The Sun.
London, England, 1864-01-01 00:00:00

For the present I will merely say that the grossest
exaggeration has characterised the representations
of the Northern journal.' in regard to the treat-
ment which Northern prisoners have met with.
To say that their rations have not been so
abundant as those issued to them when they
were Federal soldiers is nothing more nor less
than to say that the Confederate army puts up
with fare which the Federals—fighting for pay, and
not for principle—would not tolerate for a week.
That the Federal prisoners fare better than the
Confederate soldiers I am abundantly satisfied from
what I have learnt. That there is great suffering
among the Confederate prisoners in the North is
still more abundantly evident from the deluge of
letters flooding the Richmond papers every morn-
ing ; and the inference which may safely be drawn
is that the condition of a prisoner in the hand either
of Federal or Confederate authorities is very far
from being on a bed of roses ; but while the Federal
journals, possessing the ear of Europe, denounce in
the name of outraged humanity the atrocities of the
Libby Prison, the Confederate journals, which daily
exhibit the horrors of Fort Delaware, are powerless
to make their voice heard beyond the walls of
Richmond, and leave to their enemy the advantage
which he has possessed from the beginning in his
unchecked and irresponsible access to the ear of
Europe.

In conclusion, reviewing the situation at this mo-
mant of the Confederate States, I cannot but be of
opinion, that President Davis, by his well-inten-
tioned, though ill judging, obstinacy in adhering to
his friend Gen. Bragg, has done more to shake the
stability of his hold upon the affections and confi-
dence of the Confederate people than by any other
act which has signalised his two and half years of
troubled and agitated power. It would seem that
Mr. Davis has failed to discern that the compe-
tency of a General, like the virtue of a woman, can-
not affcrd to be discussed in public. The very fact
of the discussion by his soldiers of their General's
competency adds most alarmingly to his incompe-
tency, and no one can have watched Gen. Bragg's
army for the last two months without noticing the
fearful deterioration to which its want of faith in
its head has visibly subjected it. War in a re-
publican country, with a daily press which is
its interpreter, and which is read by every soldier
that conducts it, is very different from the
wars of Marlborough or Napoleon, and so Mr.
Davis has long ago discovered. It is greatly to his
honour and credit that he has not emulated Mr
Lincoln's example and imposed upon the journals
which surround him a decorum of criticism and
comment which is, indeed, strange and exotic upon
American soil. But a defiance of an almost unani-
mous :public opinion, for which, in reference to
General Bragg, Mr. Davis is responsible, even as-
suming that public opinion was wrong and Mr. Davis
right, is, to say the least, an error. May it not be
converted by persistence in it from an error into an
irreparable calamity, and may there be truth in the
rumour which circulates through the feverish streets
to-day to the effect that General Hardee is about to
assume the command from which General Bragg by
transgression fell !

DEC. 1.

I have an opportunity of adding a postscript to
my letter, although three additional days have done
little to throw further light upon the situation. In
Virginia the two antagonistic armies face each
other, and have faced each other for three days
past, divided only by a narrow stream called Mine
Creek, which runs into the Rapidan river from the
south a few miles west of the junction of that river
with the Rappahanock. But I should not omit to
explain to the reader that the position occupied by
the two armies at the battle of Chaneelloreville,
which was fought in the immediate neighbourhood
of their present camping ground, was precisely the
reverse of their actual position at this moment.
General Meade and the Federals face westward,
and have their backs turned on Fredericksburg
and the old battlefield of Chancellorsville ; General
Lee and his army face eastward, with their
backs to the Blue Ridge. There appears on
both sides a disinclination to attack, which does
not seem to me wise policy on the part of the
Federal General. For three or four days heavy
reinforcements have been going forward to General
Lee from Richmond, and if Meade had fought on
the 29th his superiority in numbers, which is likely
to be great whenever the battle comes off, would
have been very much greater. On the night of
Sunday the 29th I witnessed the departure from
Richmond of a large portion of Pickett's division—
the same division which was so roughly handled at
Gettysburg—,end which, it might be supposed, had
good ground for weary distaste of the war. The
Englishman introduced for the first time into the
Confederacy, and unfamiliar with such scenes,
might have fancied that the excited, enthusiastic,
shouting, jubilant troops were advancing to their
maiden battlefield, inexperienced in the dire horrors
of the bloodiest combats which this century has
known, and intoxicated with the animal joy which
heralds the dreadful revelry of a soldier's first
battle. I could not but contrast their exhilira-
tion with the stolid dulness and depression which
were perceptible almost universally among Gene-
ral Bragg's troops ; nor could I fail to do homage to
the character and influence of Lee and " Stonewall"
Jackson, which has stamped and moulded the rank
and file which upon Virginian soil have been only
familiar with victory, and which neither in Penn-
sylvania nor Maryland have ever known defeat. It
was dilleult to have any other opinion than that
the seventh " Oa to Richmond" which is now being
eassayed by Meade, would share the same fate as its
six predecessors, and that Bull Run,
Bethel, Drury's
Bluff, M‘C:ellan's battles round Richmond, Fre-
dericksburg, and Chancellorsville would culminate
in the coming strife of Mine Creek.
And yet there is reason to pause and dread the
battle which seems to be now imminent more than
any of-its forerunners. For the first time Lee fights
without either Jackson or Longstreet by his side.
The Federals, on the other hand, I confidently anti-
cipate, will fight better than they ever fought be
fore. 'Without an atom of military genius, Meade
understands the value of the secret which seenis to
have been known to 3PClellan alone among the
Federal Generals in Virginia—the secret of massing
the troops and keeping them close together, never
manoeuvring in face of his enemy. Lee will fight in
the ratio of two men against three. At Chancellors-
ville he fought in the ratio of three men against
eight. But it is not any want of confidence in the
army of General Lee which Shakes my faith. It
the Confederate horizon is at this moment overcast,
it is not because Confederate troops are less valiant
than of yore, but because the Confederate people are
more corrupt. It is difficult not to curl the lip when
the graFping, money-grubbing, mercenary spirit
of the Yankee is denounced in an atmosphere
reeking with speculation more feverish and eager
than any that Wall-street exhibits. Go this day
to the great auction sale of blockade-running goods
exhibited by Messrs Kent and Paine, in the prin-
cipal street of Richmond, take note of the army of
young and ablebodied men who might, if they were
men and not sharks, swell Lee's host to 100,000
bayonets, and who are engaged in scrambling over
each others' backs to buy silks and muslins, and to
invest some of the Confederate notes which they
have in two years and a half of unscrupulous greed
amassed in materials and fabrics which, whether the
Confederates sink or swim, must still command gold.
What mny still be in store for this agcnised and sorely
tried continent it is more difficult to say that when
the thunder of the first gun which initiated the
greatest revolutionary war of history reverberated
around the walls of Fort Sumter and died away on
the startled ear; but if on the 7th of this current
month the Confederate Congress, which assembles
to hold counsel upon matters of as grave debate as
were ever submitted to deliberative body, and
which, it must he cwaed, has hitherto shown little
grasp, or earnestness, or capacity, fails to rise to
the height of the great argument before it, then
may be expected such misery as upon earth has
never yet been known—the extension over the
whole area of Secess a of the bloody border war-
fare of Missouri ant Kansas—a cessation of the
pure and mild sway d General Lee and his imita-
tors, end an lieeent to the surface of Quantrell,
M'Niell, Parson Brovnlow, and others of the same
brood—the dispersion all over the Slave States of at
least 200,000 border ruffians or guerillas, more