The Sun.
London, England, 1863-03-11 00:00:00

THE CIVIL WAR IN AMERICA.

(From the limes' Correspondent.)
BALTIMORE, Feb. 21.
Remaining in this city for a couple of days on
my way to Washington, I have been a spectator of
the reception given by the people to Benjamin F.
Butler, the model General and gentleman of the war
faction. The journals published under the auspices
of the military Governor represent the welcome as
most enthusiastic as well as nearly unanimous; those
under the patronage of the Baltimoreans them-
selves scarcely condescend to notice it at all, or nar-
rate it in a paragraph of a few lines among their
local intelligence. The people of Baltimore, properly
so called, kept entirely aloof from the proceedings.
Not a single citizen of any note, character, wealth,
or position was present to do him honour. Toe only
persons who figured in the celebration of the day
were the Mayor and members of the city council,
who were appointed some time ago under military
dictation, when the old civic functionaries were
compelled to resign their offices or take an oath
against their consciences, and the military and
naval officers and other dependants of the Govern-
ment. The Mayor is an Englishman, who keeps a
shop for the sale of crockery, and the city council
is composed of persons entirely unknown to the
merchants and professional classes. The General
was invited to a dinner, the cost of which was to be
defrayed out of the city funds ; and the invi-
tations were limited to 150 persons, comprising
the members of the municipality and the mili-
tary officers of the garrison and the stL round-
ing forts that keep the rebellious city in subjec-
tion. The General, on his arrival, was hailed
with shouts of welcome by a mob of about 300
people, among whom the Irish hackmen and car
drivers were conspicuous, and conducted by these
in triumph to his hotel. Thirty-four young women,
dressed in white, each supposed to represent a State
of the Union, were stationed in the drawing rooms
to receive him. It may be surmised that they were
not, known to the society of the city, and such was
the fact. There was not one of them who would be
acknowledged a lady by the ladies of Baltimore;
and if hereafter any of them, by marriage or other-
wise, shall take rank with the educated and wealthy
classes of their city, their appearance at this cele-
bration will be remembered against them as a bar-
rier to exclude them from the society of all who
sympathise with the ladies of New Orleans and con-
sider Gen. Butler the reverse of a gentleman. In
Baltimore this class comprises at least four-fifths of
the whole population, and all the ladies, except
those of the Federal officers and other strangers in
temporary residence in the city. Gen. Butler made
a short and characteristic speech, in which he pro-
claimed the United Statss to be a young giant,un der-
going the painful but necessary agonies of teething
—agonies that would speedily pass away, and leave
it strong—to bite as well as to feed. If Gen. Butler
is himself a specimen of the teeth that the young
giant is so painfully producing, the teeth are not
handsome front teeth, but strong molars, well cal-
culated to grind into aliment any New Orleans
plums that may happen to excite its appetite for
sweet plunder. The dinner in the evening, which
was to have concluded the day's festivities, and at
which the General was to have made his principal
speech, was abandoned in consequence of a melan-
choly casualty that occurred in the afternoon. Com.
matder Maxwell Woodhull, of the Federal Navy, a
relative of Gen. Schenck (pronounced Skenk, and
by the Baltimoreans wickedlyperverted into Skunk)
was walking on the ramparts of Fort Marshall,
along with Gen. Schenck, Gen. Butler, and others,
and lingered a little behind the rest of the party. The
gunner charged with the duty of firing a salute in
honour of the distinguished guest, imagining that
the whole party had passed, discharged his gun,and
the wadding unfortunatelystruck Commander Woo-
dhull with great violence, tearing away the calves of
both his legs, and dashing him along the ground a
distance of 30 feet. The unfortunate gentleman
never spoke, and survived but three minutes after
the accident. The occurrence threw a gloom over the
whole city; and though it was, no doubt very cruel
and very wicked in people at such a moment to
harbour such a thought, there was an all but univer-
sai expression of regret that the wadding had struck
the wrong man. Gen. Butler left the pity this morn-
ing e 4 route for Massachussetts. It is not positively
ascertained whether he is to return to New Orleans
or to be appointed to some other command. He
stands higher in the President's favour than any
other General in the service, and it is known to be
Mr. Lincoln's wish that he should resume the ad-
ministration of affairs in Louisiana, from which, in
Mr. Lincoln's opinion, he ought never to have been
removed. Gen. Banks is not sufficiently a Couthon,
or Fouquier Tinville, to satisfy the Jacobins of
Washington. They think a " reign of terror" essen-
tial to reduce the South to obedience, and that
Banks is not the man to enforce it. Thera are symp-
toms, however, in the disposition of the ruling party
to try a " reign of terror" in the North as well as
in the South. And after the 4th of March, when
C.mgress separates, it may perhaps be found that
New York, and not New Orleans, is to be the
scene of Butler's future operations, and that the
quasi rebellious and very troublesome democracy
of the North may find him installed among them
to re-enact all the atrocities of New Orleans, except
the crowning atrocity against the women, which
Gen. Butler, whatever else he may be, is by far too
good a tactician to repeat.
WASHINGTON, FEB. 24.
A few days in this city are sufficient to satisfy
any dispassionate inquirer that the dominant party
has grown desperate, and that, having failed to
subdue the South, it is directing its remain' ng ener-
gies to the subjugation of the North. The infatua.
Hon of the Republicans is almost inconceivable
They are, and always have been, in a minority. Al.
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all the interests of commerce--all the glorious tradi-
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