The Sun.
London, England, 1864-12-17 00:00:00

THE CIVIL WAR IN AMERICA

(From the Times' Correspondent.)
•
NEW YORK, Dec. 2,
Recruiting has nearly stopped in New York and
the cities of the North, although the old high
bounties continue to be offered and the old hand-
money, or kidnapping fee, continueg to be paid to
the crimps and other scoundrels who make it their
business to supply the Federal Government with
alien soldiers. General Grant requires a reinforce-
ment of at least 50,000 men to raise his army to
the efficiency it possessed in midsummer, and opes
rations before Richmond and Petersburg, though
not entirely suspended, are delayed in consequence.
The immense aitnies aTh=pM"Trniiitirererafri
tars have melted away as rapidly as that of Grant,
and the cry is again raised for men, more men, to
deal the blow within " ninety days" against the
great serpent of rebellion, which is to break its
back, cut off its head, and leave its dishonoured car-
cass to rot in the sunshine, or be picked to a skeleton
by the vultures and cormorants of the North. The
President's annual Message, to be delivered to Con•
gress on its reassembling on Monday next, will, it is
alleged by those who have been admitted to a pre-
liminary perusal of the proof sheets, dwell empha-
tically upon the necessity of a new levy of half a
million of men, to be obtained by voluntary enlist-
ment if possible, but, if not, to be enforced by a
stringent conscription, from which no man of the
proper age shall be exempt for any cause except
physical disability, and from which no money pay-
ment shall purchase immunity. At one time or other
Mr Lincoln has called upon the Federal States for
I,Boo,ooomen to fight the bat!le of compulsoryunion,
but how far his calls have been responded to is
matter of grave doubt, and will probably remain so
until the history of the war shall be written in the
next generation. What is the actual force of the
Federal armies at this moment no one knows, unless
it be Mr. Stanton ; but the estimate formed
.by
many who are in a position to judge with more or
less of accuracy, and whose sympathies lead them
to take as favourable a view as possible, places it
under 300,000 men of all arms. They allot 100,000
to Grant, 40,000 to Sheridan, 60,000 to Sherman,
40,000 to Thomas and Slocum, 30,000 to Rosecrans,
and 20,000 doing garrison duty in the cities of the
North and West. This is a formidable host, but it
is in daily process of disintegration and decay, and
will require a considerable accession of new men to
be maintained at :the same standard until the

spring of 1865. As the number, liberal as it is,
is palpably insufficient for the work in hand--to
say nothing of that greater work, the subjugation
and extermination of the Southern people, which
is threatened as the penalty of a resistance much
longer protracted—Mr. Lincoln must call for new

legions, and the country must promptly supply them,
or the Confederates will be in a position to assume
the aggressive, and threaten Washington with the
fate of Atlanta, and perhaps Ozlio with such a raid
of desolation as Sherman at this moment is inflict.
iog upon Georgia. The subject will doubtless be
prominently noticed by Mr Lincoln. Evident:y some
fresh zeal must be infused into the heart of the native
Americans, or some new force employed to convert
them into soldiers, or the war must linger, if not
collapse, and all the immensely superior advanteges
of wealth and numbers possessed by the North be-
come unavailing tor want of the unselfish patriotism
and the heroic devotion exhibit3d by the poorer and
less numerous people of the South. Mr Fessen-
den's annual Report on the state of the Finances is
expected with even more interest that attaches to
Mr Lincoln's Message. The army is in arrears
of pay, some regiments not having received a cent
for seven months. The taxes, whether from import
duties or internal revenue, do not provide for one-
fifth of the daily expenditure, so that there must
either be an increase of the burdens upon the people
—new loans—or fresh issues of paper money, to
enable the Government to pay its way. Some o! the
war-zealots, whose audacity is only expl!cable by
their ignorance, are of opinion that an income and
property tax of 20c. or 252. would be cheerfully
borne by all but the very poorest of the people, and
urge its imposition, as not only the most effective,
but, in the long run, the cheapest mode of main-
taining the credit of the Government, and meet-
ing the daily increasing difficulties of the finan-
cial situation. Congress, however, will scarcely
be so reckless as the eager but irresponsible poli-
ticians of the press and the pulpit, and risk
the imposition of a burden so onerous upon a
people already taxed in every conceivable mode,

upon every conceivable commodity, profession, or
trade, though it is not improbable it may raise the
existing income and property tax to 10 per cent,
upon all incomes above 600 dollars. But even if the
screw were placed upon the comfortable classes to
this extent, the operation, if successful and not
largely evaded, would put no immediate millions
into the depleted treasury, and the Secretary would
have either to borrow or print fresh paper to meet
his current necessities. As the certain result would
be to raise the premium on gold to a point much
higher than it has hitherto reached, it may easily bt
imagined Mr Fesbenden has greater difficulties to
contend with than ever fell to the lot of Mr Chase.

The public was told from Washington two days ago
to expect " thunder all round the military horizon,"
that is to say stirring news from Grant, Sheridan,
Sherman, Thomas, and other generals in the
field. As yet the only " thunder " of
the kind that has been heard has sounded
from Tennessee, whore Gen. Hood assaulted Gen.
Schofield, a lieutenant of Gen. Thomas, at Franklin,

and fought a desperate battle in which Gen. Scho-
field, in his official report, claims the victory, with
a loss to himself of 1,200 men and of 6,000 to the

enemy. These figures, however, do not impress
impartial people with the idea of accuracy, and as
Gen. Hood only used a small, and, under the cir-

cumstances, too small a portion of his available
force, aad threatens to renew the attack, the battle

of Franklin, as at present reported, takes no higher
rank than a severe skirmish, Sherman's position is

suspected rather than known, He has slipped past
Macon,whioh was too strong to attack, and will, it is

supposed, do the same by Augusta, in full march to
the seaboard, if the Confederates will permit him,

The attempted ineendiaridm of New York has
already lost much of its interest, and the theory at
first received with derision, that it was never in•

tended to burn the hotels, bat only to frighten the

people to an extent sufficient to justify the establish-
ment of martial law on the plea that public safety

required it, has grown rapidly in favour. The police
aided by the military, or the military aided by the

police, whichever be the proper subordination of the
two authorities, have not yet succeeded in obtain-
ing any real clue to the perpetrators. Several arrests

have been mad°, and several mysterious and semi-

official announcements have appeared in the news-

papers to the effect that the authorities were on the

right track,and that the ringleaderscould net by any
possibility escape; but the public has fast settled

down into the conviction that the scheme, whether

Confederate or Federal, or simply that of thieves and
murderers, Nv4B too cunningly planned to permit
much hope of the discovery of the guilty 'Allies.