The Sun.
London, England, 1863-11-28 00:00:00

account of the results of free-labour plantations on
the Mississippi. In spite of the most unfavourable
circumstances, he says, this first attempt to make
the negro a self-dependent and responsible being
has answered beyond his most sanguine expecta-
tions. "Some of the lessees of the plantations were
negroes, and the cotton they have raised for them-
selves, owirlg to better cultivation, is of a higher
grade than, that of the white lessees," •and further,
" The net, proceeds on a crop by a Southerner who
has paid his hands wages will exceed that of a
Soutiverner who has cultivated by slaves." " The
negroth employed have been of no expense to the
Government, but have supported themselves and
families." _

Compare and reconcile, if you can, the above re-
port with what General Grant writes from the
same banks of the Mississippi :—" All. the able-
bodied among the negroes are forced into the army
as soldiers or camp servants." The rest, a sable
throng of women, children, and infirm persons, are
huddled along the Mississippi. "In one city, Mem-
phis, during three months of the present year, out
of 40,000 negro refugees, 1,200 miserably perished."
Which of the two authorities are we to believe?
Of course, both. The experiment made in a fa-
voured locality, with picked men, and under wise
direction and supervision, is no proof in favour of a
system which is to be widely applied to a whole so-
ciety. Every one can tell wonders of some well-
conducted trade unions got up on socialistic princi-
ples, and the plantations of Adjutant-Gen. Thomas
may be those perfect models of Southern agricultural
industry that he describes. But, on the other hand,
that the Government has thought far less of the
improvement of the negro race than of the uses it
could be put to in the furtherance of the war ; that
the able-bodied have been pressed into service, and
the weak and helpless left to shift for themselves,
no man would be bold enough to deny. Disorganise
the whole social system of the South, and then try
o imagine the dreadful condition to which the slave

and the women and children of the slave, will be re

duced, and you will hardly be able to refrain from
echoing the exclamation of Gen. Grant, who says
that "the suffering of these people (the so-called
contraband) is our national dishonour." However,
it is the law of human matters that good should
spring from evil, and it is possible,as the abolitionists
say, that " a new order of things may rise out of
the ruin both of the white and negro races in the
South," to make us forgive, if not forget, the horrors
of the crisis through which that part of the world
is now passing.
__

NOVEMBER 14.

" All quiet" along the lines of the Federal armies.
In the midst of the prolonged idleness to which
they are doomed they have leisure to hear deserters'
tales about the " utter demoralization of the rebel
at mies," the " terrible disaffection" of the troops of
Bragg, which are now reduced Ito about 60,000
men, Bzc. Still, the Federals, with such enormous
odds, and such a combination of circumstances in
their favour, hesitate to go in and win, and " all is
eternally quiet" in their camps
The journals here keep up a prodigious crowing
at the " humble pie" eaten by England and France
in all the matter of the rebel rams. " England has
taken alarm at our display of immense power ;"
"Afraid that she may have to pay the damages in-
curred by her through the Anglo-rebel privateers
which have preyed upon our ccmmerce," " England,
with her usual tact, made virtue of necessity, and
whirled to the right about with commendable cele-
rity." Even the friendly act of the Governor
General of Canada, in giving, through Lord Lyons,
timely warning to the Washington Government of
the plots of Southern refugees to liberate their pri-
soners of war at Sandusky Bay, is construed into a
symptom of English funk. " A selfish feeling was
at the bottom of this friendly act." Had the Go-
vernor acted otherwise, " we should have first recap-
tured the rebel prisoners," &c., and then we should
have turned our attention to the Canadians, and
flogged them out of their boots off-hand. The
Northern Border States could raise 100,000 volun-
teers—half of them veterans—in less than three
weeks for such an expedition, and where would the
Kanucks and Blue-noses be then ? Thousands of
our fighting men are already very anxious to twist
the neck of the British Lion, and what would they
Icare for a little tussle with one of her puny whelps?"

I have culled all these sweet flowers of rhetoric
out of the columns of a single number of that one
American paper which is most extensively read. I
could multiply such quotations every day, out of
almost any other organ of public opinion in this
country. France has her own share of these vapid
bravadoes and insolent vituperations. But France
" only follows the example of Engiand." Napoleon
is in a perfect stew of fear, only anxious to get out
of that terribly bad scrape of Mexico. "He knows
very well that in a reasonable time we shall 1)e at
liberty to give our undivided attention to that
country, and that it will not then go well with
intruders."

In the same measure as they are reassured on the
score of England and France, the Americans snap
their fingers at their " twin giant brother" of
Russia, and are disgusted with and ashamed of
themselves, and of the " fetes or rather farces"
which have now at last come to an end. " Russia
sends her navy here to keep it safe in the event of a
war with France, but we doubt if ehe would send it
hero if we needed it to aid us in fighting England.
Her navy, in fact, is not worth the sending. One
of our ironsides could blow it out of the water, with
all the barbarians on board in a couple of hours."
" For free America to become cheek by jowl with
Russian despotism is contrary to all the traditions,
all the sentiments, and ail the principles of this re-
public." (This they have found out at last.) " The
genius of Liberty and America is supremely ridi-
culous when she appears e.t a ball, and trips about
on her toes like a ballet girl to obtain a little worth-
less applause trom foreigners."
This vapouring of American papers is unlikely to
give any great offence to the French and Russians,
who never read them, but they are written in
English, and it is not in the power of every John
Bull to take such compliments with becoming indif-
ference. Some of the British residents here come
to me now and then, and retail their grievances
as if it were in the power of the limes correspon-
dent to redress them. "What can any man do ?"
I answer, " It is the Yankee's nature to crow," and

by way of consolation I dismiss them with the wise
old adage, "Bragg is a good dog, but Holdfast is a
better." The Fenian brotherhood also gives these
trusty subjects of Queen Victoria no,trifling uneasi-
ness. The Fenians hold their meetings in Chicago,
and " resolve" that Ireland is to be wrested from the

power of the English Crown. ig If we may credit
the ' givings out' of some of the ' chiefs' of the
order (say the American sympathisers), preparations
"e in an advanced state of progress, and something
decisive is anticipated to occur at no distant day.
Loth as the Irish are, under tha lead of native de-
magogues, to fight the rebels, they would be avail-
-Le to &twin in a war with England, and would
go in with a will:'
go
the
shere makes
otre t,
ea
British Lionp.,,hFeernians, both in this country and in
be the vanguard of America, when
mind to " twist the neck of the

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