The Sun.
London, England, 1863-01-20 00:00:00

MADRAS.

The traffic receipts on this company's south-west line for
the month of October last amounted to £14,147, or £35 per
mile, on 406 miles open, against £9,887, or £4O per mile, on
247 miles open in October, 1861, showing an increase of
159 miles in the length and £4,260 in thG receipts for the
month.

RAILWAY BILLS.
Yesterday the Examiners on Standing Orders of the
Houses of Lords and Commons, Mr. Smith and Mr. Frere,
commenced their inquiries as to the compliance or non-
compliance therewith of the bills proposed to be brought
before Parliament in the ensuing session. After hearing
the usual evidence the Examiners declared that the stand-
ing orders of both houses were duly complied with in the
following cases :—Scottish Central and Dundee and Perth
and Aberdeen Railway Junction, amalgamation; Scottish
North-Eastern and Dundee and Arbroath, amalgamation;
London, Chatham, and Dover, for proposed extensions to
Mitcham, Epsom, and Sutton, at an estimated cost of
£560,000 ; the Central Isle of Wight Extensions, authoris-
ing the company to raise additional capital; Sidmouth and
Budleigh Saltcrton, to raise a capital of £80,000; White-
haven, Cleator, and Egremont, for an extension of their
line from Damplugh to the Cockermouth and Workington
rilmVsabkye7 '
power use certain on of
fßorailway, andto to raisect7ss,otaotoi; Westt
Riding.the
Yorkshire,Hali fax, anfdo
rLpaonwc ae
r-
ILreoercklss,hLireeeldisa,ilßwraaydsfo;rds,otainthd
sfiheilrde aanndd
a to
01 wianya,k
ea nai 1 r ma
lawk ea
yt rfar
offline
to purchase th. eNewßarpnosrlteyp-
aCgonaelini,
arrangements;
Wolverton to Newport Pagnell, with pow4esr,toooop7 Barnsley
estleyhe
Newport Pagnell Canal, and to raise .c
Coal Railway, to extend their line, and to raise 0
£llO,OOO.
The only case of non-compliance in consequence f the
plans and sections not having been deposited in duetime,
was that of the Birmingham and Sutton Coldfield Exten-
sion.

CAYENNE CONVICTS-.—The Demerara Colonist
states that the six French convicts who lately escaped from
Cayenne have been given up to the French Government
under the treaty between Great Britain and France for the
mutual extradition of criminals. These men were all under
sentence for criminal offences. They formed the crew of
a twat which left Isle de Mere, under the charge of the
superintendent of convicts and the civil engineer of works,
for the purpose of proceeding to the mainland, and they
effected their escape by throwing the two officers into the
sea.

CURIOSITY IN A DYING MAN.—It was a bright
thought that of Smithson, the founder of the Smith-
sonian Institution, when he was dying of an unknown
complaint. Smithson had had five doctors, and they
had been unable to discover what the disease was.
At length they told the patient that he must die.
Calling them all around him, he said ;—" My friends.
after I die, make a post-mortem examination and
find out what ails me; for, really, I have heard such long
and learned discussions on the subject, that I sin dying to
know what the disease i 5 myself,"

ill-fortuneto havethat
turned. For the
has been running
Theagainst l
thelongtide r
of
seems
N h
last three days the public mind has been fiiled with
o
disquieting presentiments of evil in the South-West.
On Sunday it was reported that Gen. Rosecrans had
been defeated at Murfreesborough, and that he had
surrendered with his whole army to Gen. Bragg.
Yesterday it was asserted on better authority that
the battle had raged for five days with awful slabgh-
ter on both sides, but with no definite result. This
morning there is news from Gen. Rosecrans himself,
' admitting the obstinacy of the contest, but claim-
ing a victory, purchased with the loss of from 7,000
to 10,000 men. Nashville, the prize on which the
Confederates had set their hearts, has been saved;
and if the great Confederate army of the South-
West have not been destroyed or rendered incapable
of further offence, it appears to have received so
heavy a blow as to incapacitate it from any imme-
diate resumption of hostilities. The telegraphic
despatches represent it as in full retreat to Tulla-
homa, about 30 miles distant, on the line of the
Nashville and Chattanooga railway. One despatch
adds the words, "in disorder ;" but a careful perusal
of the two bulletins of Gen. Rosecrans leads to the
belief that Gen. Bragg saved his army as secretly
and unexpectedly to the enemy, and in as good
order, as Gen. Burnside saved his at Fredericks-
burg. When the struggle ended on Saturday night
Gen. Rosecrans evidently calculated on its renewal,
and only awakened to find, at ' 7 o'clock in the
morning, that the foe had escaped without ex-
citing his suspicions. Gen. Robert Mitchell,
dating from Nashville yesterday, says "The Lord
is on our side. The rebels are whipped." But
the profane supposition in the first sentence, and
the confident assertion in the second, may yet be
put to the test at Chattanooga, should General
Rosecrans pursue the enemy to that strong position
and again offer battle.

The result of the fivo days fight of Murfrees-
borough is not the only favourable turn in the
military fortunes of the North. A. secretly planned
expedition from the army of General Granger in
Kentucky, which started on Christmas-day, has suc-
ceeded, by a series of brilliant cavalry movements,
in breaking up a large and important portion of the
Virginia and Tennessee Railroad, by which rein-
forcements might have reached General Bragg, or
by which the Confederates might have retreated by
way of Knoxville and Bristol towards Richmond.
It is also asserted that Vicksburg has been captured.
after a desperate struggle prolonged for six days,
but, as the story only rests upon the authority of a
newspaper paragraph, and has not been officially
communicated to the Government, it is open to
doubt, even though the authority is that of a
Southern journal, which would rather give currency,
if it coulrl., to the very opposite statement.
It cannot be said, however, that the usually im-
pulsive and easily satisfied public of this city finds
the same gratification in these military successes,
even supposing that they prove as decisive as they
are represented, as it would have done if the Presi-
dent had not issued his Proclamation of Etnancipa-
tion. It is feared that this document is but " the
"beginning of the end," and that a partial revolt
of the slaves in some outlying district of the
South may lead to such measures of repression
as may disgrace the Federal authority which pro-
voked it, and cause humanity to shudder both
at the crime and the punishment. Even the Abo-
litionists and Exterminators begin to seo that
the Proclamation destroys the last faint hope of the
restoration of the Union, and to find fault with it
as an incomplete and illogical document which could
have done no greater harm than it has done already
if it had gone the full length of unconditional and
immediate emancipation. If the South is to be
recognised by Europe—if the Union is virtually at
an end—if the independence of the Seceded States
is as clear a fact as the independence of any other
nation or empire in the world, why, say the zealous
foe of slavery, should not the Northern people re-
tire from the conflict with something like nobility
of aim and dignity of expression, and declare to the
loyal States still remaining in the Union that
"Slavery has ceased to be ?" This party is already
locking up to Gen. Butler as its future leader in the
place of Gen. Fremont, and has not only invited
him to a public dinner in New York, but has re-
commended that he should take the command of a
negro army—with which it is to be supposed he
will endeavour to exterminate a people whom it is
impossible to conquer, and head the crusade against
negro slavery in all parts of the Union. The negroes,
in their bondage, are looking for the " Moses" that
is to deliver them. Their free brethren in the North
pray in all their churches for the coming of the
great chieftain and lawgiver who is to lead them
out of " Egypt," and have been taught to believe
that failing a man of their own race, of full negit,
blood—or even a man with an admixture of white
blood, like Mr. Frederick Douglass—they cannot
do better than place themselves under the command
of the unconquerable Butler, to give them freedom
and social equality within the limits of the United
States; or, if that be impossible, to lead them out
of it en masse within the walls of some New Jeru-
salem in Central America, where they may dwell in
peace and grow cotton for the world.

The Rev. Dr. Cheever is delighted with the Pro-
clamation as far as it goes. He prayed in New
York last night to a mixed assembly of black and
white men at the Cooper Institute that the " soul"
of the late John Brown, which, according to the
popular hymn, has been " marching on" at the
head of the Northern armies to lead them to vic-
tory, might animate the councils of the President,
declaring at the sauce time that the soul in ques-
tion was "big enough for an )7 twenty of the Fede-
ral Generals," Butler and Fremont, of course, ex-
cepted; He also blessed the name of God for hav-
ing so humbled the nation that it was compelled
as a military necessity to ask the aid of the negro.
The Rev. Henry W. Beecher, suspected of design-
ing to make a similar attack on the social prejudices
of the white race, was, if the morning papers of to-
day may be believed, not quite so fortunate as his
clerical brother. Having been invited to lecture last
evening at Elizabeth, in New Jersey, the people de-
termined that he should not be heard. A mob ga-
thered at the railway station where he was to alight
on his way from this city and made such demonstra-
tions of hostility, that, by the advice of the police
and special constables who had been sworn in to
preserve order, he decided not to endanger the peace
of the town by persevering in his attempt, and re-
turned to New York with his lecture undelivered.
It is but right to add that this statement is contra-
dicted by one who says the lecture was delivered,
and that he heard it. But, independently of this
ittle incident, the report and denial of which only
confirm hcw difficult a thing it is to arrive at the
truth in the present temper of the public mind, it
is well known by this time all over the world that
the negro is not, and never was, popular in these
latitudes. As the pressure of taxation combined
with the high price of all the necessaries of life
begins to be seriously felt, the unpopularity of the.
race increases. It is alleged that the war is carried
on entirety upon accou ,t of the negro, that the Go-
vernment has no less than 150,000 runaway slaves
on its hands at this moment, whom it is maintaining
in idlenesslat an average daily cost of 30 cents each,
making 45,000 dols. (L 9,000 sterling per diem), or
£3,285,000 per annum; that while this sum is
wasted upon black men, who would have been hap-
pier and more useful cultivating the cotton, the rice,
and the sugar of their Southern
arernmreciasrt,earsn,dtitlhaeptLymrot.
the army is aLveral months
thme,(pitrieo,,,tsiitntOgddioeism.
linndisrroei
deemable paper to me
Chase has to issue anotehtei
armies in actual service, who, if justice were done,
for their money.
would not be allowed to wait a week
'they furthermore allege that the Government has
ism into the
introduced the new element of pauper
tof England
. a worse and more hopeless form than t h a
many difficulties that beset the State—pauperism of
i—the pauperism of an alien and inferior nice, which
would not have been reduced to this helpless and de-
graded condition if it had not been for the ignorant
and aggressive philanthropy of Puritan agitators.
It is easy from these and a variety of other indica-
tions to see that the Proclamation will lead to many
serious complications and embarrassments which ,

Mr. Lincoln never dreamt of when, with the blind
faith of a new convert, he promulgated it tc, the un
willing people. It is simply impossible that he can
limit its operations to meet the military necessity
which he declares to have alone dictated it. The
slaves in the loyal border States have as much na-
tural right to their freedom, and as much love for it
as the slaves can have in the rebellious Cotton States.
The one cannot be incited to obtain their freedom
without inciting the other to imitate their example.
And, according to both the letter and spirit of Mr.
Lincoln's measure, it is possible that the Fcaleral
armies may on the same day be engaged in the two
contradictory duties of aiding one set of slaves to
escape and of returning another to captivity. Already
a difficulty has arisen in Norfolk in Virginia, a town
and district that are " loyal" by virtue of their occu-
pation by a Federal army, and in which, as a conse •
quence of Mr. Lincoln's war measure, the slaves
are not entitled to their freedom. In anticipation of
a boon not accorded to them the negroes assembled
on New Year's Day, to the number of about 4,000,
and marched in military procession, four abreast, to
the headquarters of General Viele, who made them
a speech, wished them a happy new year, and
recommended them to be peaceable and orderly
—which they were. But when the proclamation
reached these poor men two days afterwards they
learnt that its terms did not apply to them, unless
they could prove the disloyalty of their owners.
Hence, in American phrase, " there is trouble" in
Norfolk. The Federal forces will have to act as
oppressors rather than as liberators, if the negroes
insist upon their liberty with arms in their hands.
As affairs now stand they have nothing for which
to thank the President but a fallacious hope—and
a trick as scurvy as that which the witches played
Macbeth.

The Cheevers, the Beechers, the Sumners, the
Fremonts, and to these must now be added, it ap-
pears, the Lincolns and the Butlers, do not repre-
sent the American mind on the question of the
negro. America is not ripe for emancipation—even
were the feat as easy as it is difficult. Philanthropy
is not fashionable—least of all the philanthropy
that would look upon the black man as a brother.
The one passion next to the passion of gain in the
American heart is the passion for extended empire.
They want to eclipse, overcome, and bully England.
They want to stand at the head of the Anglo-Saxon
race, and to allow no gun to be fired in any part of
the civilized world without their consent, They do
not wish the negro and his rights to stand in the
way. Nay, more, they do not even wish their own
liberties to interfere with the realization of the
splendid vision. So dear, for these reasons, is the
Union to the Americans, so essential does the great
West believe it to ba to its future'growth and pros-
perity, and so little do people of all parties in the
North—the Puritans of New England and New
York excepted—care for the negro or his freedom,
that there is scarcely any sacrifice of dignity or of
principle that the majority of the North and West
would not make at this moment if they could induce
the South to come back again—slaves and all—and
govern the Union as before. Were Mr. Jeffer-
son Davis, at the head of a conquering army, to
march into Washington, depose Mr. Lincoln, as-
sume the Presidential chair, and call a general cone
vention of the people to consider the terms of Re-
union, and the amendment of the Constitution, I
firmly believe that the North would go wild with
joy, and hail Mr. Davis as a second Washington and
the regenerator of his country. It is a favourite
theme at this moment among Anti-abolitionists, and
all who consider the Union as the first blessing and
the first necessity of America, to speculate on the
possibility ofa reconstruction which should either ex-
clude New England, or hold it as a military de-
pendency. They are not daunted by the difficulties
in the way, and prominent members of the Demo-
cratic party are fond of asserting that come what
may, New England must be punished for the
offence of exciting the war by her meddlesomeness
and intolerance, and that once for all there must be
an end of the question of slavery in Federal poli-
tics. The Legislature of the several States, which
will deal with it when and how it pleases them, is
alone, they allege, the machinery by which the
question cae ever be touched with safety, and if New
England persists in meddling with it, and stirring
up strife, the sooner New England secedes the better
for herself and the Union which she imperils.
The loss of the Monitor, though it both startled
and grieved the public, did not startle those who
were acquainted with her bad sea-going qualities.
Lieut. Worden, her late commander, declared in
March last, after his attack on the Merrimac in
Hampton-roads, that the sea voyage from New York
to Fortress Monroe was the most perilous part of
his achievement, and is said to have warned the Go-
vernment a few weeks ago of the danger of subject-
ing her to the chances of a winter storm in the At-
lantic. Her fate but confirms the prevalent belief of
engineers and sailors, as well as military men, that
an iron clad capable of being safely navigated in a
stormy ocean has yet to be invented, and that all
such vessels as are now in existence in this hemi-
sphere are of little use,except for service on the coast
and in the rivers. They may supersede stone forts
at the entrance of harbours, and they may, if towed
ofo
rthe e
fsehnoeree ,obfemma
ra
idtei
ev
tai be
sl e;
ewi
ti
ht heirnfenarsyt
hdei sattatna co ek
but as at present consotfrtuhceteNBdotrhideyinarareidn-ooteleiakn. But
ely to
supersede the navies
t
the mechanical genius of this country is so prolific
and so confident that the loss of this favourite vessel
will but direct the energies of engineers and inven-
tors to the subject of improvement in the construc-
tion of such ships. Ultimately, perhaps, it may be
found that" rafts and cheese boxes," like the Moni-
tor, ahreeirno navigators
proper combination to insure safety
with power of offence against
distant enemies; and that the Warrior and the
Gloire, and not the Monitor or the Merrimac, pre-
sent the real models for imitation.
The bad conduct of the mercenary armies of the
North—whether they were Irish,German, or native-
born Americans—has as long been notorious as it
has been vehemently denied. The doings of the
ruffians who, under Turchin, disgraced the name
of soldiers—the plunder committed by the Ger-
mans under Blenker—the wanton destruction of
property in the unhappy city of Fredericksburg,
when Burnside's Irishmen made bonfires of piano
fortes in the streets, and committed other acts of
wanton and disgusting Vandalism, were all com-
mented upon in private with befitting indigna-
tion, but received no word of reproof from Ihe
press of this city. But, as all these acts were duly
chronicled in the South, and tended to strengthen
every Confederate's hand, and embitter every Con-
federate's heart, making an army of 50,000 men
worth 250,000, for concentrated hatred and deter-
mination, it has at last become apparent to the au-
thorities at Washington that a more strictly mili-
tary system ought to be introduced, if it were only,
to preserve the good name of the North in the esti-
mation of the civilised world. A civil, next to a
and
servile, war is the worst in which any nation can be
engaged; but even a civil war must be conducted
with some decency, humanity, and honesty, under
the heavy penalty of exciting more hatred than
time can ever allay, rendering future amity difficult,
exciting, o
tthwehgatrenaot ceooumnittryy
and
dn
i f
safely notbear, impossible,
the disapproval
court of nations. " We know,"
says the New York
Times, that Wherever our troops have been, houses
are wrecked, fowls and pigs killed,
horses carried
off, fences burnt,—the country,• in fact, laid waste,
and the people made bitterly hostile. . . We can
hardly avoid the conclusion that for this state .of
affairs and Government are responsible; that, in
short, t here is some stronger reason for the demon-
strations of detestation with which our troops arc
constantly greeted than tnefe political alienation.'
Ic is late in the day for this confession—perhaps too
late to repeir the evil which has been done ; but if
the Federal Government will make a few signal
examples of plunderers and of officers who connive
at or excite the evil passions of their soldiers, the
Administration will stand better in the world's
opinion than it does now, even though it may be
hopeless to attempt to regain the good opinion of
the Border States and the The
amity of the South.
Germans have been especially to blame. Then
notion of war seems to be derived from the tradi-
tions of a hundred years ago ; but the world has
advanced since those days, and if the Germans have
been left behind in the march of decency or of in-

tellect it is high time that civilised America, if re-
duced to the unhappy strait of accepting their
mould teach them how to bt-have with
propiTr regard to the recognisA t.-)bervances of legi-
timate wurtare, it not of Co rtsi,tnity,