The Sun.
London, England, 1864-08-23 00:00:00

•ospects of Peace in America.

(From the Times' Correspondent.)
C LIPTON HOUSE, NIAGARA FALLS, Aug. 8.
Th a long and fiercely-contested battles of North
and South have decided nothing but the courage of
the iombatants and the hopelessness of Southern
subj ugation. The North has boasted of its wealth,
of i ts inexhaustible resources, of its teeming mil-
lions, and of its determination to restore by force oZ
arms the perished and vanished Union, which it
insanely believed to be better than peace, law,
liberty, and prosperity ; while the South has replied
'to the bravado by the calm assertion, which it has
made good by valiant deeds—that though its re•
sources both in men and money, are inferior to those
of its adversary,thedifference was more than compen-
sated by the indomitable spirit of its people, who
will under no circumstances renew the partnership
which the sword has cut asunder, and who will
carry on the war for 30 years, rather then make or
listen to any terms that shall not rest upon Southern
independence as their basis. Fighting has but in.
creased the obstinacy of the Southern people; bat
it hss had no such effect upon the Northern. Defeat
is no disgrace to men who are struggling for their
liberty and their firesides. On the other hand, the
invader feels defeat to be a humiliation. His con-
science tells him that he is foiled in a bad cause, and
that were the conditions of the struggle reversed, he,
too, would shed the last drop of his blood for home
and independence. Such is to-day the feeling of the
North. The failure of Grant's campaign, and the
awful losses by which the fact has been established,
have not encouraged the people to incur new sacri-
fices. They have not inspired them with hope that
the cause which tosday looks so black will look
brighter to-morrow. On the contrary, they
have inclined them to compromise and peace.
The people have palpably lost heart. They do not
respond to the President's call for another half a
million of men, although they know that unless new
armies be immediately raised they will not only be
unable to continue the offensive war which they
have now waged with varying fortune for nearly
four years, but to guard their own fields from the
enemy's cavalry and their cities from his torch.
They never had much faith in the administration of
Mr. Lincoln and the impracticable, jealous, and self.
seeking functionaries whom he called into office, but
whom he can scarcely be said to have admitted into
his councils, and that little they have lost, Neither
have they any faith in their militery leaders.
General Grant, from whom so much was expected,
has proved no better than his predecessors, and will
speedily be thrust aside to make room for some
other hero of the same calibre rash enough to try
the impossible, and to be as ignominiously dismissed
in his turn as all who came before him. The de.
preciation of the currency fills the commercial and
professional classes with alarm ; the rapid rise in
the price of all the necessaries of life goads the
working men and their families into perilous discon-
tent, which, were it winter instead of summer,
might burst forth at any moment into formidable
riots, if not into organised insurrection.
It is at this crisis that the present hostelry on
the Canadian side of the Falls of Niagara has be.
come the centre of negotiations which promise the
withdrawal of the differences between North and
South from the arbitrament of the sword. As the
Republican party, under the leadership of Mr. Lin.
cola, either cannot or will not make peace, and will
not listen to any proposal of compromise that does
not involve two conditions which the South will
not accept—restoration of the Union and abolition of
slavery—the Northern friends of peace, who hope
to elect a peace President in November next, have
taken counsel with such Southern exiles and friends
of peace as have congregated on the Canadian fron-
tier to ascertain whether there is no common
ground upon which the whole weight of the Demo-
cratic party might be brought to bear against the
war faction, and on which a peace candidate might
be nominated at Chicago on the 29th inst, The
South, through Messrs. Clay and Holcombe, the
fully-authorised agents of President Davis, demands
an. armistice and the calling together of a National
Convention, as prescribed by the Constitution, for
the consideration of all matters in dispute. The
Democratic party of the North, no longer hopelessly
split into two sections, the one advocating war, and
the other peace, has made up its differences on a]
minor and major issues, and resolved to support at
Chicago a candidate for the Presidency who will
pledge himself to these terms. As it is feared, if
not known, that Mr. Lincoln, in his insane
desire of re•election will, under the plan of re-
construction, which gives the right to a tenth part
of the population of any State in the military occu-
pation of the Federal armies to perform all functions
of election that belong to a clear majority of the
whole people, endeavour to elect himself by the aid
of the soldiery, and by the exclusion from the polls
of all persons who will not take a test-oath of un-
conditional loyalty to the Union, it has been resolved
by the leading Conservatives and Democrats who
are now awl ..Qembled at the
Clifton-house that measures shall immediately be
taken to defeat this purpose. At the Chicago Con-
vention it will be emphatically and distinctly de.
Glared that any State carried on behalf of Mr. Lin.
coin and Mr. Johnson by bayonets or by test-oaths,
or by the rotten votes of a tenth of the population,
shall be counted as having voted for the Chicago
nominees; and that if such nominees shall receive a
clear majority of the electoral vote, inclusive of that
of the Border States of Kentucky, Maryland, Dela-
ware, and Missouri, they shall be considered duly
elected as President and Vice-President of the
United States, and shall be inaugurated accordingly.
The nominees, whoever they may be, will be re-
quired to pledge themselves to take possession of the
Government should they be elected in the manner
specified, and to maintain their position at all hazards.
It is understood that the Convention will organise
committees of vigilance in every town, village, city,
and district of the North to support the constitu-
tion, and to resist by force of arms, if necessary,
every usurpation or encroachment on the part of
Mr Lincoln and the Federal Administration or
authorities, civil or military. Thousands of lead-
ing Conservatives and Democrats, comprising men
of the greatest wealth, position, and talent in the
country, are already pledged to serve upon such
committees, and are ready to stake their lives,
fortunes, and honour in defence of the platform on
which they have resolved to stand, and of the
purity and freedom of election. If Mr Lincoln is to
be President for another term he must be elected
fairly, or a now civil war will break out in the
North, in the interest of the wrongly-defeated, but
legitimately-chosen candidate. Such is the present
condition of the Presidential question as far as the
Democratic party is concerned. Within the next
ten days or a fortnight it will assume a still clearer
shape. Possibly by that time, if not earlier, the
candidates whom the party will support will have
made up their minds to assume all the risk and all
the honour of the position. Gen. M'Ciellan might
have been the man, had he chosen, but he had let
Blip the opportunity. His civic courage was not
equal to the occasion, or 'he has allowed himself
to be overpersuaded by timid advisers. Per-
-naps, too, he has preferred the chance of
being Commander.in-Chief under a civilian Presi-
dent, elected on this basis, as more congenial to his
tastes and habits than the office of Civil Governor.
At all events, whatever chances he may have had
of the Presidency have disappeared for ever ; and
It Dean Richmond, chairman or president of the
New York Cezitral R sil xay, rules in his stead as the
favourite of the United Democracy. That gentle-
man has taken time to consider, and will probably
make known his decision within the present week.
Should he accept, ho will be the 110111112 CC of the
Chicago Convention on the platform of an armis.
tice and a convention of the States. If the Demo-
they have truly made up
crats he really united, if
their minds to hold togtthrr in support of their
candidate, their candidate is certain to obtain a
majority of the electoral vote, and to be the le,gal
President of the United States. If Mr Lincoln,
however, be determined to win, per fa.; aut nefas,
titti will be a conflict of powers that will convulse
the country and carry the fire and bloodshed of war
into regions that hav,, not yet felt the miseries of
civil conflict, or know of them but by the depre-
ciation of the currency, the derangement of trade,
and the augmented cost of subsistence.
governing
A short time will show whether the

risk
party will be rash enough to incur so awful a
in favour of Mr. Lincoln or any other person, or
whether Mr. Lincoln himself will not have the good
sense and the patriotism either to retire from the
contest or allow it to be peaceably decided by the
votes of the citizens.

If Mr. Richmond, or some other candidate as
yet unnamed, be elected upon this platform and
duly installed in his office without any resistance
on the part of the present incumbent, the war
will immediately stop. The armies of North and
South will return to their homes on furlough, and
preparations will commence for the election of
delegates to the great National Convention,
which will have to decide whether reunion be
possible or advisable. The preliminaries, it is sup-
posed, will occupy at least six months, and the Cone
vention will not conclude its business until the
autumn of the year 1865, That, under such cir-
cumstances the war which has desolated tha country
so long should be allowed to recommence it is
scarcely possible to believe. Under every aspect
of the case it is clear that the election of Mr.
Richmond will ead the Civil War. Of that fact
there can be no reasonable doubt. But will it re.
store the Union ? The Southern leaders are content
to leave that question to the National Convention,
though certain, without the certainty of a foregone
conclusion, that the Union is at an end, never to
be restored in name or in fact, in show or in sub-
stance. The Northern Democratic leaders are also
content to leave the question to the Convention,
not without a faint hope that somehow or other,
by time and good management, or by chance and
happy fortune, the North may be reunited to
the South, if the South refuses to be reunited to the
North, and that the constitution of the Confederacy
may be adopted by the North-west and by the
Central States of Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and
New York, and of all the States except the six
little States of New England, who are " to be left
out in the cold," to be independent if they please,
or to annex themselves to Canada if this solution of
their difficulty shall please them better. At all
events, the Northern Democracy have resolved that
Americans shall not continue to cut each other's
throats in support of a political partnership which
has ceased to be agreeable to one of the high con.
tracting parties ; and that, if Union be utterly im-
practicable, an alliance and an entente cordiale may
take its place,

THE CONFEDERATE STATES,

(From the Special Correspondent of the limes.)
RICHMOND, July 14.
Encouraged as the inhabitants of Richmond are
at this moment by the consciousness that Grant
with the shattered residuum of his once mighty
host is impotently held in check at Petersburg by
an army which is more than a match for his own,
and by a general who is markedly his superior, it
must be admitted that great and increasing anxiety
is here felt as telegram follows telegram announcing
that General Johnston has again and again fallen
back until the Chattahoochie River has been passed,
and his bold antagonist, General Shet man, is seen
to be within three leagues of Atlanta. The mingled
accents of defiance and dismay which ascend from
New York and Philadelphia and herald the:ad•
vance of General Early and his Confederates into
Maryland and Pennsylvania are counterpoised by
the gloom which is here inspired at the mere men-
tion of General Sherman and Atlanta. We need a
Scipio Africanus to remind us, as in the famous
speech which Livy puts in to his mouth, that if
Sherman has seemingly had the best hitherto of the
Western campaign, Lee has foiled greater numbers
and (as the world thinks, though I cannot agree
with it) a more formidable chieftain than Sheridan
in the Eastern, and hce secundce res illas adversas
sustinuerunt. In order to explain the position of
affairs in the West it is desirable that I should say
something as to what is, in my belief, the character
of General Johnston. It is impossible to converse
with General Johnston without perceiving that he
is a more deeply read and scientific theorist on the
art of war than General Lee. He is a grave,
dignified, and self-contained man—one vho
has meditated much upon manoeuvres, and
would probably study with delight those adroit
moves and countermoves which have made
Turenne and Montecuculi famous as chessplayers of
war, and which were so highly commended by Na-
poleon. But this scientific study of the military
art, and a consciousness of the reputation which he
has thus gained as a strategist, supervening upon a
cautious and sensitive temperament, seem to disguise
lift' Gen. Johnston, fearless though he be personally,
for the command of a Confederate army in such a
war as this. The most successful generals of this
war, Lee and Stonewall Jackson, have certainly been
the rashest. If any one doubts this statement in re-
gard to Lee, my assertion might be supported by a
dozen confirmations. Let me instance the audacity
with which, in 1862, Lee left the defeated M'Clellan
with 60,000 men at Malvern Hill (15 miles from
I and tarnino• northwards se; Ike smaller
but victorious army shattered Pope, and then, cross-
ing into Maryland, fought with 35,000 men the
Battle of Sharpsburg against three times his num-
bers. Nor has the temerity of Lee's tactics at the
battle of Chancellorsville, where, for 16 hours, he
faced with 18,000 men Hooker's 80,000, ever been
surpassed. But of aggressive warfare, such as Lee
delights in, Johnston seems incapable, His notion
is to draw his enemy on and on, to keep retreating
before him, and to await the moment when by some
maladroitness his opponent will be delivered over
into his hands. But such moments appear not to
have hitherto occurred. In the retreat in 1862 of the
Confederate army before M'Clellan two battles were
fought—the first, the Battle of Williamsburg,
which General Johnston has always generously con-
fessed that he had nothing to do with, and of
which the credit is due to General Longstreet ; the
second, the battle of Seven Pines, where General
Johnston made up his mind to strike a blow, which
blow, from some misconception, proved a failure.
It cannot be denied that after Seven Pines General
Johnston fell greatly in the estimation of wise and
impartial men. But the confidence of the Southern
journals in him remained still unshaken. When
General Bragg fell from grace at the end of 1863 a
great cry for Johnston as Bragg's successor echoed
through the country, it was seconded, as I am in
formed, by General Lee, and, against their conscien

• -
:ow; judgment, the Richmond authorities yiolded

Across 130 miles of the most difficult country in
the Confederate States, much of it resembling parts
of the Lowlands and the Ochill hills of Scotland,
Johnston has permitted Sherman and 80,000 men to
advance unmolested. To oppose Sherman he has, I
believe, never bad less than 55,000 effective bayo-
nets. Letters from many officers under Johnston,
who have served repeatedly under Lee, speak of
Johnston's present army as the finest they have ever
been attached to. Compare what an army of about
the same strength under Lee has been able to effect
against the vastly superior numbers of Generals
Grant and Butler, assisted as the latter have been
by gunboats and navigable rivers, and it is difficult
not to animadvert severely upon Johnston's caution
and timidity. It will be remembered by some of
your readers that Colonel Fremantle's pleasing book
exhibits Johnston to us as expressing a prefer.
ence for Marlborough over Wellington as a gene.
ral ; but where has Johnston given evidence
of a tithe of that vigour which was the supplement
of Marlborough's singular prudence, and which
made his onslaught irresistible in five of the greatest
aggressive battles of history ? As there are among
scholars minds which are enfeebled by erudition,
so are there among soldiers spirits which are robbed
of enterprise and courage by poring over military
test-books. Such a study is an aliment meant for
vizorous stomachs, and while to Marlborough fami-
liarity with Vegetius (his favourite author) brought
nothing but advantage, it is certain that Lee, Grant,
Jackson, and Sherman have lost nothing from their
probable ignorance of the very names of Vigotius or
Jomini.

Although the peril of Atlanta is obviously great,
there is every reason for thinking that if the Fede-
rals succeed in gaining possession of it, it will prove
in their grasp like the apples on the Dead Sea shore,
" Fair to the eye, but ashes to the taste," To begin
with, I understand that preparation has been made
to evacuate the Government workshops and