The Sun.
London, England, 1864-06-13 00:00:00

end of Jane, during which time the claims put for-
ward on behalf of bat not by General Grant will
probably be decided one way or another by himself
or General Lee. With Grant as President, General
WC!ellen would, doubtless, be reinstated in high
command, so that WC:ellan's policy is to watch
and wait, and take advantage of any divisions in
the ranks of his opponents which may serve to
keep his name before the public, and gather round
it the great Conservative party that still believe
in State rights, and see in a centralised Government
the inevitable downfall of republican liberty. If
he eould serve that party as President, he could
also serve it as Commander•in-Chief. Thus
Grant's success or failure will equally serve his
purpose. In the one case he may be at the head of
the army; in the other at the head of the State,
so that he, of all men, has most reason to maintain
his soul in peace and leave events to their natural
solution.

Mr Lincoln's temporary suppression of the World
and the Journal of Commerce for being as ready to
be deceived by a forgery as his Secretary of State
in Washington and his Ambassador in London has
considerably damaged his popularity. In America
a man is either very much praised or very much
execrated. The people have no medium is their
love or hate. Their generals must either be
Napoleons or "stunted corporals," and their lead-
ing men paragons of honesty and virtue, or
knaves and imbeciles. Mr Lincoln has had his
"heated term," in which it was the fashion to
endow him with every possible good quality, and
in which, if a blunder were brought home to him,
the all-sufficient excuse and palliative was found in
his immeasurable and unprecedented honesty. The
cold fit is now upon his reputation, and he who was
so great before finds none to do him reverence,
except those who expect favour or fortune at his
hands. The journal which was the first to recom-
mend him for re-election has changed its tone, and
denounces him with a virulence of ill-will of which
no journal in the world is so great or so mean an
exemplar. It states that the renomination of Mr
Lincoln will be an attempt to perpetuate the
petty despotisms, the gross corruptions, and the
unparalleled abuses of the past four years, and that
the slightest probability of his success will intensely
infuriate the masses of the people; that the politi-
cians, by simply nominating two or three weak
candidates, may allow Lincoln to slip in between
them ; but that if this old game, frequently
played and generally successful, be attempted
while the people are in their present temper,
it will not answer for the consequences. It adds
that "riots, burnings, assassinations, barricades, and
a revolution will probably ensue, All that the people
want is a fair chance to defeat Lincoln. Give them
that by nominating such a man as Grant, and all
will be well. Attempt to cheat them out of it by
nominating half a dozen weak men in order to
divide the opposition vote, and Lincoln's re-election
will be the signal for such an upheaval of the North
as has never before been witnessed." It requires
but little knowledge of the American character to
know that this wicked prophecy will not bs fulfilled,
and that if Mr. Lincoln were elected by a legal vote
—whether resulting from the split in his own or the

opposing party--tiae people would very quietly
submit to the infliction. The danger to the public
peace does not lie in that direction. A defeat of
Grant and a call for another half a million of men,
to be taken from the ranks of labour by conscription,
are the rocks ahead. Tne people respect the civil
law but they chafe at the introduction of a military
law which would deprive them of their liberty, and
is in opposition to their prejudice and whole course
of life and thought. They detest and abhor the
conscription, and rather than submit to it they will
run any risk of violence in opposing it, as every
houseowner and capitalist in New York well knows,
and as every public man of the least foresight is but
too thoreughly convinced.

Neither is there much dangerof such a multiplicity
of candidates es will greatly increase Mr. Lincoln's
chancos. Banks and Butler are out of the way—
ruined by military failure ; and there remain but
Grant, M'Clellan, Lincoln, and Fremont. In the
ex ent of any mishap to Grant, it seems as if the real
struggle will lie between the Revolutionists and
Radicals under Fremont,and the Con'Arvativesunder
MT:ellen, and that poor Mr. Ijincoln will have to
quit his perilous honours dnd his thorny chair in
1865, and retire to Ill;,nois to practise law in the
county of Eauguolin. Happy will it be for him if
at the end of .nio troubled career, health, a good
appetite, efia the power to indulge in his little
jokes be still left to him ; happy also if he do not
expect the gratitude which he will never obtain, or
any other place in his country's history but that
reserved for all weak men of good intentions, who
do mischief without meaning it, and ruin the coun-
try which it was their ambition to save.
The price of gold, which yesterday ran suddenly up
to 941, the highut yet attained, dropped to-day to
881; but not. In consequence of any favourable news
from the
restorp army or other circumstances tending to
. the drooping spirits of the people, but because
Mr .;base was represented in Wall.street by an agent
Authorised to sell a surplus, real or supposed, in the
National Treasury. The agent threw half a million
of gold and sterling bills into the market, with the
sole object of reducing the premium, and accom-
plished it. Mr Chase thereby sacrificed the sum of
30,000 dole. and upwards, for the poor satisfaction
of making financial matters look six per cent. less
gloomy to-morrow on the departure of the Persia
than they would have done had he not been in
readiness to discount for a time the bull operators of
the Exchange. No one expects gold will remain at
the lower level to which it was thus forced, not even
if victory in Georgia or Virginia should occur to
prevent a too rapid rise. It is understood better
than it used to be that it is the immense volume of
the paper currency and not the varying military
fortunes of the day which causes the depreciation
in greenbacks. No victory that does not end the
war will put paper and gold on a level ; and that ,
the war will be ended even by the capture of Rich-
mond few are now so sanguine as to believe.

TUE SCZNE OF THE IMPENDING BATTLE.--The
situation of both the opposing armies in Virginia is
sub, at the latest advices, that a battle may be considered
imminent. In view of this fact a brief topographical descrip-
tion of the battle-field may not be uninteresting. Both
armies are now in Hanover county, with the North Anna on
the north and the Chickahominy on the south. Lee's army,
as is announced in official despatches from General Grant,
is on Mechanicsville-road, south of the Tolopotonion slyer,
one of the tributaries of the Pamunkey, and between that
stream and Hawes's shop, with his right resting on Shady
Grove. The surface of Hanover county is billy, and the
soil sandy, but there are few natural impediments to the
operation of an army. Hanover Court house, the county
seat, s memorable as the scene of Patrick Henry's early
career, and as the birthplace of Henry Clay. The object of
Leo will be to preserve the rebel capital from the advance of
General Grant, and for this reason he has selected a field
a leading to Richmond. Gene-
ral Grant seems inclined to give his enemy
which covers all the hiebeva_y
no oppor tuuity
to move northward, and therefore has ordered the destruction
le, roadvvhfrom
of the bridges over Little and the North Anna rivers. Lee's
left—assuming that he faces to the south- is protected by
Ilanovertown crosses this
which i
sthtreeaCmhicakt6 013. a turnpike five miles
northwest of Richmond. There is another road just in
the rear of this which also leads to the rebel capital. In
alllll7llchiannYi.csTelti;
moving down these roads General Grant will encounter
the lines of Lee's army, and the situation is so con-
tracted that there is little probability of
another tank
movement being successful, If the Chickahominy is in-
tended by Lee as the last line of defence, the position has
been well chosen. The stream itself is peculiarly adapted to
the defensive warfare. The river is a small one, and flows
sluggishly. It divides itself into half a dozen strearolets,
running into and out of each other at random. These
water-courses occupy a space about 70 yards in width.
Immense trees grow up out of the water, and the entire
stream is covered by thick woods. It is a remarkable in.
stance of a river running through and watering a long strip
of woods. From each side of this woodland a flat surface
extends for about half a mile. This is nearly always over-
flowed, and becomes an impassable morass. It is only when
the water in the river is very low that men can safely walk
upon the ground bordering it. On the flat surfaces there is
not a solitary tree. They are bare, and anything moving
upon them can easily be discerned. From the borders of
these plains huge hills, in some cases 200 and 300 feet high,
abruptly rise. They are covered with thick woods, and are
so steep that waggons cannot be hauled directly up their
face. The few roads go down them diagonally to the
bridges, across the swamp and river. This Chickahominy
valley, one of the strongest in America, is the outer defence
of Richmond. From the tops of the hills on the one side,
across the swamp to the hill-tops on the other side, the
distance varies from a mile to a mile and a-half. The ordi-
nary 12-pounder rifled Napoleon gun just about throws a
shell from one hill-top to the other. From the Fredericks-
burg railroad crossing down to New-bridge, a distance of
eight miles, the Confederate works are all along tho hills
on is southern border.--Aete York World, June I.