti, where convents were very nu-
merous.

INDIA, CHINA, AND AUSTRALIA.
(By died Overland Yelegrayb.)
BOMBAY, Antic 22, 12.58 rat.
Cotton buoyant. Exchange on London, 2a.
CALCUTTA, Arm 20.
Vbs. ehirtinge 6 *ulnae lower. Exchange on
London, 23.

CANTON, Apia. 1.

ilthirtings and mule twist quiet. Total exports
a tea, 111,780,0001b5. Exchange on Landes,
41e. 13fd.

SHANGHAI, *mice 21:

Tea dull and unchanged. Bilk, higher prices de-
manded. Export to date, 36,125 bales. Exchange
on London, 6a. 41d. Freight unchanged.

MELBOURNE, MARCH 25.
The shipments of gold since the departure of the
last mail amount to 62,750 ounces.

The above telegrams from China and Melbourne
left Gallo on 17th of April.

AMERICA.

(mom oat SPECIAL

)m.)

NEW YORK, LIMII. U.

It was evident from the moment that the occu
patiou of Burkeaville by Sheridan had cut off Lee's
retreat towards Danville that his case was hopeless.
He was forced to push on towards Lynchburg, with
his men deserting in great numbers, his supply of
food and ammunition short, and without the means
of renewing it, with the Federal cavalry in his front,
flank, and rear, preying incessantly on his already
scanty baggage train, and with the prospect of
having to turn and engage a superior force every
twenty miles. Even had be succeeded, under such
circumstances, in reaching Lynchburg, he would
have been no better off than before. He would have
found Hancock already there ; the passage down the
valley to Knoxaville barred by a portion of Sher-
man's forcer, and the remorseless Grant and insa-
tiable and eager Sheridan still pressing behind him.
So that the only question he had to decide on
Friday 'sat, when he received Grant's summons,
was not whether he would lay down his arms, but
whether he would lay them down there and then,
or a few miles further on, after the slaughter of a
few hundred more of his weary and war-worn men.
I thought it most likely, as you may remember,
that he would struggle ou, and that the surrender
would occur at Lynchburg, unless, indeed, which
seemed by no means unlikely, desertion, and casu-
alties, and captures should so thin his ranks, that
he would have nothing left him to surrender by the
time be got there. But the engagement at Jettes-
ville on Thursday, and the gradual closing up of
Grant's troops, seems to have convinced him that
he had uo alternative, and be has accordingly
given up the contest. And when we consider that
be is the only able leader the Confederates have
left, and that his army is the only one which has
been able from first to last to keep the field against
the enemy with unbroken front, and has
been composed from the outset of the
!owe? of the Confederate population, it is
fair to conclude that with its destruc-
tion the war is virtually at an end. It is not
probable that Johnston will attempt to hold out
very long after be receives the news of Lee's over-
throw, even if his men could be induced to follow
him. He will, of course, see that any prolonga-
tion of the struggle under present circumstances
would be simply a useless, and therefore guilty
prolongation of bloodshed. He has no place to re-
tire to, no depots of supplies to draw from, no
arsenals to rely on for ammunition, no money to
pay his men with, nor manufactures to clothe them,
and he has three powerful armies on his track.
Moreover, the fate of the Confederacy has been so
long linked with that of Lee's army in the eyes of the
Southern public, that there can be little doubt that
the news that that army has ceased to exist will
cause most of Johnston's men to give up the game
and go home, no matter what his opinions or wishes
may be. As to the prospect of a long period of
guerilla warfare, I have, as you know, always
scouted the idea that the guerillas would keep the
field after the regular armies had disappeared. lam
of the same opinion still. I venture to predict that
before Christmas next there will not be a trace of
them left, except in the persons of a few common
robbers, in any State east of the Mississippi ; and
more than this, that those of them who do not go
home voluntarily and iu despair will be compelled
to do so by the action of the State authorities.
Already, since the fall of Richmond, and before
Lee's surrender, a large portion of Mosby's band in
Virginia, the most enterprising body of partisans
in the Confederacy, have given up the businees and
gone back to their farms. I know that these are
not the opinions generally held on this point by
the friends of the Confederacy in London, but I
take it for granted that the English public has by
this time been cured of all disposition to heed
what they say.
There is every reason to believe that you will
now witness the dissolution of the Confederacy in
the mode which I mentioned last winter as that
in which it was moat likely to take place. You may
remember that I argued strongly against the notion
which was current during the conference at Hampton
Roads between Mr. Lincoln and the Confederate

Commissioners, that peace would ever come from
any formal negotiations between the Federal and
Confederate governments. I maintained that the
end would come only when the Confederacy had
ceased to have any organised force able to keep the
field, that the government of Mr. Davis would
then perish of inanition for want of a
treasury, a capital, an army, or any other
means of executing its mandates, and that
when this happened the separate States, find-
ing themselves face to face with the enemy,
would separately provide for their own safety,